See Them While You Still Can: Safari Tracks Endangered Rhinos in Namibia

PHOTO: Under current trends, the rhinos may not be with us much longer. (Photo courtesy of Natural Habitat Adventures)

After 10 years of no sightings, the International Union for Conservation of Nature declared the western black rhino of Africa extinct in 2011. The Javan rhino subspecies in Vietnam was also declared extinct the same year. Under current trends, more extinctions of the great wildlife are likely to be coming, but while the world still has rhinos, some safari operators are providing opportunities to see them.

Natural Habitat Adventures has organized a safari program called “Namibia: In Search of the Desert Rhino” that offers the chance to observe the animals on the Namib Desert in Namibia.

The program will be the second in a series of “In Search Of” programs that began in 2013 with “In Search of the Snow Leopard” in Mongolia.

The safari will be joined by scientists from the World Wildlife Fund, local researchers and members of the Save the Rhino Trust. It will be an opportunity to not only track and observe the rhinos and learn about them, but also to find out about conservation measures that are being employed to try to save the remaining rhinos from extinction.

The group will be limited to 12 participants. Departures are scheduled for late 2015 and 2016. The 10-day trip is priced from $9,895 per person, double occupancy, not including transatlantic air. Travel in Namibia will be in light aircraft, minivans and 4X4 safari vehicles.

With the market for powdered rhino horn, which is considered a cure for practically everything from fevers to cancer in traditional Chinese medicine, poachers descended on Africa and, in the period between 1960 and 1995, about 98 percent of the rhinos were killed.

When CNN republished its two-year-old story about the extinction of the western black rhino in November 2013, it unleashed an international wave of regret over the loss of the animals, though it had really happened years before.

The sadness in the wake of the extinction of the western black rhino was too little too late. But there are many other great species under threat of extinction. It is possible that the spreading of awareness through projects such as the Natural Habitat Adventures' Namibia safari could help in the struggle to save the vanishing wildlife of Africa.

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