San Camp

The five twin tents are light and airy with roll-up windows that offer panoramic views of the Kalahari Desert from the comfort of your own bed. The twin bedrooms are furnished with two large four-poster beds with cotton sheets, soft blankets and plush pillows, as well as colourful rugs, comfy armchairs and a mahogany writing desk. The bedrooms also include snuggly hot water bottles for the cool mornings and evenings during Botswana’s dry season.

The solar-powered lanterns give the tents a cosy and warm atmosphere and create a magical feel once the sun has dipped beneath the desert plains. The en-suite bathroom features hot and cold running water, indoor showers and a flush toilet. The tent leads out to your own verandah where you can sit back and marvel at the stunning landscape, and keep an eye out for any passing wildlife on the horizon.

San Camp has two spacious double tents which both feature a sprawling four-poster double bed, ideal for collapsing onto after an exciting day of activities. The beds are covered with soft cotton sheets, blankets and pillows, allowing you to cuddle up and gaze out at the horizon in utter comfort. The tents also consist of colourful rugs, comfy armchairs and a mahogany writing desk. Additionally, a snuggly hot water bottle will be provided for the cool mornings and evenings of Botswana’s dry season.

The tent can be lit up with solar-powered lanterns during the evening, giving your surroundings a warm and magical atmosphere. The en-suite bathroom features hot and cold running water, indoor showers and a flush toilet. The tents also include a private verandah, where guests can sit outside and look for scavenging meerkats and passing zebra during the day, or gaze at the stunning star scape at night.

Guests can expect to enjoy three delicious meals each day, as well as a range of sweet homemade treats from the tea tent and tasty canapés in the evenings. Wake up to a light breakfast before embarking on your first activity on the day, and come back to camp in time for a hearty lunch at midday.

Dinner can be enjoyed in the mess tent, a perfect place to interact with your fellow guests and view the interesting display of natural history artefacts of San Camp. Dig into a three-course meal, the starter usually consists of a light soup, and dinner concludes with an indulgent dessert. All meals are freshly prepared by the camp’s chefs and are elegantly presented. Finish off the evening with a refreshing beverage from the camp’s bar.

Embark on a game drive across the Kalahari Desert in an open-sided 4×4 safari vehicle. The vehicles are designed for 6 guests, and includes rooftop seating for an elevated view. Speed across the Nwetwe Pan and look out for zebra, bat-eared foxes and the occasional lion or elephant.

Marvel at the unique desert wildlife and keep your eyes peeled for the brown hyena, the rarest species of hyena. Learn interesting facts about the extraordinary creatures that live on the pans and in the desert from a professional guide, and explore the amazing Makgadikgadi region.

Walk amongst the habituated meerkats that have made their homes around Camp Kalahari and watch these fun and quirky creatures as they scurry around on the hunt for scorpions and other tasty morsels. These friendly meerkats are used to human presence, and may even use you as a lookout point for keeping a watch for predators. Walks take place from sunrise and guests will be accompanied by one of the camp’s guides.

San Camp has worked together with the local Zu/’hoasi Bushmen since it opened. Follow the bushmen on a guided walk and learn about their heritage and culture. The Zu/’hoasi Bushmen will also pass on their extensive knowledge of the surrounding wildlife, and teach you about surviving in this unique environment.

Set off on a horse safari as the classic explorers once did, and gallop over the salt-crusted earth of the Makgadikgadi Salt Pans. Explore the open plains at your own pace with the wind in your hair, and immerse yourself in the tranquil and empty landscape, occasionally finding herds of wildebeest and passing wildlife.

Speed across the Makgadikgadi Pans on a morning quad bike ride and get a sense of the true size of this immense landscape. Once the huge Makgadikgadi Lake, the salt pans are all that remain. During the dry season, the land is white and baron, creating a large empty space where guests can lose themselves in the peaceful and quiet atmosphere. Guests are advised to wear sunglasses or goggles to protect themselves from the dust.

Visit Chapman’s Baobab, a colossal baobab tree that was discovered by the explorer James Chapman in 1852. Guests can climb over its branches and get a sense of the tree’s mighty size. The ancient tree is one of the three largest and oldest trees in Africa. Sadly, it now lies sprawled across the plains after the tree’s trunk split and it came crashing to the ground in 2016.

San Camp is a Natural Selection safari camp. Natural Selection supports the vision of the Botswana Community and Conservation Initiative (BCCI), which provides regional conservation and support for rural communities to develop sustainable land-use practices that promote conservation-based economic opportunities, facilitate landscape-scale wildlife movements, and provide for climate change resilience.

Natural Selection has also partnered with Coaching Conservation ‘to provide local people with the critical information they need to stay safe and healthy during the pandemic.’

‘Over the last three years, 1.5% of every guest’s stay in [Natural Selection’s] camps has gone towards community and conservation projects. Combined with the direct contributions that [Natural Selection’s] camps make to local community outreach, this amounts to nearly 1 million USD of committed funds.’

Natural Selections has been working with the local Khwai Village in order to identify needs within the community and create solutions. Natural Selections have launched a number of projects to do this, such as the Feed A Child programme which provides schoolchildren with a healthy vitamin-rich meal at the start of the school day, setting up a pre-school in Khwai Village and providing an income for the teachers, supporting the village elders and disabled members of the community, and providing homes with electricity using solar power.

Natural Selections’ initiatives not only help the local communities but inspires the local villagers to see ecotourism in a positive light, helping to prevent human and animal conflict.

The increase in the number of elephants in the Okavango Delta in recent years is a cause for celebration. However, for villagers along the Delta’s panhandle and outskirts, the sudden boost in elephant numbers means that their land is more likely to be trampled and humans may be at risk of fatal encounters.

Natural Selection has recognised that transportation for local communities is a need, and they worked with EcoExist and the Okavango Community Trust to launch the ‘Elephant Express’ in January 2020.  The ‘Elephant Express’ service transports children to schools safely, as well as helping patients get to clinics without the fear of crossing paths with a gigantic elephant.

Natural Selection ensures that 1.5% of your expedition fees goes to wildlife conservation. They also work with the local communities, governments and conservation organisations in order to help protect conservation areas, and sustain them.

The camps that are built are subtle and blend in with the environment and the habitats that already exist there, causing minimal disruption to the surrounding wildlife. San Camp is also entirely powered by solar energy, reducing carbon emissions and pollution, and the camp is a non-permanent structure. This means if the camp were ever to be removed, the landscape would quickly return exactly to how it was before San Camp appeared.

Natural Selection started the Etosha Heights Rhino Protection program which is an anti-poaching group that monitor Rhinos, and ensure that poachers are unable to illegally hunt these endangered creatures.

‘We take rhino conservation extremely seriously, and the Etosha Heights team work tirelessly to safeguard the future of these bushveld unicorns and ensure that many more generations can enjoy watching them. Within the reserve, we have an anti-poaching camp and team that are dedicated to protecting the rhinos and preventing any illegal hunting from happening along the boundaries of the reserve’.

‘Our rangers are on the ground 24 hours a day and have completed an intensive training programme to ensure that they’re the best of the best. Combined with new state of the art anti-poaching surveillance technology, this team is a force to be reckoned with.’