Lake Manayara boasts an incredible array of tall forests, sustained by groundwater, dominated by evergreen fig and mahogany trees with extensive marshlands, ground water forests, bush plains, baobab strewn cliffs with saline flats. The grassy floodplains are filled with algae-streaked hot springs that offer incredible ecological variety, rich in wildlife and incredible numbers of birds.

The majority of the land area of the park is a narrow strip running between the Gregory Rift wall to the west and Lake Manyara, an alkaline soda lake, to the east which is home to incredible bird life that thrives on its brackish waters with Yellow-billed storks that plunge on thermal winds rising up from the escarpment and Pink flamingo grazing by the thousands against the mineral rich lake shores.

The lions of Lake Manyara National Park are a rarity among their own kind, being some of the only lions in the world to regularly climb trees and use them as places as rest.