Backpacking in Zambia🇿🇲: Walking With Wild Rhinos 🦏At Mosi-Oa-Tunya Game Park

“Born to be wild” – Steppenwolf.

Unfortunately the rhino is listed as an endangered species, even as recently as April 2023, it was in the news in an attempt to salvage this fine animal from extinction. On my travels I have been on over ten safaris, and over fifty animal related adventures. This doesn’t include zoos and animal sanctuaries. The first time I ever saw a rhino live was in Whipsnade Zoo in England in the 1990s. Then in 2009, while on Night Safari in Singapore, I saw rhinos in a kind of “fake natural environment” so it was finally time to see rhinos up close when I was backpacking in Zambia in 2020.

Backpacking in Zambia and I saw seven white rhinos in their natural habitat. Astonishing experience. A creature of fine beauty and peace. This African adventure is my craziest and most action packed to date, not even had time to post real updates and running a few days behind due to the Wi-Fi issues (grey screen loyal!). #rhinos #horny #beauty #zambia

Organising the Rhino Tour at Mosi Oa Tunya Game Park, Zambia

I was staying at the iconic Fawlty Towers backpacker’s hostel in Livingstone, Zambia and organised the tour through their reception. It’s a superb hostel by the way!

You will be picked up outside the hostel at 6:30 a.m. and taken with a group to the Game Park. To make it easier for you, the company was called Livingstone Rhino Safaris and here are their details…the price is $85 US in 2023, it was slightly cheaper when I did it – plus the hostel had some discount as they had a deal with them and I was blogging about it too.

https://livingstonerhinosafaris.com/rhinowalk/

Livingstone Safaris Office:+26 0213 322-267 / +260 97 7450716

Emergencies Jenny: +26 0977 712-496

The tour lasts about 6 hours, including the drive from the hostel to the national park and back and it includes about 2 hours walking in the park near the rhinos and we saw seven of them! We got up pretty close and they were calm animals just eating grass and lazing in their natural habitat.

What’s the difference between a black and white rhino?

Well it’s not the colour – as our guide informed us – one isn’t black and one isn’t white – they’re both quite dark in colour, but the word “white” is a mis-pronunciation that has stuck. They were called “WIDE Rhinos” due till their wide bakes (mouths) and this was pronounced or heard wrongly as white over the years and the name stuck. These rhinos we saw are called “white rhinos” which  is “wide rhinos”.

The guides on the tour were highly informative, telling us this amongst many other great facts and anecdotes along the walk. It was an excellent tour and I was backpacking with my friends Malina (from Poland) and Russell (from Australia).

After walking with the rhinos, we had a stop for food – more like a late breakfast /early lunch including cheese sandwiches and cookies. This included tea/coffee and juice.

After that, the tour continued through the game park and we also saw zebras, giraffes, crocodiles, deer and a few other animals. Plus we feasted our eyes on the Zambezi River too, as this place is very close to Victoria Falls, to which the river flows into. On the same trip, I visited both sides of Victoria Falls which borders Zimbabwe and Zambia. We also saw the four country border between Zambia, Zimbabwe, Botswana and Namibia as we crossed by ferry on the border from Botswana to Zambia at Kazungula. Here are a few more photos of the other animals on this safari trip.

This was one of the last tours I did before the first lockdown – I was there in February 2020 just after the COVID pandemic began (in December 2019). Here are some videos from that tour: