Manovo-Gounda St Floris

Manovo-Gounda St Floris spreads UNESCO-listed savanna across the country's north - floodplain grasslands, gallery forests and sandstone massifs at a scale that once carried the region's great herds and still anchors its conservation hopes, with renewed protection efforts working to write the park's recovery chapter. The landscape's bones are magnificent: the Gounda's floodplains flushing green after rains, buffalo and antelope on the grasslands, in a park on UNESCO's danger list after poaching that may have taken as much as 80 per cent of its wildlife, and birdlife - crowned cranes to bustards - that never left. Access is strictly specialist-arranged.

Highlights

• The floodplain grasslands - the Gounda's green flush after rains.
• The gallery forests - shade lines threading the savanna.
• The protection effort - a park on UNESCO's danger list, its herds much reduced.
• The crane skies - the wetland birdlife that endured.

When to go

December to April is the dry season in principle. Arrange the trip through specialist local operators.

Practical notes

Visits run wholly through specialist partnerships. The park's story is recovery in progress; the honest visit supports it on its keepers' terms.

Nearby

Ndele and the Bamingui-Bangoran country southward.

Key facts