BotswanaSafariTour

The Grand Collection

The whole country, arranged around one party.

Exclusive-use villas and private camps, a private guide and vehicle throughout, helicopter transfers over the Delta, and a Botswana Safari Tours Director travelling with you.

Sunset after a boat cruise in the Okavango Delta

Less an upgrade than a different way of travelling.


Nothing at this level comes off a list. We start with who is travelling, what they want the fortnight to feel like, and which handful of places in Botswana are worth their time, and then we leave the whole thing open until it is right.

A private guide and a private vehicle for your party alone, for every day. Exclusive-use camps and villas wherever they exist on your dates. A private chef. Helicopter over the Delta. And a Director of ours travelling with you, with the relationships and the authority to change the plan the moment something better appears.

We only take on a handful of these a year, and we plan them a long way out.

One journey

The Grand Collection


Every itinerary below is a private departure and can begin any day of the year. The day-by-day flow is how we would run it as written — and every one is a starting point we expect to rewrite around you.

A lone tree silhouetted against an Okavango Delta sunset

The Grand Botswana

  • 14 days
  • Every major ecosystem
  • Grand Collection
  • from USD 1,800 pp/day

Fourteen days, none of them rushed. This one gets written from a blank page around whoever is travelling, so what follows is how we most often end up building it rather than a route you would be booking.

What stays constant is how much of it you control. A private guide and vehicle for your party alone, every day, so you leave camp when you want to and stay at a sighting as long as it holds your interest. Exclusive-use camps and houses wherever they exist on your dates. A private chef. And a director from our own team travelling with you from the day you land to the day you fly out.

The helicopter tends to be the part people bring up afterwards. Doors off, low and slow over the Delta in the hour before sunset, following the channels instead of a flight path, and landing on an island where dinner has already been laid.

How the days run

  1. Days 1–3Arrive in Maun and fly into an exclusive-use camp on permanent Delta water. Mokoro, motorboat, island walks, and a helicopter flight over the channels at golden hour.
  2. Days 4–5Moremi Game Reserve. Private vehicle, dawn to dusk, with your guide and tracker working the floodplains for leopard and wild dog.
  3. Days 6–7Linyanti or Selinda. Night drives, walking safaris and a private concession with almost no other vehicles in it.
  4. Days 8–9Savuti. The marsh, the lion prides, and a fly-camp night under canvas if you want one.
  5. Days 10–11Chobe riverfront by private boat, timed for the evening elephant crossings and away from the day-trip traffic.
  6. Days 12–13South to the Makgadikgadi. Quad-biking the salt crust, a morning with the meerkats, and a night sleeping out on the pan with nothing between you and the sky.
  7. Day 14A scenic flight over the Okavango panhandle on the way back to Maun, and your onward connection.
  • Best monthsMay to October for the full route; the pans night is best April to October
  • Where you sleepExclusive-use villas and private camps, private chef, and a Director travelling with the group
  • Who it suitsFamilies taking over a camp, private celebrations, and travellers for whom the itinerary should bend entirely around them

Enquire about The Grand Botswana

Indicative from-rates are per person per day, excluding international flights, and vary by season. Compare all four collections, or ask a Travel Designer for a quotation against your dates.

What Grand adds

Access we hold for this tier.


A private guide and vehicle, throughout

The same guide for the whole journey, in a vehicle nobody else shares. You set the pace, the hours and the priorities from the first morning to the last.

Helicopter and private charter

Doors-off flights over the Delta at golden hour, private charters between camps, and scenic flights over the Okavango panhandle.

Exclusive-use camps and villas

Whole properties taken for your party — staff, chef, boats and guides working to you alone. Ideal for families and milestone celebrations.

A Director in attendance

A senior member of our team travelling with the group from arrival to departure, holding every relationship on the route.

Before you enquire

The Grand Collection, answered.


What does exclusive use actually mean?

That the camp, or the villa, is yours. No other guests, no shared vehicles, no fixed mealtimes, no negotiating the dinner table. On a camp buy-out the staff, the chef, the guides and the boats work to your party alone for the length of your stay.

Is a private guide really worth it?

It is the single biggest upgrade available on a safari, and it matters more than the accommodation. A private guide and vehicle means you leave when you want, stay as long as you want, follow what interests you, and never wait while somebody else finishes photographing a roller. For photographers it is close to essential.

Tell me about the helicopter.

Doors off, low and slow over the Delta in the hour before sunset, following the channels rather than a flight path. It is not a transfer with a view: it is a scheduled highlight, and we normally land somewhere with dinner already set. Subject to weather and availability, and quoted in.

Who is the Director who travels with us?

A senior member of our own team, not a hired guide. They travel with the party from arrival to departure, hold the relationships with every camp on the route, and have the authority to change the plan on the spot when something better presents itself.

How far ahead do we need to book this?

Twelve to eighteen months for peak season, and longer if you want a specific exclusive-use property over Christmas or New Year. There are very few of these places and they are held early. We will tell you honestly what is realistically available on your dates before you get attached to a plan.

Taking a camp, or a country?

Grand journeys are written from a blank page and planned a long way out. Tell us who is travelling and roughly when, and we will start there.