Vast and beautiful
The vast Selous game reserve in Tanzania offers luxury lodging and close encounters with amazing wildlife, writes James Delaney
On safari at the Selous game reserve, Tanzania
Leopards will usually only eat what they kill fresh,” our guide Joseph tells us as the canvas roof of our jeep scrapes against a low hanging branch. It’s early evening in the Selous game reserve, the sun is slowly disappearing behind a silhouetted tree line and around us herds of impala begin grouping together to wait out the night.
In this remote part of Tanzania, I’m told the likelihood of us running into one of the top predators on our first drive is almost zero, but as our open sided vehicle brushes through the undergrowth, the unmistakable gold and black spotted coat instantly stands out against the lush greenery.
The leopard initially seems unmoved by our presence, instead preferring to continue basking in the cool African breeze, but the approaching commotion piques its interest.
Rising up on its front legs, the leopard fixes us with a marble-eyed gaze; are we friend or food?
It decides we are a light snack not worth chasing, instead returning to languishing in the grass; our jeep retreats.
The Selous is vast. At 21,000 square miles, it is larger than Switzerland or a lot bigger than the single track road through Blair Drummond, my only previous ‘safari’ experience.
By the time our light aircraft lands at the Sumbazi airstrip, the urban sprawl of Dar Es Salaam is 130 miles in the distance and the bush stretches on infinitely in every direction.
We are met by the crew from our camp – the Azura Selous, nestled on the banks of the gushing Ruaha river a five minute drive away – with glasses of iced tea and a brief safety warning to keep our arms inside the jeep at all times.
The Azura isn’t your conventional hotel, instead its dozen part-canvas, part-clay wall dwellings are designed to give guests a sample of luxury without taking away the ‘authenticity’ of the bush experience.
Emerging from the trees and set back around 50 feet from the water, each one is dominated by a conical dome on the roof, apparently inspired by a termite mound, while earthy colours help camouflage it against scorched-red dusty paths.
Guests sleep out under the tented roof, separated from the wild and all of its inhabitants by a single screen, but do so in a queen-sized bed with the air conditioning on full blast – creature and comfort are both catered for.
Sightings of the top predators here are slightly less frequent than more popular destinations to the north. But while the Serengeti is rightly lauded for its biodiversity, visitors are as likely to see a pack of other jeeps as a pride of lions.
Although there are only a handful of guides and the Selous Rangers on site, they are in constant communication, alerting each other to the animals in the area, so happening upon three well-fed lions resting in a dried up riverbed shortly after our encounter with the leopard is no accident. By the time we return to camp on our first night, we have already met two of the big five.
We are accompanied back to our rooms by the group of Maasai askari – ‘warrior’ in the local dialect – who patrol the camp overnight to keep an eye out for any approaching predators.
I don’t speak much Swahili and his English isn’t great, so my attempts to lure him into what has widely been described at home as Inane Football Banter (IFB) don’t go over well. We walk in silence.
Each night, the deck of the main lodge becomes our restaurant, but on guests’ last evening in camp, the crew pull out all the stops to give them a truly spectacular parting gift.
Skittish impala dance between the trees as inquisitive giraffes pop their heads up from behind half-eaten branches
Joseph drives us into a secluded area of the bush, where we are greeted by a roaring bonfire and neatly lit table adorned with delicate looking lanterns. There, the chefs assemble an epic feast of traditional Tanzanian dishes – a chickpea and spinach curry was sublime even by my own usually carnivorous standards – all eaten under the blanket of unblemished sky with Jupiter and Venus glistening against the darkness.
Morning game drives begin at 6:30am in front of the main lodge building, but guests are woken well in advance with a tray of tea and biscuits brought to their room before heading out into the bush.
As we drive into the rising sun, hundreds of skittish impala dance between the trees as inquisitive giraffes pop their heads up from behind half-eaten branches, while we get frequent glimpses of eland, warthog, wildebeest and zebra.
The early part of the day is spent bounding through the wilderness on the good ship Pangolin – all of the Azura jeeps have names – before tucking into a bush breakfast laid on by the banks of the river.
In the Selous, there are no other lodges for miles around and on every drive, part of the experience is learning to read the environment and recognise the clues left behind by the animals we track.
Joseph frequently leaps from the jeep to point out footprints or dung recently left by lions, hyena and leopard. The landscape is pockmarked by trees upended by elephants once they are finished stripping them of any nutritional value and pellets of half-eaten grass are scattered randomly along the tracks by hippos that come inland during the night to feed.
By midday, vultures circle overhead for a kill to scavenge and the searing heat forces us back to the lodge.
There is wifi in the main building, but the compulsion to check my phone every five minutes feels like a betrayal of the serene surroundings, so I opt for a dip in the private plunge pool at the back of my villa with a few bottles of the local brew – Kilimanjaro, the tallest beer in Africa – and spend some time watching the Ruaha’s ever-present pod of honking hippos lounging in the fast-flowing rapids – who said going on safari meant roughing it?
We break from the standard evening drive to try our hands at fishing in the river where 15-kilo catfish are a common catch. But despite our best efforts and with the hippos laughing in the background, they aren’t biting, although another Kilimanjaro or two is more than adequate compensation.
A few lions we tracked earlier in the day are spotted nearby, so it is all aboard the Pangolin for one last bush night out.
Both look like they’ve been in the wars, the older lion is nursing a particularly nasty looking wound on his eye and his younger companion has certainly been in some kind of scrape – the result of a leadership challenge gone wrong, Joseph tells us.
With the sun dyeing the sky a hue of orange and pink and the light fading, the younger lion strides off into the distance, his older friend is in a bad way in the grass and for a moment, the Pangolin is the only thing standing between the two.
Realising our intrusion, the older lion is up, the injury not slowing him down. It looks panicked.
Frantically searching for his friend, it paces towards the jeep, six of us inhale at once. In the front, Joseph carefully reaches into the passenger footwell.
The lion saunters past the Pangolin, barely giving us a second look, there is a sharp exhale; that felt close.
My eye catches the low sun glinting off something in the front seat, Joseph is holding a glass. “Gin and tonic anyone?” he asks. Safari eh, I think I could get used to it. Stays at Azura Selous (www.azuraretreats.com) start from $700 per
person per night in a tented villa, excluding park fees, tourism levy and Medivac insurance. Guests can enjoy their fourth night free until January 6, 2019. Emirates (www.emirates. com) flies to Dar Es Salaam from London via Dubai. Internal flights between Dar Es Salaam and the Selous Game Reserve are operated by Coastal (www.coastal.co.tz).