Nyerere National Park (Selous Game Reserve)

Nyerere National Park — formerly known as the Selous Game Reserve and still widely referred to by its historic name — is Africa's largest protected wildlife area, covering a staggering 30,893 square kilometres of pristine wilderness in southern Tanzania. Renamed in 2019 in honour of Tanzania's founding father Julius Nyerere, this UNESCO World Heritage Site is larger than Switzerland and harbours some of the continent's most significant populations of elephants, hippos, crocodiles, wild dogs, and lions. Yet despite its immense size and extraordinary biodiversity, Nyerere receives a tiny fraction of the visitors who flock to the northern circuit parks, making it one of Africa's last true wilderness frontiers — a place where you can spend an entire day on safari without seeing another vehicle.

What sets Nyerere apart from every other park in Tanzania is its remarkable diversity of safari activities. While game drives are spectacular, the park is equally famous for its boat safaris on the mighty Rufiji River — Africa's largest river by volume in Tanzania — where you glide past basking crocodiles, pods of 50+ hippos, and elephants drinking on the banks while fish eagles cry overhead. Walking safaris with armed rangers offer an adrenaline-charged, ground-level perspective that few other parks permit. The Rufiji River and its network of lakes, channels, and oxbows create a water-based ecosystem unlike anything in the Serengeti or Ngorongoro. With C.A.T.S Safaris, Nyerere offers the adventurous traveller a raw, uncrowded, and profoundly authentic African wilderness experience.