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It’s malaria-free so great for families with young children. You have to stay overnight here – there are no day visitors allowed – and I stayed at the Royal Madikwe Lodge with a waterhole easily visible from my room. I couldn’t quite believe rhino and elephant were drinking there together. There’s plenty of wildlife elsewhere too – we saw giraffe, zebra, wildebeest, hyena, cheetah and impala among other species. Of the Big Five, lion, buffalo and elephant were easy to see. A great spot for elephant is Tlou Dam where we watched over a hundred taking it in turns to roll in the mud. But I hadn’t expected to see
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quite so many rhino. They seemed to be everywhere, and completely unbothered by our presence, which in a way was a downside for me – it didn’t feel a particularly wild place.
Malaria-free, Big Five safari
Madikwe is a malaria-free reserve about five hours’ drive from Johannesburg. I’ve had incredible rhino viewing here – both white and black varieties. The rest of the Big Five is present, too. Leopards are hit and miss – I’ve seen one, but apparently that was lucky. Wild dogs are frequently seen. Madikwe has a lot of good lodge options of mid- to high-range. There are telegraph wires running through the park and at night you can see Gaborone lit up across the Botswanan border, so it’s not exactly remote – but it’s not unattractive, with green hills and orange dusty roads making for photogenic backdrops.
Madikwe: An Exclusive Big-Five Safari
Hard up against the Botswana border, Madikwe Game Reserve is one of South Africa’s most rewarding safari experiences. In wildlife terms, the Big Five are relatively easy to see – I saw rhino, buffalo and elephant all drinking from the same waterhole at the same time on one wonderful late afternoon. Lions are plentiful, there’s a reliable pack of African wild dogs, and there’s also a small but growing population of cheetah, as well as springbok, klipspringer, giraffe, zebra and other iconic southern African savannah species. More than 350 bird species, too, add to the appeal, while the scenery is also rather special, with a fine mix of habitats – bushveld, distant red-walled mountains, parched desert plains – that turn magical at sunset. But above all, Madikwe is an exclusive park; to visit here, you must have a confirmed reservation at one of the reserve’s fabulous lodges.
South Africa’s top Big 5 Wilderness on the Botswana Border
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Madikwe Safari Lodge which offers a real bush experience without compromising on luxury mod cons such as air conditioning and plunge pools. The large swimming pool next to the busy waterhole is the place to be in the middle of the day. Another favorite of mine is the well-priced Mosetlha Bush Camp. With the authentic donkey boiler and paraffin lamps this pioneering eco camp offers a true back-to-basics wilderness experience.Elephants, wild dogs and lions at luxurious Madikwe
On my last visit, I was lucky enough to see a new litter of wild dog pups playing around their den, while a rather tired looking adult, who had obviously drawn the short straw and been assigned babysitting duty, looked on disinterestedly.
Madikwe is also gaining a reputation as a lion hotspot, with sightings near guaranteed these days, and it has an increasingly staggering number of elephants too. Leopards and cheetah are also seen with some regularity.
There is an excellent range of top-notch luxury lodges here, and they won’t set you back as much as some of Sabi Sands’ finest. My personal favourite is the colourful Jaci’s Tree Lodge. It is a particular treat for wildlife photographers, with a unique semi-submerged
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photographic hide that pops up in the middle of a waterhole, and state of the art dual camera mounts and gimbals on the lodge’s safari vehicles.The Born Again wilderness
Today there is nothing to remind you of Madikwe’s ranching past. Instead what you see are red earth trails winding into the distance between thorny thickets of acacia and combretum, and its waist-high expanses
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of bleached blond grassland and rolling blue hills give the reserve a sense of enormous sense of space and freedom. And of course what has also boosted Madikwe’s popularity is the fact that it is malaria-free.Big Five safaris with wide-reaching benefits
There’s inspiration all around: the scenery includes some dramatic escarpments, the wooded savannahs are great for watching elephants, lions and, with luck, wild dogs (the reserve was painstakingly stocked in the 1990s) and there are some excellent, ethically designed and managed lodges. It’s not possible to drop in for the day – you have to stay overnight – but this is no hardship, since the lodges provide a fantastic safari experience for a good deal less money than the places in the luxury safari belt. My favourites are Jaci’s and Madikwe Safari Lodge, comfortable, organically-designed lodges where you feel close to the wilderness.
I rather like the fact that Madikwe
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is relatively little visited, despite being so accessible. It has an appealing, frontier feel. But what I like most about the reserve is the fact that the local community benefits directly from tourism and plays a very active role in conservation.Fantastic rhino and leopard sightings at marvellous Madikwe
I only stopped over briefly at Madikwe en-route from Jo’burg to Botswana and did not really have immensely high expectations for sightings on what would be our first day in the bush. However, we set off on the game drive the next morning and almost immediately I spotted rhino spoor. Seems that this is almost a guarantee at Madikwe and we spent some time watching the rhinos grazing around a waterhole. On the way back we had several other good sightings but the unforgettable highlight (especially for my father who had never seen wild leopard before) was surely our sighting of a female leopard and her adolescent cub high on a rock kopje above us. Not bad for day 1 before breakfast!