Kalahari Desert Hotels & Resorts

Experience the ancient culture of the Khoisan community, semi-nomadic bushmen whose ancestors have roamed the Kalahari for over 20,000 years. The Khoisan community are descendants of the oldest people on earth, so it’s incredible to come face-to-face with this historic way of life, hear the villagers’ distinctive clicking language and discover how they’ve survived in this barren desert landscape for centuries.

At Bagatelle Kalahari Game Ranch, they have developed close ties with many of the local bushmen families and now work with them to run respectful tours of their villages. This helps provide income for the Khoisan community and gives visitors a glimpse into their traditions, beliefs and lifestyle.

The experience starts with a morning walk to the village, accompanied by the Khoisan bushmen, who’ll show you around their traditional grass-and-mud rondavels. During the tour, you’ll collect water in ostrich eggs, watch the villagers set animal traps and see how women make beautiful pearl and ostrich jewellery. A favourite part of the tour is learning how the Khoisan forage plants and identify which ones to use for food and medicine.

Guests really enjoy this cultural experience and the chance to learn about Namibia’s heritage.

When you stay at Bagatelle Kalahari Game Ranch, you’ll get the complete desert experience. Guests love morning and afternoon safaris through the 10,000-hectare reserve in the southern Kalahari, which features some of the highest dunes in the region, as well as salt flats and valleys dotted with acacia trees. To really immerse yourself in the desert, you can also ride one of the horses through the dunes with a guide. After dinner, join a local astronomer and peer through one of the state-of-the-art telescopes to see planets, star clusters and distant galaxies.

As well as sleeping among the dunes in luxury chalets, you’ll spend your days exploring them with expert guides. Along the way, your guide will point out various types of native vegetation and wildlife. Look out for desert animals, which can include everything from kudus and oryx to zebras, giraffes and ostriches, as well as a family of cute meerkats who live around the ranch. You’ll also get to visit three orphaned cheetahs, Ralf, Etosha and Tuano, who are cared for in a 12-hectare enclosure near the ranch – they work with the Cheetah Conservation Fund to protect the area’s endangered big cats.

You can also ride one of the American Quarter (cowboy) horses through the dunes with a guide. This gives you a unique perspective you just don’t get in a car. The stargazing experience completes the day. The clear, star-filled skies above the Kalahari are quite magical.