Mashatu Tent Camp

Mashatu Tent Camp sits in the Northern Tuli Game Reserve in eastern Botswana, on a thirty-one-thousand-hectare concession that holds more than one thousand elephants. The camp has eight tents only, which keeps the atmosphere close and the game drives uncrowded.

Each tent stands on a raised platform beneath large trees, connected to the rest of camp by footpaths. The en-suite facilities are outdoors — an open-air shower and a W.C. on the private deck — so you wash and dress in the open air. The tents are tall enough to stand in fully upright. There is no air-conditioning and no heating, so seasons matter: summers are hot, winters cold at night.

Meals are shared either under the open thatched roof of the gazebo or around a fire in the boma, an enclosed outdoor dining area with a view over a floodlit waterhole. A shaded hide faces the same waterhole from a different angle, where you can sit quietly and watch elephant, antelope, and birds come to drink without disturbing them. A plunge pool is available for the hotter months.

Activities run from the camp and across the wider Mashatu reserve: twice-daily game drives in open four-wheel-drive vehicles, guided walks, mountain bike safaris accompanied by rangers, horseback safaris (riders must be twelve or older), night drives, and dedicated photographic sessions at an award-winning sunken underground hide elsewhere on the reserve. Fly-in access is available via Limpopo Valley Airfield, with scheduled shared flights operating from Lanseria.