Zimbabwe

Zimbabwe sits on a central plateau of miombo woodland flanked by two great rivers: the Zambezi to the north, with the Victoria Falls and Lake Kariba, and the Limpopo to the south. In Hwange, the country's largest park, the absence of permanent surface water made it necessary to install artificial waterholes that now concentrate thousands of elephants in the dry season. Mana Pools, on the banks of the Zambezi, is a plain of apple-ring acacias and lagoons where walking among the wildlife without a vehicle is permitted, something rare in Africa. In the east, the Chimanimani and Nyanga mountains contribute cloud forest, heathland and waterfalls, and in the southwest the granite hills of Matobo form a landscape of stacked boulders with one of the highest densities of cliff-nesting raptors in the world.