Chobe National Park, Botswana

The Chobe National Park is located in the Northern part of Botswana and lies along the Chobe River, which borders Botswana and Namibia, it is one of the best destinations in Southern Africa to enjoy a safari.

The Park is the second largest in Botswana and is known for its superb game viewing all year round, as it has one of the largest populations of game on the African continent, in particular it hosts large herds of elephants.

Chobe NP is a vast 21 000 square kilometre (8000 square mile) wilderness that was declared as a National Park in 1967.

Chobe National Park is divided into four different areas, each with distinctly unique geographical landscapes.

The areas of the Chobe National Park

  • the Savuti channel
  • Linyati wetlands
  • Serondella or Chobe Riverfront
  • Nogatsaa

The park has an open migratory routes to the Moremi Game Reserve in the Okavango Delta and to Hwange Game Reserve in Zimbabwe enabling large migrant animals to move instinctively, seasonally and freely between these protected areas following their ancient seasonal migratory routes.

The gateway to Chobe is Kasane, a small town near the borders of Zimbabwe and Zambia, Kasane is also a convenient base for visiting the nearby Victoria Falls.

Why visit Chobe National Park?

Game drive and boat safari

Chobe National Park is a true wildlife paradise and one of the best national parks in Southern Africa and safaris in this park are always exciting.

The most remarkable feature of the Chobe National Park is its huge concentration of Elephants, the Park supports the largest surviving Elephant populations in the world, currently estimated to exceed 120,000.

This population is dispersed throughout much of northern Botswana, as well as parts of north-western Zimbabwe. The Chobe Elephants are migratory, making seasonal movements of up to 200 kilometers in a circuit from the Chobe and Linyanti rivers, where they concentrate in the dry season, to the pans in the south-eastern region of the park, where they gather during the rainy season.

Chobe National Park is home to huge herds of Buffalo, and Zebra. There are high densities of predators such as Lion, Leopard, Spotted Hyena and Cheetah.

The park also hosts more unusual antelope species such as Roan and Sable, Puku, Tsessebe, Eland, Red Lechwe, Waterbuck, and the rare Chobe Bushbuck. The better-known species such as Giraffe, Kudu, Warthog, Wildebeest and Impala also abound in the park.

Boat safaris allow you to closely observe aquatic animals such as crocodiles and hippos and witness fantastic scenes of thousands of animals coming to the river to drink.

Birdwatching

Chobe National Park is a Bird-Watcher’s Paradise with more than 450 species on record, Chobe is Botswana’s premier bird-watching destination.

Water-loving birds abound, with large populations of geese, ibis, storks, cormorants, darters, egrets and herons. Colourful kingfishers, bee-eaters and rollers add vivid brilliance to the bush and river foliage.

The hot, wet season is a peak time for bird watchers to visit as the summer migrants arrive and the resident species are breeding.

Chobe Riverfront

The Chobe Riverfront is the area we will explore on our trip; the Chobe Riverfront, or Serondela area, forms the northern boundary of the Chobe National Park. It has lush plains and dense forests as well as the renowned Chobe River which attracts huge numbers of elephants, buffalo and general wildlife.

Habitats found in the Park range from floodplains, mopane woodland, baobab trees and acacia woodlands, to verdant flood grasslands and thickets bordering the Chobe River.