Kasanka National Park

About this place

Kasanka National Park is one of Zambia's smallest parks, at about 390 square kilometres in Chitambo District. Yet it hosts a sight found nowhere else, as close to ten million fruit bats arrive each year from October to December, in what is called the largest mammal migration in the world. At dusk its sky fills with living clouds of them. It was the first Zambian park run by a public-private partnership, with the private Kasanka Trust working alongside the national parks body since 1986. Species such as zebra and buffalo have been reintroduced. It has recorded 114 mammal species, including elephant, hippopotamus and sitatunga, and more than 471 kinds of bird. The bats roost in the evergreen Mushitu swamp forest, then pour out at dusk in a long stream overhead, the finest thing to see here. Out of season you find calm Lake Wasa, the Wasa River hung with branches, puku in the grass and meadows dotted with small termite mounds on either side of a white sandy track. It is about 86 km from Kundalila Falls in a straight line and about 73 km from the Bangweulu Wetlands, so many visitors join them in one trip. November is the best time for bats, so book well ahead and go out at dawn or dusk. Wear a hat while you stand under the swarm, and bring protection against mosquitoes.