Travel to Arusha

a pleasant and interesting location

Arusha is a relatively large town in the north of Tanzania, a major transport hub which acts as a gateway to the famous safari reserves of Serengeti, Ngorongoro, Lake Manyara and Tarangire, as well as Mount Kilimanjaro.

It’s a buzzing and lively town in a scenic location at the foot of Mount Meru and with its suburbs spread out over numerous volcanic foothills. The place has a frontier style atmosphere, with safari vehicles, stinky trucks and cranky old taxis fighting for space on the dusty roads.

The areas to the north and east of town are extremely scenic in parts, with coffee plantations and shamba farms covering the volcanic domes, a really great place for walking and mountain biking and with some high quality rural retreats.

But we don’t want to paint too pretty a picture here. Most visitors view Arusha as a rather hectic African town, which for the most part is dirty, chaotic and run down. There are also some very serious traffic issues and getting across town in the rush hour can be a major undertaking.

Love it or hate it, that’s the way most towns and cities are on this continent.

Geography

Arusha is situated to the southwest of Mount Meru, the sister volcano of Mount Kilimanjaro.

This pair of enormous mountains stand proud of the arid plains of the Maasai Steppe and are of sufficient altitude to disturb the upper layers of the atmosphere and create significant rain shadows.

As a result the vegetation on the lower slopes of these mountains and for around ten kilometres to the south and southwest is much more lush and tropical than the surrounding grasslands.

The volcanic soils, increased rainfall and a remarkable year round growing season combine to make this an extremely fertile area.

The immediate landscape around Arusha is one of dramatic but dormant mini volcanoes and craters, cloaked in folliage, small scale shamba farms, larger commercial coffee and flower farms and, increasingly, urban development.

Key experiences

In terms of activities, the Arusha area has some decent shopping options, whether you are looking to stock up on supplies for a safari, visit a colourful local market or a large curio emporium.

There are also lots of cultural activities that you can get involved in, from watching a national league football game in the main stadium (although we’ve not yet tried this ourselves and cannot vouch for your safety) to visiting various schools and philanthropic projects.

If you are staying in one of the more rural lodges around the periphery to the east, there are also lots of opportunities for walking and mountain-biking amongst some really lovely scenery.

It’s also possible to do day trips into the nearby Arusha National Park, which is covered in more detail on the page for that reserve.

Arusha is the primary hub for safari in Tanzania and, as such, tends to feature in a very high proportion of trips.

The usual stay duration is just one night, but the area is easily nice enough to warrant longer stays.

Seasonality

The timing of your trip will most likely be defined by the seasonality of the safari areas in your trip, rather than the conditions in Arusha, which follow the same general pattern.

Getting there

Arusha is generally accessed via flights into Kilimanjaro International Airport to the east of the town, from where it is a drive of 30-90 minutes, depending on your choice of lodge.

If you are flying into Dar es Salaam, then you would normally connect up to Arusha Airport, which is on the other (western) side of the town.

It is also possible to fly into Nairobi and catch the bus down to Arusha, but very few of our guests choose this relatively arduous and unsafe routing these days.

Where to stay

Although Arusha itself is clearly not a safari location, virtually every visitor to the surrounding safari areas ends up passing through the town at some point during their trip, often being obliged to spend at least one night.

Fortunately the area has an interesting range of semi-rural lodges, which makes this more than a simple transit location. So much so that some people choose to spend more than one night here at the front and of a trip, it can be a really pleasant and relatively low cost location to rest up and get over international flights, before heading out on safari.

usually features for at least one night in transit