The snow-capped summit of Kilimanjaro rising above a bank of cloud at first light

The national guide to Tanzania

A country of
many countries

Thirty-one regions, each with its own history, economy and reason to be visited. This is the record of all of them, written for the people who visit and the people who live here.

Regions: 31
National parks: 23
Of coastline: 1,424 km
To the summit: 5,895 m

00Where to begin

Most people arrive knowing two words — Serengeti and Zanzibar — and leave having found the country behind them.

We write the guide to every region and every national park: how each came to be what it is, what it produces, what is worth crossing the country for, and what you actually need to know. Every fact is checked against a named source, and the sources are listed at the foot of each page.

Start with the destinations

01Destinations

Four ways into the country

A lioness resting along the branch of a tree in the Serengeti

Northern & Southern circuits

Safari

Twenty-three national parks, from the Serengeti's open grass to the flooded miombo of the Nyerere. Where to go depends far more on the month than on the map.

Fishermen beside a wooden dhow on the shore at dusk, Zanzibar

Zanzibar, Pemba, Mafia

The coast & islands

A thousand kilometres of Indian Ocean, a monsoon that still sets the working calendar, and three islands that were trading with Arabia before Europe knew they existed.

5,895 metres

Kilimanjaro

The highest point in Africa, and the tallest free-standing mountain anywhere. Six routes up; the one you choose mostly decides how well you acclimatise.

Maasai dancers in red shukas gathered on the plains

120 peoples, one language

Culture & heritage

Kilwa's ruined mosques, Bagamoyo's caravan road, Olduvai's hominin floor, and a Swahili coast that has been mixing Africa with the ocean for a thousand years.

A Masai giraffe walking through open grassland in the Serengeti

02The season decides

There is no best time to come. There is only the best time to come for the thing you want to see.

December – March

Calving on the short-grass plains around Ndutu. Predator activity at its highest, and the southern Serengeti at its emptiest of vehicles.

June – October

The dry season. Game concentrates on permanent water, the Mara River crossings begin, and the mountain is at its clearest.

Mid-March – May

The long rains. Roads soften, some camps close, prices fall by a third, and the country is greener than at any other time.

03The regions

Every region,
not only the famous ones

A guide to each region of Tanzania: how it came to be what it is, what it produces, what is worth crossing the country for, what a visitor actually needs to know, and the towns, parks and heritage sites across it. All 26 mainland regions, with Zanzibar covered island by island. Published progressively, and fact-checked before it appears.

Read the Arusha guide

The ruins of Kilwa Kisiwani seen from the air — Kilwa Kisiwani — a sultanate that minted its own coinage while Europe was still in the early Middle Ages.

Portrait of a Maasai woman wearing beaded ear ornaments

04Why we exist

A country this varied deserves better than a list of tours.

Tanzania, region by region and park by park: history, culture, landscape, wildlife and the practical things worth knowing — for visitors and for Tanzanians alike.

Most of what is written about Tanzania covers the Serengeti and Zanzibar and stops there. We are writing up the rest of it: every region, every park, and the practical things people search for and rarely find in one place.