Tanzania safari packing list, including light-aircraft luggage limits

Camps launder daily and cheaply. It is the single reason you can pack for four days rather than fourteen.

The weight limit nobody mentions

If any part of your trip is on a light aircraft — and most good itineraries have at least one sector — you are limited to roughly 15 kg in a soft bag, plus a small day bag. Some operators allow 20, some allow less, and it varies by aircraft and by the day's load sheet.

“Soft” is a requirement rather than a preference. The baggage compartments on a Caravan are shaped, not boxes, and a rigid case simply will not go in. People arrive with hard shells every week and the conversation at the airstrip is not a pleasant one.

The answer, if you also have a coastal half or a city stop, is to store a second bag in Arusha and have it rejoin you. We arrange this as a matter of course. subject to confirmation: confirm limits per airline and per sector.

Clothes, and the colours that matter

Pack four days of clothes for a trip of any length. Camps launder daily, cheaply, and often for free. This is the single biggest saving available to you and almost nobody uses it on a first trip.

Colours. Neutrals: khaki, olive, stone, brown, grey. Not for camouflage — animals see shape and movement long before colour — but because dust shows less. The two that genuinely matter are dark blue and black, which attract tsetse flies, and that is not folklore. In Nyerere and Ruaha in particular it changes your day. White shows every speck of dust within an hour.Layers. Mornings in the Serengeti are properly cold and the Ngorongoro rim at 2,300 m is colder, often single figures before dawn. By eleven you are in a shirt. A fleece or light down layer, a windproof shell, and long sleeves for the evenings.On the coast. Beachwear for the beach only. Covered shoulders and knees in Stone Town and in the villages, for both men and women. This is a conservative, majority Muslim society and it is not a dress code somebody invented for tourists.

The kit that is actually worth carrying

Medical and mobility kit

This is the section the standard list leaves out, and the one that most determines whether a trip works.

Medication. Bring all of it, in its original labelled packaging, in your hand luggage, with a doctor's letter listing it. Then bring a second supply in the other bag. Nothing specialised can be bought in a national park, and a bag that goes missing between two bush strips is a real possibility.Power for medical devices. Ask, before you book, how many hours of mains power each camp has and whether a socket in your own tent is one of them. Many camps are solar with limited hours and no high-draw sockets at all. A CPAP or a nebuliser overnight is a question for the camp, not an assumption.Mobility equipment. Carry the manual's spare parts: tyre repair, inner tube, Allen keys, a spare castor if you have one. Nothing is repairable locally at short notice. For a powered chair, bring the battery specification in writing — airlines ask and the answer determines whether it flies.Prescriptions and insurance. A copy of every prescription, and the insurer's 24-hour number written on paper rather than only in a phone. Emergency evacuation cover matters more here than almost anywhere, because the parks are hours from a hospital.

What to leave at home

Hard suitcases, if any sector is on a light aircraft. See above.Single-use plastic bags. Banned in Tanzania. Zip-lock bags for toiletries are tolerated and are supposed to leave with you.Camouflage-pattern clothing. Restricted in several East African countries because it is associated with the military. Not worth the conversation.A drone, unless you have a permit arranged well in advance. Flying one in a national park without authorisation is an offence and the penalties are serious.More than one formal outfit. Nothing in a safari camp requires one, and coastal properties are relaxed.A hairdryer. The power will not take it and most camps supply one if they can support it at all.