Ruaha, one of the largest national parks in Africa, remains blissfully off the beaten track and one of Tanzania’s best kept secrets. It’s named after the Hehe word for ‘river’. The Great Ruaha River runs through this conservation area and is vital for the animals and communities outside its boundaries. Ruaha’s relative remoteness means it gets far fewer tourists than Nyerere National Park (formerly Selous Game Reserve) and less than any comparable park in the Northern circuit and therefore a safari here feels secluded and exclusive. The rewards of travelling this far are a wild landscape with baobab studded hills and rocky escarpments, with superb wildlife. Ruaha safaris have reliably exciting predator concentrations, being home to 10% of the world's lion population, a quarter of the cheetah population in East Africa and has the third largest wild dog population in the world. This is accompanied by huge elephant and buffalo herds and a cross-over of game from southern and Eastern Africa.

Ruaha National Park has a huge diversity of species, boasting both the Greater and Lesser Kudu, the striped and spotted hyena as well as Roan and Sable antelope. The lion population is now so large that they have gained film rights for their prowess at hunting Giraffe, which is not their traditional fare. The park’s rugged rocky outcrops are home to a healthy population of leopards and wild dogs as well as cheetah, jackals, bat-eared Foxes, genet and civet. Many Buffalo and elephant herds are found throughout the park in addition to east Africa's common species such as zebra, defassa waterbuck, impala and giraffe but it is the park's crazy combinations of species from east and southern Africa that excites wildlife and birdwatching enthusiasts! The park has over 530 recorded bird species, more during the green season (December through to March) with visiting migrant species.  Overall, it is an excellent safari destination and one to definitely experience when in Tanzania.