Namibia: Nkasa Lupala National Park

🚗 Crossing the Border & Picking Up the Wheels

We crossed into Namibia from Botswana at the Ngoma Bridge border crossing, which sits right on the Chobe River and is one of the more scenic border gates you’ll encounter anywhere in Africa. You could alternatively make the drive from Windhoek, Namibia’s capital city — but that would be a journey of roughly 1,200 kilometres through the heart of the country, which even by southern African standards is a serious undertaking. We had no complaints about coming in from Botswana.

At the border, we were met by a representative from the vehicle hire company who were supplying us with our transport for the Namibian leg of the trip. The vehicle in question turned out to be a Toyota Fortuner — a step up from the Land Cruiser we had been rattling around Botswana in. The Fortuner is a proper mid-size SUV built on a body-on-frame ladder chassis, designed for exactly this sort of work, and this particular example was comfortable and well-equipped with all the extras you could want. We were quietly impressed. That said, we couldn’t help wondering how its relatively modest ground clearance was going to cope with the notoriously sandy tracks we knew we’d be encountering further south and west in Namibia. As it turned out, those concerns were entirely justified — but that is a story for another post.

From the border we were driven to Katima Mulilo, the regional capital of the Zambezi Region and a surprisingly busy town of roughly 28,000 people sitting right on the southern bank of the Zambezi River. The town serves as the main commercial hub for the entire region and has a reasonable range of shops, banks, and services. We stocked up on food supplies, hit the ATM for some Namibian dollars, and got ourselves a local SIM card so we wouldn’t be entirely cut off from civilisation. It was also the moment to say our goodbyes to our driver, which felt rather like being pushed out of the nest — suddenly we were on our own, loose in Namibia for the very first time. Slightly terrifying, if we’re honest.

🏕️ Nkasa Lupala Tented Lodge — Our Base for Two Days

For the next two days, our base was to be the Nkasa Lupala Tented Lodge, located approximately 110 kilometres south-west of Katima Mulilo. The lodge is built right on the banks of one of the many channels of the Kwando-Linyanti river system, sitting on the northern unfenced border of the park within the Wuparo Conservancy. The Wuparo Conservancy is one of the many community-run conservancies that form part of Namibia’s celebrated communal conservancy programme — a model that has attracted worldwide admiration and numerous awards for the way it balances wildlife conservation with the very real economic needs of local communities. The programme, supported by organisations including the Integrated Rural Development and Nature Conservation (IRDNC) and the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), has been running since the mid-1990s and is widely regarded as one of the most successful community-based conservation initiatives in the world.

The Nkasa Lupala Tented Lodge itself is a joint venture between the private sector and the Wuparo Conservancy, meaning that local community members benefit directly from the tourism income it generates. The lodge building is pleasantly small and unpretentious — there is a bar, a restaurant, a comfortable sitting area, and a small plunge pool that looked extremely tempting in the afternoon heat. The whole structure overlooks a channel of the Kwando-Linyanti river system. The lodge staff mentioned that in recent years the channel had completely dried up — a worrying sign of the pressures on water systems across the region — but that good rains had brought it back to life, and it was once again full and flowing when we were there.

Our tent was raised on a wooden platform and looked out directly over the river channel, which is precisely the way things ought to be. Inside, we had a very large, comfortable bed and a private bathroom — proper glamping, as the young people apparently say these days. Out on the small deck at the front of the tent, a couple of chairs and a small table provided the perfect spot to sit with a sundowner and watch the marshland do its thing. The birdlife alone would keep you entertained for hours without leaving the deck. All in all, a thoroughly good billet.

🛥️ Day One: The Harubandi Channel Boat Cruise

In the afternoon we booked onto a boat cruise along the Harubandi Channel, part of the wider Kwando-Linyanti river system. A group of six of us set off from the lodge in a game drive vehicle, heading through the park to reach the water’s edge. Even on the short drive through the park we were rewarded with wildlife — zebra (specifically Burchell’s zebra, the common plains subspecies found across this region), giraffe, and those rather splendid long-tailed magpies catching the afternoon light.

The area is dominated by extensive marshes laced with narrow channels and shallow waters, so the boat we boarded was an entirely appropriate vessel for the job — a tiny, flat-bottomed affair with a roof to provide protection from both the sun and any rain that fancied having a go. The roof itself was robustly constructed and fitted with chairs, so the more adventurous amongst us could clamber up there for an elevated view across the reeds and papyrus. The boat nosed its way out into the narrow channels, winding through the dense stands of papyrus grass — Cyperus papyrus, the same plant that ancient Egyptians used to make writing material — which grows to well over three metres in height along these channels and creates an almost cathedral-like enclosed feeling as you push through it.

Almost immediately we could hear an elephant moving in the water somewhere close by, hidden from sight by the towering grasses. We gripped the sides of the boat with slightly white knuckles and hoped rather fervently that it wasn’t going to decide to come crashing through the papyrus exactly where we were passing. We needn’t have worried — it stayed put.

Eventually the channel opened out into a broader stretch of water, and in the distance, on the far bank of the river — which we were told was technically already Botswana — we could see a group of elephants going about their afternoon business on the riverbank. The tranquil scene was unfortunately interrupted when another boat, from a different operator, began approaching the elephants and got far too close for the animals’ comfort. What followed was a rather alarming display of displeasure from the elephants — a great deal of ear flapping, trunk waving, trumpeting, and what appeared to be a mock charge towards the boat. The boat backed off, the elephants backed off, and peace was eventually restored. It left us thoroughly irritated with the driver of that other boat, who quite frankly ought to have known better. These were elephants that were far less habituated to human presence than those in some of the more heavily visited parks, and approaching them that closely was irresponsible and needlessly stressful for the animals.

Continuing on our cruise, we spotted a magnificent African fish eagle — Haliaeetus vocifer — perched imperiously in a tree overhanging the river, surveying its territory with the sort of aristocratic disdain that only an apex predator can properly pull off. Its distinctive call, a haunting, yelping cry that carries for enormous distances, is often described as the sound of Africa itself. Along the water’s edge, pied kingfishers — Ceryle rudis, the only kingfisher species that can hover like a kestrel — were working the water with tremendous energy. Small groups of red lechwe antelope (Kobus leche leche) patrolled the banks, grazing on the lush water-margin grasses. The lechwe is supremely adapted to wetland environments, with elongated hooves and water-resistant legs that allow it to move through shallow water far more effectively than most other antelope species.

Then, with very little warning, we came upon a pod of hippos — and rather closer than we would have ideally liked, truth be told. A fully-grown male hippopotamus (Hippopotamus amphibius) can weigh well over three tonnes and is capable of capsizing a small flat-bottomed boat with minimal effort. They are, despite their apparently lethargic demeanour, responsible for more human fatalities in Africa each year than virtually any other large mammal. Our driver moved us past with commendable promptness, and we all exhaled with some relief once we were clear.

The undoubted highlight of the entire cruise, however, was what came next. We came across a small herd of female elephants, juvenile males, and calves that were feeding on the vegetation along the water’s edge. When we first spotted them, they were perhaps 200 metres away, pulling at bushes with their trunks in that unhurried, methodical way that elephants have. Our boat pulled in quietly to the bank so we could settle in and watch. We sat there for a considerable time — long enough for the sundowner drinks to be produced, which only added to what was already a rather perfect moment in life.

The African elephant (Loxodonta africana) is the largest land animal on earth, with adult bulls reaching up to four metres at the shoulder and weighing up to seven tonnes. The Kwando-Linyanti system supports a large and healthy elephant population, part of the broader trans-boundary population that moves between Botswana’s Chobe National Park, Namibia, Zimbabwe, and Zambia — one of the largest elephant concentrations anywhere on the planet, estimated at well over 130,000 animals.

As we watched, the herd gradually drifted closer and closer. Then a couple of the juvenile males — at that entertaining adolescent stage where they’re big enough to feel bold but lack the wisdom to be sensible about it — decided they didn’t much like our continued presence, even though we hadn’t moved the boat in the best part of half an hour. There was some ear-flapping and a certain amount of posturing, and our guide made the very sensible decision to begin a strategic withdrawal. This was complicated slightly by the fact that we had drifted onto the reeds and were temporarily stuck, requiring some undignified pushing and shoving with legs to get the boat back into open water. The juvenile males watched this performance with what we chose to interpret as contempt.

By the time we were clear, the sun was dropping towards the horizon and the sky was doing something spectacular with oranges and reds. The elephants stood on the riverbank perfectly silhouetted against it, which was the sort of moment you fly to Africa for.

Then the herd decided to cross the river. Elephants are extraordinary swimmers — they use their trunks as snorkels when the water is deep enough to submerge them, and they can cross substantial bodies of water with apparent ease. Even the smallest calf in the group made the crossing, bobbing along with its little trunk raised above the surface like a furry, grey periscope. It was utterly charming.

The return journey meant running the gauntlet of the hippo pod once more, which we did with slightly less white-knuckling than the first time, before finally pulling back into the bank and transferring to the game drive vehicle. Due to a slight mishap involving not one but two flat tyres somewhere along the park tracks — which is precisely why the vehicle preparation checklist recommends carrying two spares — we arrived back at the lodge in full darkness. Night falls with remarkable speed this close to the equator.

Dinner at the lodge is served at one large communal table — one of those lovely old safari traditions that forces you to actually talk to the other people you’re sharing a wilderness with, rather than retreating to a private table and staring at your phone. Most of our fellow guests that evening were a large group from Belgium, who turned out to be a thoroughly jolly crew. Many of them spoke excellent English, the conversation flowed very freely, and we had a lovely time of it.