Africa, with its 30 million square kilometers, is the third largest continent on the planet. At first glance, its straight coasts and its little contrasting relief stand out, but Africa is much more. If you plan to travel there soon, we are going to name you and detail 4 beautiful and very different landscapes that you can find there, although it will depend a lot on the specific destination.
The savannah, in Africa
The savanna of Africa is the natural landscape of the areas of dry tropical climate. The vegetation of the savannah is formed by a continuous cover of grasses and by widely spaced trees.
The most common native species that you can observe in this area are the baobab (a rather peculiar and beautiful tree) and acacias. Narrow forests known as "gallery forests" grow on the banks of the rivers in this area.
Here the temperature is high and rainfall is quite scarce.
Jungle
To say jungle is to imagine at times many dangerous animals and a lot of intense green vegetation, and we are not very wrong in this. The characteristic natural landscape of the equatorial climate zones in Africa is the jungle. It is made up of large trees whose thick crowns prevent sunlight from reaching the ground.
The intertropical rainforest is made up of different species of trees that grow mixed in different levels of vegetation.
In this place we can find both very high temperatures and regular and quite frequent rains throughout the year. It exactly occupies the central part of Africa, that is, Congo Basin, Gulf of Guinea, the westernmost part of Guinea and the northeast of the island of Madagascar.
The desert
The desert is the natural landscape of the hot and extremely dry climates. The vegetation of the deserts is practically nil and we can only find, in certain areas, small shrubs and bushes that survive because they are adapted to dryness.
In these areas, temperatures are very high, with great thermal oscillation, and with a significant variation between daytime and nighttime temperatures (more than 40º). In this area, rainfall is almost non-existent and we can find two clearly differentiated areas: the Sahara desert to the north, which occupies the areas near the Tropic of Cancer, and the kalahari desert to the south, stretching around the Tropic of Capricorn.
Steppe
The steppe is the characteristic natural landscape of the dry tropical climate zones that are in the vicinity of deserts. The tropical steppe has very poor vegetation, composed of bushes and shrubs. In the African steppes there are two rainy periods a year. Those that are more numerous are produced in spring and autumn.
The most predominant colors of the African steppe range from brownish yellow to the most intense green, always depending on the rainfall of that year.
What to see and visit in Africa
If the African continent is on your list of possible future trips but you still don't know which area or areas you would like to see, in this article we are going to recommend some of them:
- Visit the immense Fish River Canyon in Namibia.
- Observe the gorillas of the Rwanda volcanoes in Congo and Uganda. These are the same ones that zoologist Dian Fossey dedicated much of her life to.
- Make a safari through one of the most beautiful natural parks in the world: Kruger National Park.
- See the Victoria Falls, located between Zambia and Zimbabwe.
- Know and visit the pyramids of Egypt.
- Stroll through the immensity of tunisian desert.
- See the baobabs and animals of Madagascar.
- See the number of flamingos that migrate to the lake nakuru.
- Let yourself be caressed by the beaches of Mauritius, a natural paradise.
- Contemplate the starry sky from almost anywhere on the continent. As there is not so much presence of artificial light, it is in the African sky where we can find one of the greatest beauties.
- Visit serengeti park, in Tanzania.
- See the highest point in Africa: Kilimanjaro.
- Visit Morocco and its always alive Djemaa el Fnaa square in Marrakesh.
- Go to Kilwa Kisiwani, a medieval town on an island off the coast of Tanzania.
- See the Matobo Hills (Zimbabwe).
Africa is a continent to get lost, to discover without hesitation and prejudice, ... Without a doubt, to visit at some point in our lives.