Serengeti Balloon Safari: Is It Worth It?
Are you dreaming about going on a Serengeti Balloon safari?
Choose from the most extensive listing of balloon safari itineraries available in Tanzania, catering to all your needs. Stop dreaming start doing!
A Serengeti balloon safari is a fantastic once in a lifetime experience, particularly suitable for a bird’s eye-view game viewing experience on your Exuberant Kilimanjaro Safaris wildlife safari in northern Tanzania. Hot air balloon rides leave from four sites in the Serengeti:
In the Ndutu area; December to March. We make the most of the short-grass plains and woodland to view the migration from above as it lingers here for the calving season of the wildebeest in their hundreds of thousands.
In Central Serengeti; wildlife gathers year-round in the Seronera River Valley where there is permanent water. The Great Migration passes through around May and June.
The Western Serengeti; includes the Grumeti River, scene of theatrical crossings during the Great Migration in June and July, when hundreds of thousands of gnu, brave the giant Nile crocodiles, and many perish while others detour to avoid the perilous river.
In South Serengeti plains, the wildebeests assemble from December onwards, to calve in February, producing 8000 newborn every day on a three-week marathon, a sight not to be missed on your personalized nature travel in Serengeti.
The plains of the Serengeti are particularly suited to balloon flights which are particularly convenient, letting you get aerially closer and distinctly accessible to the action than you could be by a game-viewing safari vehicle.
Your Balloon Safari adventure starts early morning when you depart your lodge or camp, it is still dark and you may be fortunate to see nocturnal animals on the way to the
launch site.
Conditions are favorable early every morning, but you are advised to pre-book this popular activity for your safari holiday to Tanzania due its limited seating availability. Unfortunately, only children over seven years of age and fit and active adults can be accommodated. Because weight is a crucial safety consideration, passengers weighing over 120 kilos (265 pounds) may need to reserve two places. The balloons are immense. Baskets are divided into compartments for comfort and security, accommodating 16 people for each one-hour voyage.
Depending on your camp / lodge location, you will be collected as early as 04:00 and taken to the balloon launch site. When you arrive, you will meet your pilot and witness your balloon being inflated and prepared for launch. As the balloon’s huge envelope is filled by fans powered by a mobile generator, you will be provided a thorough safety precaution briefing and demonstration of boarding and landing positions, as well as what you are likely to see. The basket is quite deep, with compartments and rails to grasp for safety and to brace yourself.
Finally, with the balloon still safely tethered, you climb aboard at about 06:30, just as the sun is about to break above the horizon. When the full complement of passengers is loaded, the pilot starts the burner, the balloon is released, and you lift off.
Launching at dawn, rising as the sun rises; you gently float over the plains of the magnificent Serengeti. Your balloon floats in whatever direction the winds of the day are heading over this wonderful area. It is an adventure – even for us. Whereas we know where we have started, we genuinely do not know where we will land as we float in the direction of and speed of the wind.
Your pilot will use varying altitudes and layers of air to navigate the balloon over this amazing area. Each day is different, some of the flight may be low, offering a different perspective and at other times your balloon may climb to 1000’ or more.
Nobody can predict, no two flights are ever the same and your balloon safari will be unique. Some flights high enough to view the panoramic landscape for miles ahead, others low enough to see individual animals at close quarters.
For the next hour (flight times vary from 50–70 minutes) you drift above the plains with the winds, tracked by the ground crew in their vehicles. Depending on conditions, you may fly high over the forest, peering into vultures’ nests and watching baboons waking in their tree-top roosts, or swoop just a few metres above the dew-covered grass as zebra and antelope scatter. Skilled pilots can follow streams, to glide just yards above snorting hippos or prides of lions taking water, and skim the savannah low enough to capture aerial wildlife photos. However for much of the flight, you’ll soar like a tawny eagle through the dawning landscape as the sun transforms from a burnished orb on the shadowy horizon to a brilliant disc above the plains. You may have other balloons – often strikingly patterned – accompanying your flight.
Landings vary as you descend, the balloon may drag the basket onto its side, leaving the passengers grasping the rails in a giggling cluster of arms and legs; or if the breeze is kind your pilot may execute the perfect finish, setting the basket upright onto suitable ground as the balloon collapses neatly to one side.
It is not a cheap excursion, but it will make your northern Tanzania vacation one of the most memorable of your whole life. The price reflects the enormous cost of the balloons due to a safety replacement every few hundred hours, equivalent to swapping with a high-end automobile. High fees are payable to the national park for tourist concessions for every single passenger. A skilled, experienced and licensed pilot and staff of 20 are needed for each trip, including launching and recovery as well as transport to and from the launch and celebratory champagne / sparkling wine breakfast.
Cost of Balloon Safari (minimum two persons sharing, in addition to cost of safari itinerary arranged by Exuberant Kilimanjaro Safaris):
Balloon Flight Cost - Serengeti Standard = $599.00 per person
Enjoy a thrilling bird's-eye perspective of the wildlife, the endless plains, and its numerous Kopjes.
Balloon Flight Cost - Serengeti Private (couples) = $4,800.00 per person
Whether it’s a wedding anniversary or any other special occasion, hot air ballooning will always be one of the most original memories for a couple. As a gift from husband to wife or girlfriend to boyfriend or as a joint experience the couple has always wanted to do – hot air ballooning is definitely top of the list.
Other balloon destinations; It is also possible to charter special private balloon flights in the Grumeti Reserve for honeymoon couples on their romantic trip in the Great Plains of Serengeti, as well as a Tarangire balloon safari and Ruaha balloon safari. Contact me for more information.
Balloon Excursion Notes:
Start location and time: Various launch sites, pre-dawn
Duration of excursion: 3 hours in total
End location: Various locations, depending on the flight
Maximum size of group: Usually 16
Meals included: A full bush breakfast, with sparkling wine, is included after landing
Availability: Balloon flights are available every morning, subject to suitable weather conditions. If the flight is cancelled because of poor weather, you will be re-booked on a later flight or your money refunded.
Height and age restrictions
The basket height is 1.2m (4ft). Children need to be at least 1.2m in height and can then fly at the pilot’s discretion, depending on their age and maturity.
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