PAFURI TENTED CAMP
Kruger Park, South Africa

Safari Lodge

Pafuri Camp is situated between the Limpopo and the Luvuvhu Rivers in the northern sector of the Kruger National Park, in a 24 000-hectare area called the Pafuri or the Makuleke. This area is the ancestral home of the Makuleke people and is one of the most diverse and scenically attractive areas in the Kruger National Park.

This area is certainly the wildest and most remote part of the Park and offers varied vegetation, great game viewing, the best birding in all of the Kruger, and is filled with folklore of the early explorers and ancient civilisations. It is well known for its fever tree forests, beautiful gorges and Crook’s Corner, where the Limpopo and Luvuvhu rivers and three countries, Zimbabwe, South Africa and Mozambique, meet. The region is considered one of Kruger's biodiversity hotspots, with some of the largest herds of elephant and buffalo, leopard and lion and incredibly prolific birdlife.

Pafuri Camp caters for the traditional Kruger Park visitor and is the only camp accessible to self-drivers in the extreme northern sector of the Park. Being so different from the rest of the Park, it complements the scenery and experience offered at the lodges in the southern Kruger and the Sabi Sands. Travellers visiting the lodges or camps in the south can experience the Kruger in its entirety by including the Pafuri / Makuleke region in their itineraries.
Camp Description

The camp has 20 tented rooms with six family rooms for up to four people. These are East African-style "Meru" tents that can accommodate two people comfortably per tent. Each tent has en-suite facilities and each tented room is under a shaded thatch canopy under canvas. There is also a dining and bar area are under a canopy of majestic ebony trees. A large swimming pool overlooks the river, and dinners are served in a traditional style boma under the stars, on wooden decks overlooking the Luvuvhu River or indoors under thatch.

Game Viewing

Game drives in open 4x4 vehicles, night drives, walks, hides (including some that will cater for sleep-outs) are all part of the range of activities that are on offer.

The Pafuri region boasts fully three-quarters of the Kruger’s wildlife and vegetative biodiversity, with many large mammal species and incredibly prolific birdlife. It is famous for the large herds of elephant and buffalo that are resident most of the year round, which concentrate in particular around the permanent waters of the Luvuvhu River in the dry winter months. Cheetah have been sighted hunting the strong population of nyala and impala that live alongside the Luvuvhu system. On the easternmost boundary at "Crooks Corner" the Luvuvhu supports a large population of hippo and crocodile.

The Limpopo and Luvuvhu rivers host the highest density of nyala in Kruger and species such as eland, Sharpe’s grysbok and yellow-spotted rock dassie, which are difficult to find further south in the Park, are regularly seen here. A drive along the floodplain and riverine fringe of either of the two large rivers usually produces good general game in the form of nyala, impala, greater kudu, chacma baboon, waterbuck, warthog and perhaps grey duiker or bushbuck, while careful searching may yield the more elusive residents of the area such as lion and leopard. Other areas hold steenbok, the agile klipspringer and herds of Burchell’s zebra. Recently, and excitingly, species such as giraffe and white rhino have been relocated to the area, from which they have been locally extinct for almost a century.

The area has long been regarded as something of a Mecca for southern African birdwatchers. Some species are found nowhere else in South Africa and the serious birder will revel in being able to find Böhm’s and Mottled Spinetails, Racket-Tailed Roller, Three-Banded Courser, and Southern Hyliota. Other specials are Black-Throated Wattle-Eye, Pel’s Fishing Owl, Yellow White-Eye, Meve’s Starling and Tropical Boubou.

Note: Game drives are done in open Land Rovers, so you can feel close to Nature.
Makuleke Concession

The Makuleke Concession is the extreme northernmost sector of the Kruger National Park and is located between the Limpopo and Luvuvhu Rivers in what is also known as the Pafuri region. To the north and east lies Mozambique and Zimbabwe. This area is destined to become the core of the new Transfrontier or "Peace" park that will straddle South Africa, Mozambique and Zimbabwe.

The Makuleke / Pafuri is one of the few true wilderness areas left in South Africa and the vegetation is so different to anything else within Kruger, that one might be forgiven for thinking one was in Central Africa! The large trees in this area are usually nearly 50% taller than most baobabs, and scenically, the area is diverse, with stunning mountains, shady, deep gorges, forests of Yellow Fever trees and groves of Baobabs, Mopane woodland, and open savannah grassland. The area is a true contrast to the rest of the Kruger National Park and a visit here truly rounds off the Kruger experience of the southern lodges.

Although this 24 000ha area comprises only fractionally more than 1% of the total area of the 2.2 million-hectare Greater Kruger National Park, 75% of all species in this region occur at Pafuri: nearly 400 birds species and over 100 mammal species make up some of the more visible aspects of this incredible biodiversity.

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The Kruger National Park & Private Game Reserves