Botswana

Botswana is Africa's quiet overachiever. When it gained independence from Britain in 1966, it was one of the poorest countries on Earth - a landlocked, mostly desert territory with twelve kilometers of paved road and no obvious prospects. Within a generation, the discovery of diamonds and remarkably good governance turned it into one of Africa's most prosperous and stable nations, with a continuous democratic record that puts most countries to shame.

The real draw, though, is what lives here. The Okavango Delta, where the Okavango River simply gives up trying to reach the sea and fans out into the Kalahari, is one of the planet's most spectacular wildlife ecosystems. Botswana has more elephants than any other country in Africa, lions roam the Makgadikgadi salt flats under some of the darkest night skies you'll find, and the ancient rock art at Tsodilo Hills tells of people who lived here long before the pyramids were built. For a country of just 2.4 million people, the landscapes are absurdly generous.