Camp Hwange
Thatch and canvas chalets · Private concession, Sinamatella sector, three hours from Main Camp · Wild Expeditions Africa
Photo: Wild Expeditions
High-end
Inside the park
Owner/family-run
Founded by Dave Carson, one of Zimbabwe's most respected professional guides, and bought outright by Wild Expeditions in 2023, who run it the same way. What sets it apart is not a slogan about guiding but an arrangement: every guest is assigned a fully qualified walking guide rather than an apprentice, so you can walk or sit in a log-pile hide whenever the moment is right instead of waiting for a pro guide to become free. It also overlooks two natural waterholes rather than pumped ones. No credit card facility, limited signal.
Why you'd pick it
- Every guest gets a walking-qualified professional guide, not a learner
- Overlooks two natural waterholes, rare in a park of pumped pans
- Walking and tracking are the core product, not an add-on
Straight from the lodge
About the guides
Most camps say their guiding is excellent. What is unusual here is the arrangement behind it. Every guest is assigned a fully qualified walking guide rather than an apprentice, which means you can leave the vehicle or settle into a log-pile hide when the moment is right, instead of waiting until a professional guide comes free for a short nature walk later. Tracking on foot is the point of the place, not an extra.
- Four learners or apprentices in camp at any one time; at the moment three men and two women.
- Four of them have passed Zimbabwe's professional guide proficiency exam since covid. In recent years only two or three people pass it nationally.
- Two dedicated ten-day courses a year, run for their own learners and for those from other Hwange camps, usually Nehimba and Chitubu but also from the larger operators.
- Outside specialists are brought in for those courses.
Told to us by Chris Roche of Wild Expeditions, August 2026.
What the park charges on top
The rate above buys you a bed. Hwange National Park charges its own entry fee for every day you are inside, and almost no booking site shows you that.
- Park entryThe rate for guests sleeping inside the park.
- $12per person, per day
- VehicleForeign-registered vehicle, at the staying-inside rate.
- $3per vehicle, per day
Three nights means three days inside, so two adults sharing one vehicle pay $81 in park fees before anyone pays for a bed.
Sleeping inside the boundary is what keeps that low. $12 if you sleep inside the park, against $24 a day for anyone driving in from outside.
The full fee schedule for Hwange National ParkRates
From $550 pppn. $724 April to June, $1,080 July to October, $590 November to December. Fully inclusive, but ZimParks fees are extra.
What the rate covers is not confirmed. We have not been able to check whether meals, drinks and activities are included here, so treat this figure as the bed alone until it is.
Indicative 2026 rates from operators' own rate cards, gathered July 2026. Always confirm with the lodge. One thing to watch when comparing: some camps include ZimParks fees in their rate and some do not, which shifts the real gap by $12 to $36 per person per night.