Tanzania: Tourists Tout Landscapes

By Adam Ihucha

Arusha — Landscape tourism has the potential to diversify Tanzania's travel industry which is currently centred to mainly wildlife, beaches and mount climbing, visitors have said.

A group of 54 tourists from Europe who are exploring the country's landscape say that visitors who look beyond wildlife, mountain climbing and beach products often overlook Tanzania.

"A big number of tourists in Europe scout for landscape tourism to discover the beauty of the world. Tanzania stands a better chance to tap on them as it has picturesque landscapes" says Mr Le Gouil Jean Yves, a tourist from France.

A local tour firm, Congema safaris is marketing Tanzania's landscape tourism, a move that attracted them to discover the country's unexplored sceneries.

"I came to discover the beauty of Tanzania, meet people, enjoy sun and come closer to the nature... more people in Europe seek for this kind of products," chipped in his colleague Ms Corinne Siron.

After two years of painstaking experiments, sheer hard working and considerable private funding, the landscape tourism product is now ready for Tanzania's bound tourists with less interest on mainstream game drive, says Congema CEO Mr Constantine Ngelengi Malembela.

He says that the current tourists group is the second after the one he successfully managed to handle last year.

The new tourism item will add to other Congema safaris' key to do list such as mountain climbing and bush safaris in the country and across the East Africa region.

"Stunning landscape is a great new frontier in tourism, promising a better future to the tourists who look beyond wildlife, mountain and beach," Mr malembela says as he flagged off the 54 tourists to test the new product. The 125 km trip would take the tourists through King'ori village under the splendid Mount Meru in Arusha to legendary Momella Lake straddles in the border of picturesque Arusha national park.

After Momella Lake they would go through Mukuru savannah land, where on the east side the visitors would be able to see iconic Mount Kilimanjaro - the most famous mountain in Africa and the world's tallest freestanding peak.

Mr Malembela says that the heroic safari will also take the tourists through Longido wildlife management area, Lake Natron and Olpopong'i cultural village.

"Much of this route is a green and lush with vegetation and memorable landscapes," he explains.