Why Zambia Should Be Your First Safari
Editor's Note: This is the latest installment in our series on underrated destinations, It's Still a Big World.
We were 10 minutes into the safari when Bertram, our guide with Robin Pope Safaris, knelt and scooped up a handful of glistening antelope feces. “Still warm,” he announced, the pellets sifting through his bare fingers as we looked on with equal parts horror and fascination. “Dung piles are a territorial marker. The alpha male can’t be far.”
Droppings, plants, paw prints, bugs—on a walking safari, you hone in on the little things, the tiny critters and hidden natural phenomena that you’d never notice on a traditional game drive. It was that promise of raw, unimpeded contact with the bush that lured me to South Luangwa National Park, a 3,500-square-mile swath of savanna that’s Africa’s prime destination for walking safaris (Norman Carr is said to have created the concept here in the 50s).