My tent is pegged under a tamarind tree, in whose upper branches Pope has spotted an enormous python. He reckons it must be at least 14ft long; and that evening, after a splendid beef-stew supper, we joke about securing our tent flaps. But next morning the snake has not moved from its hiding place.

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AFRICA ALWAYS seems bigger when you are on foot, but only when I arrive in Kafue National Park, in western Zambia, do I begin to realise what a huge country this is. First stop is Lunga River Lodge, an oasis of comfort in a boundless wilderness. It is owned by Ed Smythe, a one-time commando in the Rhodesian army, who came here 11 years ago to find peace and solitude in Africa’s largest national park.

The Lunga River is a great place for birding. Below my veranda it runs clear and deep between wooded banks, where fish eagles cry and Ross’s louries — gorgeous blue birds with yellow masks — feed in the overhanging fig trees. Over dinner, Smythe tells me about his seasonal bush camp on the Busanga Plains. It must be the remotest in Zambia, and that is where I’m heading tomorrow.

To get there, we drive for three hours through the miombo, the crackling dry woodlands of central Africa, then take a canoe trip through the Lufupa swamps. With room for only six guests at a time, the camp is simplicity itself: dirt floors, reed walls and long-drop loos. But the bucket showers are sheer bliss, and the views are mind-blowing.

What an extraordinary place this is — a Zambian Serengeti of antelopes, larks and bugling cranes that reaches out as far as the eye can see. For half the year the plains are flooded, and the Busanga lions become semi-aquatic, splashing across its drowning landscapes in search of prey. But when the rainy season ends in May, the floodwaters recede and the plains game — zebra, wildebeest, roan antelope — return to their dry-season grazing grounds.

Dawn at Busanga begins on the dot of 5.15, with the dynamo hum of bees in the tree above my tent. There is coffee and toast by the campfire, then I set out on a game drive with Lexxon Mununa, who knows this land like his own garden. It is Lexxon who spots the local lion pride, resting under a fig tree whose iron-grey boughs are scarred with claw marks. In the heat of October, he tells me, the lions climb this tree to seek the breeze. Now, they sprawl in its shade: six lionesses and an 11-year-old male known as Earl.

Resplendent in his heavy mane, Earl is a magnificent specimen, and we meet him again at the end of the day. We are driving back to camp with the spotlight on, and pick out his lionesses as they fan across the plain. A herd of lechwe are not far off — so we kill the light and settle down to wait.

We sit in silence. The Milky Way glitters overhead. Then, out in the darkness comes a sudden rush of bodies. Lexxon snaps on the light to reveal a lechwe with a lioness on its heels. She grabs and misses and the antelope jinks to freedom — then gets pulled down by a second lioness that had been hiding in the grass.

It happens so fast. Even while the lechwe is still in its death throes, the rest of the pride emerge from the shadows and fall on the kill, only to be shouldered aside by Earl as he muscles in for his share. Ten minutes later — 10 minutes of ill-tempered snarling and crunching of sinews — nothing is left but the horned head, which Earl grabs in his jaws and carries off into the night.

I am sorry to leave Busanga. I love its sense of space and freedom, and the frisson that always comes with the presence of lions. And as we drive back to the Lunga River in the early morning, Zambia provides one last memory to carry away: a cheetah and her cub on a termite mound, backlit by the early-morning sun.

The details: The Ultimate Travel Company (020 7386 4646, www.theultimatetravelcompany.co.uk) has a two-week safari, including Kafue, the Lower Zambezi and four nights with Robin Pope Safaris in South Luangwa, from £3,995pp, including flights from Heathrow to Lusaka with British Airways, internal flights and all meals.

Other Zambia specialists include Steppes Africa (01285 650011, www.steppesafrica.co.uk), Sunvil Africa (020 8232 9777, www.sunvil.co.uk) and Audley Travel (01869 276250, www.audleytravel.com).

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