The Ngorongoro Crater lies in the Ngorongoro Conservation Area, encompassing
some 8300 sq.kms. This unique multiple land use area must be
seen to be believed. The crater (a collapsed volcanic caldera) covers 250
sq.kms and is 611m deep. The crater floor contains alkaline and fresh water
lakes and teems with large carnivores, herbivores, primates and birds. It
also boasts one of the last viable populations of the nearly extinct black
rhinoceros and the highest density of lions and spotted hyenas. A visit
to the Ngorongoro Crater is like returning to prehistoric times when animals
ruled the earth. Ngorongoro includes the world-famous archeological sites
of Laetoli, with its fossil footprints of ancestral humans who walked the
earth 3.6 million years ago, and Olduvai Gorge, which continues to yield
a remarkable record of human evolution beginning some 2 million years ago.
