Botswana – Best of Chobe Wildlife Photography Tour [2024]

THE ITINERARY

Here is the complete day-by-day itinerary for our amazing Botswana photography tour.

Legend: B (Breakfast), L (Lunch), D (Dinner)

22nd October – Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe

Accommodation – 3-Star Hotel

Our tour starts in Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe, with the meeting point being our beautiful 3-star hotel just 400m from the legendary falls. We will have a welcome dinner that evening to meet our fellow guests and get to know each other.

If you have not been to Victoria Falls before we recommend arriving a day or two early to make the most of all the activities you can do here. Airport transfers to the hotel are not included but can be arranged.

• Meals Included: None

23rd October – Victoria Falls to Our Chobe Houseboat, Botswana

Accommodation – Luxury Houseboat

We’ll have breakfast at our hotel before leaving mid-morning to cross the border to Botswana. After a short 1.5 hour drive we will arrive in Kasane, where we’ll meet our local guide and jump in a boat to be transferred to our floating base for the next two nights, a stunning luxury houseboat that sits over the border in Namibia. We’ll enjoy lunch on the houseboat and then get ready for our first afternoon river safari on the Chobe. Loading into the boat we’ll spend the next few hours searching for the big and small wildlife that calls the Chobe home. Dinner will be had on the houseboat after the safari.

• Meals Included: B, L, D
• Activities: Afternoon river safari

24th October – Chobe Houseboat

Accommodation – Luxury Houseboat

We’ll wake before sunrise to have a light breakfast and coffee before jumping in the boat and heading out for another river safari. The goal is to be on the river well before the sun comes up to allow for the best light for photography. We’ll cruise around looking for all kinds of animals, big and small, and morning is a perfect time for birdwatching here too. We’ll have tea and coffee on the river then come back to the houseboat for an early lunch and relaxation time.

In the afternoon we’ll have another light snack and then head out for another boat safari. Enjoying sunset on the river, we’ll return to our houseboat for an evening cocktail and dinner.

• Meals Included: B, L, D
• Activities: Morning and afternoon river safari

25th October – Kasane, Botswana

Accommodation – Pangolin Safari Lodge

We’ll start the day with another pre-sunrise boat safari, focusing on getting better photos and different experiences from the day before, and then will head back to the houseboat to pack our bags and move to the mainland.

After transferring to Kasane down the river we’ll head to our new accommodation for the next 4 nights, the splendid and luxurious Pangolin Safari Lodge. Once you’re settled in your room we’ll have a light snack here then jump in the open-top game vehicles for a land-based safari in search of different wildlife experiences.

Returning just after sunset we’ll have dinner and drinks at the lodge before calling it a night.

• Meals Included: B, L, D
• Activities: Morning river safari and afternoon game drive.

26th, 27th and 28th October – Kasane, Botswana

Accommodation – Pangolin Safari Lodge

While the structure of the next 3 days is the same, the experiences will likely be quite different depending on what we find in the park. We can opt for river or land safaris in the morning and afternoon, searching for more big mammals and colourful birdlife.

In the few hours between safaris we’ll conduct personalised photo editing workshops where you’ll learn how we use Adobe Lightroom to bring our creative images to life, and we can also help you editing your own images if you’d like.

At night we’ll have drinks and dinner under the stars.

• Meals Included: B, L, D
• Activities: Morning and afternoon river or land safaris, Lightroom editing workshops

29th October – Kasane, Botswana

It’s our last day together and depending on your flight out of Kasane you can either enjoy one final safari or relax at the lodge. You will be transferred to the Kasane Airport in time for your departure, or if you would like to return to Victoria Falls we can arrange a transfer for you.

If you would like to continue your safari adventures in Africa we can help book a very exclusive fly-in fly-out 5-star luxury safari experience in either the Okavango Delta or Kalahari Desert as an optional add-on to your Chobe tour.

It’s not good bye but see you later, and as we part ways in Kasane our group will now be fantastic friends.

• Meals Included: B
• Activities: Morning safari if you have time before your flight

Wildlife Photography on Our Botswana Tour

This tour is very much a photo safari, meaning that during our twice-daily river and game drives we will put a large focus on capturing fantastic and unique imagery of wildlife.

The boats we use for the river safaris have been custom-built by the team at Pangolin to cater for photographers, and there are fully articulating tripods mounted to the floor and swivel seats to allow for optimum wildlife viewing on any angle.

The boats also sit very low to the water, allowing for incredible eye-level photography and low angles.

When we encounter an animal we will position the boats, and the game vehicles, to allow for the best angles for photography without interfering with the wildlife.

We will also spend a much longer amount of time with each animal than most other tour companies offer. This is so we can study the animal’s behaviour and maximise the opportunities for unique photography.

This isn’t a ‘tick the animal off my list and move on’ type of safari. This is designed for people who genuinely want to leave Botswana with fantastic photos and for those who love observing animals in their native habitat.

There will be a minimum of two professional photographers on each boat, and one per vehicle, to assist guests with using their cameras, dialling in correct settings and providing photography guidance at all times.

We’ll also be conducting photography workshops at the safari lodge.

Being a wildlife photographer is not mandatory to join this tour, and on our recent scouting mission to test out this product we met a number of people who were happy just observing the wildlife up close and through binoculars.

Before booking this tour though do keep in mind that it is a photo safari, making it more in-depth and at a slower pace when compared to a standard African safari.