Trailing a few feet behind Jasper, my guide in Matusadona National Park, I’m gobsmacked when he stoops to pick up some elephant dung and wheels round to do a taste test. While that might sound awful, dried elephant dung is largely made up of vegetation – they process food very inefficiently, which is why they have to eat such voluminous amounts. With a satisfied look he spits out “female!” Apparently, male dung is especially potent while the girls produce less robust waste. Welcome to Zimbabwe.
For years, I’ve heard about Zimbabwe’s legendary safari guides. They train for four years, endure intense scrutiny from a panel of experts then set up a mobile bush camp for a week doing everything from guiding and hosting to plumping pillows and pouring gin and tonics. If they pass, they become pro guides. At my urging, my pro Jasper spent 30 minutes geeking out on the cells in elephants’ feet and trunks that enable them to feel seismic vibrations and communications from other elephants. I was riveted.
But it’s not just the guides that make Zimbabwe such a special safari destination. My two weeks in this country were a safari aficionado’s dream.
I started in the UNESCO World Heritage Site of Mana Pools National Park, known for its scenic beauty. Bordered by the Zambezi River that flows past on its way to the Indian Ocean, Mana Pools is remote and unspoiled.
Here you can walk, canoe, fish and enjoy traditional game drives. The park’s four natural pools (Mana means four in the Shona language) attract huge herds of elephants, buffalo, zebra and antelopes, while megapods of hippos and huge crocs wallow in the water. Predator sightings are excellent year-round but from September to November, lion, cheetah, leopard and wild dog join their prey at the pools for high safari drama.
A highlight was watching a hippo submerge himself in the shallow water outside my gorgeous tent at Molori Mashuma, roll over for what looked like a back scratch, his feet pedaling the air like a dog’s, followed by an elephant sauntering into the dining area at breakfast.
Mana Pools has a range of accommodations, from rustic bush camps to luxury tents that rival Africa’s finest. I stayed in both and loved the contrast. With the park nearly 50% larger than Kenya’s Masai Mara, I recommend combining two camps or lodges in different areas for the most complete experience.
Flying between parks in Zimbabwe used to be pricey until November 2022 when Botswana-based Mack Air expanded into the country. It was an easy hop from Mana Pools to Matusadona National Park and Lake Kariba for a couple of days and then to Hwange National Park.
Hwange, near the Botswana border in northwest Zimbabwe, is roughly the size of Connecticut. It’s one of Africa’s largest safari areas with astonishing wildlife numbers. Unlike Mana Pools, Hwange has no natural water sources to support its 45,000 elephants, 600 lions, more than 30 packs of wild dog, north of 10,000 buffalo and oodles (a well-accepted math term) of giraffe, zebra, eland and other plains game that make up the more than 100 mammal species in the park.
Wildlife in Hwange depends on about 60 pumped watering holes. Animals are everywhere you look in Hwange all year but if you visit during a full moon in the fall, you can join a unique “count” – a 24-hour annual wildlife census at a waterhole. Participants record every animal that comes to drink, contributing invaluable data to researchers. Ask us for dates to join the fun.
If that sounds too much like hard work, my informal tally on a single morning game drive was three cheetahs, including a female with two impossibly fluffy cubs; a lion pride with cubs on a kill; a solitary leopard lounging up a tree, her tail twitching like a metronome; 18 giraffes loping through the trees; a jackal couple – they mate for life so are almost always in pairs; and a clan of hyenas too big to count muscling their way across the landscape. Back in camp, hundreds of elephants come to bathe, play, mud-wallow and socialize. It’s like a wildlife documentary here and I wasn’t even there at peak season.
All that bounty aside, sometimes it’s one or two creatures that stand out. Hwange is an ideal habitat for black and white rhino. However, all but a handful of black rhino were poached for their horns and the larger, more docile white rhino were entirely wiped out. Ask elders in the Ndebele villages surrounding Hwange and they’ll tell you rhinos are part of their cultural heritage, etched into cave walls and woven into oral traditions. Yet their grandchildren have never seen one. Enter the Community Rhino Conservation Initiative.
A partnership between Imvelo Safari Lodges and the Ngamo community, this remarkable effort is restoring rhinos to their traditional range. But I’m not thinking about conservation as I walk across the golden savanna toward Thuza and Kusasa, a combined 8,000 pounds of white rhino in their prime. I’m flanked by Cobra scouts, part of an elite Community Wildlife Protection Unit, who come from local villages. They’re well-armed and now rockstars back at home. The Cobras are there to protect the animals from humans, not the other way around.
Thuza and Kusasa are impervious. They’re busy mowing the grass, munching up the 120 pounds of grass daily to sustain their bulk. Rhinos are among the species that conservationists call “charismatic megafauna,” chubby unicorns with widespread appeal. I’ve walked in the wild with elephants and polar bears, waddled with penguins and trekked gorillas but my time with these rhinos is incomparably peaceful. I feel relaxed in their presence and incredibly grateful to be here. From 30 feet away, I can see Kusasa’s right eye is irritated. “Puberty,” said Mark “Butch” Butcher, the visionary behind the initiative. “He and Thuza had a tussle yesterday.”
Butch has been a pro guide for four decades. His lifelong passion for Hwange’s wildlife and communities is what drives Imvelo, and the arrival of four (soon to be six) male white rhinos is just the beginning. Once the Cobras prove they can protect them, females will follow. These boys will breed, and rhinos will once again roam Hwange.
The vast funds poured into conservation usually benefit wealthy travelers and wildlife, but Butch has a broader vision. The rhino sanctuaries sit on community-owned land. Guests can choose to stay at Bomani Tented Lodge, situated in its own private conservancy or Camelthorn Lodge, nestled in a beautiful forest on community land. Both have access to visit the rhinos. Every dollar of the $180 each guest pays for the privilege of walking with rhinos pays for the scouts’ salaries and community development: 5,000 patients treated at Ngamo Clinic, 3,000 students at 14 schools get lunch every day, 16,000 people and their livestock have clean drinking water. The list goes on.
A stay here packs a huge safari punch at an affordable price, and everyone benefits. Meeting the Cobras, the Ngamo village chief and the clinic nurse, I see the community’s deep connection to wildlife, especially the rhinos. For them, protecting animals isn’t just conservation, it’s a path to a secure future.
My recent trip to Zimbabwe was eye-opening and deeply rewarding. The wildlife experiences are among the best in Africa and the Zimbabwean people are resilient, warm and as welcoming as any you’d hope to meet. With Victoria Falls as your gateway, Mana Pools and Hwange deliver diverse landscapes and outstanding guides. But it’s the range of activities – walking safaris, fishing, canoeing, boating, traditional game drives and the personal interaction with rhinos that make Zimbabwe one of the most dynamic safari destinations on the continent. For decades, I’ve heard safari gurus preach that Zimbabwe is Africa’s best-kept secret and greatest value. I couldn’t agree more!
Contact a Journey Specialist and subscribe to our newsletter below for more safari information and inspiration.
Photos courtesy AAC Senior Journey Specialist Tracy Stevens, Molori Mashuma, Imvelo Safari Lodges and Fothergill Island