Waza National Park Walking Safari

Waza National Park was gazetted as a hunting reserve in 1934 and covers 1,700 km² of Sahelian floodplain and acacia savanna hard against the Chad border. It is the most internationally known of Cameroon's parks — the giraffe, elephant and lion that appear in every Cameroon tourism brochure are Waza's — and it is one of the few places in the country where you can walk that landscape on foot rather than view it through a vehicle window.

Walking safaris leave from the ranger post near Waza village on the park's north-western edge, always with an armed conservation-service ranger, along the floodplain tracks where the game concentrates as the dry season deepens. Elephant, giraffe, kob, hartebeest and warthog are common; lion and cheetah are present but far less reliably seen on foot than from a vehicle at dawn. There is no climbing and no real distance to speak of — the difficulty here is heat, sun exposure on open floodplain, and the total concentration a walking safari among large game demands.

The dry season, roughly November to April, is both the only time walking is practical and the best time for game, as animals concentrate at the shrinking waterholes. The wet season floods the plain and closes the park to walking entirely. This is also a security-sensitive part of the country — the Far North has been affected by instability tied to the Chad Basin over the past decade — so check current advisories and go through the park office rather than arranging anything informally.