Home of the Victoria Falls, the largest sheet of falling water on earth — and of Hwange, Mana Pools and the granite hills of Matobo. We reach it overland from Kasane, across the Zambezi.
Our Botswana journeys already touch Zimbabwe: a day at the falls from Kasane. The country beyond deserves more — Hwange with one of Africa’s largest elephant populations, the wild river frontage of Mana Pools, the balancing rocks and San paintings of Matobo, the stone city of Great Zimbabwe that gave the country its name, and the cool green Eastern Highlands. Routes are in planning; the falls we know well.
Key figures
Zimbabwe in numbers
surface area
390,757km²
slightly larger than Germany
inhabitants
15,178,957
2022 census
people per km²
39
ten times Namibia — still mostly empty in the west
width of the Victoria Falls
1,708m
the largest sheet of falling water on earth
elephants in Hwange
~45,000
one of the largest populations in Africa
UNESCO World Heritage sites
5
Victoria Falls, Mana Pools, Great Zimbabwe, Khami, Matobo
Highlights
Where the highlights are
Hover over a place to find it on the map, click it for the full story.Tap a place for the full story.
Zambia
Zimbabwe
Mozambique
Victoria Falls
Hwange
Mana Pools
Matobo Hills
Great Zimbabwe
Lake Kariba
Nyanga
Gonarezhou
NZimbabwe · 8 highlights
ZimbabweHighlights
01Mosi-oa-Tunya — the smoke that thunders
Victoria Falls
On the border with Zambia the Zambezi drops 108 metres into a basalt gorge, 1,708 metres wide. At peak flood in April the spray column rises 400 metres and can be seen from 50 kilometres away.
The falls from the rainforest
02Elephants by the tens of thousands
Hwange National Park
Zimbabwe’s largest park: 14,651 km² of Kalahari sand, teak forest and pumped waterholes where in the dry season hundreds of elephants drink at once. Also wild dogs, lions and one of Africa’s largest sable populations.
Elephant family at the waterhole
03Canoeing the Zambezi
Mana Pools
A World Heritage site on the floodplain of the Zambezi, where elephants stand on their hind legs to reach the albida pods. Walking and canoe safaris are allowed — rare in Africa, and unforgettable.
Elephant on its hind legs
04Balancing rocks and rock art
Matobo Hills
Granite domes and boulders stacked by two billion years of erosion, thousands of San paintings, one of the densest black-eagle populations anywhere — and the grave of Cecil Rhodes on World’s View.
Balanced rocks on a granite dome
05The stone city
Great Zimbabwe
Between the 11th and 15th centuries a city of up to 18,000 people rose here, built from granite blocks without mortar. Its Great Enclosure is the largest ancient structure south of the Sahara; the country took its name from these ruins.
Walls of the Great Enclosure
06A sea in the bush
Lake Kariba
Dammed in 1959, the Zambezi backed up into a lake 220 kilometres long — by volume the largest man-made lake on earth. Houseboats, the skeletons of drowned mopane trees, fish eagles and sunsets that need no filter.
Drowned trees in Lake Kariba
07Mist, tea and mountains
Eastern Highlands
Nyanga, the Bvumba and Chimanimani: a green mountain spine along the Mozambique border, with Mount Nyangani (2,592 m) the country’s highest peak, trout streams and Mutarazi Falls, at 762 metres the second-highest in Africa.
Proteas in the Eastern Highlands
08Place of elephants
Gonarezhou
In the far south-east, the red sandstone Chilojo Cliffs rise above the Runde river — part of the Great Limpopo Transfrontier Park with Kruger. Remote, rugged, few visitors: exactly our kind of place.
Elephants below the red cliffs
TheFalls
The bridge across the Zambezi
Victoria Falls in depth
A curtain of water 1.7 kilometres wide
David Livingstone reached the falls on 16 November 1855 and wrote that scenes so lovely must have been gazed upon by angels in their flight. The Kololo name says it more plainly: Mosi-oa-Tunya, the smoke that thunders.
wide
1,708m
the widest single curtain of falling water
high
108m
at the deepest point, Rainbow Falls
spray column
400m
at peak flood in April — visible from 50 km
Livingstone’s arrival
1855
World Heritage since 1989
01When to come
February to May the Zambezi is in flood: the roar is enormous, the spray so dense you see little of the face — and the rainbows are everywhere. June to August is the balance of water and view. From September to December the flow drops to a fraction; parts of the Zimbabwean side run dry, but the view into the gorge is clearest, and on the Zambian side the Devil’s Pool opens on the lip of the falls.
02The viewpoints
About three quarters of the falls’ face is seen from Zimbabwe: a rainforest path with sixteen viewpoints from the Devil’s Cataract past the Main Falls and Horseshoe Falls to Danger Point. From Zambia, the Knife-Edge Bridge and Livingstone Island add the other angle — we cross for the day.
03The lunar rainbow
On the three nights around full moon, during high water, the park opens after dark: the moon in the spray makes a rainbow of pale silver. Few places on earth offer it.
04Around the falls
A sunset cruise on the upper Zambezi with hippos and elephants; the “Flight of Angels” by helicopter; the 111-metre bungee from the 1905 bridge; white-water rafting in the gorge from August to December; game drives in the Zambezi National Park; high tea on the terrace of the Victoria Falls Hotel, unchanged since 1904.
05From Kasane
The falls are an hour and a half from Kasane: 80 kilometres via the Kazungula border and the new bridge over the Zambezi. Visas are issued on arrival; the KAZA UniVisa covers Zimbabwe and Zambia when it is available.
Zimbabwe
Good to know
Independence
18 April 1980. Sixteen official languages; English is spoken everywhere, Shona and Ndebele most widely.
Currency
The US dollar is accepted everywhere alongside the local ZiG. Bring small notes.
Time zone
CAT, UTC+2 — the same as Namibia and Botswana.
Getting there
Victoria Falls has its own international airport; our routes arrive overland from Kasane.
Driving
Left-hand traffic, good main roads, sand and gravel inside the parks.
Health
The Zambezi valley — the falls, Kariba, Mana Pools — is a malaria area; prophylaxis is advisable.
When to go
The year at a glance — Zimbabwe
Month by month: when each season runs, and what it means on the road.
Green seasonDry seasonGreen season
JanJJanuary: Green season
FebFFebruary: Green season
MarMMarch: Green season
AprAApril: Green season
MayMMay: Dry season
JunJJune: Dry season
JulJJuly: Dry season
AugAAugust: Dry season
SepSSeptember: Dry season
OctOOctober: Dry season
NovNNovember: Green season
DecDDecember: Green season
Now
May – October
Dry season
Cool nights, wildlife concentrating at the waterholes of Hwange and along the Zambezi at Mana Pools. Our travelling season.
November – April
Green season
Rains, birds, newborn antelopes — and the Victoria Falls at full power from February to May.
Signature journeys
Every route can be tailored — tell us what you have in mind.
Journeys through Zimbabwe are coming
The first routes are in planning. Tell us what you have in mind — we build the journey around it and combine it with Namibia or Botswana if you like.
On the border with Zambia the Zambezi drops 108 metres into a basalt gorge, 1,708 metres wide. At peak flood in April the spray column rises 400 metres and can be seen from 50 kilometres away.
Zimbabwe’s largest park: 14,651 km² of Kalahari sand, teak forest and pumped waterholes where in the dry season hundreds of elephants drink at once. Also wild dogs, lions and one of Africa’s largest sable populations.
A World Heritage site on the floodplain of the Zambezi, where elephants stand on their hind legs to reach the albida pods. Walking and canoe safaris are allowed — rare in Africa, and unforgettable.
Granite domes and boulders stacked by two billion years of erosion, thousands of San paintings, one of the densest black-eagle populations anywhere — and the grave of Cecil Rhodes on World’s View.
Between the 11th and 15th centuries a city of up to 18,000 people rose here, built from granite blocks without mortar. Its Great Enclosure is the largest ancient structure south of the Sahara; the country took its name from these ruins.
Dammed in 1959, the Zambezi backed up into a lake 220 kilometres long — by volume the largest man-made lake on earth. Houseboats, the skeletons of drowned mopane trees, fish eagles and sunsets that need no filter.
Nyanga, the Bvumba and Chimanimani: a green mountain spine along the Mozambique border, with Mount Nyangani (2,592 m) the country’s highest peak, trout streams and Mutarazi Falls, at 762 metres the second-highest in Africa.
In the far south-east, the red sandstone Chilojo Cliffs rise above the Runde river — part of the Great Limpopo Transfrontier Park with Kruger. Remote, rugged, few visitors: exactly our kind of place.
Every route starts with a conversation — tell us what you have in mind.
No booking yet — just a first conversation. Tell us roughly what you have in mind; we reply within two working days with an honest assessment and a first route.
No booking yet — just a first conversation. Tell us roughly what you have in mind; we reply within two working days with an honest assessment and a first route.
