Malawi reopens Nyika National Park

The concession to run the tourist facilities in the park has been award to Wilderness Safaris by the Malawi Department of NationalParks and Wildlife. This includes the well-known Chelinda Lodge. Camp Chelinda is expected to open shortly but the lodge will becompletely rebuilt and is only expected to open in July 2010. Horse safaris across the plateau are also expected to be revived. Nyika was Malawi’s first designated national park and remainsits largest at over 3 000sq km. “The Nyika Plateau is of undoubted biological   mportance,” says the company. “It contains one ofAfrica’s richest orchid communities totalling some 214 species ofterrestrial and epiphytic orchids: four species and two subspecies occur nowhere else on earth. A further 13 plant species and sevensubspecies are also endemic to the park.”

The plateau also has a unique assemblage of large mammals such as leopard, spotted hyena, roan, eland and even elephant, and nearly 100 species have been recorded here. No other sizeable populations of large mammals are found elsewhere in this biome, making Nyika National Park unique in both its ecosystem as well as its ecotourism opportunities. There is even an endemic mammal subspecies (chequered elephant shrew) confined to the plateau.