Fanned out like a silvery hand, the Okavango Delta spreads its fingers across some of the last true wilderness left on Earth.
The beginnings of the Okavango Delta’s complex system of waterways are as bizarre as they are fascinating. Instigated by some sizeable tectonic plate drama around 60,000 years ago, the once fast-flowing river went wildly off course. All plateaued with no place to go, the waters settled into what is now the world’s largest inland delta, measuring 50,000 square kilometres at high water. And in its midst, life flourished. The Okavango Delta’s signature palm-fringed islands grew from seed deposits left on termite mounds by passing birds and baboons. Droves of hippos, drawn by this new prime real estate, carved out the winding channels you can see from the air. And its gin-clear waters, filtered by the Kalahari sand, began to ebb and flow with the annual rains.
At the height of Botswana’s dry winter, when the rest of the country is parched brown, the Okavango Delta does something it isn’t supposed to: it floods. Fed by rains that fell in Angola months earlier, the Delta swells to three times its size, and as the water creeps in, inch by inch, the wildlife pours in right behind it. From birds to elephants, and just about anything that wants to eat you.
The Delta is adorned with an array of perfectly polished camps and priceless experiences. Where a camp sits determines what you’ll spend your days doing. Water-based camps, deep in permanent-water territory, draw crowds of hippos and elephants and some of the best birdlife on the continent. Gliding along the channels by mokoro is the real draw here. Land-based camps hug the floodplains on the Delta’s fringes: game-drive country, thick with predators, walking safaris and the odd night drive. Can’t decide? Don’t.
Getting there means flying; most of the Delta’s best concessions have no other option. Maun is the official gateway (Kasane, occasionally, the alternative), and it isn’t much to look at: an airport, a handful of sun-kissed bush pilots, and several thousand donkeys, give or take. Don’t be fooled, it runs like a Swiss watch. From here, a fleet of tiny aircraft, tails bearing gloriously specific registrations like OWL, LEO and GNU, island-hop you across the Delta. Game-viewing starts the moment you lift off, with elephants and hippos reduced to specks below.
