Your Favorite Places To Photograph Wildlife

I’ve been fortunate to have done a lot of traveling throughout the world that has taken me to amazing locations for wildlife photography. But the same token, there are many great places for wildlife photography that I have not yet been fortunate enough to visit, such as Bosque del Apache Wildlife Refuge in New Mexico.
Topping my list of great places for wildlife photography are northern Botswana in southern Africa, the Galapagos Islands off the coast of Ecuador and Patagonia (both in Argentina and Chile).
The Okavango Delta and Chobe National Park, both located in the northern part of Botswana, are among the premiere wildlife habitats in the world. Chobe boasts one of the largest concentrations of elephants in Africa, and the Okavango has the entire range of The Big Five game animals (lions, elephants, leopards, rhino and Cape buffalo), plus everything from hyena, jackals, vultures and giraffes.
The Galapagos is a unique place in that it is teeming with species of animals that have adapted and evolved in isolation from related species on the mainland of any other continent. More importantly for photographers, these animals have been protected and/or isolated for so many years that they do not seem to regard humans as something to fear. It’s not uncommon for photographers visiting the islands to be able to photograph a blue-footed or red-footed booby from extremely close quarters. There is no way you could come that close to wild birds in most other places on the planet without scaring them off. This makes for some enviable opportunities for wildlife photographers.
You often hear photographers refer to Patagonia in terms of the great landscape photography if offers. But if you look a bit deeper, you’d see that Patagonia also is teeming with wildlife, from guanaco and Andean condors to Patagonian foxes, puma, caracara and rhea. On my second journey to Patagonia in April 2017, I probably used most space on my memory cards photographing Andean condors and eagles than I did landscapes.
So I’m curious – what are your favorite places in the world for wildlife photography and why? Looking forward to hearing your responses.