Classic Walking Safaris

South Luangwa Walking Safari - 4 nights for a total of £767 per person

Your itinerary begins at the remote Kaingo Lodge, located towards the north of the Park, reached by a game drive transfer from your previous hosts. Later that afternoon you will take your first walk in the bush, arriving back in camp in time for sundowners, which can then be followed by a night game drive, if you wish (there is no walking at night, for obvious reasons). The following morning you will transfer on foot to their Mwamba Bush Camp, then following a similar itinerary to that of the previous day.

A game drive will then transfer you to Wildlife Camp in time for lunch, followed by an afternoon walk in their own land on the banks of the Luangwa river. The following morning you will transfer on foot to Wildlife’s bush camp, a unique experience which is about as basic as it gets, incorporating fly tents, bucket showers and long drop loos. The following morning some guests will be relieved to be returning to civilisation again: others will need to be dragged away from this unique experience.

Norman Carr Walking Safari - 6 nights for a total of £1733 per person

This walking module begins at one of Norman Carr Safaris’ four remote bush camps, reached by a game drive transfer from your previous hosts. Later that afternoon you will take your first walk in the bush, arriving back in camp in time for sundowners, which can then be followed by a night game drive, if you wish, as above. The following day you will explore the terrain in the vicinity of this bush camp. On the third day you will walk to the next camp in the series, which is located in a different habitat, then following a similar itinerary to that of the previous day. On the fifth day you will again transfer on foot to the next camp in the series, enabling you to experience yet a further habitat, then following the same pattern as previously. The camps used will be any three that are next to each other in the sequence Luwi, Nsolo, Kakuli and Mchenja, depending on availability and preference. In fact Mchenja is slightly more expensive than the other three camps, and staying here adds £56 per person to the above cost.

It is perfectly possible to extend or reduce the above itinerary by a day or two, depending on how much walking you wish to undertake. All walks last up to 4 hours, and are usually taken at a leisurely pace, allowing time to study everything that is encountered along the way – from animal tracks and droppings through plant and insect life, to the same sort of big game that is encountered when travelling by vehicle.

Robin Pope Walking Mobile Safari - 10 nights for a total of £3100 per person

This safari actually involves two nights conventional game viewing at Nkwali, concluding with three nights at Tena Tena, between which is sandwiched the actual walking mobile safari, which lasts for 5 nights. Hence this particular module in itself provides both the Game Viewing and Walking Safari experiences.

Thus your safari begins with two nights at Robin Pope’s legendary Nkwali Camp, situated on Robin’s own land in a marvellous spot on the banks of the river. Game drives from Nkwali can enter the Park via the main gate, or into a quite different sector, by crossing the river on a pontoon. It concludes with a game drive into the remote north of the Park, up by the Mupamadzi river, a tributary of the Luangwa itself.

Here you will stay in substantial fly tents, accompanied by the customary bucket shower and long drop loo, walking to the next location each day, your camp being struck and driven or portered around to this new location, together with your baggage. This region is one of the most remote in the whole of Zambia, and you are very unlikely to meet another human being. Concomitantly the wildlife is much less habituated to the presence of man, and hence behaves much more naturally.

On your return from the Mupamadzi area you will finish up at Robin’s other well-known camp – Tena Tena, described by the London Times as “altogether beyond superlatives . . . one of the best safari camps in the whole of Africa”, at which you will spend your final two nights, before moving on to the next phase of your visit.

Next - Zambezi Safaris

• Example Itinerary 1:
  The Hemingway Safari
• Example Itinerary 2:
  The Livingstone Safari