A safari is a time of day before it is a place.
Animals move at dawn and dusk; sand only lets a 4x4 climb it once the heat has gone out of the day. Pick the hour first and the country second. Reviews of the safaris you can actually book, from a $15 dune run to a week under canvas.
-
Before six
National Park Safaris
Engine off at a waterhole while it is still cold enough for the cats to be out.
from $14
-
Four in the afternoon
Desert Safaris
Tyres let down, dunes soft, the light going orange behind the ridge.
from $15
-
Once it is dark
Safaris with BBQ Dinner & Live Shows
Fire lit, meat on, a drum somewhere behind you and no phone signal.
from $24
The four safaris everything else gets measured against.
A dune run out of Dubai, a game drive out of Johannesburg, a leopard park in the south of Sri Lanka, and a balloon over the Serengeti. What each costs and what riders say about it.
01The busiest one on earthDesert Safari, Quad Bike, Camel Ride & Al Khayma CampRed dunes an hour out of the city, quad bike, camel, then dinner at the camp. Tens of thousands of riders a year cannot all be wrong.
02The first real game drivePilanesberg Nature Reserve Game SafariPilanesberg sits in an old volcano crater two hours from Johannesburg, and it is malaria-free. Rhino and elephant on a day trip.
03Leopard country, cheaplyHalf, 7-Hour, or Full-Day Safari & MealsYala holds the densest leopard population anywhere. Half day, seven hours or the whole thing, meals thrown in.
04The one you save forSerengeti Balloon Safari and authentic bush breakfastUp at four, airborne at dawn, wildebeest below and breakfast laid out in the grass when you land.
Six countries where a safari means six different vehicles.
Gulf sand needs a Land Cruiser with the pressure down. The South African bush wants an open Toyota and a spotter. Sri Lanka runs battered jeeps at speed on park tracks, Turkey does convoys with a water fight, Qatar drives down to an inland sea and Tanzania puts you in the air.
Every Dubai desert safari sells the same dunes. The difference is the four hours around them.
The drive out is identical, the camp is often the same camp, and the price gap is what happens in between. Four versions of the same afternoon, and what each one costs to board.
★★★★★★★★★★ 4.9 · Desert Safari, Quad Bike, Camel Ride & Al Khayma Camp
With a quad bikeThirty minutes on an ATV before the camp, helmet included.
With a camelTen minutes on a camel, which is nine longer than most people want.
For the sunsetLeave at four, dunes in the good light, dinner after dark.
Stay the nightSleep in the camp, stars with no city glow, breakfast in the sand.
All 166 desert runs across the UAE →
Nobody books a game drive to see a lion. They book it to sit near one.
The sightings are the story people tell afterwards. The thing itself is two hours of cold air, a radio, and a guide who reads tracks in the road. Big Five reserves, national parks and the private concessions that let a vehicle leave the track.
South Africa is the country that will sell you a safari on a day trip.
Everything in South Africa →
Nowhere else can you leave a city after breakfast, see rhino before lunch and be back for dinner. Kruger for the scale, Pilanesberg for the crater and no malaria, the Garden Route lodges for a first night in a tent with a zip.
Pilanesberg, out and back
An extinct volcano stocked with all five, close enough to Johannesburg to do in a day. The crater rim keeps the animals in a bowl, which is why the sighting rate is so high for a park this size.
Kruger, with nights in it
Kruger is the size of Wales and the difference between a day visit and two nights is the difference between seeing animals and watching them. Private concessions on the western boundary can drive off-road; the park itself cannot.
Game lodges off the Garden Route
Cape Town has no big game within reach, so the lodges cluster three hours east around Oudtshoorn and Addo. Two drives, a meal and a bed, which is the cheapest way to sleep in a reserve anywhere in the country.
Ordered by how many riders have actually been, with what earns each one the slot and what it costs to join.
1
Desert Safari, Quad Bike, Camel Ride & Al Khayma Camp
Ride Dubai’s red dunes by 4x4, quad bike, sandboard, and camel, then enjoy sunset, BBQ, and shows at Al Khayma Camp.
From · $32
Read our review →
2
Desert Safari, Quad Bike, Camel Ride and Sandboarding
from $29
3
Safari, Quad Bike, Camel Ride, and Buffet Dinner
from $46
4
Red Dune Safari, Quad Bike, Camel Ride, BBQ Dinner
from $29
5
Premium Safari, Camel Ride & Al Khayma Camp 3-Buffets
from $79
6
Desert Safari with BBQ Dinner & Quad Biking Options
from $30
7
Half-Day Desert Safari, Camel Ride, ATV & Dune Buggy
from $30
8
Desert Safari, Camel Ride, Sandboarding, Quad Bike
from $30
Aurora, black bulls and a lava field: the word travels further than the continent.
A safari is a hunt for something that moves, which is why the word survives on a Tromsø fjord chasing green light, in the Camargue marshes behind a herd of black bulls, and on the volcanic tracks of the Canaries. None of them involve a lion. All of them involve a vehicle, a guide and a thing that might not show up.
Every safari outside Africa →
Sri Lanka runs the cheapest leopard tracking on the planet.
Yala and Wilpattu hold leopards at a density nowhere in Africa matches, and a seat in a jeep costs less than a restaurant meal. Udawalawe is the elephant park; go at four when the herds come down to the reservoir. Across the strait, Rajasthan swaps the jeep for a camel and the park for a dune.
- 1Sigiriya and Dambulla Day Trip with Safarifrom $53
- 2Yala National Park Safari Tours: Morning/Evening/Full Dayfrom $25
- 3Elephant Safari with Expert Guidefrom $30
A safari can cost $15 or $6,000. Here is where the line sits.
Every safari on the site, grouped by what a seat costs. Shared vehicles and half-days sit at the bottom, private guides and multi-day camps at the top, and the middle is where most people end up.
Shared jeeps, half-day dune runs, park entries and the Sri Lankan and Egyptian day trips.
Full days with a meal: Pilanesberg out of Johannesburg, Kruger day drives, overnight desert camps.
Private vehicles, multi-day camps, gorilla permits and the balloon over the Serengeti.
Three things you cannot arrange any other way.
Plenty of holidays put you outdoors. Very few put a rhino thirty feet from an open door, drop a car down the face of a dune on purpose, or hand you a balloon basket at four in the morning.
Sitting with the Big Five
Lion, leopard, rhino, elephant and buffalo were named the Big Five by hunters because they were the hardest to kill on foot, not because they are the best to look at. The list stuck. What a guide will not tell you until you are out there is that the animals ignore a vehicle entirely and notice a person the moment they stand up in one.
- 1Sunrise Desert Jeep Safari with Wildlife Experience★★★★★★★★★★ 4.7 · 1,782 reviews
- 2Addo Elephant National Park All Inclusive Full-Day Safari★★★★★★★★★★ 4.8 · 872 reviews
- 3Elephant Safari with Expert Guide★★★★★★★★★★ 4.9 · 641 reviews
Driving down a dune
Dune bashing works because a soft tyre floats and a hard one digs. Drivers drop pressure to a third of road spec at the edge of the sand and put it back at the exit. The sideways slide down a face is deliberate, the engine noise is mostly first gear, and the fifteen minutes after a run are the reason sick bags are in the door pocket.
- 1Desert Safari, Quad Bike, Camel Ride & Al Khayma Camp★★★★★★★★★★ 4.9 · 68,962 reviews
- 2Desert Safari, Quad Bike, Camel Ride and Sandboarding★★★★★★★★★★ 4.9 · 43,505 reviews
- 3Desert Safari with BBQ Dinner & Quad Biking Options★★★★★★★★★★ 4.9 · 20,485 reviews
A night in a camp
The camps switch generators off around ten and the difference is total: no glow, no hum, and the noises get very specific. In the Gulf the sand keeps the day heat until about two in the morning and then drops fast. In the bush the sound at three is usually hyena, and it is much closer than it seems.
- 1Overnight Safari, Dinner, Stargazing & Al Khayma Camp★★★★★★★★★★ 4.8 · 2,562 reviews
- 2Dubai Overnight Desert Safari, BBQ & Stargazing at Al Khayma Camp★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 2,327 reviews
- 34 Days Group Camping Safari★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 1,101 reviews
Four safaris that will not be there when you arrive.
Most of this can be arranged from a hotel desk the night before. These four cannot: permits are rationed by the government, balloons carry sixteen people a morning, and the good park jeeps are taken weeks out.
- 013 Days gorilla trekking Safari tour in UgandaRwanda and Uganda cap the permits and sell them by the day. There is no standby list and no turning up at the gate.
- 02Serengeti Balloon Safari and authentic bush breakfastA Serengeti basket takes sixteen and flies once, at dawn, weather permitting. High season sells out a month ahead.
- 03Overnight Safari, Dinner, Stargazing & Al Khayma CampCamps have a fixed number of tents. When they are full the answer is a day trip instead, which is not the same night.
- 04Yala National Park Safari Tours: Morning/Evening/Full DayYala closes for roughly six weeks around September for the drought, and the morning slots go first all year.
Season, heat and a driving licence decide more safaris than budget does.
Four rules that catch people out. African parks are best in the dry months when the grass is short and animals stay near water. The Gulf pushes its dune runs later into the evening through July and August and sells sunrise slots instead. A quad bike needs a licence in some countries and a helmet in all of them. And camouflage clothing is illegal to wear in several African states, tourists included.
By country — the Gulf, Africa, Asia
By kind of safari — wheels, hooves, hull or basket
Johannesburg, Kruger, the Cape: the run a first safari usually takes.
Kruger
Mpumalanga
Cape Town
Garden RouteThe newest safari reviews on the site.
The newest ones after these →
Addo Elephant Park and Giraffe Walk Full Day Safari
Read our review →
Addo Elephant Full Day Safari / Shore Excursions
Read our review →
Addo Elephant National Park Full Day Safari with Braai Lunch
Read our review →
Desert Safari, Quad Bike, Camels & Sandboarding
Read our review →
5 Day Golden Triangle, Safari, & Bird Sanctuary
Read our review →
4×4 Jeep Safari in Agadir Mini Sahara and Berber Lunch
Read our review →