Namibia and Botswana: A Trip for the Safari Connoisseur

Namibia is a country of stark beauty and enormous diversity in terms of its people, wildlife, and geography. My ideal trip would start in the capital, Windhoek, from where I would take a light aircraft south to the towering dunes of Sossusvlei – this is quintessential Namibia, where the oldest desert in the world stretches out as far as the eye can see. Two nights is a reasonable amount of time to spend here, although I could be persuaded to stay for a third night and treat myself to a morning of sailing over the dunes in a hot air balloon!

From Sossusvlei, I’d move on to Damaraland, maybe splitting my stay with time in the south to see the herds of desert-adapted elephant that roam here and to take a look at the rock art at Twyfelfontein, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. After that, I’d venture to the north of the region in search of rhino, as this area is home to the largest number of free-roaming black rhino left on Earth.

For travellers looking to explore the remotest corners of the country, Damaraland makes a great stopping point on the way up to the Skeleton Coast. At this famous destination, you find a wild coastline littered with whale and seal bones, punctuated by ghostly shipwrecks in varying stages of decay. Move inland and this desolate landscape reveals some well-kept secrets, for it is home to a surprising amount of desert-adapted wildlife – lion, elephant, and giraffe, to name a few. I would definitely spend three nights here, as there is plenty to explore.

My next stop would be even farther north, up towards the Angolan border, to the Kunene river – the only permanent source of water in the entire region. This area is truly unique, and makes up a riverine oasis in the middle of the desert. It is also home to the Himba people of Namibia, and you can visit their homesteads and learn about their culture. I found this to be a very authentic and culturally sensitive experience.

After visiting the Kunene region, I would then return to Windhoek and get ready for the Botswana portion of my journey. I realise that, at this point, many of you might be asking: “What about Etosha?” Well, when combining Namibia and Botswana it is just not possible to visit every part of each country, at least not without several weeks’ holiday and an exhaustive budget! While Etosha National Park is one of my favourite destinations – I’ve visited over seventy times – it just can’t compare with the wildlife experiences that Botswana, and in particular the Okavango Delta, has to offer. In this multi-country trip, the big game experience is best left to Botswana!

One point worth mentioning is that it is no longer possible to fly directly between Namibia and Botswana. The options are to go via Johannesburg or via Victoria Falls, the latter being the preferred choice for most people – and a night or two spent admiring the Falls is no hardship. It’s a great place to relax before the Okavango Delta safari section begins.

From the Falls, I would transfer by road into Botswana before hopping on a light aircraft and flying down to the beautiful Okavango Delta. The Delta covers a vast area of pristine wilderness, up to 22,000 square kilometres when in full flood. There are many different experiences to be had in this wetland paradise, and you could take a very long safari! However, when combining a safari here with Namibia, it is best to keep the safari shorter and choose a region of the Delta that will give you a wide-ranging diversity of experiences.

For this reason, I would opt to visit the northern Okavango Delta, the region above the Moremi Game Reserve. This area is home to a handful of excellent camps and lodges at varying levels of cost and luxury, including Shinde Camp and Little Vumbura. What makes it really attractive, when on a combined trip like this one, is the variety of activities on offer. These properties have access to some of the most game-rich parts of the Delta, so the wildlife viewing is simply excellent. To balance this, the camps and lodges also have access to some of the Delta’s deep water channels, so guests can enjoy water activities during most of the year. Not every property in the Delta is able to offer game drives and mokoro boat trips, so if you are just visiting one camp then be mindful of the camp you pick, so you can enjoy a full range of activities.