Fascinating Botswana

Your trip begins with a highlight: A visit to the Victoria Falls waterfalls in Zimbabwe! Your transfer driver welcomes you at Victoria Falls airport and takes you to your accommodation, the Batonka Guest Lodge. You can check in, unpack, and take a moment to settle in. Here, you will also meet your guide for the upcoming safari. After checking-in, you go on a tour of the Victoria Falls together with your guide. Being 1.7km wide and 108m high, the Victoria Falls are said to be the biggest waterfalls in the world. An impressive experience! Afterwards, you can visit the big souvenir market or take a walk around the little town of Victoria Falls. Together with your guide and the other participants, you enjoy dinner at a restaurant in town (at own cost). You spend the first night of your journey at the Batonka Guest Lodge.

Please note: To join activities such as scenic flights, boat cruises or bungee-jumping at Victoria Falls, you would need to plan for an additional night ahead of your trip. Please get in touch with us!

Today your safari adventure in Botswana begins. Your transfer driver takes you – together with your guide and the other participants – across the border to the town of Kasane. Here you change cars and get into your 4×4 Land Cruiser safari vehicle. Your next destination is the Chobe National Park where your first game drive begins! No other park is better known for its elephant population. With more than 40,000 elephants calling the Chobe National Park home, it is the region with the highest density of elephants in the world. It is for this reason that the Chobe National Park is also known as “The Land of Giants”. Your guide knows the area very well and will share interesting facts and anecdotes about elephants as well as other animals in the park: lions, buffaloes, different types of antelopes and many smaller creatures live in Chobe. When the day draws to a close, you leave Chobe National Park on the western side and drive to your accommodation for the next two nights: Chobe Elephant Camp.

Enjoy a tasty breakfast before heading out on safari. With your guide by your side and in the optimal 4×4 safari vehicle, you return to the Chobe National Park. You spend the whole morning on game drives and have enough time to enjoy the big and small moments of a safari. You will very likely come across animals you didn’t see yesterday. In the afternoon, you embark on a boat cruise on the Chobe River. You can observe animals that come to the river to drink; with a bit of luck you can even watch elephants drinking, splashing and playing in the water. You spend another night at the Chobe Elephant Camp.

After breakfast, you go on another morning game drive in the Chobe National Park together with your guide. No day on safari is like the other and you never know which wildlife sightings await you today. Watch as the elephants come to the water to drink, cool down and play by splashing about. You may also want to keep your eyes open for the water-loving red lechwe and the rare puku antelope on today’s morning game drive. After exiting the park at the Ngoma gate, you continue towards the Chobe Forest Reserve. Along the way we make use of the wonderful outside setting to enjoy a picnic lunch. With quite possibly many new safari impressions, you arrive at your lodge, the Thobolo’s Bush Lodge, in the mid-afternoon. End the day by enjoying a cool sundowner on the viewing deck and gaze over the waterhole as elephants, buffalos and other resident wildlife arrive for a drink of their own.

You have an exciting day ahead of you and one which must therefore start very early. Before the first light, you will be up and going already, heading towards the Savuti region. The Savuti is renowned for its fantastic game viewing and its varied landscapes. The region is particularly famed for its predators, so be on the lookout for any lions, leopards, or hyenas about. During the morning hours, these hunters can sometimes be spotted returning from their night-time activity. The surreal Savuti landscape was formed and is constantly being reformed by the mysterious Savuti channel. The channel can flow for many years, bringing water to the region and then unexpectedly dry up and remain dry for an undefined period of time. Nature, however, always finds a way to show its impressive resilience. This makes every safari in the Savuti fascinating. After a long and wonderful day of game viewing, you arrive at your accommodation for the next two nights, the Mmatsebe Camp, at the Mbudi River in a private concession north of Khwai. Here, a tasty dinner and a good night’s rest await you.

Look forward to another exciting day on safari. Depending on the time of year and presence of wildlife, you will explore either the famous Moremi Game Reserve or the wildlife-rich Khwai Region. The whole region is home to a tremendous amount of wildlife, including the Big Five. It is also one of the best places in Africa to spot African wild dogs. The Moremi, with its surrounding private concessions, provides the wide-open spaces which these rarely seen animals require to roam. Further highlights you may encounter here are antelope species such as the tsessebe, the roan and the sable, as well as lions, leopards, elephants, giraffes and if you are lucky, you may find a cheetah. Your guide has well trained eyes and his spotting skills will help make it an incredible safari. In the afternoon, you return to your camp. As the sun sets on another memorable day, be sure to sit on the camp’s deck and watch as the animals come to drink at the Mbudi River. You spend another night at the Mmatsebe Camp.

You set out on another morning game drive in the region surrounding your camp, taking advantage of the cool morning temperatures just like the animals do. Most animals are active during the morning hours and your chances to experience exciting sightings are good. Your journey takes you further south through Botswana’s bush landscape. The southern part of the Moremi Game Reserve is more remote and there are fewer safari vehicles on the roads than in the northern part. A great opportunity to explore this secluded area on game drives. In the late afternoon, you will leave the Moremi Game Reserve at the South Gate and reach your accommodation, the Thamalakane River Lodge. End this wonderful day with another delicious dinner before you sit around the campfire and overlook the river.

After a hearty breakfast it is time to pack your bags. Your guide or a transfer driver will bring you to the Maun Airport where you say your farewells. From here, you can start your return journey or continue your adventure by flying into the Okavango Delta. Depending on your onward journey, you may have enough time for a helicopter flight across the delta this morning (optional). Please get in touch with us and we will be happy to assist you further. No matter what you choose, we are certain that your time amongst Botswana’s nature and wildlife will have left a lasting impression and we hope to see you again!