Visit Chobe
EN
Where to stay

Month by month

Chobe in December

December is the month the zebra go. With the rains, zebra that spent the dry season on the Chobe floodplain cross the river and walk south to Nxai Pan, and the rest of the riverfront's game scatters into a green interior.

If you only want the answer

December is wet, green and quiet: 138 mm of rain over 19 days, highs of 30.3°C, the zebra leaving for Nxai Pan and the riverfront herds thinned out. Green-season rates return at the Savuti and Nogatsaa lodges, some camps add festive surcharges from 20 December, and the birding is excellent.

December weather: the rains set in

The normals for the middle of the park give December 138 mm of rain over 19 days, afternoons of 30.3°C and nights of 21.0°C. Rain falls on more days than not, the bush thickens fast, and only January is wetter.

The river is still low, fed by local rain only; the Zambezi flood that will spread over the floodplain is still about three months away. Cruises run on low water, with hippo, crocodile and a wide range of waterbirds and migrants.

The zebra leave for Nxai Pan

December is the one month the migration is pinned to by research. Eight adult female zebra collared on the Namibia-Botswana border all crossed the Chobe River in December 2012 and walked due south to Nxai Pan National Park, where they stayed for an average of ten weeks; the same southward movement was seen in December 2013. The round trip is about 500 km in a straight line, and the rain-fed clay grasslands of Savuti and Mababe are the wet-season range on the way.

The rest of the riverfront's game disperses too. A two-year study of the riverfront routes never recorded a giraffe in December, and the elephants and buffalo follow the water inland. In their place come newborn animals and birds: BirdLife's November and December raptor passage, and the Palearctic migrants that make November to April the best birding season.

Rates, roads and malaria in December

Green-season rates return on 1 December: Ghoha Hills Savuti Lodge at $636 per person per night and Nogatsaa Pans Chobe Lodge at $607. Wilderness Savuti charges $1,259 until 19 December and a festive rate of $1,400 from 20 December 2026 to 5 January 2027, and Chobe Bakwena stays on its low rate of $653 for a two-night stay. Expert Africa notes low-season rates at many camps.

The Savuti clay deteriorates as the rain sets in, and gate staff at Mababe advise whether to take the Marsh Road or the Sand Ridge Road. Malaria risk is high. Fishing outside the park is open until 31 December; the national closed season starts on 1 January.

Sources