Matobo or Matusadona?
The two parks side by side on what you will see, what you can do, what it costs, how you get there and the health picture, with the facts behind every rating.
Our verdict
Matobo is a small granite park of painted caves and eagles near Bulawayo; Matusadona is a remote lakeshore park on Kariba with big game along the shore. Pick Matobo for ease and cost: about 30 km of tar from Bulawayo, entry at $10 a day when you sleep inside, three nights camping for about $161 and a low malaria risk. Lion and elephant have no resident populations, so the draw is rock art, walks and birds of prey, with over 50 raptor species. Pick Matusadona for elephant and buffalo likely, hippo guaranteed, boat cruises into the Sanyati Gorge and guided walks with a park official. It costs more: a flat $30 a day, about $255 in camping and park fees for three nights at Tashinga before the boat crossing, and the park recommends malaria prophylaxis. Our guides publish no route between these two parks.
Best for big game MatusadonaBest for walking MatoboBest for on the water MatusadonaBest for self-drive MatoboBest for low budget MatoboBest for families MatoboBest for wilderness Matusadona
Tap a row label to see the reasoning behind a rating.
| Compare | Matobo424 km² | MatusadonaAbout 1,400 km² |
|---|---|---|
| 1No game peak | 3June to October, on the lakeshore | |
1No game peak; May to Sep for walking and rock artBlack eagle nest sites: 100+ monitored; Eagle survey: Every year since 1963; Raptor species: 50+, 32 breeding | 3bestJune to October, on the lakeshoreElephant: About 480 (2022 count); Hippo on the shoreline: Over 2,100 (2021 survey); Wild dog: 20 reintroduced, Feb 2026 | |
| Elephant | Rare | Likely |
| Lion | Absent | Fair chance |
| Leopard | Rare | Rare |
| Buffalo | Not published | Likely |
| Wild dog | Absent | Rare |
| Cheetah | Not published | Absent |
| Hippo | Fair chance | Guaranteed |
| Giraffe | Likely | Not published |
2340 speciesAbout 340 bird species listed on the wildlife page. | 2350 speciesAbout 350 bird species listed on the wildlife page. | |
| 5Self-drive | 5Water | |
4A park you walk into rather than drive through: walking on the granite domes is widely practised, every private lodge offers guided walks, and there are no resident lions. | 4Guided walks of two to three hours with park guides at about $40, and the Matusadona Trails, multi-day escarpment backpacking at $275 a day; walking only with a designated official and no under-12s on the Trails. | |
1No night activity is listed; park hours are usually given as 06:00 to 18:00 and driving after dark outside towns is discouraged. | 2bestThe park runs no night drives; only Bumi Hills offers them, on its own concession outside the boundary. | |
1The guide says to assume the dams carry bilharzia and not to swim, and fishing rules are not in the tariff. | 5bestMorning and evening cruises from Tashinga and every lodge, the Sanyati Gorge by boat, houseboats along the shore and tigerfishing under a five-fish limit; canoeing is not offered. | |
5bestTar from Bulawayo to Maleme, gravel roads suitable for most vehicles, and a high-clearance 4x4 only for the fenced game section and some outlying areas. | 2Self-drive is allowed from sunrise to sunset, but getting a vehicle in means the private McMaster ferry, 3 to 3.5 h plus about 2 h of bush road, or 9 to 10 h from Harare with a 4x4 recommended. | |
| $12cheapest bed | $30cheapest bed | |
$18 / $10bestInternational adult per day, the lower figure if you sleep inside the park ({'name': 'Official ZimParks tariff (De-Gazetted Tariff 2026), published February 2026', 'url': 'https://www.zimparks.org.zw/media/2026/02/De-Gazetted-Tariff-2026.pdf'}, 2026-09-24). | $30International adult per day ({'name': 'ZimParks De-Gazetted Tariff 2026 (Matusadona conservation row p.12, vehicles p.23)', 'url': 'https://www.zimparks.org.zw/media/2026/02/De-Gazetted-Tariff-2026.pdf'}, 2026-09-24). | |
$12bestLowest listed rate per person per night across 18 places; 13 are budget tier. | $30Lowest listed rate per person per night across 38 places; 22 are budget tier. | |
$154bestMedian of 8 priced places; top end $447. | $630Median of 6 priced places; top end $999. | |
5bestCheapest listed bed $12, 13 of 18 places in the budget tier, park fee $10 a day. | 3Cheapest listed bed $30, 22 of 38 places in the budget tier, park fee $30 a day. | |
| $818mid-range | ||
$161Budget one: self-drive camping at Maleme | Not published | |
$818Budget two: Farmhouse Lodge, dinner, bed and breakfast | Not published | |
Not published | Not published | |
| Bulawayo (BUQ)nearest airport | Kariba townnearest airport | |
Bulawayo (BUQ), about 55 to 60 km to the boundaryFrom the getting-there and flights pages. | Kariba town, about 1 h by speedboat to TashingaFrom the getting-there and flights pages. | |
Not needed to Maleme; recommended in the game sectionFrom the getting-there page. | RecommendedFrom the getting-there page. | |
| No game peakpeak game viewing | June to October, on the lakeshorepeak game viewing | |
No game peak; May to Sep for walking and rock artFrom the best-time page. | June to October, on the lakeshoreFrom the best-time page. | |
Open all yearFrom the best-time page. | No closure published; interior roads may close in the rains (unconfirmed)From the best-time page. | |
| Low, per secondary sourcesmalaria | Prophylaxis recommended by the pa…malaria | |
Low, per secondary sourcesFrom the health page. | Prophylaxis recommended by the parkFrom the health page. | |
Not publishedNo Matobo page mentions tsetse. | Not publishedThe guide found no Matusadona-specific source; the management plan says tsetse were eradicated from the surrounding communal areas. | |
OctoberMean daily maximum of the hottest month, from the health page. | October, up to 40°C and moreMean daily maximum of the hottest month, from the health page. | |
Bulawayo, the nearest city, about 30 kmFrom the health page. | Clinic at Tashinga headquarters; hospitals a boat ride or a long day's drive awayAir evacuation: Recommended by the park. | |
| 4Families | 4Wilderness | |
4bestMalaria risk is described as low, Bulawayo is about 30 km away and Matobo Hills Lodge has family chalets with cots; the real hazards are wet granite and near-freezing June to August nights. | 3There is a clinic at Tashinga and Changa has family tents with adjoining children's tents, but every camp is unfenced, the park recommends malaria prophylaxis and Jenje and the Trails take no one under 12. | |
2Not a big-game park: no resident lions or elephants, leopard takes luck, and the plains game lives in a fenced, restocked section of about 105 km². | 2Hippo, crocodile and impala are guaranteed and elephant likely, but lion is only a chance in what the guide calls a recovering park. | |
2Well under an hour from Bulawayo, with a fenced and restocked game section and the festive weeks busier with Zimbabwean holidaymakers. | 4bestAcross the lake from the nearest town, with a park fleet of two pontoon boats and four vehicles in 2023 and no more than three vehicles allowed at a sighting. |
Compare all of Zimbabwe's parks on the comparison page. Matusadona has its own guide at visitmatusadona.com.
How the ratings work
- Big game is calculated from each park's sightings table on its wildlife page: guaranteed counts 3, likely 2, a fair chance 1, rare 0.5 and absent 0, across elephant, lion, leopard, buffalo, wild dog, cheetah, hippo and giraffe, scaled so that 16 points is 5 out of 5. We do not rate or locate rhino anywhere in this guide network.
- Birding follows the species count on the wildlife page. Low-budget safari follows the cheapest listed bed, the share of budget places and the daily park fee.
- Walking, night drives, water, self-drive, families, first safari and wilderness are our ratings, whole numbers from 1 to 5. Press "Why?" on any row to read the facts each one rests on, with the page they come from. Where a rule is not published we say so rather than guess.
- Prices are per person per night in US dollars as listed on the lodges pages, before park fees; the three-night totals come from each park's costs page and use the dated rates there. Fees are the international adult rate per day.