Zambia has an immense wildlife and environmental heritage, enshrined in some 20 national parks occupying about 30% of the country’s surface area, including some of the wildest and largest in the whole of Africa.
The 22,000 square kilometer Kafue National Park is Zambia’s main national park and among the largest in the whole of Africa. This immense protected area is still little explored in its entirety and little visited by safaris, although it offers incredible and varied opportunities for sightings on its territory. Its environmental variety ranges from vast expanses of savannah, to rocky areas, from swampy areas to miombo and mopane forests, and river scenery along the course of the Kafue River. One of the areas most frequented by wildlife are the Busanga Swamps, on the edge of the swamp areas, where hundreds of elephants, buffalo, wildebeest, lechwe antelopes, lions and leopards congregate in the driest season.
The South Luangwa National Park, covering an area of about 9,000 square kilometres south of the Luangwa River course, which divides it from the North Luangwa National Park, is probably one of the most beautiful parks in Africa, famous for having inaugurated the walking safari, an exciting alternative to game drives or boat excursions, in close contact with the wildest nature. Spectacular sightings of leopards and around the river and lagoons in the driest season, of some 60 species with only the rhinoceros missing from the roll call, first and foremost the copious herds of elephants and buffalo, but also a birdlife sample of 400 types of birds, for birdwatchers.
Definitely the wildest park in Zambia is the Lower Zambezi National Park, which until 1983 was the president’s private hunting reserve and therefore remained virtually devoid of facilities and easily accessible roads. It is precisely the difficulty of access that makes it one of the less frequented safari parks, which has preserved its environment intact, favoured by herds of elephant, buffalo and antelope that congregate on the plains near the Zambezi River that bounds it to the south. Boat trips are characteristic, in close contact with the impressive colonies of hippos, crocodiles, a multitude of birds and the families of elephants that constantly ablution or ford its course from one bank to the other, in search of food.
An unforgettable experience is witnessing the seasonal migration of wildebeests in Liuwa Plain National Park, or the bats that cross the skies by the millions in Kasanka National Park, a favourite birdwatching sanctuary.
Exuberant nature and wildlife, including savannahs, forests, plateaus and floodplains, washed by the fertile river waters that flow through Zambia. Boundless and wild spaces, where you will feel like a little extra, as in an adventurous novel by the famous Zambian writer Wilburn Smith.
