Travel to the Okavango Duba Plains

arguably the best super-luxury camp in Okavango

At around 225 square kilometres, the Okavango Duba Plains Concession is a prime private safari area, restricted to just two small camps with around 19 square kilometres per person.

The ecosystem here is not as diverse here as most Okavango areas and there has historically been a major focus on a relentless ongoing conflict between lions and buffaloes.

The majority of the area hosts an extremely young ecosystem, created over the last hundred years, as papyrus swamps have dried out to create open grassy plains. As a result, the flora and fauna is still developing the usual levels of complexity of surrounding areas and the wildlife experience is only now broadening out to a more balanced set of sightings.

This private concession is an utterly pristine wilderness, free from all signs of humanity other than these small-scale safari operations and where you are free to explore unhindered by the strict regulations and often chronic vehicle traffic of the national parks.

The area is operated by a single safari company and contains just two camps. The famous Duba Plains Camp is certainly one of the best super-luxury properties in the Okavango Delta, if not in the whole of Africa, but with a price tag to match. The other property, Duba Explorers Camp is deliberately more simple and more reasonably priced.

When it comes to trip shapes and durations in Botswana, most visitors combine 2, 3 or 4 lodges by light aircraft over 6-12 nights, one or two of which will usually be here in Okavango Delta, combined with the Linyanti Waterfront and/or Makgadikgadi areas.

These trips are often done in combination with further nights at the Victoria Falls and/or down in the Cape.

The usual stay duration in this area Okavango Duba Plains is 3-4 nights.

Seasonality

The Duba Concession offers reasonably strong wildlife viewing year round, but with considerable seasonal variations.

The May-Sep cool dry season is the classic time to visit, as the wildlife viewing is superb, with the animals being drawn in from the dry hinterland towards the rising floodwaters, which arrive early into this more westerly location.

During the transition period between the peak of the dry season and the start of the green season, Oct-Dec, the Duba area can become a real epicentre for wildlife activity, with the convergence of big herds of herbivores. This is the hot season and humidities are becoming uncomfortably high as the rains approach. When the rains break, the wildlife disperse quickly into the vast hinterlands in search of better grazing and becomes much more difficult to access.

During the Jan-Apr main season, the bush is verdant and beautiful, the animals are well-fed and there’s lots of wildflowers and baby animals around. The camps are significantly discounted and become increasingly attractive as the conditions improve through the period.

Getting there

Duba Plains can only be accessed by light aircraft into the nearby airstrip, which has daily flight connections with all other camps in Okavango, Linyanti, the main airport at Maun (for connections to Central Kalahari, Nxai, Makgadikgadi and Johannesburg) and north to Kasane (for connections to Livingstone and Victoria Falls).

From the airstrip it is a drive of around 15 minutes through the bush to the camp itself.

unusually early and reliable floods during Apr-Aug