Makgadikgadi Pans

Makgadikgadi is part of the part of the Kalahari Basin, an area of 12 000 sq km and home to one of the largest salt pans in the world. Arid, desolate and waterless for much of the year means that large mammals are thus absent.
As a result of years of good rain, the two largest pans, Sowa to the east and Ntwetwe to the west, have flooded which attracts wildlife including zebra, wildebeest and flamingos .at Sowa and Nata Sanctuary. Flamingo numbers can run into hundreds of thousands, and the spectacle is completely overwhelming.

The national park is situated roughly halfway between the towns of Maun and Nata, on the Francistown road. The name Makgadikgadi implies of a 'vast open lifeless land'. The pans are located in large areas to the south, east and north-eastern regions of the park. The rainwater that pours down on the pans is supplemented by seasonal river flows – the Nata, Tutume, Semowane and Mosetse Rivers in the east, and in years of exceptional rains, the Okavango via the Boteti River in the west. During this time, the pans can be transformed into a powder blue lake, the waters gently lapping the shorelines, and flowing over the pebble beaches – a clear indication of the gigantic, prehistoric lake the Makgadikgadi once was.

The Makgadikgadi & Nxai Pans National Park is situated roughly halfway between Maun and Nata on the Francistown road in northern Botswana. The turnoff is 160 kilometres east of Maun and 45 kilometres west of the small village of Gweta, which has the nearest lodge accommodation, fuel and supplies.