Botswana Untouched Lodge Safari

The Tswana word for ‘Greetings’, Dumela is a word you are likely to hear as you are met on arrival at Maun Airport, lying quite literally at the edge of the Okavango Delta. A road transfer takes you to a pleasant riverside lodge where you meet your guide and fellow travellers. There is an afternoon at leisure today – time to rest by the swimming pool or book a scenic flight over the Okavango Delta, your chance to see the scale of the world’s largest inland delta.

After breakfast at the lodge it is a short drive to your mokoro – a traditional canoe – and an opportunity to sit back and watch the Okavango slip by as your local guide poles and steers the craft with ease. Your destination is a pre-erected tented camp, set under trees in a privately managed concession next to the Moremi Game Reserve. Your tent is large enough to walk around and comes complete with a proper bed and a private bathroom; solar power provides enough energy to recharge batteries and electrical devices.

This is where the permanent waters of the Okavango Delta meet the wooded savannah of Moremi and the result is an extremely game-rich area with a healthy reputation for rare sightings such as leopard and wild dog. There are day and night game drives in the concession to look forward to plus a full-day safari in Moremi, your chance to head deep into the reserve and its most productive areas.

Enormous baobab trees are part of the scenery as you drive north after an early breakfast. It is a long day on the road today but the reward is a friendly lodge on the banks of the Chobe River. A lifeline in Botswana’s dry season, the river attracts massive concentrations of big animals between May and October, but such is the wildlife here that a visit at any time of year yields plenty of game sightings. You have a morning drive to look forward to plus an afternoon boat cruise, a great chance to see animals at water plus Chobe’s famous river life – hippos, crocodiles, giant monitor lizards and scores of different bird species, not least the African fish-eagle whose iconic call rings out across the river.

It is a short drive to the border with Zimbabwe and then an hour’s travel time to the town of Victoria Falls, set close the famous waterfall. You check into one of the town’s riverside hotels, lying outside town and next to a national park – it is not unusual to see warthogs and impala on the hotel lawns. There is time to visit Victoria Falls before your final activity as a group – the classic Zambezi River cruise, complete with chilled drinks and sunset. The next day is open for you to enjoy, explore or rest as much as you like. Victoria Falls is well-known as a white-knuckle adventure capital with river rafting, bungee jumping and zip lining among the most popular activities but this is a town with markets, canoe safaris, birding tours and scenic flights. Ask us for recommendations and bookings.

After breakfast at the hotel you will be transferred to Victoria Falls International Airport for your onward travel arrangements and the end of this tour.