Perhaps one of the finest safari locations in Africa, and our particular favorite, is Botswana. We feel that Botswana is a terrific option for a once-in-a-lifetime safari trip, despite being frequently picked or suggested as a second safari trip. It can be difficult to realize you are still situated in the same country when you move from one region to the next due to its utterly varied regions.
With few roads, electricity lines, and sometimes even low cellular and Internet coverage (which makes it difficult to bet on sports even with the best sites presented at Bookmaker-Expert.com), Botswana offers a distant and untamed safari experience. As soon as you exit the bush aircraft, a natural and fresh scent greets you. Being among the safest places in Africa to travel, the nation has some of the friendliest citizens we have ever met.
Any tourist will quickly wish they had more time because of the array of wildlife and activities. The safari experiences in Botswana ideally complement those in South Africa or Namibia, two nations with quite different safari traditions. There is a wonderful experience that can be enjoyed whether staying for a duration of entire two weeks or even just three nights in this wonderful safari location.
Here is our perspective ranking of something like the top 4 distinctive and must-visit locations in Botswana:
Okavango Delta
This inland delta is a complex network of marshland and tiny water veins, and it is one of Africa’s top natural wonders and a UNESCO World Heritage Site. It is visible on satellite pictures and covers 5,800 square miles. The Okavango River, which transports water from Angola’s rains, causes the delta to flood and dry up in a predictable seasonal cycle. The seasonality of the rain, which is also in effect, has no bearing on this pattern at all. The dry season in Botswana normally starts in April and lasts until the end of November, when the rainy season starts. Then, from March through the conclusion of the wet season, there are a few hot, muggy months.
This setting offers wildlife a special home, creating thriving ecosystems that thrive on this source of water. Giraffes, elephants, buffaloes, hippos, wildebeests, zebras, lions, crocodiles, hyenas, leopards, and enigmatic wild dogs are some of the favorite animals to view in this region. Sitatunga, red lechwe, and uncommon antelope species like sable, roan, and tsessebe are just a few examples of wildlife that is exclusive to the Okavango. The populations of black and white rhinos have undergone recovery attempts more recently, but sightings of them are still infrequent. With more than 400 distinct species, the Okavango Delta is a notably renowned birding hotspot all year long.
Visitors can glide softly through the woods in a traditional canoe called mokoro, where they can enjoy a fresh perspective as they drift by unobservant wildlife, thanks to the area’s numerous but, at the same time, tiny streams.
Kalahari Desert
The Kalahari Desert is a striking contrast to the Okavango Delta and is only a short bush fly away. Imagine a flat, dry terrain with sand, baobab trees, and little shrubs. Most unusually, the Makgadigadi Salt Pans are located in this region. They are a cluster of small pans divided by stretches of desert that together encompass a total area of 6,200 square miles, in contrast to the well-known Salar de Uyuni salted pan of Bolivia, the single largest salt pan in the world.
Even though the living conditions here do not seem to be particularly friendly, life still manages to flourish. At first look, the area appears to be utterly uninhabited, although visitors can witness aardwolves, meerkats, cheetahs, bat-eared foxes, yellow mongooses, spotted or brown hyenas, Kalahari black mane lions, and aardwolves. Oryx, blue wildebeest, eland, springbok, red hartebeest, and kudu can also be found in this region.
In addition to daily game drives and resort activities, this is a fantastic adventure destination with options for quad biking, horseback riding, trekking on the salt pans, and bush hikes with a nomadic community that lives off the land – the renowned San Bushmen.
Chobe
If you adore elephants, head to Chobe National Park! Chobe is home to some of the most densely populated elephant herds in all of Africa, as well as leopards, lions, cheetahs, buffaloes, wildebeests, giraffes, wild dogs, and hyenas. The Chobe River is a unique characteristic of Chobe National Park. It is an excellent site to launch a sailboat for a sundowner and witness as herds of elephants approach the stream banks for a night drink. With the dramatic backdrop of the sunset, they are frequently joined by birds, hippos, and crocodiles. It is quite a scene.
Chobe is basically a reserve to add to Victoria Falls or South Africa tours because it is easily accessible from the town of Kasane or from Victoria Falls. With simple connections between bush planes and domestic flights back to Johannesburg, it is also a wonderful place to begin or end a longer Botswana trip.
Savuti
Savuti, which is technically a component of the Chobe National Park but feels like it is on another planet, is located to the southwest. A savanna and grassland similar to the Serengeti may be found in the area’s marsh, along with a lot of species and renowned predator activity. With the ideal mix of habitat and prey that they require to thrive, local hyenas and lions are prolific in this area. Giraffes, wild dogs, zebras, elephants, kudus, impalas, elands, buffaloes, bat-eared foxes, cheetahs, and jackals are among the other creatures that can be seen in this region.
The Savuti Channel is one of the area’s most enigmatic features. It flows intermittently between Mababe and the Chobe River. It ran again from 1957 to 1982, when it started to dry up once more until 2010. It had been dormant for around 70 years. There is currently flooding in the channel, but it is unclear how long it will last or if it will ever dry up again. Despite much research, there is no explanation or trend for this event. Naturally, this has an impact on the local wildlife’s behavior, serving as a warning that anything can shift at any time and that one of life’s greatest lessons is to appreciate the present moment.
Final Thoughts
It is difficult to fit it all in between watching the elephants drink from a boat on the Chobe River, traveling by mokoro through the unique scenery of the Okavango Delta, searching in solitude for creatures that have adapted to the desert in the massive salt pans, and seeing predator activity in Savuti.
Safari adventures like those in Botswana are simply impossible to obtain elsewhere. After all, the nation’s parks, reserves, and wildlife conservation areas cover 38% of its total area of land.
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