Lolelunga Private Reserve opened its gates in August 2025 on 30,000 hectares of restored wilderness along the Lunga River, roughly 30km north of Kafue National Park in northern Zambia. It’s Zambia’s first — and so far only — fully fenced private reserve, run by the Zambia Luxury Lodge Collection. What makes it worth watching isn’t the scale alone: it’s what the reserve has done with the land since.
“Conservation here isn’t separate from community; it’s built on it.”
Jennifer Beattie, Director of Sales & Marketing, Zambia Luxury Lodges
A Landscape Rebuilt
Before Lolelunga existed, this stretch of the Lunga was fished with dynamite and hunted out by poachers, and the surrounding forest was logged hard enough to erase much of its wildlife. The reserve’s founders set out to reverse that — fencing the land, stopping the dynamite fishing, and rebuilding habitat from the ground up. The Lunga itself has since been designated a nursery river by the Zambian government, a recognised source of fish stock for the wider Kafue Basin, and it runs clear and perennial through the reserve’s northern boundary on its way down from the Congo.
Lion and Cheetah, Both Zambian Firsts
In April 2026, Lolelunga completed Zambia’s first-ever rewilding of captive-bred lions: a male and female, Mushiri and Miso, rescued from an interactive tourism facility in Livingstone and given a six-to-eight-week rewilding programme — guided by a wildlife veterinarian and a lion-rewilding specialist — in an enclosure ten times the size of where they’d lived before. Cheetah came back to the reserve earlier: the first cubs born on Lolelunga arrived in 2025, a first for the property and a meaningful addition to Zambia’s critically low wild cheetah population. Independent reporting also credits the reserve with reintroducing pangolin and the elusive sitatunga antelope, with a black rhino reintroduction reportedly planned for later in 2026. The lodge counts its antelope diversity as the greatest of any Zambian reserve, and its birdlife at well over 185 species.
A Reserve Guests Have Entirely to Themselves
Thirty thousand private hectares means no shared game-drive traffic and no other operators working the same ground. Guides and trackers can follow a sighting for as long as it holds rather than sticking to a fixed circuit, and with visitor numbers kept deliberately low, every game drive, walk or river outing belongs to one group at a time.
Conservation Built on Community
Lolelunga employs local people directly across lodge operations and its Anti-Poaching Unit, including former poachers now working as rangers. Independent reporting puts the reserve’s community investment at two secondary schools built, more than 50 boreholes drilled for clean water access, agricultural support extended to roughly 500 families, and a private airstrip that also carries medical supplies through to six local clinics.
Where to Stay
Lolelunga has seven rooms across the lodge, all with river-facing views, for a maximum of 14 guests at a time. Shared facilities include a spa, swimming pool, fitness centre, outdoor yoga deck and a riverside dining platform.
On the Water and in the Bush
Activities run from game drives and walking safaris to canoeing and sunset cruises on the Lunga, catch-and-release fishing, birding, and sleepouts on the reserve’s Ngoma Deck under some genuinely dark skies. Bush breakfasts and dinners round out the days.
Getting There
Lolelunga operates a seasonal window, from 10 May to 15 November each year. The most convenient way in is by private charter, landing on the reserve’s own 1km graded gravel airstrip, about ten minutes from the lodge.
Sources
- Jennifer Beattie, Director of Sales & Marketing, Zambia Luxury Lodges — history, Q&A answers and fact-checking correspondence with 25° SOUTH, August 2026.
- Zambia Tourism, Lolelunga Private Reserve listing, zambiatourism.com.
- ATTA, “Lolelunga Private Reserve Reintroduces Lions As Part Of Its Groundbreaking Rewilding Initiative In Zambia,” atta.travel.
- ATTA, “Lolelunga Private Reserve Redefines The Zambian Safari Experience,” press release, atta.travel.
- Travel And Tour World, “Lolelunga Private Reserve Opens 2026 Safari Season With Accelerating Wildlife Restoration in Northern Zambia,” travelandtourworld.com.
Hero image — Photo: Elsa Young, courtesy of Lolelunga Private Reserve.