Olduvai Gorge

About Olduvai Gorge

Olduvai Gorge is in northern Tanzania, inside the Ngorongoro Conservation Area on the eastern edge of the Serengeti plains, and it sits beside the main road between the Ngorongoro Crater and the Serengeti. It is one of the most important sites in the world for the study of human evolution. Fossils and stone tools found here span close to two million years, and most safaris crossing from the crater to the Serengeti can stop at the museum on the rim for an hour or two. The gorge is about 48 km long and up to 90 m deep, cut by erosion into the bed of an ancient lake. Its name comes from the Maasai word oldupai, meaning the place of the wild sisal. The oldest fossils found here are dated to about 1.89 million years ago. Two finds made the gorge famous. In July 1959, Mary Leakey found a fossil skull at a site called FLK that was first named Zinjanthropus and is now usually placed in the genus Paranthropus. In May 1960, her son Jonathan Leakey found the jaw that became the type specimen for Homo habilis, an early member of our own genus. Louis Leakey had already found simple stone tools here in the 1930s, and the oldest stone tool tradition, the Oldowan, takes its name from the gorge. The Olduvai Gorge Museum stands on the rim of the gorge and is one of the largest on-site museums in Africa, a good place to see the finds in context and look out over the gorge itself. A monument to the discoveries was unveiled in July 2019. The story continues at Laetoli, about 45 km to the south, where Mary Leakey's team found a trail of fossil footprints in 1976. They were left in volcanic ash about 3.7 million years ago and are some of the oldest evidence of human ancestors walking upright. You can visit Olduvai in any month. It works best as a stop on a travel day, so you don't lose game-viewing time. In the dry months, from June to October, the road is dusty and the light over the gorge is clear; in the rains the plains around it turn green. Several of our published safaris stop here on the way from the crater to the Serengeti, including the 6 Days Best Northern Tanzania Safari and the 10 Days Tanzania Luxury Sky Safari. If Olduvai matters to you, tell us when you book and we'll leave enough time for the museum. Allow about one to two hours. Bring a hat and water, since the viewpoints are exposed and the plains here get very hot by midday. There is no accommodation at the gorge itself. Most guests stay at the Ngorongoro Crater rim the night before or drive on to a camp in the southern or central Serengeti afterwards.