With over 300 national parks across 52 countries, there is much to consider when planning a safari holiday in Africa
Africa is big. Combine the landmass of the USA, Mexico, China, India, Bangladesh, Japan, Peru, New Zealand, Nepal, Spain, France, Germany, Italy, Greece, Sweden, Norway and the UK, and you’ll still have plenty of square miles left.
Diverse too: from the flinty geological marvel that is Namibia to the tropical tangle of the Congo basin, the glistening whorls of the Okavango Delta to the grass pelted Serengeti, this is nature at scale, rich enough in habitat to support a quarter of all mammal species, plus the world’s largest surviving populations of terrestrial megafauna.
There’s little to beat finding yourself amid a large herd of elephants, silently moving at pace. Listening to lions shred their way into a carcass, black-backed jackals and hyenas patrolling the perimeter. The aerial display of white-fronted bee-eaters above the pale pink underbellies of sunning hippos.
Africa’s conservation history dates back to the turn of the century, when Hluhluwe-Imfolozi, the original hunting grounds of the Zulu kings, was proclaimed a reserve by the British colonial administration in 1895. Today there are over 300 national parks across the continent’s 52 countries. Some are little more than ‘paper parks’, with little or no infrastructure, others are rated amongst the best in the world – the selection below has been chosen for the standard of conservation and tourism infrastructure as well as their landscapes and wildlife.
It’s worth noting that lodges in private reserves, or located in private concessions within National Parks, enjoy greater flexibility and the thrilling ability to go off-piste. Conservation is expensive and these lodges have high fixed costs. That said, ecotourism is key to conservation. An authentic safari experience is never cheap but if it supports community and conservation initiatives you’re contributing in a real way to the survival of Africa’s magnificent wild places.
Serengeti National Park, Tanzania
Best for The Great Migration
Tanzania’s oldest national park is extraordinary. With its vast plains and filigreed flat-topped acacias under an enormous arc of blue, Serengeti is home to a visual abundance of wildlife that feels almost surreal.
The National Park comprises some 1.5 million hectares, but the Serengeti – derived from the Maasai word for “endless plains” – is an ecosystem that stretches way beyond the fenceless borders of the park. It hosts what is considered the world’s greatest wildlife spectacle: some two million ungulates, predominantly wildebeest and zebras, determinedly on the move, lured on by seasonal rains to follow a great elliptic circle that mirrors the time taken for the earth to revolve around the sun. Following in their wake are predators in numbers unrivalled; the Serengeti ecosystem is believed to support some 4,000 lions, more than 300 cheetahs, 7,500 hyenas and an estimated 1,000 leopards, though the latter are very elusive. Rhino sightings too are very rare.
Look out for:
Thousands of wildebeest and zebra, as far as the eye can see. It’s always a thrill to spot the critically endangered cheetah in the wilds, and the Serengeti, particularly around Namiri Plains, is one of the best places to see one without a research collar.
How to do it
When to go:
Anytime except April and May, when the combination of heavy rains and black cotton soil makes swathes inaccessible. Bear in mind that wildlife is everywhere, so no need to follow the migration but if that is your focus, when you go may determine where you stay.
Calving season, a lovely time, takes place in the southern Serengeti from late January to February. Most though, will want to witness river crossings, animals braving the crocodiles of the Mara river that separates northern Serengeti from Kenya’s Mara. This is July to September, peak tourist season, when riverbanks are sometimes lined with waiting vehicles.
What to book:
The Central Serengeti has some of the biggest hotels you’ll find in any African National Park, from the 77-room luxury Four Seasons to the 75-room budget Seronera Wildlife Lodge. If you want a real safari experience, book a small camp, away from the hubbub. I’d recommend booking more than one.
Asilia is a great outfit with camps in prime locations (Olakira has double tents from €1,822/£1,512.1 while Ubuntu has double tents from €1,416/£1,175 including all meals, local drinks and game activities).
Moremi Game Reserve, Okavango Delta, Botswana
Best for luxury safaris
Vying with Serengeti as the wildest, most beautiful sanctuary in Africa, the world’s largest inland delta is somewhat of a geological miracle, fault lines in the Earth’s crust diverting the Okavango River to empty into the Kalahari desert, a bizarre aquatic paradise of palms and papyrus fanning out into a sea of desert sand.
Swollen by seasonal rains in the Angolan Highlands 400 miles to the north, the annual arrival is called the “flood”, expanding into a vast network of glistening channels and transforming the floodplains into fields of green, attracting vast numbers of game at a time when the surrounding Kalahari is most parched.
The 35,000 hectare Moremi Game Reserve is the heart of this fenceless 2 million hectare Delta. Led by their local queen, Elizabeth Moremi, the residing BaTawana proclaimed it a reserve in 1963 to arrest the growth in uncontrolled hunting and cattle encroachment.
Host to numerous National Geographic shoots, this documentary-making mecca offers high concentrations of lion, elephant, buffalo and one of the best places outside of southern Kruger to see leopards, wild dogs and cheetahs.
Look out for:
Perhaps the best place on the continent to view critically endangered wild dogs, particularly when they den around May.
How to do it
When to go:
It is impossible to predict exactly when the “flood” will arrive during what is confusingly known as the “dry” season (referring to the lack of rainfall in the desert), but rates are an indicator: peak season is July and August; high season is June, September and October.
May is shoulder but increasingly popular; I’d avoid November when it’s sweltering and humid. Jan to March, referred to as the “green season” is good value and great for birding, but be sure to book where there is perennial water.
What to book:
Newly opened, Natural Selection’s Tawana is a top pick (from $3,590/£2,783 double, including all meals, local drinks and game activities), not only for the most incredible game sightings.
On the neighbouring private concessions I’d recommend Ker & Downey Botswana’s Shinde Footsteps for walking, also incidentally a great option for families, and with rates from $1,300/£2,783 for a double, one of the better priced options.
Natural Selection’s beautiful North Island Camp is another personal favourite, and their San Camp the best accommodation in Makgadigadi. For horseback safaris in the Delta contact Okavango Horse Safaris. If you’d prefer to book with a tour operator, Timbuktu is a good outfit.
Kruger National Park, South Africa
Best for reliable Big 5 encounters
Together with the fenceless private reserves that flank its western border, the Kruger National Park is a 2.5 million hectare sanctuary for an array of wildlife more diverse than the Serengeti but in quite different terrain. Despite the denser bush it is renowned for the regularity and proximity of sightings, comparable to the Mara in Kenya, at least in the southern section of the park and private concessions where game is habituated to vehicles, and wildlife guides are able to get virtually within spitting distance of big cats.
Southern Kruger is understandably popular, dense with luxury lodges, and the ideal destination for a first timer keen to enjoy the virtually guaranteed sightings. But old bush hands prefer the remote northern Kruger, particularly the area around the lush Luvuvhu river. While game viewing here is less productive, birdlife is phenomenal, landscapes beautiful, and travellers far fewer.
Look out for:
Southern Kruger is renowned for its leopard sightings; Sabi Sand, the private reserve that shares a fenceless border with Kruger, has reputedly the densest population in Africa – about 12 every 100 square km. This is also one of the most reliable destinations in Africa for rhino, though often dehorned to mitigate the poaching scourge.
How to do it
When to go:
Kruger is essentially a year-round destination. Most visit during the winter months when frost pares back vegetation, but early morning drives can be bitingly cold. Summer brings short thunderstorms that perfume the bush with petrichor, baby antelopes gambolling and migrant birds flitting like jewels through the undergrowth.
What to book:
The lodges and camps located on private concessions within Kruger are pricey but not quite as eye watering as Botswana. Personal favourites are Tinga and Narina, located on the banks of the Sabi River in the More Lion Sands concession in southern Kruger (doubles from R53,990/£2,374 per night including all meals, local drinks and game activities). Hamiltons Tented Camp, also in a southern concession, is good value (from R40,000/£1,759 per night).
Infrastructure for self-drive is one of the best in Africa. Accommodation in Rest Camps is basic, and you will have to stick to designated roads, but costs will be a fraction of a private lodge. You can fly directly into Kruger with Airlink, landing at Skukuza, the main Rest Camp, where there is an Avis.
Volcanoes National Park, Rwanda
Best for accessible gorilla trekking
The first National Park to be proclaimed in Africa, named in 1925 by a somewhat hubristic King Albert I as Albert National Park, straddled Rwanda, Uganda and the Democratic Republic of Congo. The 16,000 hectare section of the Virunga Mountain ecosystem, located on Rwanda’s northwestern border, is where the first gorilla permit was issued in 1979.
This is steep terrain with altitude affecting vegetation, from Afroalpine shrubland to swamp meadows, and tropical forests and bamboo groves. The Park’s gorillas were made famous by American primatologist Dian Fossey, who lived here from 1967 to 1985. A replica of Fossey’s mountain cabin has been built at the Ellen de Generes Campus, located near the Park headquarters; a hike to her grave in the gorilla cemetery, next to her beloved gorilla Digit, is a pilgrimage of sorts for some; for others its the hike up Bisoke to the crater lake, scarlet-tufted sunbirds flit between giant lobelias.
Post-civil-war Rwanda once again embraced “gorilla tourism”, with initiatives like Kwita Iziina, the annual naming ceremony for baby gorillas taking place every September, and a focus on high-end low-volume tourism, luring luxe operators like Singita, One&Only and Wilderness Safaris to service the well-heeled and time-poor.
Certainly it’s the most accessible Park for gorilla trekking, being around a two-hour drive from Kigali. And with 12 gorilla families now habituated, up to 96 visitors a day (maximum of eight per group) return enthralled by their hour in the presence of Africa’s gentle giants.
Look out for:
In addition to mountain gorillas the park is home to large troops of endangered golden monkeys, endemic to the Virunga Mountains.
How to do it
When to go:
It rains throughout the year but June to August are the driest, the terrain best for hiking. September, January and February are also reasonably dry.
March to May and October and November are the wettest. Near the equator temperatures don’t vary much: an average 15°C/59°F during the day, dropping to 7°C/45°F at night.
What to book:
At $1,500 (£1165) a pop per person (children under 15 are not permitted), these are the most expensive gorilla permits in Africa (Bwindi’s permits are $800/£621). Limited in number, and must be pre-purchased. Contact Rwanda Eco Company. The mobility-challenged can be carried to a gorilla nest for a fee.
There is no accommodation option available inside the Park (though visitors that have booked multiple-day hiking excursions can camp overnight); the closest lodge is uber-luxurious Singita Kwitonda (doubles from $5280/£4,104 including all meals and drinks). Sharing a 1.2km border with the Park. Less than 10 minutes from the Park’s headquarters, where all treks commence, it offers a matchless experience, and priced accordingly.
Maasai Mara National Reserve, Kenya
Best for affordable big cat safaris
The northern part of the borderless Serengeti ecosystem; Africa’s most famous wildlife destination offers classic savannah plains, where habituated animals make for excellent viewing and filming, as evidenced by series like the BBC’s Big Cat Diaries and Disney’s African Cats.
It’s also very accessible, with regular daily flights directly into the Mara from Nairobi (or a six-hour drive from the capital), and well-developed infrastructure able to cater to a wide range of budgets and large group sizes. That does mean that it’s far, far busier than most, and the crush of cars around sightings can spoil the experience; if you can, do fork out for a base in one of the private Maasai conservancies that seamlessly border the reserve.
For many the annual river crossings – when millions of wildebeest and zebras brave the crocodiles for the sweet new grass shoots of the Mara – are the major draw, but it’s worth noting that the Mara is home to a huge population of resident herbivores year-round. These in turn provide regular sustenance for predators – your chances of seeing lion, cheetah, hyena and leopard at any time of the year in a day are extremely high, alongside giraffe, hippo, elephants and buffalo. Rhino sightings are rare.
Look out for:
The sheer density of game is wonderful. Ask your guide to avoid joining queues or crowded sightings and keep going, looking for your own.
How to do it
When to go:
If your purpose is to see the migration then July to September are the months to book, but when the migration departs, so do the heavy number of tourists.
The ‘wet’ season (still plenty of dry days and lovely temperatures) brings lush landscapes and an altogether more restorative safari experience; the heaviest rainfall period is April to June.
What to book:
Recommended camps are located in private conservancies, picked for their exclusivity and the fact that conservancy fees directly support the Maasai communities.
These include Serengeti Camp (doubles from $1,134/£880 including all meals, drinks and game activities); Sanctuary Olonana located on the banks of the Mara (doubles from $2,310/£1,792 including all meals, drinks and game activities); Ishara Mara (doubles from $3,000/£2,327 including all meals, drinks and game activities); and Mara Plains (doubles from $3,212/£2,491 including all meals, drinks and game activities).
South Luangwa National Park, Zambia
Best for walking and canoe safaris
Zambia’s best National Park is southern Africa’s best kept secret, combining great game viewing with top-tier yet unpretentious, good-value camps. But the real reason to plan a trip here is the true wilderness experience it offers, particularly on foot.
The park was proclaimed in 1972, but British conservationist Norman Carr persuaded Chief Nsefu to set aside a portion of the Luangwa Valley back in the 1950s and was the first to offer walking and photography safaris, and ensured that the chief and community profited.
Bounded in the south between the Luangwa river, a broad expanse of water that can be explored by canoe, and backdropped by the Muchinga Escarpment to the northwest, the Park has not changed since Carr’s time, with open grassy plains, acacia shrub and woodlands with a magnificence of trees – leadwood, mopane, winter thorn, ivory palm, marula, tamarind, ebony.
In the past decade Zambia has ranked as the third fastest emerging tourism destination worldwide; last year more than 2 million passengers passed through Zambia’s Airports, a record number for the country. South Luangwa really is marvellous. Get here before everyone else does.
Look out for:
The park enjoys one of the highest densities of leopards. Between the months of September and October, thousands of Carmine bee-eaters nest in the banks of the Luangwa River to nest – a wonderful sight even if you’re not a bird-nerd. It’s also one of the few Parks that permits night drives, so you may clock nocturnal species such as genets, civets and bushbabies.
How to do it
When to go:
The dry season is best, running from July to Sept, but this is also when high-season rates apply; “emerald season” is from November to April, when the valley is abundant with migrant birds and newborns but it’s hot and humid. May and June, the start of the dry season, offers good value.
What to book:
You can walk between Time+Tide’s four riverside camps, each one only two to four hours apart on foot (doubles start from $1,680/£1,303 and $1,760/£1,365, including all meals, drinks and two daily activities game drives, walking, cultural visits and seasonal canoeing and boating).
Know before you go
To help avoid mosquito bites, pack lightweight, loose clothing that covers the arms and legs.
If you are travelling in the popular dry season in southern Africa you will want a layered look: very warmly dressed when setting off at dawn for a game drive, but easily shed as the day gets hotter.
If you are travelling to an area where you are likely to encounter tsetse flies – not dangerous but bothersome – don’t wear black or dark blue as these attract them, but pack insect repellent and antihistamine cream.
Remember that strict luggage restrictions apply if you are flying in small planes (check these with your agent or airline) and bags must be soft-sided.
What to pack
To help avoid mosquito bites, pack lightweight, loose clothing that covers the arms and legs.
If you are travelling in the popular dry season in southern Africa you will want a layered look: very warmly dressed when setting off at dawn for a game drive, but easily shed as the day gets hotter.
If you are travelling to an area where you are likely to encounter tsetse flies – not dangerous but bothersome – don’t wear black or dark blue as these attract them, but pack insect repellent and antihistamine cream.
Remember that strict luggage restrictions apply if you are flying in small planes (check these with your agent or airline) and bags must be soft-sided.
For gorilla trekking pack non-slip, well-worn hiking shoes and lightweight rain gear. Retractable walking poles are advisable but many lodges supply these, alongside gaters and other essentials.
Read the original article on The Telegraph.
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