Central Kalahari

The Central Kalahari Game Reserve is an extensive National Park in the Kalahari Desert of Botswana. Established in 1961 it covers an area of 52,800 km² (about twice the size of Massachusetts and about 10% of Botswana's total land area) making it the second largest game reserve in the world.

The Central Kalahari Game Reserve boasts wildlife such as giraffe, brown hyena, warthog, cheetah, wild dog, leopard, lion, blue wildebeest, eland, gemsbok, kudu and red hartebeest. The land is mostly flat and gently undulating, covered with bush as well as grasses that are found on the sand dunes. There are also areas of larger trees.

Many of the river valleys are fossilized with salt pans. Four fossilized rivers meander through the reserve including Deception Valley which began to form around 16,000 years ago.

The Basarwa, or San, have inhabited these lands for thousands of years since , roaming the area as nomadic hunters. However, since the mid-1990s the Botswanan government tried to relocate the San from the reserve. By 2005 the resettlement of the San from the Central Kalahari had left only about 250 permanent occupiers there. Subsequently some San have returned to the Central Kalahari Game Reserve.