Just south of the tourist meccas in Kenya, on the eastern coast of Africa, Tanzania is gaining the recognition it deserves as an unrivaled destination. It offers everything from the Big Five (elephant, rhino, buffalo, leopard and lion) on safari, to high altitude adventure atop Mt. Kilimanjaro, and the ancient Arab stone town nestled on the beautiful tropical island of Zanzibar.
Tanzania hosts an array of exotic attractions and rare gems that appeal to tourists with a wide variety of interests. There is the famed Serengeti National Park for nature buffs, where wildlife teems upon wide plains in unprecedented numbers. Ngoro-ngoro Crater also offers premier wildlife viewing within the stunning sheer walls of an ancient collapsed volcano.
Climbing Mt. Kilimanjaro has become an incredibly popular exploit for those looking for adventure but lacking the technical skill required for conquering the world's other highest peaks.
In terms of cultural richness, authentic Masai villagers still dress in their traditional tribal garb: bright red clothes wrapped around their bodies with colorful beaded jewelry draped around their necks, ankles, wrists and ears. Some hold long spears with which they still hunt lions on ceremonial occasions.
And for those who crave a beach chair and a daiquiri after all that rough adventure, the island of Zanzibar is an ancient Arab trading port that is now covered with resorts. These little paradises offer delicious seafood and beautiful palms.
Tanzania is so vast and varied, it is impossible to capture all in a single article, but there are certain moments that stand out in my memory and seem to encapsulate the riches of this country. I discovered the majesty of Tanzania while visiting my brother there. I recall lying in bed in my hut on the shore of the Ruaha River, which cuts through Ruaha National Park, listening to the low roar of lions calling to one another in the distance, accompanied by the high-pitched whooping of hyenas. Hippos had climbed the riverbank and were making satisfied grunts as they munched heartily at the grass. I leaped from my bed at the sound of a great splash in the water, and was able to make out three elephants wading across the river in the moonlight, holding their trunks just above the surface for air.
Another unforgettable moment was watching the sunrise over the African plains from the 19,344-foot summit of Mt. Kilimanjaro. After five days of scaling her flanks through thick jungle mud, through chilly alpine meadows and through a slippery rubble of rocks, we stood, our lungs struggling with the oxygen-deficient air, our faces numb from exposure to the wind, allowing the sun to settle upon our red frozen cheeks and blind us with its reflection off the white glaciers.
Perhaps the most vivid memories are not of prides of lions or flaming Serengeti sunsets but of poignant human interactions: the Masai elder who shared a leg of goat with me, the porters on Kilimanjaro who carried all our tents and food up the mountain and still offered encouragement and the safari guides who could tell stories Hemingway himself would have envied-some of the funniest ones involved unconscionably stupid foreigners (and not all of whom were American).
If you do not have your wits about you, I would not recommend traveling to Tanzania. You may, as one British tourist somehow recently managed, be killed by something as unthreatening as a giraffe. But the risks are worth it. Between the thunderous clap of the massive wildebeest migration, the bloodcurdling cry of hyenas and the majestic aloofness of Kilimanjaro, one experiences forces and raw energies that stir, terrify, humble, delight and bring you back, again and again.
But the glaciers of Kilimanjaro are melting away rapidly due to climate change. Colossal safari lodges are popping up within national parks, crowding the areas with vehicles and sacrificing aesthetics for financial gain. Masai are abandoning their villages for more profitable jobs in town. Always a land of dynamic flux, Africa is modernizing rapidly, so get there before it resembles a Disneyland with malaria.