Camdeboo National Park

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In 1975 the Southern African Nature Foundation (today WWF-SA) established the 165km² Karoo Nature Reserve virtually all around the historic town of Graaff-Reinet. It was only in 2005 that the Karoo Nature Reserve was transferred to the stewardship of South African National Parks, and officially proclaimed as the Camdeboo National Park. Additional land was incorporated into the new Park, enlarging it to 194km². Some parts of the reserve consists of inspiring mountain topography, and yet others of wide open arid plains. The Nqweba Dam, previously known as the Van Rhyneveld’s Pass Dam and built in the early 1920’s, occupies a large section of the Park (up to 1000 hectares when full). The vegetation of the Park is a mix of Karoo scrub, grasslands, thorn savannas and succulent thickets, consisting of over 330 species.

Memorial to Voortrekker leader Andries Pretorius
Sunset over the Camdeboo
A view over the Nqweba Dam
Camdeboo landscape
Gemsbok roaming the plains of Camdeboo
Camdeboo National Park scenery

Camdeboo National Park’s most celebrated natural feature, and a declared scenic national monument, is the Valley of Desolation, an awesome cleft over 100m deep, bordered by imposing pillars of stone and cut by natural forces over a period of 240-million years into the side of the mountain looming over Graaff-Reinet. A tarred road leads to the toposcope and viewpoints right at the top, where visitors have an opportunity to enjoy the magnificent vistas over the expansive Great Karoo and the small frontier town situated in an oxbow bend of the Sundays River below.

Making sense of the toposcope at the Valley of Desolation
Graaff-Reinet seen from the toposcope on the way to the Valley of Desolation
Spandaukop
Camdeboo’s Valley of Desolation
Camdeboo’s Valley of Desolation
Camdeboo’s Valley of Desolation
Camdeboo’s Valley of Desolation
Taking in the scenery at the Valley of Desolation

The Karoo Nature Reserve and later Camdeboo National Park was stocked with several large game animals that used to occur here historically, and today Cape Buffalo and Cape Mountain Zebra count among the 43 kinds of mammals that can be seen here. All told, there’s no less than 225 kinds of birds, 34 reptile species and 8 varieties of frogs and toads that has been recorded within the Park’s borders.

Acacia Pied Barbet
Ant-eating Chat chick at nest burrow
Black Wildebeest
Blesbok
Bush Karoo Rat
Cape Robin-Chat
Caracal in th dark near Camdeboo’s campsite
Cardinal Woodpecker
Crowned Lapwing
Familiar Chat
Four-striped Grass Mouse
Gemsbok
Common Duiker
Southern Grey-headed Sparrow
Ground Agama
Southern African Ground Squirrel
Helmeted Guineafowl
Karoo Korhaan
Karoo Prinia
Karoo Scrub Robin
Kudu
Leopard Tortoise
Malachite Sunbird (unusually dark form)
Meerkat
Namaqua Dove
Neddicky
Ostrich family
Pale Chanting Goshawk (Immature)
Pied Crow
Pririt Batis
Red Hartbeest
Red-billed Firefinch
Red-billed Quelea
Rock Kestrel
Scrub Hare
Springbok Ram
Springbok Lamb
Southern Masked Weaver
Steppe Buzzard
Vervet Monkey
White-backed Mousebird

Overnight guests have a choice between the four basic two-bed safari tents at the Lakeview Tented Camp, which make use of a communal ablution block, kitchen and lounge, or the Nqweba Campsite which has fifteen sites for caravans and tents (each with a braai stand (barbeque) picnic table and electric point). There’s a limited network of gravel game-viewing roads available to sedans, a few more 4×4 trails, hiking trails, fishing and other watersports on the Nqweba Dam, a bird-watching hide (unfortunately really only of use when the dam is full), and rustic picnic sites. Graaff-Reinet has shops, restaurants, fuel stations and more.

Camping at Camdeboo National Park, December 2017
Safari Tent at Lakeview
Communal kitchen and lounge for the use of visitors staying in the safari tents
Communal showers for the use of visitors staying in the safari tents
Viewing platform in the camping area
Viewing platform in the camping area

Camdeboo National Park was the final stop on our December 2017 holiday tour through eight of South Africa’s national parks. The easiest access to Camdeboo’s Nqweba Campsite, Lakeview Tented Camp and the main game-viewing area is from the gate on the N9, just a few kilometres north of Graaff-Reinet, while the gate to the Valley of Desolation lies on the R63 to Murraysburg.

24 thoughts on “Camdeboo National Park”

  5. kim blades, writer

    Wonderful post. I love the Karoo, The Drostdy Hotel in Graaf Reinet is one of my favourite places in SA. I haven’t been there for 22 years so don’t know if it is still open. I hope so. Such a dry area is still a haven for a host of wildlife.

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  6. John

    Incredibly beautiful nature!😊 There are both large steppes and rocks, not flat as most nature films show. Is as where I live, in Scania (Skåne). It have a reputation to be flat, but it´s opposite. Wonderful animals,it´s a mecka for all who love animal and nature.

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  8. allentimphotos2

    Wonderful. It is so great to see governments appreciate that value of lands to be preserves for generation. This something that the U.S. has been doing since President Grant with Yellowstone. At least this was true until now with a much less stellar Donald Trump as president.

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  9. perdebytjie

    Hierdie park is op my lysie. Dankie vir die inligting, Dries. Dit motiveer ons om soontoe te gaan. Vriende van ons boer in die Kamdeboodistrik en elke keer as ons daar kuier, dreig ons om die park te besoek, maar kom nooit sover nie!😄

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  10. Beth

    I don’t know if your blog setup was designed that way, but I could click on one photo to enlarge it and then scroll through the otheres–really neat feature.
    Talking with my granddaughter about her volunteer work at a wildlife rescue center recently, I learned that little woodpeckers have an attitude. She said the tiniest little bird they had was a baby woodpecker, and knowing she was about to feed him, he would fly at her and peck hard. While other birds pecked because they feared human touch, they did not have the “hammer” that little guy had.

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    1. de Wets Wild Post author

      Thanks for the kind compliment, Beth. I believe the “gallery carousel” feature doesn’t work in all browsers though.

      During our latest trip we realised again just how hard a woodpecker can peck – we’d hear the hammering and start looking for them, and often didn’t find the responsible party before walking several hundred meters!

      Your granddaughter’s time at the rescue centre sounds fascinating!

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