1001 Things To Do Before You Die
See Elephants In The Wild!

BBC 50 Things To Do Before You Die

BBC 50 Places To See Before You Die

African elephants are usually bigger than their Asian cousins and also outnumber them ten to one. In fact there are two species of African elephant - the Savanna Elephant and the Forest Elephant - and are distinguishable from Asian Elephants because they have much bigger ears.

Elephants are increasingly threatened by human intrusion and poaching and are now a protected species worldwide. Once numbering in the millions, the African elephant population has dwindled to between 470,000 and 690,000 individuals. Conservation projects have stabilised the population in most areas of Eastern and Southern Africa - in fact the number of elephants in the country of South Africa has been able to grow from 8,000 in 1995 to more than 18,000 by 2008 because of a ban on killing elephants (although sadly this has led to the government announcing that it will allow elephant culls again).

So where's the best places in Africa to see elephants in the world?

Etosha National Park in the Kunene Region in northwestern Namibia is home to some of the biggest bull elephants on the continent. Here 50 waterholes have been built to increase the chances of visitors seeing wild animals, and if you spend the night at one of the rest camps nearby watering holes are floodlit so you can watch the animals after dark.

The Chobe National Park in the north-west of Botswana, near the borders to Zambia, Zimbabwe and Namibia, has the largest concentration of wild elephants of any such park in Africa. It is also just 60km from the Victoria Falls.

In South Africa, head for the Tembe Elephant Park, a 300km² game reserve in Maputaland, KwaZulu-Natal. 'The Ivory Route'. It was once part of the ancient ivory route that linked the ivory traders of Mozambique and Zululand and today is home to a group of over 200 elephants.

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