The Okavango Delta: a unique environment
The Okavango Delta is listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site – a remarkable destination that offers exceptional wildlife viewing and experiences you simply can’t have elsewhere. Known as the ‘Jewel of the Kalahari Desert’, the Okavango is clearly visible on satellite images of northern Botswana as a distinct blue and green hand-like shape in an otherwise dry landscape.
The Delta is fed by rivers that never reach the sea. Summer rainfall in the highlands of Angola flows slowly across Namibia’s Caprivi Strip and across the border into Botswana, arriving during the dry winter months and spilling out of narrow channels to refill vast floodplains. This creates a remarkable mosaic of wet and dry habitats, and ensures that there is food and water to be found in the Okavango year-round.
In turn, this supports an incredibly rich and diverse population of wildlife, including many of Africa’s most iconic animals and birds, plus rare wetland species.
Diverse landscapes, amazing wildlife
The Okavango Delta is a patchwork quilt of habitats, which makes for fascinating safari adventures. In a single game drive, you could experience wooded islands, mopane forest, wide open floodplains and dry grasslands studded with termite mounds. Depending on the time of year, the scenery can change dramatically – rivers flow and dry up again, floodplains become lagoons and then slowly revert to savannah again.
This is truly a magical place, and the sheer diversity provides opportunities for many different experiences. These include classic game drives, guided walking safaris and scenic helicopter and light aircraft flights (which are a great way to understand how the Delta fits together as an ecosystem).
Activities that make the most of the annual floodwaters include boating and the serene experience that is a mokoro excursion. A mokoro is a traditional dugout canoe that’s propelled by a guide with a pole (rather like a Venetian gondola). These slow-moving, stable vessels give you a whole new perspective as you glide along the waterways of the Okavango Delta and let you appreciate tiny details like delicate water lilies and painted reed frogs.
A paradise for predators
The sheer profusion of game in the Delta means that the area is very rich in predators including lion, leopard, cheetah and wild dog. The fact that many of the professional safari guides who work here have years of experience, and know the territories and habits of these creatures intimately, means that quality sightings are very likely indeed. This, plus the astonishing natural beauty of the Delta, means that it is a wonderful setting in which to take stunning wildlife images.
Remote yet closer than you might think
On safari in the Okavango Delta, you could be forgiven for feeling you’re a world away from anywhere – and you’d be right. That said, the luxury lodges (some of Botswana’s most opulent properties can be found on islands within the Okavango) are easily reached by charter flights – indeed, most of the lodges and luxury tented camps have their own small airstrips. Maun, the ‘frontier town’ that serves as the gateway to the Okavango, is connected by scheduled flights to both Johannesburg and Cape Town.
In the same way, time spent enjoying land and water activities in the Okavango Delta can easily be combined with Botswana’s other iconic safari areas such as the Chobe and Savuti, as well as the lunar-like landscape of the Makgadikgadi Salt Pans. In addition, the Delta lends itself naturally to being included in itineraries that also include Victoria Falls in neighboring Zimbabwe or Zambia.
To explore the best of the Okavango Delta on your next safari adventure, contact the travel experts at Journey Beyond today.