A Ngorongoro Crater safari is the one day on the northern circuit that consistently outperforms its own reputation. The crater is a collapsed volcanic caldera 610 metres deep with a floor covering 260 square kilometres, and because the walls hold most of its wildlife in year-round, it delivers a density of animals nothing else in Tanzania matches.

The Big Five are all present, and the crater is one of the few places in the country where a black rhino sighting is a realistic expectation rather than a lucky break. Lion prides here are large and unbothered by vehicles, and the Lerai forest and Ngoitokitok springs concentrate game tightly enough that a single morning descent can show you more than two days elsewhere.

Ngorongoro is also more than the crater. The conservation area is the one place in Tanzania where wildlife, Maasai pastoralists and their cattle legally share the same land, and the highlands above the rim hold Empakaai and Olmoti craters, both walkable. We usually sleep on the rim and descend early, because the crater floor gets busy by mid-morning.