Ngorongoro Coffee Lodge Review - Tanzania - The Brutally Honest Traveler

My sister and I stayed near the Ngorongoro Crater – here is my Ngorongoro Coffee lodge review in Tanzania.

In a nutshell, the Ngorongoro Coffee Lodge was the best place we stayed at during our East Africa safari through Kenya and Tanzania. While it was the best, there were some nuances here that I should point out – because if you came to this site, you’re expecting an honest review, and that’s what I’ll give you. Let’s begin – I’ll spill the tea on everything you need to know before you stay at the Ngorongoro Coffee Lodge.

Ngorongoro Coffee Lodge Review Tanzania — Welcome!

We stayed at several safari lodges and camps on our 13 day safari throughout East Africa and most of the places we stayed in were…well, disappointing. I didn’t ‘cheap out’ on my safari either; I thought that by booking ‘mid range’ accommodations, it would be all good. After all, reading reviews prior to my trip on all of the lodges that were booked were always glowing. So I excepted that it would be as amazing as these so-called reviews said. But it wasn’t. And it wasn’t necessarily the room itself at these lodges that was the issue – most of the time it was food issues and other nuances that just added up to a less-than-stellar stay.

Where is the Ngorongoro Coffee Lodge?
How much does it cost to stay at the Ngorongoro Coffee Lodge?
Ngorongoro Coffee Lodge Review – Rooms
Amenities at the Ngorongoro Coffee Lodge
Our experience
Final Thoughts – Ngorongoro Coffee Lodge
More East Africa Safari Information

Where is the Ngorongoro Coffee Lodge?

If you’re staying here because you are visiting the Ngorongoro Crater, this hotel is quite far from the crater itself. It’s about 1 hour, 40 minutes from the central area of Ngorongoro Crater itself, so you have quite a bit of a drive. For us, we stayed here after visiting the crater (we only had one game drive in the crater on our safari). We only had one night here and then we were off to Tarangire National Park.

I (wrongly) assumed that this place – being called “Ngorongoro Coffee Lodge” would be located on a coffee plantation. Else, why call yourself the Ngorongoro Coffee Lodge? But they’re not. They claim that it overlooks a coffee plantation, but all I could see was a dense jungle.

Also, the coffee here was not good. It was like drinking oil sludge.

For a place called a Coffee Lodge, you better damn well have good coffee! But here, it’s just a name. Go figure.

How much does it cost to stay at the Ngorongoro Coffee Lodge?

Hell if I know! Kidding. Sort of. We came here as part of our safari package and the Ngorongoro Coffee Lodge was part of the mid-range accommodations that my tour operator uses.

You can book this place independently too, but in general, you’ll come here as part of your safari booking if your tour operator has an account with them. You room price includes full board, just like most safari lodges.

Ngorongoro Coffee Lodge Review – Rooms

These rooms were amazing. And I’m not overstating that. After staying in some questionable tent lodges, this place was an absolute gem and felt incredibly luxurious. The room was as big as a small house. You have your own private veranda (with french doors), indoor fireplace, both indoor and outdoor showers, and a bathroom you could play baseball in.

We had a room with two beds.

Amenities at the Ngorongoro Coffee Lodge

Like most lodges on safari, you only have WiFi in the common areas, and that was also the case at the Ngorongoro Coffee Lodge.

The landscaping here is stunning and the place is well-cared for. The infinity pool was beautiful but we arrived here after a thunderstorm and it had significantly cooled off, so we just dipped our toes in.

The Ngorongoro Coffee Lodge provides laundry service, but it’s ungodly expensive compared to what we paid in Kenya. We definitely needed laundry done but it was far too much. For example, it was $4 to wash a single pair of underwear. Fuck that. I’ll go commando at that price!

In general, laundry prices in Tanzania were outrageous – not just here, but in the other lodges we stayed in. Kenya prices were cheap.

Also note: Some lodges in East Africa will NOT wash women’s undergarments — we did NOT run into this anywhere we stayed but yes, it is definitely a thing!

Our experience

This was our second safari lodge during the Tanzania portion of our safari, and we were a little bit apprehensive when we pulled up and saw that there was literally no signs of life at this hotel. No one walking around, no other safari vehicles in the parking or unloading. Nothing. We had just came from the Angaata Seronera Camp in Serengeti National Park where we had two uncomfortable nights being the only guests at that lodge.

Not again!

Some travelers might relish in this experience – being the only guests at a hotel, but not us. Our minds went right into horror movie territory.

NOTE: We were here in mid-March, which is the beginning of the low season (rainy season). You might have a totally different experience if you stay here in the peak months of July, August, September.

After we checked in, we put on our swimsuits to check out the pool, but it was way too chilly outside due to the rainstorm that had just happened. We just hung out for a while, played on our phones (the wifi was pretty good – that’s one advantage to this place being completely dead – we were the only ones sucking up that sweet, sweet wifi signal). But we weren’t completely lost in our phones; both of us had our heads on a swivel, desperately looking around to see if any other guest would check in.

Luckily, a short while later, we saw a couple enjoying a glass of wine on the porch. PHEW. Not the only fools here!

Why is being the only guests at a hotel creepy? It’s hard to explain. I’ve never had this happen to me before I came to Tanzania and it’s so weird. Despite no guests, there’s still a ton of staff members at these places and knowing that they’re all here for you and ONLY you is just…weird. Maybe I’ve watched too many horror movies or read too many spooky books. I like being anonymous and you definitely don’t get that when you are the only guest at a lodge. While I don’t particularly like overcrowded hotels, I do want some signs of life at a place I’m staying. Otherwise you get this impending sense of…doom.

Dinner was served at 7pm (like most safari lodges) and it was served sort-of family style, in that the servers bring out a dish and they will scoop it onto your plate. It was a three-course meal and you’re at the mercy of whatever the chef dreamed up to cook that night. The food wasn’t anything to write home about, but it was a tad better than some of the other places we stayed. I especially enjoyed the avocado salsa salad.

Two other things about dinner here – it looks like this place is setup for buffet-style dining, but (I’m guessing) because it was low season and it was just us and another party, they do away with the buffet. Makes sense.

The other thing is that here, your driver will eat with you (the other couple staying here had their driver eating with them too). I’m a little torn on how I feel about this, but in general, I’d rather have a private dining experience – and I’ll probably get flack for this but hear me out – especially if you’ve never been on a safari before, much less a 13 day safari.

You are with your driver all day long, in a car. For days on end, talking about animals, animals, and more animals. After a while, this gets old. You need a break from talking shop. When you’re in the car all day on game drives, it is nice to be able to zone out at dinner and play on your phone and not have to make small talk. Or, you just want to chat with your travel companions.

But if your driver joins you for dinner, that all goes out the window and it’s back to safari chat. There is no escape. It’s not that I didn’t think he should be there; I just wanted some ‘me’ time to decompress, ya know?

Our experience was that at the Tanzania lodges, our driver ate with us, but in Kenya, the drivers did not. Drivers had their own dining hall and our driver in Kenya (they switch at the Kenya/Tanzania border) wanted to dine with his buddies and catch up. Granted, the lodges were much busier and full of guests in Kenya, but in Tanzania, no one was there. So, take everything with a grain of salt; this is just my personal anecdote.

The next morning, we had breakfast at the lodge (which was mediocre at best, with nasty, bitter coffee – why are you calling yourself a coffee lodge when you can’t even get the coffee right?? The Holiday gas station near my house has much better coffee – they should be calling themselves a coffee lodge!). We checked out and were handed boxed lunches (ugh) and made our way to the next — and final — safari destination.

Final Thoughts – Ngorongoro Coffee Lodge

Pros:
Beautiful, spacious and clean rooms – it was like having a small house to yourself.
Indoor and outdoor showers!
Well manicured grounds
Common areas were really nice

Cons:
Horrible gut rot coffee. The irony at a coffee lodge…
Nowhere near the actual Ngorongoro Crater
Food was disappointing. Don’t even bother with the boxed lunches.

All in all, I would stay here again – the rooms really were fantastic and it is a really pretty lodge. The food could be better, but I didn’t walk away hungry like I did at other safari lodges.

Have you stayed at the Ngorongoro Coffee Lodge? What did you think?