Chobe National Park

Elephants galore!

We visited Chobe on a day trip from Victoria Falls in Zimbabwe, organised through the company Wild Horizons. Chobe national park is about an hour's drive from Victoria Falls town, plus about 15 minutes at the border crossing in each direction.

We had a morning river safari with 2 incredible guides, and saw a huge variety of wildlife, including hundreds of birds, several types of antelope, crocodiles, hippos and a staggering number of elephants. Chobe has one of the biggest populations of elephants in Africa, and as our guide said, once you've seen one group of elephants there are sure to be many more nearby. We certainly were not disappointed!

After lunch we had a 3 hour game drive, again with a very knowledgeable and enthusiastic guide. We were able to get much closer to the elephants and other animals, and even saw 3 lions (2 female and one male) stalking a puku near the river. Our guide also pointed out insects and plants of interest, and went out of his way to try and ensure that everyone was happy with their safari experience.

We would definitely return to Chobe on safari and would recommend it to others. It represents an amazing and authentic safari experience and fantastic value compared to some of the other more popular parks in southern Africa. We would also recommend booking through Wild Horizons as they offered a great all inclusive package with transfers and a brilliant buffet lunch, the staff were helpful and all were respectful of the environment and stressed the importance of conservation measures to protect this incredible place.

For my photography. Magnificent sightings and exceptional birdlife. Would highly recommend

Chobe National Park has much to offer for all.

I visited Chobe National Park as part of a group of 18. We stayed at Chobe Bush Lodge and had our meals there as well. For the three days there, we partook of three game drives and two cruises on the Zambezi River.

Our park ranger drivers were very knowledgeable about the wildlife in the park, including birds (though I am not a birder, some members of our group were). While we did not see leopards on our drives, we did encounter the rest of the 'Big 5' more than once. Our drivers were very cooperative in allowing us sufficient time for taking pictures. Botswana is justifiably well known for its elephants, and we did encounter them on numerous occasions. Lions and Cape buffalo were also seen on a few occasions and hippos in large numbers during our river cruises. We did not encounter much in the way of zebras, wildebeests, or rhinos. I imagine this was due to the type of terrain in the park.

Our accommodations at the lodge were very well appointed and comfortable. We had a wide variety of meal choices available and could choose to eat either at the lodge itself or at the nearby Chobe Safari Lodge.

Weather during our visit could hardly have been better - we had no rain and temperatures during the day were comfortably warm.

We arrived at Chobe Bush Lodge by motor coach, coming from a visit to Zimbabwe to see Victoria Falls and earlier from South Africa and left by plane from nearby Kasane, flying to Johannesburg and then back to the United States.

A gorgeous park with amazing elephant and hippo viewing, as well as good birding opportunities.

I'd been on safari at other locations for about ten days already in South Africa, and I'd previously been on two safaris in Kenya and Tanzania, but here we saw the highest concentration of elephants and for the first time got to observe them at length as they drank and played in and around a large body of water. Being able to view wildlife from a boat on the river was also a new experience and allowed us to see a different array of behaviors.

Chobe is also the only place I've seem hippos out and about in large numbers during the day. This is apparently because they need to spend more time eating because of the fierce competition for resources from the large elephant population.

The scenery was gorgeous, especially from the river. I appreciated the number and variety of birds that could be viewed on the river even in midday.

We were there only for a day trip. The weather was hot but not oppressive, and the boat and jeep both had shades to protect from the sun. A rainshower came while we were having lunch but left as quickly as it came and did not interfere our game drives/boating.

We had previously stayed on private reserves in South Africa and our guides in Chobe, while knowledgeable, did not seem to have the same depth/variety of knowledge. For example, our group had a lot of interest in plant life, and our guides did not know much beyond the major grasses and trees. Perhaps they knew them in the local language, but not in English or Latin. Since this was just a day trip for us, though, we didn't have a lot of time to study plants so it wasn't a major drawback.

Our lunch was good and there appeared to be a variety of accommodations in town for varying budgets. The roads to and from the park were wonderful. I was pleasantly surprised by the way drivers observed the speed limit.

The town near Chobe is well built-out, so you don't feel like you're in the middle of nowhere. However, there were some lodges located within the park or on the river, and these had more of a remote feel.

On the drive/boat ride we encountered other vehicles, but there were no "traffic jams." All vehicles/boats I saw had guides, and there were never more than three vehicles (but usually one) at a single viewing spot. Drivers were careful not to block each others' sight lines.

Amazing wildlife experience on and off the Chobe River

Overall our Chobe Nat Park experience was amazing. We only were in the park one day but we had a river safari and land safari, both were wonderful. We travelled to Chobe while on our SmarTours vacation with the optional Victoria Falls extension. Our all the safari tours we experienced Africa, this was the best safari to view elephants. It was amazing to watch parade after parade of elephants travel to the river to drink water and play in the mud. The weather was hot around 104F but was expected since we traveled during the summer. We stayed in Zimbabwe at the Victoria Falls Safari Lodge which I couldn't rate any higher than Excellent. Our tour was through Wild Horizon and they did a great job transferring us through the border of Botswana. The line through customs was rather long on the way back which was not preferred since we were roasting in the sun and it was hot. We only safari'ed in Botswana, would have like to seen Zambia and Namibia but we would have had to buy more visas which are fairly expensive. Not sure of the hotel we ate lunch at but the food was amazing, some of the best food we had while in Africa. The wait staff was excellent. The lunch was included with the tour through Wild Horizon. Our overall experience in Chobe was excellent and I would highly recommend to anyone wanted to see wildlife especially elephants. I would definitely go back if I ever had the chance.

The most concentrated and profuse assortment of wild animals.

A great place for wildlife lovers

Chobe National Park is an amazing place for wildlife and safari lovers.
The parc is really beautiful and the guides very competent. I did an early morning drive and saw lions, baboons, elephants, giraffes...
I also did the cruise on Chobe river and it will remain as one of the highlights of my stay in Botswana. Everyone is very quiet and respectful of the animals, you can observe crocodiles, hippos, herds of elephants and a large variety of birds.
I definitely recommend this place!

Exciting and inspiring!

I think it was great. All of it. From the beginning of the drive till sleeping in the tents.

Elephants' swimming pool

I stay in CNP in september 2015, during my 16 days tour in Southern Africa with kiboko Adventures.
Chobenationalpark was the very first place where I finally saw wild animals in my life, expecially hippos, my favourite guys. It was an amazing experience, as I was very lucky. In fact during two days and three game drive I saw lions (a family with puppies), Leopard, elephants, hippos, baboons, giraffes, crocs, vultures, marabous and several species of Birds. Our guides allows us to take fantastic pictures, thank you guys! I think the only bad think was the huge Number of vehicles and boats during our game drives. It seemed to stay on a hightway...By the way I came home with Africa in my heart...and I ll come back as soon as possible.

Chobe gives the opportunity to experience the bush in a river setting and a rich mix of species.

We visited Chobe, whilst staying in Kasane, as part of a road trip from Cape Town to Namibia and Botswana. There has been little winter rainfall this year in Southern Africa and Etosha in Namibia was very dry and dusty. Chobe, with its river location, was, by comparison, green and lush. This results in a varied mix of animal and bird species in a relatively small area.
We completed the whole trip in a two wheeled drive VW Polo, which was perfectly adequate for the majority of the trip and was very frugal on petrol. However, this means that access to Chobe National Park in your own vehicle is not possible, due to the sandy nature of the roads in the Park and the need for good ground clearance. Instead it was necessary to use game drives, which whilst costly, has the advantage of a driver / guide, which gives you a greater opportunity for viewing and photography.
Elephants abound in Chobe and it is nice to see them visit the river in groups for bathing and drinking. Buffalo are also common.
It is particularly important to visit the Park on a boat trip from Kasane. Not only does this give a different viewing dimension but it provides the opportunity to have close encounters with Buffalo , Hippo and Crocs. The rare Puku and Red Lechwe antelope species were easier to see from the boat. The bird species seen along the river are also impressive. Fish eagle, open billed stork and giant kingfisher, being highlights.
Kasane offers a range of accommodation from safari type lodges to bed and breakfast accommodation to suit all tastes. It also has an excellent range of shops, banks, petrol stations and eating establishments. As independent travellers we found it is easy to organise the game drives and boat trips. As a bonus, it is also a good location to visit Victoria Falls in Zimbabwe.