Reviews of Chiawa Camp

"The flight and the boattrip to Lower Zambezi and Chiawa Camp is already beautiful. What a splendid environment and what a warm welcome.

The camp with very luxery beautifully furnished "tents" is very good organised with excellent perfect service. The food is incredible good. Enjoyed the dining in a fairy like lighted bush, lunch on the river and my early morning tea in bed.

The guides are superb! They found everything we wanted. Also enjoyed the canoe trip very much." See all these reviews: 12n in Zambia

"See comments for 18th to 22nd Sept 2018" See all these reviews: 10n in Zambia

"As a return visitor to Chiawa ( last visit 2014) I had very high expectations in respect of every aspect that makes up "The Chiawa Experience".
In all respects even these were exceeded.
Quality wildlife/ rooms/ food/ service and activities. Excitement, fun, interesting people ( guests and staff ),educational, healthy outdoor living and a great environment to stimulate ( and rest) body and mind.
Note: I am not a fisherman at home, but at Chiawa it is one of the activities a visitor has to try.On my last morning I caught a 62 lbs Vundu ( a freshwater catfish)......I know, boasting!!
The fish was returned unharmed to the river.
I will return to Chiawa." See all these reviews: 10n in Zambia

"Best sited camp in whole trip. Most comfortable and loads of game in the camp.

In one hour we saw a troop of baboons, a small herd of elephant, bush buck, water buck, impala, warthogs and hippo from our verandha!

Most enjoyable canoe trip. Not at all strenuous and very relaxing." See all these reviews: 10n in Zambia

"A wonderfully run Camp. Fantastic food and very organised staff." See all these reviews: 7n in Zambia

"all good." See all these reviews: 7n in Zambia

"We were given honeymoon/family suite which was beautiful and had a private pool. Amazing view over animal corridor to river. Constant animals around the suite.


Staff especially friendly and personable. Lots of amazing activities and surprises. Great game drives and the canoeing was very special and quite unique.


We found this a good combination with its sister camp old mondoro as chiawa is less of a bush camp and more formal." See all these reviews: 5n in Zambia

"On arrival at Chiawa, I informed the manager that I was unwell and somewhat disinterested in food and so we were quite stunned to find that they had a special brunch of fillet steak with champagne for us aboard one of the boats. It was obviously something they had planned/always give new arrivals and they didn't seem to understand that neither of us really wanted a special meal and being on a boat with no 'facilities' made me particularly wary. Neither of us ate much and we both felt guilty that they had gone to a great deal of effort that was ultimately wasted and not appreciated.

If they had asked, I would also have told them that Judy doesn't drink alcohol and doesn't like boats either! I understand that camps want to make things special but springing this on us without a choice felt insensitive at the very least. We terminated the boat ride as soon as we could to return to camp and the 'facilities'.

I spent the whole 3 days in camp due to my uncertain requirements but was able to enjoy the very close visits of elephants and warthogs around our 'tent'. I recovered in time to move on to Old Mondoro." See all these reviews: 16n in Zambia

"A superb camp and run beautifully. Having so loved Old Mondoro and its informal luxury, we were a bit concerned that Chiawa would be a bit too "posh" for us

Yes, it was beautifully run, but without all that "poshness" that we would have hated

It also was very laid back and had informal luxury

Food superb

We simply loved the range of activities available----unusual and "right up our street"

We felt the same on this point at Old Mondoro

Rooms were superb---we had one night in room 6 and then for the next nearly 5 days we were moved to The Honeymoon Suite---for no cost: This was unbelievably superb and can't begin to say how huge and spacious it was-----so many places to sit inside and outside

So many candles everywhere, which I used every solitary night

Our own pool

Our own loungers

Our own camp fire

I could go on and on

We even had 2 x private dinners at our Suite----the staff call it "The Palace"

We realise that we will never get it again, as next year they are going to officially start to sell it, and the rates will no doubt be exorbitant!

However, for any of your clients wanting to really splash out, then we cannot recommend highly enough this Honeymoon Suite---it is "to die for"!

We intend going back to both camps in 2019---in Sept----and would request Room 7 as our 1st choice and Room 8 as our 2nd choice

No complaints whatsoever

However, there was a camp fire at breakfast, but never in the evening----I mentioned this, and was told that I only had to ask to have one built---that was not the point---there is nowhere like a camp fire for getting clients to mingle and to discuss their day's activities---like a camp fire

Their answer in truth, was that they don;t want to wake up guests who have gone to bed at very early hours (from our point of view!) by the guides needing to walk them home, when they might be a little noisy, and wake up the sleeping guests!

I don't agree with this----one is only talking about maybe sitting at the camp fire after dinner for an hour --max!

As it is, with dinner at 8 pm, most of the time, dinner is over by 930 pm at the latest----and although one gets up at 0530, a further 45 mins chatting around a fire, is hardly late

But I doubt that they will change their minds re a camp fire every night----of course, as the nights get much warmer, it is almost too hot for a fire!

We had a wonderful dinner off-site at what they call their "Bedrock" facility----all the tables are set up completely in the open,beside a red canyon, with lamps hung everywhere all over the canyon------too magical to express----and all the hard work that goes into making these dinners so special, is unbelievable!

Again--please do not let them get any bigger!

We met and spent quite a lot of time with Grant, the owner---had lunch and dinner and many chats with him on his "2 sleeps" at Chiawa---as he calls them---a great fun, completely down to earth with a lovely sense of humour

We all discussed convservation quite a bit, as Mike is a Trustee of both Born Free, headed up by Virginia Mckenna and Will----and he is also a Trustee of The Galapagos Trust---so we all had heaps in common---and of course Grant has done a lot to encourate the other camps in the area to see the benefits of getting involved in conservation of the Lowe Zambezi---which they now do----good on him

In fact, we asked to visit the Conservation site near to Royal airport, on our way to Royal to fly to Lusaka, and we spent nearly 1 hour with them---the do a great and very necessary job

Mike is intending putting in money into this Conservation project on the Lower Zambezi

So a wonderful experience" See all these reviews: 9n in Zambia

"it was our first time in a camp and we enjoyed it very much.

We very much enjoyed the professional and friendly team, the management, and the guides.

To listen to the Chiawa choir before dinner was wonderful." See all these reviews: 5n in Zambia