The Makgadikgadi Salt Pans in Botswana
Botswana is well known for the wetland paradise of the Okavango Delta, but many visitors miss one of its lesser known gems; the Makgadikgadi Pans are the largest salt pan on Earth. The desiccated remnant of an ancient super lake on the northeast edge of the vast Kalahari Desert, a shimmering, glittering expanse of salt encrusted earth fringed with palms, grassland, and occasional giant baobabs. People have lived here for countless millennia, surviving against the odds in what seems to be an incredibly harsh and unforgiving environment and living in harmony with the wildlife and the land.
Ancient baobabs on Kubu Island.
Why visit the Makgadikgadi Salt Pans
This is a wonderful place to get out of the vehicle and enjoy connecting with Africa. Walking with a family of bushmen is fun and fascinating, learning a little about their low-impact lives, complex society, and sophisticated way of living in harmony with each other and their habitat without having a noticeable impact on the environment. It’s also excellent terrain for some fast horse and electric ‘fat’ bike rides year-round.
Learning traditional skills with the Bushmen.
The Pans change greatly through the seasons, and plenty of wildlife thrives here, relishing the rich grazing when the sparse rains come. It surprises many people to learn that they are an important breeding site for flamingos, who only arrive when there’s sufficient water to keep jackals away from their nests. How do they know when it’s right? It’s a mystery. Birdlife during the green season is amazing, with a plethora of waders arriving in November and December to make the most of the brief bounty offered by shallow waters, and thousands of zebra and wildebeest arrive from the adjacent Makgadikgadi National Park and Kalahari Desert in search of nutritious grasses to produce plenty of milk for babies. This is the second-largest mass migration of zebra in southern Africa after the Great Migration in Kenya’s Masai Mara and Tanzania’s Serengeti.
The spectacle of the zebra migration.
Wildlife sightings are at their best during the green season, with elephant, oryx, lion, cheetah, brown hyena, springbok, red hartebeest, impala, zebra, kudu, and wildebeest often seen. Visitors can spend time with habituated meerkats year-round, which is usually a highlight of a stay.
Makgadikgadi’s meerkats – bold, inquisitive, and endlessly entertaining.
Once the pans have dried out sufficiently, riding quad bikes across the vast expanse of salt is a wonderful way to explore the landscape, and for the adventurous, a four day expedition to Kubu Island is a must.
Quad biking across the shimmering salt flats
For the ultimate Botswana experience, I highly recommend a combination of the Makgadikgadi Salt Pans and the Okavango Delta. Our 10-day Botswana safari provides a sample of the tailor-made holidays we can create for you.
What next?
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