Tripadvisor gives a Travellers’ Choice award to accommodations, attractions and restaurants that consistently earn great reviews from travellers and are ranked within the top 10% of properties on Tripadvisor.
#5 of 5 campsites in Makgadikgadi Pans National Park
Location
Rooms
Value
Cleanliness
Service
Sleep Quality
The only permanent camp in the Nxai Pan National Park, this safari is ideal for witnessing the Zebra Migration and visiting Baines’ Baobabs as well as engaging with the time-honoured Bushmen traditions. Open-plan spaces and bleached decor inspired by the salt pans create a relaxing, harmonious atmosphere, and a raised deck provides unobstructed views of the waterhole, which attracts wildlife throughout the year. Located in the Nxai Pan National Park, an extension of the vast, and surreal Makgadikgadi Salt Pan network.
The road is very sandy for 38km but worth every minute to get to your camp destination. The camping area is wonderful under huge trees and the elephants walk slowly through the camping area 5m away from you.. The ablution blocks is clean, beautiful, warm water any time of the day and strong water pressure. Lots and lots of game around the one waterhole. Will visit again and again.
Read more
Date of stay: July 2022Trip type: Travelled with friends
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
Excellent camp site. We booked via our car hire agency. We had a nice spot for our car and had elephants walk past during the evening. The ablution block were clean and showers had lots of hot water with strong pressure. Nice drives around the park. Was our favourite camp site that we visited.
Read more
Date of stay: July 2022Trip type: Travelled as a couple
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
Nxai pan has a tough terrain, thrilling campsite location (South camp) always surrounded by elephants and a lovely Baobab cluster - The Baine's Baobab.
The south camp is very well maintained, always surrounded by people (Xomae sites) for help a bit away near the gate and has a clean and well maintained ablution block.
The park itself is vast with a huge waterhole attracting various species of animals. We had a lovely stay and 4x4 is a must when visiting the park. Ensure you deflate your tyre a bit before entering as the sand is very thick and keep an eye on elephants when at the campsite.
Read more
Date of stay: September 2019
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
The customer service or reception people are wonderful to deal with. They are typically very knowledgeable and helpful. It is very difficult to navigate within the park and they gave so much helpful information. We will definitely visit again soon.
Read more
Date of stay: April 2023Trip type: Travelled with friends
Room Tip:Â There place has really sandy roads be prepared to drive on sandy roads.
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
These reviews are machine translated from their original language. Show machine translations?
You have to reach it, with passages of deep sand and big chaos. When the road is firmer, it is a succession of quagmires. But the camp is nice, regularly visited by very curious elephants, walking on your chairs...and eating the tree that gives you shade. Extremely well kept camp.
Read more
Date of stay: October 2023Trip type: Travelled as a couple
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
We stayed here for 3 nights and had wonderful sightings of both game and birds. Campsite 1 was clean and dustbins were emptied every day. The ablutions were spotless with toilet paper and had hot water. The staff were very friendly and came to see that all was OK and shared valuable information about the roads and where to find the animals. The sand road from the gate was graded while we were there and other than sections of thick sand it was not a bad drive. General road conditions are good but care needs to be taken when traversing the deep ruts that have been left over from the recent rains. The roads to Baines Baobabs were very accessible and we had no issues on either of them, other than the top road being rutted in sections. This is our second trip to this camp site and we will be back again soon!
Read more
Date of stay: May 2014
Value
Location
Cleanliness
Service
Trip type: Travelled as a couple
Room Tip:Â Camp Site 1 and 2 are the best sites, private and close to the ablutions.
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
I highly recommend the game drives, scenery and animals at Nxai Pan- it is very beautiful. The campsite is unfortunately a different story...
Elephants have destroyed the plumbing and solar geysers at both ablution blocks in an attempt to get clean water. From the information we received the damage was caused 10months before we arrived yet this was never mentioned when the booking was made and the costs were not reduced.
The taps in the camp did not provide water and we were lucky to have a trailer with large water tanks that we could fill from the staff living area.
We arrived to over-flowing dustbins and filthy ablutions (the two toilets that still worked). On our last day elephant were drinking from the septic tanks, resulting in both toilets blocking.
Although I still recommend Nxai Pan find out about the campsite before departing so that you can arrive prepared!
Read more
Date of stay: June 2013Trip type: Travelled with family
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
We were so eager that this reserve and the camp site would be a treat, but unfortunately it failed on many levels.
Initially the reception was very good. The lady at the counter on Christmas day (Late PM) was cheerful and welcoming. I went through the document process - passport, paying and permits, relatively quickly and was allocated camp site 8. I had asked that we please be given a good site that she could recommend as we planned a two night stay. 8 I was assured was it!
Then all went "South" I had asked if there was wood at the sites and was told no there was not and that I would need to head down the road and buy at the local village - still amazes me that a simple system of keeping extra bundles at the receptions proves to be so difficult in most state run reserve/national park receptions. Nevertheless, we headed out after checking that they would keep the gate open for us as it was nearing the closing time.
After a good 40 minutes diversion to find the wood, we returned and were abruptly told that site 8 was occupied. We should take 9 instead? Such a switch especially after specifically being earlier told it was free, and was a good site, was a minor irritation. But all in a day’s travel so not a fuss.
We drove the hour or so down the unpaved but generally decent road to the camping sites and on arrival at the gate and the small "office" which I was expressly told not to bother to stop at as “no one was there”. I was stopped however and asked for paper work that clearly I was not provided with (In this case the park fee) I recalled the reception mentioned something about this when we signed in, but that it related to paying this on our departure as "There is no one from that side on duty".
The ranger was belligerent (an assistant clearly drunk – but it was Christmas day) insisting I return to the main gate and fetch it. Only after considerable persuasion, coupled with me pointing out that it was not safe as it was nearing dark, were we allowed to proceed.
Then to our horror as we pulled into the camping area, so too did two other vehicles and while we searched out site 9 (Assuming 8 was "occupied") we noticed this party made a dash for site 8 and start setting up camp. Clearly they had arrived AFTER us at the main gate and while we were wood hunting this switch had been made. The only reason I can imagine is that these travellers knew the site and persuaded the reception to make the change?
Anyway a minor fuss even if disappointing but not one to ruin the evening. That would come later.
The shower and toilet area is a sad reflection on how resources are squandered in Africa (Noticeboards acknowledging the European Union, amongst others, for providing funds for the sites and the solar infrastructure were prominent on the entrance) The actual infrastructure and solar panels working, was not! The showers were in a terrible state (Seemingly un-cleaned for a few days) Solar panels looked in disrepair and the result that there was not hot water. The water fortunately was pipe warm, but there is a general sense of despair that then sets in and make the experience less than appealing.
Needless to say rather than stay the second night for what becomes a steep fee especially in light of not clean facilities and lack of promised hot water, we chose to move on. As is so often the case the private owned and managed venues in nearby Gweta offered far better amenities and service.
It’s also worth noting that much of the park recently suffered massive fire damage and the Baines Baobabs have been affected. The park game management seemed to also be lacking. We found little game and the outbound drive was disappointing. However this might well have just been an off day for us, and the heat might have contributed to the game staying well covered in the shade.
Read more
Date of stay: December 2012
Value
Location
Cleanliness
Service
Trip type: Travelled with friends
Room Tip:Â Haha, clearly camp site 8 is the one to go for!
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
We were upset from the get go with Nxai Pan. When making the booking our friends were informed that there is a restaurant on the property and a picture of more formal luxury was created. We were not planning to join them as it was very expensive. We then decided that we could do with a luxury evening and were shocked with what we got. We arrived at the location and paid for our evening's stay. It was ridiculously expensive. You pay for yourself and your vehicle and a high rate for your camp site. After settling at the entrance gate we were sent to the camp gate where a very friendly gent welcomed us. It was a breath of fresh air, but then after his whole story came the bomb. There was no water. None at all. No where!! We were dirty and dusty and not prepared to have no water for the duration of the stay. It was mentioned that the water pump had broken a few days before and it had not been fixed. We could not buy wood (luckily we brought some of our won), the ice block is literally a solid block of ice that you can do nothing with and we had no water so we could not shower etc, The camp site itself was nice and neat, but no bin, no electricity, no water and no staff around that ever checked on us. The ablutions were lovely and clean, just sorry that we could not even use the toilets as they could not flush. The only positive during that stay was the elephants that came to visit the camp site during the evening and entertained us. We were so irritated that I wanted to claim back my money for the night as it is a ridiculous amount and is not worth a sent. We did not see any animals accept for the elephants and I felt used. It was horrible.
Read more
Date of stay: June 2017
Value
Cleanliness
Service
Trip type: Travelled as a couple
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
Campsite quite facilities clean but no hot water connected. An elephant walked right past whilst we were eating our meal. The waterhole has lots of activity and the best advice appears to be to sit and wait and the animals come although we didn't see lions we saw elephants, zebra, giraffe and lots of spingbox. The drive in is very sandy and needs a lot of concentration, the gate staff were very friendly and helpful.
Read more
Date of stay: June 2013
Value
Location
Cleanliness
Service
Sleep Quality
Trip type: Travelled as a couple
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
There are more places to choose from in the Makgadikgadi Pans National Park area.
LOCATION
BotswanaCentral DistrictMakgadikgadi Pans National Park
NUMBER OF ROOMS
9
Prices are provided by our partners, and reflect average nightly room rates, including taxes and fees that are fixed, known to our partners, and due at time of booking. Please see our partners for more details.
Is This Your Tripadvisor Listing?
Own or manage this property? Claim your listing for free to respond to reviews, update your profile and much more.
