Mount Rungwe Safaris & Tours

TANZANIA (eTN) - When tourism executives across the world are set to meet in the Kenyan capital of Nairobi in November this year to discuss strategies to market African tourism in the United States and other world markets, there are best tourist attractions in Africa not much known and needing exposure before the global tourist market.

Executives from the Africa Travel Association (ATA) from New York in the United States are expected to join other travel trade leaders from Africa, Europe, and Asia during the 40th Annual World Congress to be held in Nairobi, come November of this year.

Rich with natural tourist attractions, the African continent receives about 5 percent of global tourists, despite its unique and attractive tourist hot spots consisting mostly of wildlife and nature.

Taking a sample of Africa’s unbeatable attractions, there is a tourist park on this continent where tourists might feel closer to heaven, as it is both alive and relaxing under the sun, at a higher altitude with cold weather almost year round, similar to Mediterranean conditions.

This new park, the Kitulo National Park in the southern highlands of Tanzania, stands among beautiful and thrilling tourist sites worth a visit by its natural flowers which botanists compare to those in the Biblical Garden of Eden.

Not only blossoming flowers, which have attracted a good number of Japanese tourists to visit this Tanzanian park, but the altitude of 3,000 meters above sea level ranks among Africa’s leading sky parks.

Having its unique flower species which has remained wild since creation, tourists could also enjoy watching birds singing and migrating to the highland forests which make the park.

Kitulo Plateau National Park is the latest and a newcomer to Tanzania’s tourist attractive sites under trusteeship and management of the Tanzania National Parks. It is the site of one of the world’s great floral spectacles.

Tourists visiting this park have named it “God’s Garden” by virtue of its higher altitude and its natural setup as the only park of its kind in Africa where wild flowers, birds, and harmonious grass-eating mammals dominate.

Botanists have dubbed it the “Serengeti of Flowers” as it bears witness to one of the great floral spectacles of the world. This park is known for its flora and is home to 350 species of vascular plants, including 45 varieties of terrestrial orchids, many of which are endemic to Africa’s highlands.

Although sparse in big game, this natural botanical garden is highly alluring to bird watchers who thrill to sightings of the rare Denham’s bustard, the endangered blue swallow, mountain marsh widow, Njombe cisticola, and Kipengere seedeater.

Endemic species of butterfly, chameleon, lizard, and frog further enhance the biological wealth of “God’s Garden.” Kitulo National Park stands alone, boasting of being the only tourist attractive site in the African continent offering floristic visits with traditional wildlife photographic holidays, which most tourists to Tanzania are used to experiencing.

Tourists from all corners of the world are now exposed to this park, ecologists from Tanzania National Parks say. It is perched between the rugged peaks of the Kipengere, Livingstone, and Poroto Mountains in the Southern Highlands of Tanzania.

The eminently hikeable park is carpeted in wildflowers for 6 months of the year, from November to April. There is a documented 350 species of wild flowers including lilies and fields of daisies.

The park covers 413 kilometers of forest land, dominated with plants and few wild animals which together form a natural habitat that is tourist attractive by itself.

Added to its natural attractions and uniqueness, Kitulo Plateau is the natural resting site for intercontinental migrating birds during periods of the year on their way to Europe.

It is only in this park where migrating storks rest while flying from Cape Town in South Africa to Northern Europe.

European white storks and other species of storks from Scandinavian countries via West Africa migrate to brood inside Kitulo Plateau on their way, flying across the European and African continents every year. These big attractive birds stop in this park for some months and later continue with their long journey across the continent.

Kitulo National Park is the only natural habitat area in Africa perched on the East African massif, much influenced by the Eastern Rim of the Great Rift Valley which stretches from the Red Sea in Middle East across north and East Africa to Mozambique in Southern Africa.

To reach this park, visitors pass and climb the scenic plateau through 57 pin-corners from the Tanzania to Zambia highway. Open walking safaris through the grasslands watching birds and wild flowers, hill hiking on the neighboring ranges during the day, gives a visitor fantastic views of Lake Nyasa at Tanzania and Malawi border.

Wild flowers blossom between December and April, and the summer months from September to November, are best times to visit the park. From June to August the entire park is foggy with no visibility during the daytime, and it is hardly possible to view its beauties.