Below the sandstone Omboroko Mountains, in acacia thornveld some ten kilometres from the reserve’s other camps, Okonjima African Villa is a private house with a waterhole all its own, overlooked by an infinity pool. By day, guides follow radio-collared leopards across the reserve. Everything they find is recorded for the AfriCat Foundation, whose work the house helps to fund.
By day, guides follow radio-collared leopards across the reserve.
The house can be taken whole, with its own guide, vehicle, host and chef setting the pace, or booked by the room when it runs as a small lodge. Two suites share the thatched main house, where lounge and dining room meet at a wood-burning fireplace. Two mini-suites lie apart, a short walk away, and even the baths and outdoor showers look out over the bush.
Val and Rose Hanssen bought this land in 1970 and ran Brahman cattle on it. In those years, leopards that took their calves were trapped or shot. The AfriCat Foundation followed in 1991, and in 1993 the family made tourism, not cattle, its main income. In 2023 a third-generation leopard joined AfriCat’s research, its mother and grandmother enrolled before it.
After dark, guests can search for pangolins on foot.
A 2019 camera-trap study on the reserve found the highest leopard density then recorded in Namibia. Guides follow the cats’ collar signals by vehicle, tracking brown hyenas too. After dark, guests can search for pangolins on foot. The search needs a stay of two nights or more, and white rhinos are approached on foot with the reserve’s anti-poaching team, subject to availability.
Each mini-suite rises to its own double-volume thatched roof. The front is glass, sliding doors that open the room to the bush, and they can be swapped for roll-down canvas and heavy-duty gauze so the sounds outside carry straight in. Inside there is air conditioning and heating, a Nespresso station and a minibar. In the main house, the main suite looks straight over the waterhole. The second, set up as a family room, faces the garden and has two extra beds upstairs; when every room is let separately, it is best kept for guests travelling with those in the main suite.
A private chef cooks every meal, served at the main house table or in the shaded sala. Wildlife comes down to drink at the waterhole beyond the pool deck. Breakfast comes with one eye on the water. Drinks come with the stay, apart from premium and imported brands, and coffee, tea and fruit are laid out through the day.
Wildlife comes down to drink at the waterhole beyond the pool deck.
The reserve’s plains game includes giraffe, mountain zebra and kudu, and the waterhole draws a steady stream of birds. A stay includes two main activities a day, chosen from leopard and brown hyena tracking, game and nature drives and the Into AfriCat session, which takes guests behind the science of the tracking. Night drives, guided walking trails and the pangolin and rhino walks fall outside that allowance and are booked separately.
The reserve lies roughly halfway between Windhoek and Etosha National Park, so a stay here divides the journey north. The capital is two and a half hours away by tar road, and private charters land on the reserve’s own airstrip, a 25- to 30-minute drive from the villa. Children aged twelve and over are welcome, though there is no childcare, and the upstairs beds in the family room suit parents travelling with teenagers. The leopards that once cost the Hanssens their calves now pay for the research that follows them.
accommodation
Okonjima African Villa has four suites. Two are in the main house: the main suite over the waterhole, and a garden-facing family room with two extra beds upstairs. The North and South mini-suites lie apart under double-volume thatch. Each suite has a bath, indoor and outdoor showers, air conditioning, WiFi and a safe.
activities
Guides track radio-collared leopards and brown hyenas by vehicle across the private Okonjima Nature Reserve and run game and nature drives. Pangolins are tracked on foot for stays of two nights or more, and rhinos with the anti-poaching team. Guided walking trails and night drives are offered at extra cost, subject to weather.
conservation
Okonjima African Villa is one of the lodges whose income funds most of the AfriCat Foundation's work. Guides gather data on leopards, brown hyenas and pangolins for the foundation. AfriCat's partners include the University of Namibia, the Ongava Research Centre and the Carnivore and Pangolin Working Groups.
Get in touch and let’s start the conversation. An initial consultation helps us understand what you’re looking for, whether that’s specific experiences, luxury touches, or marking a special occasion, and from there we’ll guide you through what’s possible so you can decide if we’re the right fit.
By road or by private charter. Okonjima lies just off the B1, roughly halfway between Windhoek and Etosha, about two and a half hours' drive on tar from Windhoek and three from Hosea Kutako International Airport. The last part is gravel: ten kilometres to the reserve gate, then fourteen to sixteen more to the camps, and the villa stands about ten kilometres from the others.
The reserve has its own private airstrip, 1.3 kilometres long, so we can fly you in on a private charter, typically a Cessna Caravan or a Pilatus PC-12, from Windhoek or straight from another stop on your route. The drive from the airstrip to the villa takes twenty-five to thirty minutes. Etosha is three to four hours north by road, which makes Okonjima a natural break on the way.
Yes, for part of the year. Okonjima lies in Namibia's Otjozondjupa region, which TravelHealthPro, the UK's official travel health service, rates as high risk from December to April, when it recommends antimalarial tablets, and low risk from May to November, when it advises awareness of the risk and bite avoidance. The American CDC lists Otjozondjupa among the Namibian regions where it recommends antimalarials. Low risk is not no risk.
We are travel planners, not doctors, so whether you take tablets, and which, is a decision for you and your own doctor or a travel clinic, made with your dates in front of them. The useful practical step is long sleeves and repellent after dark, which matters most on a night drive or a late pangolin walk in the summer months.
Yes. Booked exclusively, for two to eight guests, the villa comes with its own private guide, game-drive vehicle, host and chef, and the days run to your timetable. It can also be booked by the room for two to six guests, when it runs as a small lodge with a shared guide, a shared dinner table and the main house in common.
The rate covers all meals, drinks apart from premium and imported brands, laundry, wifi and two activities a person each day, leopard tracking, brown hyena tracking and game drives among them. Night drives, guided hikes, and rhino and pangolin tracking on foot cost extra, as does the reserve's nightly levy for each adult. The first three are arranged on the day, weather allowing.
Yes, from the age of twelve. The villa sleeps up to eight adults and two children of twelve or over, and the family room in the main house, with two extra beds upstairs, is the natural place for them when all four suites are taken. Families with younger children are better served elsewhere on the reserve: Plains Camp takes children from three, and the Private Bush Suite from birth.
The activities carry their own ages: game drives from three, leopard and brown hyena tracking from six, guided walks from eight, and rhino and pangolin tracking on foot from twelve, so a villa party of twelve and over can join everything. There is no child-minding, and children must be supervised throughout. Give us their ages when you enquire and we will plan the days around them.
Good, though never certain. A camera-trap study published in 2019 put the reserve's leopard density at about 14.5 per 100 square kilometres, the highest then recorded in Namibia. Some adult leopards wear radio collars for the AfriCat Foundation's long-running research, so on a tracking outing the guide follows the signal with a telemetry receiver rather than searching at random. Two nights give a far better chance than one.
AfriCat is a non-profit the Hanssen family set up in the early 1990s, as their cattle farm, where leopards had been shot to protect the calves, turned to conservation. Its research now covers leopard, brown hyena and pangolin, and since July 2026 guests can join a session called Into AfriCat, Behind the Science. Pangolin tracking on foot is open only to guests staying two nights or more.
The dry winter months from June to September are the easiest, in line with our advice for Namibia as a whole: the bush is thin, the skies are clear and the cool mornings suit tracking. Nights are cold at this time of year, so warm layers matter for early starts and evening drives. Leopard tracking runs all year, which is one reason Okonjima works in any season.
October and November turn hot before the first storms. From December to March the summer rains bring green bush, afternoon thunderstorms, newborn antelope and the year's best birding, and April and May bring clear air that photographs beautifully. The gravel approach can soften after heavy rain, so we check it before any self-drive arrival. Pangolin tracking runs late into the night in summer and from early evening in winter.
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our approach
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