Take Your Time to Choose your Safari Accommodation

Are you planning an African Safari ?  If the answer to this question is yes, then besides air tickets, accommodation or lodging is the other  important thing to think about.  Accommodation  plays a huge role in your overall  experience of your safari holiday.

Wide Range For  Your Safari  Stay

Naturally, your choice of safari accommodation will depend, to a  very large extent, on your budget.  But, it will also be determined by other factors, for example,  your interests and  your  sense of adventure.  For some people, sleeping under canvas in the African wilderness, hearing the lion roaring or the hyena giggling in the not-so-distant bush, is a once-in-a-life-time  experience that they cannot trade in with anything.  Yet for others, they want to be as comfortable as possible, feeling safe and secure behind a concrete wall even while in the bush.  Of course, each safari traveler will still have different preferences and ideas beyond accommodation choices in Africa.

African Safari destinations  offer a range of accommodation. From the luxury beach resorts along the coastal areas of Mozambique and Zanzibar to the luxury bush camps in Masai Mara, Kruger and Serengeti.  This article  gives  guidelines on choosing  accommodation for those intending to do a wildlife safari. It endeavors to give the distinction  between Safari lodges and  Safari Tented Camps .

Safari Lodges:

The safari lodges are noted for their exciting locations and  imaginative architecture. Generally, they offer accommodation in the African wilderness in hotel-style comfort. Rooms are double or twin-bedded with private bath and shower. Common facilities will include, swimming pool,  bar, lounge, dining room. Some lodges are built is such a way that they have a verandah overlooking a focal point like a river, saltlick or water hole that attract animals. The standards of the lodges vary from simple to extremely lavish. Most lodges have 20 rooms and above – just like any hotel. They will have a resident guide or naturalist to take you on game drives and nature walks. An example of a safari lodge Serengeti Serena Lodge in Tanzania.

Tented Camps:

If you are looking for an under-canvas  experience that does not come with any discomfort, then safari tented camps are your best bet.  Tented camps are smaller and  more intimate, in comparison with the larger  lodges. Most have between 6 and 12 rooms only. They offer a wide variety of style from simple to extreme luxury.

Most  are permanent tents, pitched on spacious  concrete or wooden platforms with private balconies and picturesque views.  They provide spacious, furnished, twin-bedded tents or double-bedded tents   with mosquito proofing. Private bathroom and shower is attached.  Public areas are under canvas. Meals are provided al-fresco around campfire. One of the best, small intimate, tented camps is Cottars 1920s Camp,Masai Mara  Kenya. Cottars  has only  4 tents  with a capacity of 8 persons at any one time!

In some cases, tented camps are established on a mobile basis and are fully equipped and well-stocked by a safari company.  In such a case, the tents are pitched in prime-game viewing locations in the wilderness. They may then need to move again following the animals movements as in the case of the wildebeest migration between Serengeti and Masai Mara.