A chimpanzee paradise, where fantasy mountains and forests rise out of Lake Tanganyika.

The final hour of your journey to this far flung Garden of Eden is by boat on a cobalt blue lake, stretching 500 miles north to south and a mile below. As the fishing villages thin out and mountains rise, you begin to sense how much you've left behind. Time slows down in the silence of no roads for a hundred miles. The beauty is irrepressible. We’ve seen hunting dog on these beaches, bushbuck, even the pennant-winged night-jar.

Life here is a hedonistic wilderness cocktail. In the forest, as well as a completely wild-living, but habituated group of chimpanzees, live nine other species of primate, leopards and a host of shy forest creatures. Around them, streams are strung with vines, ripening fruit and jasmine flowers. By the beaches, with tropical fish around them like butterflies, hippopotami bob in its clear waters.

Mahale Mountains National Park

Mahale Mountains National Park is an idyllic lost world; few other people ever see the magical forest, mountain waterfalls, and the gin-clear lake.

map of Mahale National Park
Greystoke

Greystoke

Chada

Chada

Expeditionary walking camp

Expeditionary walking camp

Nomad Tanzania has the beautiful Serengeti Safari Camp which is the perfect location to catch the wildebeest migration.

Lamai sticks its head above the rest both literally and figuratively.

The hugely respected Nomad Tanzania…have chosen to build in an area of acacia trees and kigelia trees...six large canvas tents stand in a line that traces the run of the river and are spaced to ensure privacy...they are also equipped for comfort, with hot bucket showers and enormous beds

Get up close and personal with our genetic cousins at Greystoke Mahale. Perched treehouse-like on the sandy shores of Lake Tanganyika, it’s your base for tracking the fascinating troops of chimps that occupy the emerald Mahale Mountains.

It is immediately obvious that you are in very remote location with no roads nearby and only mountains and chimps for company.

Swara Magazine

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