The Ngorongoro Conservation Area is a protected area and a World Heritage Site located 110 miles west of Arusha. The area is named after Ngorongoro Crater, the world's largest inactive, intact and unfilled volcanic caldera.

Approximately 25,000 large animals live inside the crater, which includes large mammals such as black rhinoceros, lions, the African buffalo, hippopotamus, the blue wildebeest,  Grant's zebra, the common eland and Thomson's gazelles. Absent from this natural semi-enclosure are the giraffe, impala , topi, oribi and crocodile.