GAMBELLA NATIONAL PARK

A checklist of 327 bird species includes Ethiopia’s only population of the bizarre papyrus-dwelling shoebill stork and Uelle paradise whydah, along with Egyptian plover, African skimmer and the exquisite little green bee-eater. Game viewing is best around Matara, 185km west of the park headquarters in Gambella town    

• Ethiopia’s largest national park extends over 5,060km2 of Gambella Regional State in the low-lying far west. It is bordered to the north by the Baro River, a wide tributary of the Blue Nile navigable all the way to its confluence with the White Nile at Khartoum.
• Gambella National Park is at its most alluring between March and June, when Africa’s second-largest antelope migration, an estimated 1.2 million white-tailed kob, crosses into Ethiopia from South Sudan.
• The park is also a stronghold for the endangered Nubian giraffe, localised antelope such as Nile lechwe, Lelwel hartebeest and tiang, relict populations of lion, leopard, buffalo and elephant, and the largely terrestrial patas monkey.