Planning a South African/Botswana/Zambia trip in Oct.
 

The principal purpose of our trip is to visit camps - see animals.
Would appreciate advice on the optimum length of stay in each camp?

Each country you list has many wildlife areas with many camps or lodges.

To answer your general question, in the countries you mention, I like at least 3 nights per lodging. When I've stayed twice that, I've felt it was beneficial and never found things repetitious or dull. That's because nature is ever changing.

If your goal is TO SEE ANIMALS then you may wish to reduce the number of countries, parks, and accommodations, to spend more time in fewer places. Time in transit between locations rarely provides wildlife viewing opportunities.

To begin, are there certain animals you wish to see? And, how much time to you have for your entire trip? Your budget may dictate the # of days.

Perhaps we will cross paths - we have a Namibia, Botswana, Zambia, Malawi trip booked for October.

Like atravelynn, I prefer three or more nights at a camp, but our stay at tented camps or lodges is often dictated by our budget. Do you have a tentative itinerary you are able to post? Robin

thanks to you both for the good advice. We're going to plan on four nights in each of the camps - probably four camps in all. Itinerary and which camps still TBD. Overall we'll be travelling for about four weeks. Camps, Victoria Falls, a day in J'burg for the apartheid museum, then Capetown and a few days on the Garden Route.

Looks like a great plan, Jessicate.

If you visit Livingstone in Zambia you can go on a safari walk in the national park and get up close to the animals. It is a really memorable experience. I did it last year, stayed at Fawlty Towers lodge (http://www.adventure-africa.com/) and went on safari adventures. You can stay an Chobe national park (http://www.chobe-national-park.com/) in Botswana as well..they have loads of animals and game drive packages.

try this place www.2waytravel.com

Try and make sure that the different camps you are visiting have different types of game experience too -you may want to do game walks, mokoro rides (botswana) and balloon trips etc as a change from just sitting in a vehicle. Ask the guides to show you the different habitats within their areas as well -that way you'll see a wider variety of flora and fauna.

We have just started looking into doing a similar safari this October too! So if it's alright, I'll jump in now and then, but I'll be posting my own topic soon.

Although...atravelynn's tiger safari has definitely caught our eye! Hmmmmm......

Do a round the world trip and you can include both India and Africa.

If only it were as simple as getting a RTW ticket.

In South Africa you must include at least one camp in the Sabi Sand and/or Timbavati private reserves. Both reserves border Kruger Park on the west Kruger border. (But no fence separating them from Kruger). Kruger park itself is very mush worth a four day visit, you rent a car and become your own game ranger in Kruger!!!

regards - tom