Travel reviews by Neil from Sydney

"This was my thirteenth visit to Botswana, but my first time at Kwara. I enjoyed my time there, the camp is lovely and it retains a traditional safari feel despite the upgrade a few years ago. The rooms are well-appointed, very spacious and with a large shady balcony to enjoy the afternoon siesta and the ever-present wildlife in camp. All staff members were friendly and helpful, and the only minor issue I encountered was a problem with the shower which took a couple of requests before it was fixed.

The exceptional rains earlier in the year made game viewing a bit challenging, as the grass was still extremely long in early June, so predator sightings were not as frequent as I had hoped. A recent buffalo kill ensured regular sightings of one of the resident lion prides, and I also had good sightings of a solitary male, and male and female, lions. Only one brief sighting of a leopard, which was largely obscured by the grass; and one close up viewing of a male cheetah with an impala kill. The highlight was on my last afternoon drive, with a terrific sighting of a pack of 18 wild dogs; I was able to see them waking up and going through their greeting rituals, then (unsuccessfully) hunting a crocodile basking by a waterhole, a zebra foal (which the adult zebras diligently protected), and two impalas which had narrow escapes. Kwara is very strict at adhering to the limit of 3 vehicles on a sighting, so I was very grateful to my guide for enabling me to join another vehicle to stay with the dogs.

The scenery in the concession is beautiful, but I would comment that almost all the best wildlife sightings were some distance away around Splash Camp. This tallies with a previous stay at Splash Camp, where I had numerous predator sightings; but apart from this, I much preferred the atmosphere at Kwara to Splash (which felt a little impersonal and had more of a “hotel” feel).

The guiding was good, but in my opinion not outstanding; George and Sunday were always cheerful and friendly, but I think their style is maybe more suited to safari newcomers rather than experienced safari-goers.

And as a personal preference, I was very glad that Kwara did not indulge in “safari gimmicks” such as the “traditional song and dance” performances that so many camps now routinely hold.

Overall I would recommend Kwara and I would definitely return."

"This was my second visit to Lagoon Camp and I found the overall experience much improved from my previous stay.

The room was absurdly large, and I cannot for the life of me understand why it has that “half step” two levels, but it was very comfortable, was cool and airy, and the view from the balcony of the resident hippos and lechwes was great. The staff were all friendly, and I had no problems with anything in the room.

I was initially disappointed that one of my favourite guides, Lucas (who I knew from a visit to Kanana Camp) had just gone on leave, but the guide and tracker (K1 and T4) that I got were absolutely outstanding; exceptionally diligent at tracking predators, communicative without talking too much, and clearly very experienced. (This was in contrast to my previous visit in 2019, when I found the guiding and tracking quite disappointing).

The earlier heavy rains in the Delta did not seem to have been experienced up in Kwando, and the game viewing was terrific. I particularly enjoyed the prolonged leopard sightings of a female leopard with her two sub-adult cubs, a big male leopard hunting, and another sighting of the female hunting before posing perfectly on a termite mound. There were also good sightings of two cheetah brothers, several lion sightings, and one afternoon drive with a pack of dogs. General game was fairly plentiful, although the emphasis was very much on looking for predators.

As with my time at Kwara Camp, I was very pleased that there were no “song and dance” performances or safari surprises, which I really don’t enjoy - instead, the focus at Lagoon is on game viewing and experiencing the wild and very beautiful concession."