How often do you journey into unknown territory?

The ‘unknown’ is that which is mysterious, undiscovered and as yet, nameless in experience.

In search of the ultimate personal journey, we invite you to consider the walking safari in untouched African wilderness. It offers new adventures of discovery; a first step into your own unfamiliar.

On safari in the furthermost untouched regions of the Kruger National Park, the Okavango Delta or the Hluhluwe Imfolozi Game Park you are surrounded by landscapes of wild animals in free roaming Big 5 territories.

What you need to take with you on an African Walking Safari

Courage and a good ear make fine travel companions on a walking safari. Guided by an armed and trained safari professional and perhaps some fellow safari walking companions, it remains a delicately personal experience. When you are on foot and very much alone in your inner world, your senses respond to the new landscapes along different principles to how you have always responded to the familiar.

On a walking safari in the wild, Instructions are offered in low audio; there is no gossip or chatter. It’s a quiet and sensational journey where you remain connected to your own inner thoughts and responses. It’s a chance to lay your hand upon the gnarly skin in the baobab tree and focus on the sensation of touch. A chance to hear the huffs of the bull elephant while grazing mere meters away. A moment in time to crouch and focus in close on the myriad insect life busy upon the hard-baked African soil. An adventure in discovery of a half-dug lair of the anteater, its smell still lingering and strange on your nostrils.

With so much to discover about this unknown teeming life, a walking safari offers a meeting point between you and Nature like no other. It slows down time. It speeds up sensation. With many ways to explore the bush veld on safari, from hot-air balloon, bicycle, horseback, 4×4 vehicle, makoro or boat; a walking safari delivers you with the true essence of an authentic safari.

Bespoke Walking Safari Experiences with Hayward’s #GrandSafari

The walking safari remains one of the best ways to immerse yourself in untouched, pristine wilderness exclusively on offer for Hayward’s Grand Safari guests in regions where man may never have walked before.

Each intimate bespoke mobile tented camp offers Hayward’s guests the privilege of a Big 5 walking safari experience led by safari rangers adept and knowledgeable of the region, the wildlife, bird life and indigenous vegetation. Here, you can easily learn how to identify the sounds, the smells, the textures, the temperatures and the colours. It’s an encyclopaedia of nature on how animals survive. It is how our first ancestors did. Its still available today in protected regions where flora, fauna and weather inexorably cycle the seasons untouched by the modern hand of man.

The walking safari becomes the ultimate safari experience when delivered with Hayward’s luxury and style. Safari life was first discovered by Victorian explorers in search of a deep understanding of wild Africa, her animals, bird life, peoples and traditions. It is survival entwined with the knowledge of life of where to find water, the importance of shade and ultimately how to put down the burden of modern stressors and embrace the true understanding of your own existence. For some perhaps, the true meaning of the holy grail of life and the continuance of our species.

Untouched Destinations for a Big 5 Walking Safari in South Africa:

The Hluhluwe Umfolozi Game Reserve is one of Africa’s oldest game reserves and home to the black and white rhino where you may stand in the presence of a grazing rhino, hear and feel the air throb with insect life and Zulu history, where your eye scours the tree boughs in search of the illusive leopard.

The coastline of the iSimangaliso World Heritage Wetland Park is the only remaining major nesting site in Africa where Loggerhead and Leatherback turtles still lay their eggs and a chance to walk the wild dunes and witness the ancient nesting rituals found nowhere else in Africa.

Among the crevices and crannies of the Dinokeng Big 5 Reserve where where leopard hide in the shadows, hear legendary tales of mating ostrich and laughing hyena and follow wildlife spoor and dung beetle diaries and get hooked on how fascinating the small things are.

Walk with the San Bushmen,the original inhabitants of the Kalahari Desert and share their spiritual relationship with the earth and their survival in one of Africa’s most harsh environments.

The Sterkfontein Caves located in the Cradle of Humankind is a paleo-anthropological site 50 kilometers northwest of Johannesburg which takes explorers back 3-million years to when our ancestors lived in the area, today known as the birthplace of humanity.

Discover more walking safari opportunities on the Hayward Safaris Destinations and Camp Locations page.