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11 Days Bewitching Botswana Tour Package Duration: 11 Days / 10 Nights Priced From: $3,732 (All pricing reflects per-person Land Only expenses) Dates: Jul, Oct, Apr, Jul, Oct  Our 11-day adventure through Botswana deep in the African south takes us to one of the few remaining destinations in the world that can still provide a 'real' safari tour. Where possible, our camp is set up prior to our arrival to allow for optimal time for seeing game and our rustic but comfortable lodgings play a fundamental role in the experience. We take to the skies over beautiful lush-green reed marsh for an aerial view of the Okavango Delta, inhabited by crocodiles and hippos, and visit traditional villages as we drive towards arguably the most spectacular game park in Southern Africa; Moremi Wildlife Reserve. Encompassing an area of more than 1,000 square kilometres, Moremi Reserve boasts winding waterways with banks of reeds, palm-covered islands, and lush, lily-covered lagoons, as well as an incredible array of wildlife. Herds of impala and tsessebe can be seen at any time of year and wildebeest, buffalo and zebras typically make an appearance in the dry season. Packs of lions, cheetahs and wild dogs hunt in the open grassland and immense numbers of birds frequent the park regularly. Heading to the area around the River Kwai, we gaze in awe at roaming elephants, learn about the history of the first inhabitants of the area and continue our wildlife sightseeing with visits to several notable national parks. After spending some time at the magnificent Zambian spectacle that is Victoria Falls, we end our adventure safari in Livingstone. Tour Itinerary Day 1 Arrive in Maun Arrive in Maun, Botswana. After a chance to shower and relax after your long journey, we will enjoy "sundowners" around the campfire before dinner, as well as an orientation by your Tour Leader and local guide. Our first night is at Sitatunga camp just outside Maun, an area known for prolific resident birdlife. Though not deluxe, this safari is run on the basis of providing reasonable comfort for a camping trip. Wherever possible the camp is set up prior to our arrival allowing optimal time to view game. Mess tents are erected for dining and a competent cook produces tasty, well-balanced meals. Travelling with us means that you will be enjoying a real holiday; all duties are taken care of by our staff. Our specially designed and equipped vehicles are unequalled, and offer space, comfort and maximum pleasure in game viewing. Maintenance and service receive top priority and we carry with us a full range of spare parts. Our camping equipment is of the highest quality, comprising refrigerator, camp showers and toilets. Accommodation is in spacious 3x3m tents, which are insect-proof and well-ventilated. All bedding facilities are supplied, including sprung stretchers, mattresses and duvets. Overnight Sitatunga camp. Dinner. Day 2 Maun - Moremi This morning we include a scenic over-flight for an aerial view of the Okavango Delta. Rain falling on the distant Angolan highlands drains into this legendary African paradise. Our flight takes us over reed marsh comprised of papyrus, bullrush and acacia. An abundance of bird and animal life gather around the wetlands where crocodile and hippopotamus live. We then depart by overland vehicle to Moremi passing traditional villages en-route before entering the South Gate into the Moremi Wildlife Reserve, located on one of the "fingers" that form a peninsula into the Okavango swamps. Our game drive takes us on a scenic road through the Xaxanaka Lagoons where we have time to relax before dinner is served in the dining tent (Please note that the selection of beverages is local and limited). Every year, floods pour down from the highlands of Angola into the Okavango River and flow on through a vast network of narrow waterways, lagoons and broad expanses of the Okavango Delta. The water courses through this huge, 10 000 square kilometres of flood plain and dissipates in the sands of the Kalahari. ***** IT IS IMPORTANT to note that the nature of our activities and exact camp locations over the next few days could be significantly affected by seasonal variations in precipitation and water levels. This itinerary should give a very accurate sense of what will happen over these days, but passengers are urged to be flexible and be prepared for changes at the discretion of our local agents, Tour Leader, and guides. Overnight camping Xaxanaka area. Breakfast and dinner. Day 3 Moremi Wildlife Reserve Many travellers regard the Moremi Wildlife Reserve as the most spectacular and beautiful game park in Southern Africa. It covers more than 1000 sq km of grassy flood plains in the north-eastern corner of the Okavango Delta. Apart from savannah, the terrain includes winding waterways with banks of reeds, palm-covered islands, thick forest and lush, lily-covered lagoons where hippos bathe and sport. With such a wide variety of vegetation comes an incredibly wide spectrum of wild life. Huge herds of impala and tsessebe are always in the area, while in the dry season large herds of buffalo, wildebeest and zebra flock into the park from the Kalahari in search of food and water. The rare sitatunga and lechwe antelope live in the papyrus banks of the waterways. Lions, cheetahs and packs of wild dogs hunt in the open grassland. The reserve is home to an immense number of birds. Unlike most other game parks, Moremi allows visitors to approach game on foot. The park has been kept as natural as possible by the people who created it, the Tawana tribe. In 1961, worried about the increase in game hunting, the tribe under the regent, Mrs Pulane Moremi, widow of Chief Moremi III, established the reserve on their own land. It was the first time an African tribe had founded and administered a game park. We have an early morning game drive through Moremi with its magnificent scenery in search of numbers of wildlife resident in this area. We return to camp at about 11h00 for delicious brunch and time to relax in camp. An afternoon boating excursion on the Xaxanaka Lagoons take us down the papyrus fringed channels of the eastern delta, prolific in bird life. Overnight camping in Xaxanaka area. All meals. Day 4 Moremi Wildlife Reserve - Kwai After breakfast we depart our campsite and travel towards Kwai River at Moremi's North Gate. The vegetation is mainly low but thick Mopani forest, with a lot of elephant activity. With lunch en route we will arrive at North Gate in the late afternoon. We overnight in view of the Kwai River. The Kwai (Khwai) River is part of the Okavango Delta's system. At a point where the river narrows to a stream and disappears into the sand you find Moremi. The Okavango is frequently called a swamp, but mostly its waters are beautifully clear and blue. Most of the Okavango waters are soaked up by the desert, or evaporate. In good years, a fraction may remain to flood Lake Ngami in the south and feed the Boteti River which runs into Lake Xau in the west and eventually into the huge depression of the Makgadikgadi Pan. The floods reach their peak in May, covering vast grass flats and making thousands of islands out of tree-covered ridges of land. Thick papyrus grows everywhere and, in the northern parts of the delta, chokes the waterways so that they are impenetrable except by canoes. Overnight camp in Kwai area. All meals. Day 5 Kwai River Area Today we have early morning and afternoon game drives around the Kwai River area. This wilderness is uninhabited, except for a few river Bushmen who roam there. They still work iron with primitive bellows, making knives, axes and spears. Their canoes, called mokoros, are hand-hewn from logs. In the parts of the delta where there is perennial water there are large numbers of crocodiles, hippos and buffaloes. Animals like the sitatunga, lechwe and Chobe bushbuck, which have adapted themselves to the conditions of reed and water, live on the islands. Overnight camp in Kwai River area. All meals. Day 6 Moremi Wildlife Reserve - Savuti Channel Area We have an early morning game drive for one last look at the Kwai before returning to our camp for breakfast. We leave Moremi and our route takes us on an adventurous day's drive northwards to Savuti. We will stop en-route for lunch. After a game drive past the Mababe Depression we will arrive at our campsite. Savuti's highlights are numerous--large prides of lions and immense herds of plains game such as zebra, wildebeest, Sassaby and impala. The Savuti Channel, a strange waterway, apparently seems to have a mind of its own; dry for one hundred years, it then flooded abruptly in the 1950's and remained flooded till the 1980's, when shifting of the subterranean tectonic plates caused it to dry up again. Overnight camping at Savuti. All meals. Day 7 Savuti Channel Area Savuti is one of Africa's most densely populated predator areas, and well known for its bull elephants. Both the Savuti waterhole and the Savuti Pan offer an ever changing spectacle of birds and wildlife. Morning and afternoon game drives with some time to relax during the heat of the day. Overnight camping at Savuti. All meals. Day 8 Savuti - Nogaatsha Leaving the plains of the Savuti Marsh we follow the Ngwezumba Valley, driving through mopane forests. Lunch en-route. In the afternoon we arrive at the remote pan of Nogaatsha, on which a variety of wildlife depend. Tonight we camp within sight of the waterhole. Overnight in the area of Nogaatsha. All meals. Day 9 Nogaatsha - Chobe National Park - Kasane After breakfast we leave for the Chobe River and hopefully will see the herds of elephant for which this park is famous. In the afternoon a boating excursion on the Chobe River offers a new dimension to game-viewing. The original inhabitants of what is now the park were the San people, otherwise known in Botswana as the Basarwa. They were hunter-gatherers who lived by moving from one area to another in search of water, wild fruits and wild animals. The San were later joined by groups of the Basubiya people and later still, around 1911, by a group of Batawana led by Sekgoma. When the country was divided into various land tenure systems, late last century and early this century, the larger part of the area that is now the national park, was classified as crown land. In 1967, the reserve was declared a national park. A major feature of Chobe National Park is its elephant population, comprising what is probably the world's largest. This population covers most of northern Botswana plus north-western Zimbabwe and is currently estimated at around 100,000. This elephant population has built up steadily from a few thousand since the early 1900s and has escaped the massive illegal offtake that decimated other populations in the 1970s and 1980s. The Chobe elephant are migratory, making seasonal movements of up to 200 km (125 miles) from the Chobe and Linyanti rivers where they concentrate in the dry season, to the pans in the south-east of the park, to which they disperse in the rains. The Kalahari elephant, including Chobe, has the distinction of being the largest in body size of all living elephants, though the ivory is brittle such that you will not see many huge tuskers among these rangy monsters. Overnight in Kasane. Chobe Safari Lodge. All meals. Day 10 Kasane, Botswana - Livingstone, Zambia - Victoria Falls Today we travel to the Zambian side of Victoria Falls from Kasane, the confluence of the Chobe and Zambezi Rivers and roughly the place where the countries of Zimbabwe, Zambia, Botswana, and Namibia meet, the only place in Africa where four countries do so. We make our way across the river by boat (20 minutes) and continue the rest of the way to Vic Falls by road via the town of Livingstone, once an important town in southern Africa during the first days of European settlement and the beginnings of Colonial rule. This area has been inhabited for hundreds of thousands of years. The first known name of the falls was "Shongwe," and the current name did not come into being until the Scottish missionary David Livingstone was brought to the falls in 1855 and named them after Queen Victoria. The falls and the nearby town of Livingstone are on the mighty Zambezi River, the fourth longest in Africa, and forming the border with neighbouring Zimbabwe. Overnight at Victoria Falls, Zambia. Breakfast and dinner. Day 11 Departure from Livingstone Departure from Victoria Falls / Livingstone. Note: extra overnight/s in Victoria Falls can be arranged in advance at an extra cost (subject to availability). Additional optional activities could include Zambezi River rafting (seasonal), and or an excursion into the neighbouring country of Zimbabwe for more falls viewing. Note that in the case of extra night/s, your departure transfer to Livingstone Airport is not included (approximate local cost 25 USD). Breakfast. Save time, money and stress! For reservations: Fill out the vacation planner to be contacted by our Botswana Adventure vacation specialist. Contact: Travelwizard.com Phone: 10/09 |
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