Moremi Game Reserve is the soul of the Okavango Delta turned into a safari: the only protected corner of the Delta you can reach by land, and one of the places with the most wildlife in all of Africa. Its 5.000 km² bring together two worlds —the water of the Okavango and the dry land of the Kalahari— and that boundary is exactly what makes it so rich: here the big cats and elephants of the savannah live alongside hippos, lechwe and wetland birds.
Moremi is famous among those in the know for its predators. It is one of the best places on the continent to see lions, leopards, cheetahs, hyenas and, above all, the rare and fascinating African wild dog. The great Chief's Island in its interior, along with the Xakanaxa and Khwai lagoons, holds an astonishing density of life, especially when the flood pushes animals towards higher ground. And all of it with a unique history: it was the first reserve in Africa created by decision of its own community.
This guide covers Moremi with a practical eye: its zones and gates, how to get there by land or by air, what wildlife to expect, the reserve fees, and how to combine it with the Delta and Chobe. Whether in a luxury camp, on a mobile safari or self-driving with a rooftop tent, Moremi offers the essence of a Botswana safari: untouched nature, few people and wild encounters that stay with you.
Moremi Game Reserve was born on 15 March 1963, when the Batawana people of Ngamiland, alarmed by uncontrolled hunting and the spread of cattle, decided on their own initiative to protect part of the Delta. The driving force was Elizabeth Pulane Moremi, widow of Chief Moremi III, which is why the reserve bears her name. It was the first protected area in Africa created by a local community rather than a colonial power, a milestone in world conservation. In 1979 it was handed over to the Department of Wildlife, and today it is the visitable heart of the Delta. Its full story is told on our history page.
Read the full history ↓The safari capital and the world's most famous inland delta: water flowing down from Angola to vanish into the Kalahari, ancient rock paintings and a reserve created by its own people.
Read the history of Maun and the Okavango Delta →No exact prices: a scale from $ (budget) to $$$$$ (luxury), with 2-3 options per category.
Origins, formation and what the sources say.
Long before it became a reserve, the heart of what is now Moremi had an owner: it was the private hunting ground of the chief of the Batawana people. That is why the large central island of the Delta, the biggest of them all, is called Chief's Island. There, among channels and flooded grasslands, the chief and his people hunted in a controlled way, in a territory that tradition protected from indiscriminate hunting.
The Batawana were, and still are, a branch of the great Tswana people who migrated to the northwest of present-day Botswana in the 18th century and became the dominant chieftaincy of Ngamiland, the region of the Delta and Lake Ngami. Cattle herders by tradition, they lived alongside the peoples of the water — the Bayei and the Hambukushu, fishers and mokoro polers — and the San, ancestral hunter-gatherers. They all shared the Delta and its wildlife, each in their own way.
For centuries, the balance between these peoples and the wildlife held. But the arrival of British colonial rule, modern rifles and professional white hunters operating out of Maun broke that balance. In the early and mid-20th century, uncontrolled hunting, together with the spread of cattle and disease, began to decimate the Delta's wildlife at an alarming rate. The old tradition of protecting the chief's hunting ground was no longer enough.
By the early 1960s, the situation was critical. The Batawana watched with dismay as the wildlife on their ancestral lands shrank year after year because of commercial and trophy hunting and pressure from cattle. On a continent where protected areas were almost always created by colonial powers — which often evicted local communities to do so — what happened in Ngamiland was extraordinary and pioneering.
Under the leadership of Elizabeth Pulane Moremi, widow of Chief Moremi III, who was then ruling the chieftaincy, the Batawana made an unprecedented decision: to protect part of the Delta on their own initiative by turning it into a wildlife reserve. On 15 March 1963, the Moremi Reserve was officially proclaimed by the Batawana themselves and named in honour of Chief Moremi. It was the first protected area in all of Africa created by a local community's decision rather than imposed by a colonial government.
That act made Moremi a global symbol of community conservation. The original reserve mainly covered the so-called Mopane Tongue, the strip of dry land in the east of the Delta. Over time it was extended to include the large Chief's Island and other areas, eventually covering about 5.000 km² of the central and eastern Okavango. The Batawana's initiative was decades ahead of modern ideas about the role of local communities in protecting nature.
After Botswana's independence in 1966, the young nation — soon to grow rich from the discovery of diamonds — built up a system of protected areas and a conservation policy that would become a model for Africa. Moremi, born of the Batawana initiative, was gradually brought into that system. In 1979, management of the reserve passed to the Department of Wildlife and National Parks (DWNP), which has run it ever since to national park standards, although it keeps its formal status as a 'game reserve'.
Moremi's consolidation coincided with the boom in photographic safari tourism. Botswana took a different path from its neighbours: instead of chasing large numbers of tourists, it opted for a 'low volume, high value' model, with few beds, high prices and tight control of environmental impact. Private and community conservation concessions were set up around Moremi — such as Khwai, managed by the local community — which expanded the area effectively protected and allowed for exclusive, low-impact tourism.
Moremi soon earned a reputation for excellence. Safari publications and guides repeatedly named it one of the best wildlife reserves in Africa, and its Mombo area, in the north of Chief's Island, one of the places with the most and best wildlife on the continent. The reintroduction of rhinos to these areas, heavily guarded against poaching, completed the 'Big Five' on a wildlife list that was already extraordinary.
If one thing sets Moremi apart, it is its wealth of predators. The mix of permanent water and dry land, of woodland, grassland and islands, creates an ideal mosaic for a wide variety of prey and, therefore, of hunters. Moremi is home to dense lion populations — including prides that have starred in documentaries — a strong leopard presence, cheetahs in the open areas, spotted hyenas and, above all, one of the world's most important populations of the endangered African wild dog.
The wild dog (Lycaon pictus) has become one of Moremi's biggest draws. This social predator, whose mottled coat is unique to each individual, hunts in coordinated packs and is endangered across almost all of Africa: only a few thousand remain on the continent. Botswana, and the Delta and Moremi in particular, are among its last great strongholds, which draws photographers and nature lovers from all over the world, especially during the denning season, when packs gather near their dens.
Alongside the predators is spectacular wildlife: huge herds of elephants (Botswana has the largest elephant population in Africa), buffalo, giraffes, zebras, hippos and specialised antelopes such as the red lechwe, adapted to moving through water, and the elusive sitatunga of the papyrus beds. With more than 500 bird species recorded in the Delta, Moremi is also a top-tier destination for birdwatchers. All of this makes the reserve one of the most complete and balanced ecosystems in southern Africa.
Today the Moremi Game Reserve is one of the gems of Botswana's nature tourism and, as part of the Okavango Delta, belongs to the site inscribed as a Unesco World Heritage Site in 2014. Every year it welcomes travellers from around the world who fly into its camps by light aircraft or set off by 4x4 along its sandy tracks, crossing the legendary log bridge at Khwai. It is the place where many Botswana safaris start to show their true scale.
Moremi embodies a conservation model that combines the Batawana's original community initiative with state management and the private and community concessions around it. This model has kept wildlife abundant and tourism low-impact, while also bringing income and jobs to local communities, many of whose members work as guides, polers, trackers and camp staff, sharing their ancestral knowledge of the Delta.
There is no shortage of challenges, though: the Okavango's variable flood pulse (some years bring big floods, others very little), pressure from tourism, conflicts between wildlife and communities, rhino poaching and threats to the river basin upstream in Angola and Namibia. Managing that balance is Botswana's ongoing task. Meanwhile, Moremi remains what it has been since that pioneering act in 1963: a sanctuary where a community decided, before anyone else in Africa, that wildlife was worth protecting.
