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Udzungwa Mountains National Park is made for hiking and climbing with trails through the rain forest and escarpment. The plateau is a natural penthouse with views of sugar plantations against a patchwork of grassland and mountain forest extending over 100 km. The centerpiece is the Sanje River where it reinvents itself as a spectacular waterfall plunging 170 metres through the forest to land in a spray of mist in the valley below.Udzungwa Mountains National Park is a hothouse of nurturing species found nowhere on earth, a secret bank account of precious genetic stock. Of its six types of primates, two are endemic - the Iringa red colobus monkey and the Sanje crested Mangabey, not detected until 1979. The other primates of the park include vervet monkey, the ubiquitous baboon, Syke's monkey and the Black and White Colobus. There are also many larger mammals such as elephants, buffalo, lion, leopard, sable, eland, duiker and bushbuck.
Four previously unknown birds including the rufous-winged sunbird and a new species of the patridge-like francoan, make this Tanzania's richest bird habitat and among the three most important bird conservation areas on the continent.
Unlike in other wooded mountain areas, e.g. Usambaras or Ulugurus where considerable parts of the indigenous forests have been turned into cultivated land and a lot of the original nature is endangered, here at Udzungwa, the original flora and fauna remain from the lowland forest at 300 metres up to montane forests and plains at an altitude of 2000 metres and more. This is definitely a park not to be missed by anyone interested in birds and plants and for anyone who likes quiet walks through undisturbed forestand grassland and to those who can't live without camping in the bush and be completely self-sufficient.
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