The Best Walking Safaris: Zimbabwe Vs. Zambia

Zambia tends to offer a slower pace of walking. There’s a lot less focus on the big game – it’s more about exploring the park and getting the opportunity to learn about the smaller things that often get missed when in a vehicle. This can be tracking, looking at bones and dung, or birding. The aim is not to approach big game, although this does occasionally happen! In Zambia, it is the park ranger who is in charge of the rifle and the guide is in charge of leading the walk. So when you stop to talk about something, the guide can be relaxed explaining things, all the while knowing that the ranger is on the look-out for any potentially approaching game. I also found that the walks here tend to be a dedicated activity. You set off as the sun comes up and get back to camp at around 10 in the morning. You cover a range of 3–6 km, with no need for a vehicle for further exploring.

While Zimbabwe does offer longer walks, the walks tend to be shorter, often following tracks to get close to big game. Multiple times we’d be driving along, and the guide would spot lion tracks on the road. He’d pick up his rifle and we’d go off in search of that animal. So it felt more purposeful than walking in Zambia, where you tend to see what you see. The experience in Zimbabwe is incredible if you want close encounters – and the professional guides really have gone through some of the hardest exams to get to this stage. In this country, the guide is in charge of the rifle and you don’t walk with a ranger. I personally found this meant that less information was passed on during the walk, as there was more for the guides to be focused on, but they do pass this information on later. It’s worth noting that Mana Pools is the stand-out game-viewing area for walking in Zimbabwe. For years there has been a big focus on walking here, meaning the game is a lot more relaxed with walkers – you can get very close to lion, elephant, and wild dog, etc.