Botswana is a travel destination like no other country in Southern Africa. Its vast untouched wildernesses, like Chobe and the Okavango Delta, are amongst the world's most remote and unspoiled conservation areas. Vacations to the country focus on safaris based at remote and often luxurious safari camps. This adventure relishes wildlife viewing and the grand natural splendor of Botswana.
Need Advice?Botswana is a wild land of contrasts, with a rich diversity of safari areas scattered throughout one of Africa's most sparsely populated countries.
Chobe in northeastern Botswana is one of the African continent's most unspoiled conservation areas.
A world of water, wildlife, and islands awaits those who travel to the most revered safari destination in Botswana.
Makgadikgai is not a destination for everyone, but this bizarre landscape offers unique safaris that appeal to die-hard safari enthusiasts.
Those who travel to Botswana will be captivated by its wilderness's beauty and its people's hospitality.
Botswana has more than 17% of the land dedicated to protected wildlife areas, including national parks and game reserves. The most notable conservation areas are Chobe National Park, the Okavango Delta, the Makgadikgadi Pan, Savute Marsh, Kgalagadi, and the Central Kalahari – the second-largest game reserve in the world. It is nothing short of a paradise for nature lovers.
Though not as well known nor as popular as the destinations listed above, each of Botswana's other destinations offers genuinely unique and exciting safari endeavors.
The Central Kalahari is one of the largest game reserves in the world. It Stretches across 52,800 km². This safari destination covers an eleventh of Botswana's land mass - supporting a treasure trove of wildlife. The region consists of mopane woodland, open grassy plains, and red desert sands.
The Moremi Game Reserve is a protected stretch of the verdurous Okavango Delta. Some 5 000 square kilometers in extent, the reserve harbors remarkable diversity, including almost 500 species of birds. It is home to one of the Okavango Delta's most famous and largest islands - 'Chief's Island.'
Kgalagadi Trans-Frontier Park encompasses a sandy slice of the border between South Africa and Botswana - an area comprising more than 3.6 million hectares. It is home to the legendary black-maned Kalahari lion and desert-adapted plains-game like gemsbok (oryx) and springbok.
Nxai Pan is a large salt pan that lies 50km northwest of the Makgadikgadi Pans. Thousands of years ago, they formed part of the same lake system. Though significantly smaller, Nxai boasts a more permanent wildlife population than Makgadikgadi, including large predators, elephants, and giraffes.
Unforgettable wild encounters in authentic wilderness areas characterize the safari vacations you can enjoy in Botswana. The game viewing is sure to be top-notch.
Safari enthusiasts worldwide agree that few other countries can rival Botswana's authentic safaris.
We recommend African Sky for organizing everything with perfection. We appreciated their excellent advice when deciding on our travel itinerary. It will always be an unforgettable experience. Thank you very much. A special thank you to Hennie, who took excellent care of us. It was the perfect holiday.
Marc & Sylvia Deschamps, SwitzerlandThe accommodation offered in Botswana consists primarily of luxury tented camps and lodges, where the client-to-staff ratio is very high (Normally, around three staff members for each client the camp or lodge can accommodate). These camps lie in remote areas - the only way fresh supplies can reach these camps daily is via light charter flight. Though very costly, the experience is truly unforgettable. More reasonably priced alternatives are available in the towns of Maun and Kasane. These two towns provide bases for clients to explore the Okavango Delta and Chobe National Park.
View Safari Camps
Tented Camps are the hallmark of most safari destinations in Botswana. These camps range from comfortable with all modern amenities to ultra-luxurious camps fit for a king.
You can find brick-and-mortar lodges that offer varying degrees of luxury in the northern part of the Chobe National Park. These lodges offer a traditional safari stay.
These wilderness oases grace private islands in the Okavango Delta. All safaris conducted from these camps are either water-based or walking safaris.
The red sands of the Kalahari hark back to a time when man and the animal kingdom were one, living in a constant cycle of birth, life and death alongside each other and the nature around them. Here, the wilderness is wild, the night's sky is full of stars, and man's grasp has yet to tighten completely.
The San of Botswana call this place home, and have done so for tens of thousands of years. Today, their culture survives around the Central Kalahari National Park, alongside untamed, pristine wilderness.
Explore
While traveling in Botswana, your transportation will typically take the form of modified open-air 4x4 vehicles. These vehicles are used on game drives and for transfers from the airport to the lodge. It is usually the case when, for example, enjoying a safari in the Chobe National Park.
Charter flights in light aircraft will be required if your safari takes you further afield to indelibly wild areas like the Okavango Delta, Savute, or Linyanti. Keep in mind that this generally augments the price of any safari in Botswana and that particular luggage restrictions apply when taking charter flights.
When visiting a country or area, it is always a good idea to try some local delicacies.
April to October for best wildlife viewing, especially in the dry season.
7 to 10 days to explore the key regions like Okavango Delta and Chobe.
Dry season: May to October. Rainy season: November to April. Expect warm days and cool nights.
Fly into Maun or Kasane from Johannesburg or Cape Town, then take charter flights to lodges.
High-risk in northern Botswana. Anti-malarial medication recommended. Consult your doctor.
Bush walks are conducted in several reserves in Botswana. These include Chobe, the Okavango Delta, Khutse and Central Kalahari. However, the Okavango Delta offers some of Africa's most unique walking safaris, as guests often take a morning boat ride to an uninhabited island. From here, the morning is devoted to exploring this part of paradise on foot, accompanied by a ranger and tracker. These walks often offer the opportunity of viewing elephants crossing channels between islands, large buffalo herds, and a variety of game animals like lechwe and sitatunga if you are fortunate.
The Okavango Delta is synonymous with "mokoro" trips, a unique way of getting around the shallow waterways of the Delta in a dugout canoe propelled by a single pole bearer. All visitors to this region are encouraged to try at least one exploration of the Delta in a traditional canoe. It offers a silent and peaceful way of spotting various species around the reed-lined channels. It will surely be an adrenalin rush if hippos or crocodiles swim around.
The more common way of viewing the game found in the Okavango Delta is on 4x4 vehicle game drives. These excursions are conducted during the early morning and late afternoon from lodges that are not isolated on the small islands of the Okavango but have access to larger land areas. Specially adapted Toyota Land Cruiser vehicles are typically utilized, with local rangers and trackers providing a unique insight into the behavior of the various species.
Most luxury lodges in Botswana offer a selection of spa treatments to indulge the senses and relax the mind and body. These treatments can often be enjoyed on the deck of your luxury tented suite, with magnificent views and the sounds of the African wild creating the backdrop to a perfect pampering experience.
Many of the lodges in Botswana offer both conventional and fly fishing for indigenous fish found in the area. Most notable amongst the fish species is the notorious tiger fish, legendary amongst the world's freshwater fighting fish. Other species that can be caught include bream and catfish. The best time for a fishing trip in Botswana is from late August to around the middle of November.
The Chobe River, which forms the northern border of Botswana, offers some of Africa's grandest sunset cruises. On these late afternoon boat cruises - which depart from or close to the town of Kasane - significant numbers of animals, especially elephants, can be seen coming to the water's edge for a drink. A great diversity of bird species can also be observed. Keen photographers will find that these cruises present exceptional photographic opportunities.
Botswana is a birder's paradise, with five hundred and ninety-three identified species, of which a hundred are rare or accidental. Whether they choose Chobe or the Okavango Delta as their safari destination, ornithologists will indeed find the bird spotting exceptional.
Botswana's most significant tribal group is the original Tswana tribe, which comprises almost half of the entire population, followed by the Bakalanga people, who inhabit the northeast and central districts of the country, where they have lived for nearly a thousand years.
The riverine tribes of the Bayer, Basubiya, and Hambukushu inhabit the Okavango and Chobe waterways in the Ngamiland District, subsisting on the water and its natural resources. The Bayer was the first to arrive in the 1700s, closely followed by the Basubiya, who established their base at Luchindo on the Chobe River.
The Hambukushu are master basket weavers who are more recent additions to the cultural tapestry of Botswana. They arrived in waves from Namibia and Angola over the past couple of hundred years, with the last group of 4 000 moving into the country in 1969 to escape the Angolan civil war.
The Bakgalagadi tribe is also of Sotho-Tswana origin and is closely related to the Batswana people, sharing similar customs and beliefs. Many Bakgalagadi still practice subsistence agriculture. The San are also deep rural dwellers who shy away from contact with the larger villages.
The Tsodilo Hills, whose rocky cliffs rise about 400m (1 312 ft) above the surrounding plains, can be seen from the Okavango Delta more than 50km (31 miles) away. They are one of the world's most important rock art sites, with as many as 3 500 individual paintings charting over 25 000 years of almost continuous habitation.
Situated in the Kalahari Desert, around 50km east of the Aha Hills, Drotsky's Caves, known as the Gcwihaba Caves, form one of Botswana's most beautiful and unusual national monuments. The caves are easy to miss, nestled within the undulating dunes of the Kalahari below a nondescript low ridge of rock. What lies beneath, however, is quite spectacular.
The labyrinthine cave system spreads out below. They are generously sprinkled with the most remarkable and unusual stalagmite and stalactite formations. From frozen waterfalls and flow-stones to mammoth obelisks of naturally formed rock, sweeping hallways and chambers - some up to 10 meters high - to beautiful inlets and apertures, all awash in subtle lights and colors, Drotsky's caves demonstrate the passage of time in all its petrified glory.
Stretching through nine degrees of latitude, more than half of the country lies within the tropics, but unlike most 'tropical' countries, Botswana is drier and quite prone to drought. The boundless Kalahari Desert, the world's largest unbroken stretch of sand, covers 84% of Botswana, extending from the Orange River in South Africa to the equator in Gabon.
While Botswana is depicted as a flat, featureless semi-desert, much wonder and variation can be found. One of the greatest paradoxes this arid sandveld encompasses is the lush, verdant jewel of the Okavango Delta. It was formed as the wide, fast-flowing Okavango River spills out across a massive area of sand, where it eventually soaks away, drying up in its futile search for the sea.
Other remarkable features punctuating Botswana's terrain include the immense Makgadikgadi pans, whose salt-cracked surface marks the deathbed of the incredible Lake Makgadikgadi. Along the eastern edge of the country, the landscape has more variety with hills and koppies, while in the far west and southwest, deep in the Kalahari, the terrain is flat and arid.
