Fresh from a top-to-toe redesign, Belmond Savute Elephant Lodge will invite guests to take front row seats as the cycle of life plays out this summer, at a new eye-level viewing hide in front of the camp’s watering hole. The lodge’s location beside the Savute Channel in Chobe National Park makes it a popular transit point for local wildlife, with lions, elephants, cheetahs, hyenas and antelope gathering at the watering hole throughout the day.
If you prefer to view your wildlife from a slightly greater distance, pull up a pew or a rattan chair on the vast open deck and gaze out across the plains, while sipping something cold and delicious from the new contemporary lounge and bar.
Newly imagined interiors of the 12 tented rooms and all the public spaces come courtesy of Inga Moore of Muza Lab, whose design credentials include the Hotel Alfonso XII in Spain, Kanuhura in the Maldives and several other Belmond properties, amongst others.
The suites retain a natural earthy feel, but bursts of colour add to the drama of the spectacular savannah setting. Grand four-poster beds, rattan easy chairs and chunky writing desks invite guests to channel their inner David Livingstone post-safari, and the lodge’s firepit is the place to swap stories as the sun dips below the horizon. All-inclusive rates start from US $970 per person per night.