For many agonising minutes the African painted dog would let us see only her ears. Like bristly dark radars, they had inched up from her underground den, panning for danger. Finally, and to my huge relief, she stalked up into the open, her eyes amber in the mid-morning sun, her nose working the breeze. She was easily visible against the sand mound, and then suddenly the smears of black through bronze to cream that give these dogs their name melted into the backdrop of winter leaves, shadows and bark.
Despite many trips to the bush I had yet to glimpse one of these endangered animals, also known as wild dogs or painted wolves. It was worth the effort of getting to the Mana Pools in Zimbabwe National Park in Zimbabwe for my first sighting.
“She knows we’re here,” mouthed Steve Bolnick, who had guided us on foot for five miles — rifle over his shoulder — through terrain rich in lion, buffalo and elephant. We were now crouching within sight of the dogs’ sanctuary. “But she also knows we are no threat.”
A soft growl from the female evidently signalled that all was well, and six pups noisily scrambled to the surface to rag, gnaw and lick one another before collapsing in a single pile of yawns. All the while their watchful mother paced the mouth of the den — a repurposed aardvark hole tunnelled in thick undergrowth — anticipating the return of the hunting pack.
“I’m calling that one ‘Floppy Ear’,” whispered my 14-year-old daughter, Tess, picking her favourite from the weeks-old litter that would soon grow into superpredators with a kill ratio many times higher than that of a lion. A wolf has more in common genetically with the Jack Russell terrier than these natural-born killers do.
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We were lucky to find the mother there at all, Bolnick murmured from behind his binoculars. Alpha pairs are the only members of the female-led pack to breed and, since alpha females are the most motivated hunters, pup care is usually left to another member of the pack. It’s a huge responsibility; left unguarded, dens can be dug out by hungry lions. I would have happily settled for the pup show, until a bark from the female set off a squealing cacophony that signalled the return of the pack and the regurgitation of the successful hunt.
The last time I visited Zimbabwe purely for pleasure was 20 years ago. Since then my regular visits from South Africa, where I live, have been to report for The Times on the worsening economic and political chaos: the deadly land grab, stolen elections and poverty that have left half its 14 million population hungry.
Mana Pools is considered by many to be Africa’s most beautiful national park, and Zimbabwe still has many of the continent’s best wildlife guides. But the man-made mayhem has diverted all but the most intrepid international tourists to the far busier (and tamer) safari honeypots of South Africa, Kenya and Tanzania.
For the past three decades Bolnick has guided all over southern Africa, typically for foreign private clients who book his services over and over again. But this year the pandemic travel restrictions that prevented my family’s annual British summer holiday, combined with huge discounts for regional African tourists, provided a perfect opportunity for the safari we had longed for.
We savoured our walk to the den, taking many hours over it after setting off at first light, once Bolnick “could see the front sights of [his] rifle”. We spent the morning learning to identify birds from their flight patterns and getting a tracking masterclass as our guide picked out individual spoor from the overnight traffic.
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To keep us safely downwind of cantankerous old buffalo bulls — known as the “dagga boys” — and some of the biggest elephants I had seen, Bolnick puffed fine ash from a leadwood tree out of an old talc container to see which direction it blew in. He patiently fielded questions from us — a mixed group of family and friends, from teenagers to the middle-aged — never betraying that he must have answered them hundreds of times before.
My 15-year-old son was quick to pick up the bushcraft. “That’s lion, isn’t it?” Kit asked, pointing to a dimple in the sand as Bolnick nodded, his eyes now sweeping the bush. It was so fresh that it still bore the brush marks from the tufts of fur between the cat’s toes. “This print is only minutes old,” Bolnick confirmed.
Walking safaris in Africa’s national parks are uncommon, but Mana — part of a Unesco world heritage site — is among the best parks to explore on foot. While distances covered on game drives boost the chances of ticking off most of the big five (lion, leopard, buffalo, rhino and elephant — although all Mana’s rhinos have been poached), the wonders and soundtrack of nature are far more intense away from the Jeep tracks and diesel throb. The exercise also made me feel I had earned my creature comforts in an untamed wilderness.
Camp Mana, Bolnick’s tented base on the south bank of the Zambezi River, which separates Zimbabwe from Zambia, is very far from the boutique safari set-ups I’ve experienced in South Africa and the Okavango Delta in Botswana — where wi-fi and even gyms are increasingly must-haves. It was all the better for it.
“Touch the earth lightly” is the philosophy of the camp that Bolnick and his team build each March and take down each November, leaving no clue it was ever there. No cement is laid, no foundation poles driven into the earth. Yet, stripped of any frivolousness, it still provided every luxury we wanted. Our nine-strong group had the six en suite double tents to ourselves, with flush loos and bucket showers from river water warmed over a fire. The only hint of modernity was the discreet solar panels powering our evening lights.
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With summer temperatures unbearably high and rainfall that disperses the game across the park’s 2,600 square miles, the dry austral autumn and winter (May to October) is the best time to visit Mana — then the animals gravitate towards the Zambezi and its terraced floodplains, a stage on which wildlife dramas have played out for millennia.
Between activities led by Bolnick and the camp’s second guide, Frank Chikosi, we ate and lazed on sofas in a large open-sided mess tent. Our view was of the Zambian escarpment, rising 5,000ft over water that echoed with the honks of hippos. Families of elephants sauntered through the camp every day of our stay, occasionally trapping us in the mess or our tents as they delicately stepped over guy ropes to hoover up fallen seedpods from the winter thorn tree that shaded us.
We barely spotted another visitor during our week in the park, and it was well worth the effort of getting there. Many visitors usually add Mana to their itinerary by crossing the river from Zambia. Instead, with Zimbabwe’s international land borders closed, we flew into Harare, where we had booked a comfortable minivan, driven by Evans, who navigated the potholes skilfully for the 220-mile journey north to the banks of the river described by David Livingstone as “God’s highway”.
Evans returned to deliver us to the next stage of our adventure, which began with an arresting written warning to “Beware of the crocodiles” at a small marina where we boarded a houseboat for a three-night floating safari on Kariba, once a gorge and now the world’s largest man-made reservoir.
The photographers, birdwatchers and fishing fans among us were in bliss as our captain weaved our boat, Nyati, between the skeletons of long-submerged trees and lingered on the edge of Matusadona National Park, another of Zimbabwe’s overlooked jewels. Since Kariba teems with crocodiles and hippos, water from it was piped into a splash pool on the upper deck for us to have our own wallow and cool down.
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As the sun sank and began to redden, Nyati’s crew would prepare its two tenders and offer the choice between a booze cruise that invariably delivered some amazing wildlife sightings — fish eagles hunting and elephants bathing — and an expedition for the would-be hunter-gatherers to land bream for supper. By now we had all become reliant on the glorious racket of the bush to lull us to sleep and, rather than tucking up in the cabins below, we chose a mass sleepover under the stars on deck. Wherever you are in Zimbabwe, I have come to realise, life is rarely quiet.
Jane Flanagan travelled independently. Seven nights’ full board, including five at Steve Bolnick’s Camp Mana and two at the cliff-side Kavinga Safari Camp, from £3,975pp, including flights (safari-consultants.com)
Three more Zimbabwe walking safaris
Sapi and Malilangwe reserves
Tembo Plains is Zimbabwe’s newest camp, operated by the conservation-tourism pioneer Great Plains and proof that sustainable travel doesn’t mean roughing it. The tents come with outdoor pools, private dining areas and pro binoculars, and the location on the Sapi reserve, downstream from Mana Pools, is a paradise of wildlife-rich riverine forest. Twin it with a stay at the similarly indulgent Singita Pamushana Lodge on the Malilangwe reserve close to the Mozambique border. The location, high above a reservoir, is magnificent; the suites, all with private pools, luxurious. The wildlife includes lions, wild dogs and leopards.
Details Six nights’ full board (three at each camp) from £7,680pp, including internal flights (aardvarksafaris.com). Fly to Victoria Falls
Gonarezhou National Park
The Gonarezhou National Park in Masvingo Province in Zimbabwe’s lowveld is one for the purists. Popular with locals, it’s rarely visited by foreigners yet offers an astounding variety of fauna — including lions, leopards, wild dogs and more than 10,000 elephants — in nearly 2,000 square miles of rivers, gorges, mopane woodlands and bush. You’ll be fly-camping here for four out of six nights: driving slowly along the Chilojo Cliffs to a new site every night before spending the last two evenings at the Chilo Gorge Lodge. As suited to laid-back first-timers as it is to old hands, this is safari as it should be done.
Details Six nights’ full board from £4,645pp (naturalworldsafaris.com). Fly to Harare
Hwange National Park and beyond
Expert Africa’s Ground Hornbill safari is a top-value, three-camp affair starting with three nights at Camp Hwange. It’s not as extravagantly luxurious as some camps in the park, but it’s in a great spot, surrounded by water holes, and is renowned for its guides. The next stop is Somalisa, upping the luxury and the romance in a film-set camp at Hwange’s eastern edge. The walking is especially good here. The final location is Amalinda Lodge in the Matobo Hills, reached after a delightful drive through farmland and past Bulawayo. It’s a surreally beautiful billet, built around granite boulders, and offers easy rhino tracking on foot.
Details Nine nights’ full board from £4,700pp, including flights (expertafrica.com)
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International travel is subject to restrictions. For details see gov.uk
