botswana
Botswana
Thursday 1st May 2008:
With very little fuss, we were into Botswana, our 24th country. Neither of us could really believe we were finally in Botswana. We were both heavy hearted about leaving Namibia as we have loved it so much. We signed in the Immigration forms, got 30days stamped into our passports and then filled in the car details in the book. We needed to pay a BP60.00 (R80.00) Road Insurance Tax, valid for the period of our stay, required by all non-Botswanan vehicles. Luckily we were able to pay in SA Rands, as they do not accept Namibian Dollars. We got our first Botswanan Pula note in change and drove on down the main road. We were expecting a food check at the border, checking for meat and dairy products, but maybe due to it being a public holiday, there was no one there, and everyone seemed very jovial and happy.
We pulled into Sepupa Swamp Stop (BP75p/p/night +BP2p/p/night bed tax = BP77p/p/night camping) to camp for the night and were shown our 'spot'. Hmmm. Prices in Botswana are nearly double to camp, and you get nothing for your money. We've been so spoilt in Namibia and camping was reasonable. We parked and chose our site, an overgrown grassy patch next to a wall. We walked over and introduced ourselves to Godfrey, a driver for a Gecko Overland truck. He was camping at Sepupa while his guests were sleeping the night in the Delta somewhere.. From Godfrey and on the way to the bar, we met a very interesting couple, Abu (Hendrik) and Cecilia, a South African and Norwegian. They are out from the UK and are travelling for 7 weeks around SA and southern Africa - Mozambique, Botswana and Namibia. They recommended we camp at Maun Rest Camp instead of Audi Camp, in Maun, as it's apparently nicer and cleaner, so we will have to see when we get there. We chatted to them for a while before going over to the bar to have a really grown up drink of Cream Soda, before making a bacon, onion and mushroom pasta dish for supper. While we were at the bar, we asked the barman why there are SO many donkeys in Botswana. His answer made a lot of sense. He said that when the Foot and Mouth outbreak occured in Botswana in the early 1990s, all the cattle were destroyed and the government compensated people with donkeys to do the work the cattle used to do, like pulling ploughs and carts.
Donkeys can't pull as much weight as cattle so they were given more donkeys, thus there are so many. He also said that people don't eat donkeys so their numbers are growing. The mozzies were out in force tonight so we got our long clothes on to protect us from being stung. After supper we climbed in to the tent and planned to watch "Bourne Supremacy", but fell fast asleep instead.
Kimbo we hope you had a really wonderful birthday today. We missed not being able to chat to you and wish you over the phone or meet up for birthday drinks, but thought of you all day. We talk of you so often and wish you weren't so far away. We hope you had a really special day and that this will be an unforgettable year for you when God blesses you out of your socks!!!
Friday 2nd May 2008: Sepupa Swamp Stop, Sepupa, Botswana
GPS Info: S18° 44' 48.3" E22° 11' 49.8"
Miles Today: 109 Total Miles: 21 632
We were woken up VERY early, while it was still dark, by our inconsiderate noisy neighbours who were packing and unpacking the back of their open Landcruiser with the most noise possible. We got up only to realise that slavery is still very much alive and well. There were 3 men and 3 young boys sitting around the fire doing NOTHING, whilst a slave team, of a man and lady, were working like crazy packing up all of the tents, packing the car, washing, preparing food, etc. With all this going on, the 3 men and 3 boys sat around bone idle, staring into the fire. It was unbelievable to see that people can be so blatantly lazy and feel nothing for those working so hard!!!
We both had lovely hot showers, something so lovely as the mornings are becoming more chilly. Abu came over to chat before they left. He wanted some pointers of what to see and where to go in Namibia and gave us some helpful info on Botswana. We paid for the camping and drove back north up the main road, to Tsodilo Hills to see what they were all about. After a long road out through pretty scenery and past many very well reed-walled villages, we approached the Tsodilo Hills. These 3 mountains - Male,
Female and Child are sacred to the San people. They believe the Tsodilo Mountain is the place of Creation. We read all the info in the museum and neither of us were particularly struck by it. This is apparently the site for the largest collection of rock art paintings in Southern Africa, depicting mostly animals from 3 000 BC, in the Iron Age time. We decided against the 2 hour guided walk up Female to see some of the paintings, as it was the middle of the day and extremely hot. For it's cost (BP50.00p/guide) and neither of us being that keen, we decided to get to our next night's stop earlier rather than later. We drove out of the Tsodilo Mountain Reserve close to the foothills of the mountains and enjoyed their beauty.
We passed lots of cattle and donkeys grazing along the side of the road, but sadly not the wildlife we had both expected to see. There are little villages/settlements and people everywhere. No chance of a private wee/pi stop or bushcamp here. The cattle in Botswana seem to look different to those in Namibia. They seem to have much kinder faces and long floppy ears that flop downwards and forwards, with short stumpy horns. There were also thousands of donkeys everywhere. In Botswana children especially, but adults too, ride donkeys as herdsmen. There are black, brown and grey donkeys, but thousands of them. We were both a bit confused as to why there were so many, but could now understand how you could very easily hit a donkey when driving in Botswana. They just don't get out of the way or off the road. They are not bothered by traffic in the slightest, even when there are two cars approaching, one in either direction, with the donkey in the middle. He stands his ground and stares at you as if you're the one in the wrong!
We had decided to try and camp somewhere along the Okavango Delta for the night before heading away from it. We turned off to Nguma Island Lodge and drove the 12km of sandy 4x4 track, to be met by very helpful staff, both at Reception and in the camp grounds, Delta Dawn Okavango Bushcamp (BP65p/p/night + BP6.50p/p/night VAT = BP71.50p/p/night for camping). We had the choice of 3 sites, and after much discussion decided on one with our own fairly private ablutions. We popped open the tent and went to the bar to enjoy a very refreshing ice cold Coke on the raised wooden platform overlooking a papyrus jungle, which is part of the Okavango Delta. There were a few families with children camping nearby and some people being taught how to fish in the shallow water next to the road leading to the campsite. Ross made a fantastic fire to keep us warm and using some of it's coals we made fresh bread to eat with a very easy dinner. The view of the stars was amazing. We were in bed fairly early and watched "Bourne Supremacy", which was clever, but we both thought "Bourne Identity" was better. Thank you again to NAO Odeon for our movie tonight. During the night we heard a few rain drops fall which progressed into a rainstorm that lasted all night. Great for the locals, who appreciate all the rain they get.
Happy Birthday Shaun. We hope you had a very happy and different birthday in the berg, even if it was chilly and white due to all the snow falls. We thought of you all day and hope you were spoilt and able to enjoy doing what you wanted to do for a change, being away from the farm.
Saturday 3rd May 2008: Delta Dawn Okavango Bushcamp/ Nguma Island Lodge, Okavango Panhandle, Botswana
GPS Info: S18° 57' 13.1" E22° 22' 23.4"
Miles Today: 204 Total Miles: 21 836
After a night of rain, we awoke to an overcast and cool morning with the threat of more rain to come. We both had a hot shower to warm up, before having our normal breakfast of a bowl of muesli mixed with ProNutro, and a cup of Berrocca and our malaria tablets. We went over to the campsite bar to pay for our two Cokes last night, before being escorted to the Lodge next door, which is out of bounds to us lowly campers...There is even a chain barring our entry along a wooden walkway, which then branches off to each 'luxury' tent. The 'luxury' tents all look on to one another and some were on stilts over water, others merely looked onto overgrown trees. Eventually we reached the main lodge which has another wooden walkway leading to a clear, open lagoon, from where the boats launch. The lodge has a small area of cleared papyrus grass, whereas the plabby campers only get a beautiful raised wooden sitting area looking straight onto papyrus grass, rather than the Okavango. We were met by a lady, who obviously enjoyed her self imposed "powerful" position and treated us with annoyance. We were both SOOOO glad we hadn't stayed near the lodge or any of it's staff as they had such a sense of self importance and snobbery, whereas the staff on the camping side were amazingly friendly and good company. The camping side was far more relaxed and normal. We could've understood the snobbiness had the Lodge been something spectacular, but it isn't at all.
We passed a fairly small African Rock Python on our drive out. It seemed to get a fright and moved very quickly into a hollowed out tree stump. Once it was safely hidden and curled up, it poked its head out to look back at us. Their skin patterns are so beautiful.
On our drive today, we passed many Botswanan cattle, freely grazing on each side of, and in the middle of, the road not to mention the thousands of donkeys which stand ead still, alongside, on and in the middle of the road. It's amazing how they do not budge or flinch at all as cars pass around them, hooting, shouting or banging things to scare them off. There are definitely far more donkeys in the parts of Botswana we've seen than cattle by a long way. The grey donkeys are especially horrible as they are camouflaged with the tar, so Ross was kept alert to keep us safe. We also passed many beautiful horses and foals grazing on the roadside. The scenery was beautiful with us driving through kilometres of wide open land with high golden flowering grass and typical Acacia thorn trees dotted around. It was cloudy and cool with us passing through quite a few short rain storms. We also passed through many police control check points, where some asked to see our driver's license and one stop even sprayed Duzi2's tyres with anti-Foot and Mouth spray, asking us to get out and stomp our shoes through this trough of the same stuff.
Both of us were hoping to spot some sign of Obruni 1 (our name for Kenneth and Jo's green Landy) along our drive, but we very sadly never did. We stopped in at every campsite in and around Maun, hoping to see them still camping...We stopped at Sitatunga Camp, Maun Rest Camp, Island Safari Lodge, Crocodile Camp and Audi Camp with neither of their names signed in any of the visitors books. Finally we pulled into Okavango River Lodge and found they had stayed here on the 28th and 29th April leaving on the 30th. They had also filled in that they were headed to Kasane, which confused us totally. With them heading there and us coming into Botswana through Mahembo Gate, we wouldn't have passed them at all, as we were heading in totally different directions. We had only received their email on the 1st May and had got to Maun as soon as we could, but had sadly and frustratingly missed them. Such a huge pity. We were both so disappointed as we don't know when or if we'll ever see them again, and we would really love to!
We decided to head back to Maun Rest Camp (BP45p/p/night camping) for the night and as we were choosing our spot, the heavens opened again. We decided on a level site and under the cover of the open roof top tent, opening out the back, were able to cook a yummy vegetable and bacon stew to cheer us up and warm us up, before heading in to the tent to type up some updates.
Sunday 4th May 2008: Maun Rest Camp, Maun, Botswana
GPS Info: S19° 56' 36.6" E23° 29' 08.3"
Miles Today: 16 Total Miles: 21 852
After a lot of reading through the updates typed last night, we showered, had breakfast and typed up the rest of the updates to post on the web at the internet cafe at Reily's, which is right at the tourist info office in Maun. The internet connection here was really quick (P12 per half hour) so we'll definitely come back to upload our photos before we leave Maun. We got a very exciting email from Tracy telling us all about the amazing Roy, a Kiwi, she's met and been bowled right over by in Australia. This was a bit of a surprise from the normal rough and tough things she emails, that she's been up to in Australia, but SOOOO exciting to hear. We are very happy to hear this Trace. Everyone always says you meet your match when you least expect it, so there we go...
The tourist office was closed but will be open tomorrow so we'll hopefully be able to find out from them about Moremi and the Tuli Block tomorrow. It was another hot, sunny day after a cool, cloudy and wet night last night. We bought phone cards to try and phone our parents, and then drove all around Maun trying to find call boxes that were functioning, ending up with us leaving messages for both sets of parents. Unsuccessfully we tried at the Shell garage to buy the highly recommended Shell Tourist book on Botswana, which comes together with a map, the most accurate map of Botswana; we'll have to look and try again tomorrow. We drove passed the Maun airport and saw the long line of small planes, which people get flown over the Delta in.
There didn't seem to be anything to do in Maun, with a few shops, garages, 2 internet cafes and banks. There were animals roaming the streets and grazing along and in the road, with cattle crowded and grazing on the traffic circles etc. In the town there are shops mixed in amongst traditional thatched mud homes and sand everywhere. There is evidence of building work in progress, which looks like a whole big new shopping complex with a Nando's etc. Maybe this will provide Maun with a little more than what it currently has. We were both very surprised at the primitiveness of such a wealthy, modern and supposedly fast developing country. This is after all that we'd read about Maun, together with the fact that most tourists arrive in Botswana through Maun before continuing on to their various travel destinations. We really felt like we were back in West Africa again, back in a place like Ouagadougou, but without the vultures on the street lights. Street lights mostly don't exist in Maun.
Whilst cooking supper we had a very short call back from Mom and Paps, before our phone cut off. We had an omlette dinner looking up at the beautifully clear sky with thousands of stars above us. It got quite chilly so we decided to climb into bed and copied all our photos from Caprivi and Botswana so far, from our cameras to the laptop and resized them to be able to upload to the website tomorrow.
Monday 5th May 2008: Maun Rest Camp, Maun, Botswana
GPS Info: S19° 56' 36.6" E23° 29' 08.3"
Miles Today: 16 Total Miles: 21 868
Our fellow campers headed off in the very early morning. We wondered where they were going, leaving all their things on their site. Before we left for the internet cafe they all returned from various flights over the Delta. They were all very friendly South Africans. Some of the group had gone on an hour's helicopter flight over the swamps, right up to Chief's Island, while the others had gone on a 1 1/2 to 2hour plane flip over the Delta, going even further north. They all raved about their trips, but were surprised at how little game they had seen. The aeroplane group had seen elephants in the Delta, but the helicopter group hadn't. They highly recommended the aeroplane flip instead of a mokoro ride, as the mekoro apparently go in the hippo tracks and with the reeds being so high at the moment, the chances of seeing anything are very slim. The group are all slowly on their way back to SA at the end of their holiday in Botswana.
With all our photos ready to upload we headed straight to the internet cafe, but internet in Maun was down. Great! While we were driving through the main street of Maun, with donkeys and dogs crossing amongst the traffic, we passed a big bright orange overland truck with Oasis Overland written on it. We were wondering if it was the truck of people we had met in Marrakech (Morocco) and in Lome (Togo) and had Chrissie, Mark and Jo, the 3 we'd met in Windhoek on it, but in a different truck after their problems with getting through the DRC. We parked outside Barclay Bank to draw money from the ATM and were met by a very familiar face...yip it was them. The driver and one leader came over to chat. The group had gone into the Delta for 2 nights while the two leaders were staying with the new truck at Sitatunga Camp, just outside Maun. They invited us to join them for a chicken potjie tonight.
We managed to get hold of the Shell Botswana book and map at Postnet for P120.00, only to be told 5minutes later that it had just come into the Shell garage shop for only P96.00. Postnet refused to give us a refund, even though we had spent a fair bit of money in there with Heidz buying two traditional Botswana children's books and lots of postcards, etc. The tourist info office couldn't really help us much, but directed us to the Wildlife bookings office housed in a mobile home a little further along in the town.
The ladies there were very cheerful and knowledgable about the various DWNP (Department of Wildlife and National Parks) - Moremi Game Reserve, Chobe Game Reserve, Magadigadi Pans, Nxai Pan, Central Kalahari Game Reserve, etc. They couldn't help us about the Tuli Block at all as this is all privately owned, but didn't think there would be provision for camping in this area. We were shocked to find out about the DWNP park fees for all these reserves, P120p/p/day + P50p/vehicle/day + P30p/p/night to camp with most of these having no facilities - water or ablutions. Luckily the Botswanan's and Botswana residents only pay a tiny fraction of these ridiculous fees, so at least they are able to enjoy the nature and wildlife around them. With these high fees, we'll need to rethink our planned trip itinerary with Mom and Dad, as it is beyond our budget to do all these parks and stay in each of them for at least 2 nights.
Next we went to Spar to try and buy some fresh supplies, but their stuff was awful, very far from fresh and so expensive!!! We went back to Shoprite next and were pleasantly surprised at how big and lovely the shop was, as it had such a tiny entrance. All stocked up we headed back to try and phone again and left more messages for Ron and Maureen. With it being dark, we decided against driving out to Sitatunga Camp in the dark, but rather headed back to the familiar Maun Rest Camp for another night. We had yummy chicken sosaties and stirfry veggies for dinner before heading for bed, both a bit frustrated at Botswana being SO much more expensive than we can afford and SO disappointed that there seems to be little or no provision for the lower budget traveller. If you have loads of money and fly in to spend luxurious nights in the Delta or at fancy game lodges etc. you're fine, but otherwise it's very expensive. Botswana seems to be mostly, if not entirely, geared for the top end exclusive market.
We were thinking and praying for granny Herta especially and the whole Schmidt family on this day.
Tuesday 6th May 2008: Maun Rest Camp, Maun, Botswana
GPS Info: S19° 56' 36.6" E23° 29' 08.3"
Miles Today: 15 Total Miles: 21 883
In the early hours of the morning (1.30am), we were woken by the sound of sprinting footsteps from the one side of Duzi2 to the fence. We then saw a security guard who was mad that he had missed catching the potential thief before he jumped over the barbed wire perimeter fence. Nothing was missing as we had left nothing out as usual.
One tip we had been given from Justin and Becks from their 2005 Africa trip, and from Rob & Ally's website, was to always pack everything away, this provides less temptation and should result in you not losing anything. The security guard walked around with his torch trying to trace the thief's steps, but we could hear the guy was far off as the dogs were barking aggressively in the distance. Next we saw two torches and had two men patrolling. Ross fell straight back to sleep while Heidz spent hours lying awake.
We watched the sunrise and thought it would be a good idea to move on today. We tried various times to get hold of Mom and Dad, and left more messages. We managed to get hold of Lynn who told us our phone sim didn't seem to be working, so we decided to get a new Botswanan Orange sim, recommended as being the best by 4 locals.
We spent hours in the internet cafe, uploading all our photos onto the website and trying to sort out more issues to do with the flat in London. Again we have received no rent for the second month in five months, and have been charged twice for various call outs, due to the tenants negligence and stupidity!!! Our super efficient managing agent seems to have gone very quiet after our last episode, while we were in Windhoek, and we're still awaiting answers to questions raised then regarding various call outs and bills! We spent the entire day doing admin, which seemed like such a waste of time, but is necessary from time to time. Makes you wonder what these estate agents, like Hamptons International, think of overseas landlords, and how highly they value them...
We received a very exciting email from Ann announcing her and Frank's engagement. This was such great news and Heidz went all goosebumps when she read it. Ann had sent a very happy photo of her and Frank, together with a photo of her beautiful engagement ring. It's so lovely to hear such wonderful news about your close and special girl friends, wherever they are. God grants the desires of our hearts, even if He does take a rather long time about doing it. Congratulations to you both. We can't wait to hear more news and hope you both enjoy this fun time of planning your big day and your future life together.
After a frustrating day, we decided to try Island Safari Lodge for the night as it was cheap, only P30p/p/night to camp, and to just grin and bare whatever it was like. We arrived to a full car park and a place buzzing with people and monkeys playing in the trees above. The lady at reception recognised us from when we were here trying to find Kenneth and Jo, when we first arrived in Maun. We chose our campsite and set up. There were a few other cars scattered around the campsite, which was actually quite nice. We cooked a very easy rice and vegetable risotto for supper, enjoyed a lovely hot shower and climbed into bed to watch 'The Wild' in the warmth of the tent. The campsite security guard decided to place his chair against the tree literally under the tent cover. Both not quite sure how to tell him to move away and give us some privacy, we hoped he'd move off once we had eaten and showered. He didn't, so Heidz politely asked him to move to a tree further away, before we climbed up to bed.
Happy birthday Trace we know this will be a very special birthday for you as you have Megs and your wonderful Roy, to treat you and spoil you on your special day. We hope you have a blessed day and a year ahead full of incredible things.
Happy birthday Justin. May your day be very special as Andrea treats you on your special day. Hope the sun shines for you today in London.
Wednesday 7th May 2008: Island Safari Lodge, Maun, Botswana
GPS Info: S19° 55' 35.3" E23° 30' 34.9"
Miles Today: 127 Total Miles: 22 010
One lot of people near us left the campsite very early to make their way back to SA. Then the donkey's across the river started their strange breighing, which sounded like wind-up engines. The starlings chattered in the trees surrounding us and the cheeky monkeys began their raid of the campsite bins, having good looks in the car windscreens around. We decided to pack up the tent and free the monkeys of any further temptation. We did a big re-arrange of all the car stuff, refilling the kitchen/cooking cupboard, packing loose shopping away, and Ross did a check around and under Duzi2 to try and find the rattles. One thing he did find was that the rubber bush washers on the front right shock had been put back upside down, so that was one of the rattles he was able to tighten and hopefully eradicate.
With still no word from the Lloyd's we tried phoning them again. We then quickly checked on email and our bank account as we were having trouble drawing money out from the ATMs. Being told by our flat's managing agent to 'just put all this behind us and let things be...because the tenants are now happy, so we should be too,' was enough to make us explode as we still cannot account for a huge amount of money vanishing and we are not prepared to pay for unnecessary call outs due to our tenants' ignorance!!! More admin emails were sent to do with our flat.
Bank cards in Maun seem to be a new or very complicated thing. Trying to pay for anything by card is such a rigmarole. Firstly, they don't seem to know what to do with the chip and pin type of card which you put into the card machine, rather than swiping it down the one side. When you try to explain this to them they simply tell you they know what to do, but will overide the necessity for a pin...hmmm. They then take your till slip and card off to the one and only card machine working in the shop. There your card gets mixed up with everyone else's cards who are paying by card too. The poor people handling the cards get the brunt of many people's frustration at this extremely slow and very inefficient process. All this takes at least 15minutes and results in a lot of confusion. It's far quicker and easier to rather draw the cash out and pay for everything by cash only.
With it being too late to head up to Moremi to enter the park today, we decided to rather fill up Duzi2 with fuel, costing P7.50 per litre, and try and find a place closer to the reserve to spend the night, so we could go in first thing tomorrow morning. We wanted to look at Kazikini Community Campsite and Mankwe Lodge, which are the two campsites recommended in the Shell book. We took the first sign to Kazikini and quickly found ourselves in very soft sand and seemingly heading on a back road to it. We got to a veterinary fence in the middle of nowhere, who were surprised and very enthusiastic to see us, and told us to proceed along the fence for about 8 to 10 kms until we reached the main road again. They told us this road was much better than turning around and going back the way we had just come from. Trusting their judgement we did this. The road got even more soft and sandy and a few kilometres further on, we heard a loud pop and then quick hiss as the air very rapidly disappeared out of the back left tyre. With no one in view for as far as we could see and with us being in the bush in the full heat of the day, we tried to change the wheel as quickly as we could. Our first puncture of the trip had to happen in the most expensive country of the trip! Initially the bottle jack couldn't lift Duz high enough to free the wheel, so we got the High-Lift jack off for the first time in our trip. We jacked up the car, but couldn't get the H-L jack to release and lower Duzi2 back down again. By this stage Heidz was getting desperate as we didn't seem to have a way of changing the wheel safely. Eventually we did manage to get Duzi2 down, but we think our extremely heavy High-Lift jack might be faulty, as the release 'Down' pin doesn't seem to engage and when it suddenly does, it jumps down by 3 or 4 holes at a time. High-Lift jacks are very dangerous, but ours seems to be even more dangerous. We tried the bottle jack again, this time lifting on a different part of the axil, and dug the area around the wheel free. Hooray, we were able to change our poor severed BF Goodridge Mud Terrain for our brand spanking new spare wheel. This was so new it still has the little rubber hairs on its knobbly tread. We walked back to see what the cause of our puncture was, and found that we had driven passed a stump sticking out of the soft sand, which had torn straight through the inside side wall of the tyre. This sadly meant that that tyre was completely wrecked and that we now only have one spare. Unfortunately this was turning out to be an expensive afternoon for us.
With our brand new wheel and tyre on, we arrived at the vet fence gate on the main road. Here we got all our tyres sprayed with the white anti-Foot and Mouth spray, so the new tyre didn't look that new anymore. We'll wait until we get to Livingstone in Zambia before we replace our tyre, as it's bound to be a little cheaper there.
We eventually got to Kazikini Community Campsite (P60p/p/night to camp) and looked around. The campsites are pretty basic for P60.00, but they did seem to have nice ablutions which had reed walls. We thought it was a bit expensive for what it was, even though the setting was nice and there were apparently honey badgers / ratels around at the moment. We felt it was more like a glorified bush camp. We decided to drive on to Mankwe Lodge to see what that was like, but otherwise we would camp at Island Safari Lodge again for the night and aim to get to Moremi early, to try to spend at least one night in the reserve. We drove into Mankwe Lodge (P80p/p/night to camp) and looked around. The location and setting is very nice, but again the campsites we were shown were quite basic for their price, and they were totally out of our price range. The lodge is beautiful and the staff were very friendly, wishing us well.
We drove back to Island Safari Lodge slowly in the dark, dodging animals along the road. The campsite was full of new people. We chose a spot near to where we had stayed before, had a simple bread and cheese dinner before heading to bed to get snug. There was no security guard around tonight, so we had all the privacy in the world.
Thursday 8th May 2008: Island Safari Lodge, Maun, Botswana
GPS Info: S19° 55' 35.3" E23° 30' 34.9"
Miles Today: 94 Total Miles: 22 104
We had more issues trying to get cash out of the ATMs, which meant a few unexpected delays. We went to the Wildlife Reservation Office in Maun to find out about booking campsites, to spend tonight and tomorrow night in Moremi Game Reserve, only to be told it is fully booked. The lady suggested we drive up and try at the gate to see if there have been any cancelations, so this is what we did. We arrived at South Gate and explained our situation to the very friendly man there. He radioed through to North Gate/Khwai Camp and Xakanaxa Camp to see what our chances were. Xakanaxa was full, but we managed to get in at North Gate/ Khwai Camp. We paid our P120 each park entry fee + P50 for the car and P30 each for our one night's camping and we drove in with great expectation of seeing game. We did the drive straight from South gate to North gate and saw very little other than thick mopane scrub and a few impala. There was a lot of water scattered in small mud pools amongst the mopane bush, so we knew the animals had plenty of water, which would make game spotting quite difficult as the game doesn't need to come out too far to find water. The road was quite sandy and there is construction going on at the currently closed South Gate Camp, meaning we were passed by a few construction trucks inside the reserve.
We needed to check in at the North Gate/Khwai Camp office (hut) which meant driving over a rather precarious looking log bridge, over the swampy water. There was a family of monkey's crossing as we got to the bridge, which was really funny to watch. Literally the bridge is made up of logs lying next to each other, which move when you drive over it so you need to drive really slowly, but it creaks and cracks as you do this. We got a lecture by the one guy, on a power struggle at the office, telling us we needed to make a reservation, which we explained we tried to do, but it had been apparently all fully booked. We drove to our site and were recommended to put out our table and chairs to reserve our site. We did this and then went straight out on another shortish drive around the northern part of the park before sunset. There are no fences around the campsites in the park so we wanted to be back at camp by 5:30pm at the latest, to be able to have a shower and have eaten before it got dark. We saw thousands of red-billed queleas flying into and out of the bushes like swarms of locusts. It was amazing to see so many birds together and to hear the noise they made while they all flew in unison. They made a huge noise like the Indian Minahs in Hill Street, when they were in the bushes. On our drive we saw a few impala, but nothing else.
Arriving back at about 5.20pm we had lovely hot showers and bumped into a very lovely couple from Mtunzini. We chatted to them for a bit, marvelling at their super equipped trailer with rooftop tent, drop sided rooms, and built in kitchen, clothing cupboards etc. made by a guy in Durban, AfriSpoor. This was their first trip using their trailer and they were so chuffed with the ease of them. They told us they had heard lions in the camp 2 nights before and the people in our site had seen the lioness with her cubs from their tent that night. Great. There were lots of vacant campsites so we weren't too sure why we had been told they were fully booked. After chatting for a bit too long, the sun set and the light faded really quickly. We heard the buck right in front of us making their alarm calls echoed by the buck to the left and right of us. Knowing there is nothing between you and who knows what else out there, and all you have around you is totally black, we felt a bit nervous. We had a salad and bread dinner on the roof listening to the game alarm calls all around us. There were thousands of stars in the dark clear sky. There was very little moon showing tonight so it really was dark.
Torches were being flashed by other campers, but none of us could see anything. We quickly and cautiously placed the dirty dishes inside the car and climbed into the tent.
It was a cold night, but lovely to know we were in the bush. We could hear all sorts of animal sounds all around us and fell asleep to the natural bush sounds. We heard hyena calling in the middle of the night but they were far off. We were both glad to be safely up off the ground.
Friday 9th May 2008: North Gate/Khwai Camp, Moremi Game Reserve, Botswana
GPS Info: S19° 10' 22.0" E23° 45' 12.6"
Miles Today: 67 Total Miles: 22 171
Just before dawn we were woken by the alarm calls of various different buck in front of us again and then at 5am we both were wide awake by the LOUD call of two hyena on either side of the car sniffing around. They were right under the tent and around Duz. We were very thankful for our rooftop tent. The hyena must have woken the whole campsite up with their noise and then wandered off over to the other campsites. The sun slowly rose and as it got lighter, the animals seemed to relax a bit, stopping their alarm calls as they were able to see more.
After the hyenas moved off there was rustling in the bushes and grass and a huge troop of baboons moved passed us, stopping and eating various things they found along the way. The baboon society is so structured and efficient. When it was light, we got up and packed up the tent. Slowly cars started to move out, but much later than normal probably due to the hyenas being present in camp this morning. Once the baboons had left, a monkey troop moved through our site next and they stayed around for a long time. We freshened up and then had something hot to drink with rusks as it is cold in the mornings. While we were eating breakfast, the cheeky monkeys got even more curious and closer to Duzi2. Heidz realised she had left her door open and looked around to see the end of a tail sticking out of the car with the rest of the monkey and its tail completely in the car on the front seat. She chased it out, but it had grabbed somthing as it scurried off. We both chuckled when we realised it had grabbed the remains of the Ariel clothes washing soap packet. It has a shiny green and silver packet which must have attracted the monkey's attention. It opened the packet up, all chuffed with its loot, only to drop it very quickly realising it was soap powder. The other monkeys quickly snatched it up only to do the same thing.
We said good-bye to our Mtunzini neighbours and met their friends who were fascinated by our trip. They were finding Botswana a lot more expensive than they had planned for and were changing their holiday and rather going into the Caprivi and spending time in Namibia, where at least there are ablutions for your money, and they are clean when you are paying such high prices. They asked us to join them on their campsite if we had no luck with finding another campsite for tonight. They also told us they had seen a pride of lion with cubs somewhere near Third Bridge yesterday.
We left early while it was cool, hoping to see more game as we were following the road along the water. A determined honey badger/ratel crossed the road right in front of us, as it focused on where it was planning to go.We stopped in at Hippo Pools and went up into the hide there. There was a lot of water and there were lots of hippo all lazing around in the water. Some popped up their heads, yawned made their funny hippo grunts and sunk back under the water again. We heard the beautiful sound of two fish eagles calling and replying to each other. Then we spotted them, one even flying over the water, but didn't try to catch anything. We heard splashing in the water and reeds close to us and spotted a family of 6 or 7 red lechwe running through the water to get to the reeds to eat. It was so lovely to just stop and watch and listen. There were more red-billed queleas flying around who stopped flying as soon as we tried to video them.
From Hippo Pools we drove on to Xakanaxa Camp and met two bull elephants having a feast in the mopane trees in the campsite. The one had obviously had enough to eat and headed straight into the water with it's trunk up and it's tail lifted and disappeared amongst the reeds into the water. The other one enjoyed more mopane leaves, breaking half a tree down to get a few top branches. They were both very placid elephants. At one stage there was very little space between Duzi2 and the eating ellie, but he wasn't phased in the least. After he had had his full, he too lifted his trunk and tail and walked into the water of the Okavango Delta and disappeared into the water amongst the reeds. We looked around the campsite, which has each site with river/Delta views and has clean ablutions. We then decided to chance our luck and see if there was a campsite free for tonight. Shelly, at the Xakanaxa office, was so lovely and accomodating. She allocated us a site, so this will be where we'll spend tonight. We spoke to a Moremi game ranger who tried to explain to us where the lion pride was which he had seen this morning.
While we were at the Xakanaxa office, we watched a couple get into one of the small aeroplanes that fly over the Delta at the Xakanaxa airstrip. We watched them take off and wondered what they would see on their flight. There were 3 lodge game drive vehicles parked at the airstrip with their drivers obviously waiting for their guests to arrive by air. There are a lot of private, fancy and very expensive lodges along the water's edge a little way along from Xakanaxa Campsite.
We followed the game rangers rough directions and spotted the lion pride lying flat out on the grass in the shade. The reason we saw them was because of the vultures in the tree above their wildebeest kill, and the black tip of their tails flicking up and down as they tried to swat away the flies. A big male lion got up and made his way away from the pride which we followed. He took his time, even flopping flat out in the road in front of another vehicle. He must have been so full, hot and exhausted. He walked off and then we saw another big male also just lazing about trying to scrape up enough energy to move. He got up and followed the first lion's tracks. We followed where the first male had gone to a nearby water pond and was drinking. On our way to the pool, we heard and saw a lioness with 4 cubs roaring and yelping back. The cubs were so small, two of them still had spots all over them. By now there were 6 cars that had grouped around the water spot, we all parked and enjoyed watching the entire pride come to the water to drink. The two males drank their full and then flopped in the shade of a nearby tree while five lionesses came over to drink with the four cubs jumping alongside. The cubs were playing with the lion and lionesses' tails and back legs as the adults drank. It was too cute watching them playing and doing what you normally see on documentaries, but now it was right in front of us. The lionesses drank and also flopped in the shade while the two youngest cubs suckled from their mom. This was so special to experience so close, and even if we didn't have the best view, at least we got some view. We could hear them roaring as they walked, calling to each other constantly. After a long relaxing time, they started off back to where the kill was. The little cubs came jumping right close to Duzi2, yelping and purring as they went passed.
They were SO cute. It was amazing to see how quickly they disappeared into the long grass and vanished from view completely, even though they were such a big pride. They definitely are perfectly camouflaged in the grass.
We tore ourselves away from the lion pride to drive on to Third Bridge Campsite, which we'd been advised by everyone not to stay at, due to their awful and disgusting ablutions. The campsites looked nice with simple provisions and all seemed to be river facing. To get to Third Bridge you need to drive over two more rickety log bridges, crossing over the water. With time marching on and us still wanting to stop off at the lion pride on our way back to Xakanaxa and wanting to have showered and eaten and in the tent by dark, 6pm, we turned around. We passed more impala families and stopped at the lions' water spot. A very fat lioness came down to drink right in front of us.
She lay down looking rather uncomfortable to lap up many litres of water, constant lapping for at least 5 minutes. We had our own private sighting of her. She started making her way back to the pride, but only made about 5 metres before flopping down in the road in the shade of a bush panting loudly. Her tummy was so swollen from all she had eaten. She was panting and before long one of the male lions came to join her flopping in the shade. He seemed more energetic than her, rolling over and relaxing. She got up again and drank some more before they both left to rejoin the rest of the pride. By this time two game vehicles had arrived and another defender which we recognised from earlier on in the reserve. On his way past one of the game vehicles, the male squirted it's back bumper, narrowly missing the terrified looking lady sitting right there. We thought this was hysterical and so did the other defender people.
We arrived back at Xakanaxa Camp at about 5:20pm with time to join the shower queue and cook up a very quick vegetable stirfry, with 2 minute noodles which we ate on the roof. Xakanaxa camp seemed very quiet animal wise. There were two overland vehicles parked near us who had made a big fire, which gave us a sense of safety because we now had light. Heidz went into the tent to try and catch up on diary updates, while Ross went over to chat to the overland vehicles. He met Sabine and Peter, in a big overland truck who have just come down East Africa over a year and a half, and Gerhard and Gabby, in a Defender who are currently travelling for 6 months, before they leave their vehicle in Windhoek again until their next 6 month trip. Sabine and Peter got tips from Ross for their trip back up West Africa, while Ross got tips from them for our trip up East Africa. There were so many little bugs flying around the light inside the tent that the typing never happened, but rather the warmth of bed called loudly. As the night progressed we could hear the sound of animals around, including the crackling of branches and the roaring of lion, but none came vaguely near the campsites.
Only 3 more sleeps until we meet Mom and Dad...
Saturday 10th May 2008: Xakanaxa Camp, Moremi Game Reserve, Botswana
GPS Info: S19° 11' 02.1" E23° 24' 59.8"
Miles Today: 278 Total Miles: 22 449
Woke up to see the sunrise over the Delta. It was crisp and cool with lots of people moving out early. There were no animals around and no tracks or evidence of animals who had visited during the night. We packed up and left for South gate as we planned to reach Nata or Francistown tonight. Our drive through the reserve to the gate was uneventful game wise with lots of impala sightings and one kudu and a lot of dense green mopane scrub. There were bateleurs flying in the sky above us. These are such stunning birds of prey with their red beaks and legs and black and white wings. We paid our park fees for yesterday and didn't owe anything for today as it was way before 11am, which is when your park permit expires. While we were paying, a group of South Africans congregated around Duzi2 and asked Heidz all sorts of questions about our trip. They also welcomed us back to SA.
The tar road to Nata is good and seems like one long straight runway. We passed many baobabs and lots of thorny acacia scrub. We drove through Magadigadi Pan National Park and Nxai Pan Game Reserves, but we didn't see any game other than a little red duiker who shot across the road. The landscape was flat for as far as the eye could see, only broken by a baobab sticking up every now and again. The long wild golden grass was flowering with thorny acacia trees which changed into thick, green mopane bush. We drove past the entrance for Planet Baobab with it's huge ant eater entrance gate and a sign that looks very much like Planet Hollywood restuarant signs.
We stopped along the roadside to collect some spikey round cream coloured fruit things which were growing wildly along the ground. They were weird, but interesting and like nothing either of us had ever seen before. We arrived in Nata as it was getting dark. We stopped at various places to see if we could get some sort of take-away for dinner, but decided against that idea. We drove into Nata Lodge, which had been recommended to us for camping. Wow. The lodge is beautiful and was so romantically lit with water features everywhere. We instantly felt like we were miles away deep in the bush. We were welcomed very warmly by the receptionist and paid for our very reasonable nights camping (P50p/p/night camping). We were told we could choose any site we liked. We decided to walk further in through the lodge and were welcomed by another very friendly member of staff. We looked at the dinner menu and decided to come for dinner later, after we had set up the tent and showered.
The ablutions at Nata Lodge were beautifully done and we both loved warming up under hot showers. Looking less travellerish we walked into the outside restaurant to enjoy a super dinner. Ross had a rump steak and Heidz had a baby roast chicken. The meals were all quite reasonably priced and looked amazing. After our dinner treat we walked back to the tent and climbed up to bed to a really good nights sleep. It is cool in the evenings, so we are so grateful for our snug duvet.
Sunday 11th May 2008: Nata Lodge & Camping, Nata, Botswana
GPS Info: S20° 13' 28.6" E26° 16' 08.8"
Miles Today: 128 Total Miles: 22 577
Happy Mother's Day to our much loved Mom's. We hope you have special days today. We wonder what we'll be doing with you on this day next year.
Had a relaxing warm start to our morning with crows pecking away at the remaining vegetable ivory balls in the palms above and around us. We wondered where Mom and Dad would be and how they are feeling. We are very excited and can't wait to see them tomorrow. We were again welcomed back by three South African ladies Heidz met while washing up the breakfast plates. They were so pleased to hear of us returning to SA. We walked around the lovely Nata Lodge, exploring the various types of chalets and tented accomodation they offer. The lodge has lovely grounds with birds and various water features around the main area, including a big pool with a waterfall entering it.
We saw many birds feeding and really felt like we were back deep in the bush. We decided to have a delicious, cold Fruitree Guava drink before setting off on our drive as it was hot already. We met and had a long chat to the Lodge's manager, James, who has recently moved with his wife to the lodge from Jo'burg. He was very interesting to talk to and told us the Magadigadi Pan is full of water at the moment and looks like an ocean. He didn't think Lekubu Island was accessible due to the water and soft pan floor...we'll see for ourselves in a few days. He also told us that the potholes in the road from Nata to Kasane aren't known as potholes, but rather as open cast mining and if we see two ears sticking out of them, it's not a rabbit but is a giraffe. This section of road apparently is shocking broken tar and takes between 4 and 5 hours to cover.
We set off to Francistown and were grateful for the fans in the car as they kept us comfortable.
The drive from Nata to Francistown is pretty, passing mopane woodlands, thorny pinky coloured acacia bushes contrasted against the long golden grass. The road was fairly good tar with only a few potholes. As we approached Francistown, we also passed rocky outcrops with lots of baobabs which broke the otherwise flat, open, landscape of Botswana thus far, and reminded Ross of what he remembered about Zimbabwe. At this point we were so close to Zim. Ross had read in a newspaper yesterday that the Botswanan government had made a statement in Francistown that the national information and broadcasting services must do whatever they can to expose the Zimbabwean situation to the international community as it really is.
We stopped off at Woodlands Stop-Over (P57p/p/night +P2p/p/night Bed Tax = P59p/p/night to camp), a place recommended to us to camp at by Nata Lodge. It was really beautiful with beautiful gardens, green lawned campsites with fire pits and bricked braais, each site had its own bin and tap etc. There was a sparkling big, blue swimming pool and absolutely exquisite ablutions, even with rugs on the tiled bathroom floors. It is a little way off the main road, but it's beautiful. We were met by Lynette at reception who told us the strange spikey fruit things we'd picked up on a long the road yeaterday were probably some sort of wild melon or cucumber. She had a longer greeny orangey spikey fruit thing on her desk which can be found growing in the campsite. We gave her one of the strange fruit things we'd picked up yesterday for her to show her husband. Hopefully we can pick one of the longer fruit things when we return later.
Lynette had told us of a short back road into Francistown from Woodlands, which only took 10minutes and we were in central Francistown. This is in stark contrast to Maun. Francistown is a modern and big town totally different and far more sophisticated than Maun. There are traffic lights, new multi-laned roads, bridges, shopping centres etc.
There were lots of people around for a Sunday afternoon. We drove around to see a bit of this very impressive town and Ross managed to draw money using his card for the first time since we've been in Botswana. We stopped in at Spar to get some meat for a braai and to have meat for a braai with Mom and Dad tomorrow night. Luckily we managed to get what we needed just before Spar closed. All the other shops were already closed. We managed to send both moms Happy Mother's Day messages as we had mobile reception in Francistown. We got a reply from Lynn saying they were going out to dinner with granny Herta. Next year we hope to be able to treat our moms in person on their special day.
We drove back to Woodlands and got our lovely campsite. We met Titus the Zimbabwean security guard and had a very interesting chat to him. The whole Zim crisis is so sad and it's so awful that Mugabe has been allowed to get away with what he has until now. Titus' family still live in Zim, in Chinoi, and he was explaining that currently they are safe, but no one knows what Mugabe will do next. He also told us that so much of the grass and many of the plants at the campsite had died last year in the very bad frosts they had had during the winter, 21st May. It's hard to imagine that Botswana gets so cold to experience frost! Luckily it hasn't got that cold this year, even though it does get pretty chilly and dewy in the evening.
We had a yummy braai and we had a gorgeous grey cat come to befriend us while we were outside. He/she purred so loudly and was so cute. We both loved our hot shower to warm up, before climbing in the tent to try and catch up on typing updates. Our last sleep before we see Mom and Dad tomorrow.
Happy birthday Debbie. We hope you are extra spoilt on your birthday by Karl, Jess and Cam as well as being spoilt for Mother's Day.
Monday 12th May 2008: Woodlands Stop-Over, Francistown, Botswana
GPS Info: S21° 04' 52.9" E27° 27' 52.0"
Miles Today: 352 Total Miles: 22 929
After a freezing night, we were both tucked up tight under the duvet this morning when we woke up. We both loved our hot showers in the beautiful ablutions.Our kitty friend came over within a few minutes of us being out of the tent to say good morning. We found out from Titus that her name was Smokey, and she keeps the rats and snakes away. The sprinklers were on, spraying the grass, and there was a man cleaning the sparkling clear swimming pool. Titus asked us if we could give him a lift to Francistown when we left so after we had made space for him we said goodbye to Smokie and Lynette and drove the 10minute gravel road, having a very interesting chat with Titus. He is such a knowledgeable man.
We went into a Botswanan Tourist Info office and were met by a man who phoned around trying to find out info about camping in the Tuli Block. We were given beautiful magazines promoting Botswana and picked up some brochures about the Khama Rhino Sanctuary, where we will be staying tonight with Mom and Dad and the Steads. We got a text from them saying they were hoping to be there at around 3 or 4pm. Ross has read a lot on the Tuli Block, which is where the Adamson lions, Elsa's cubs from Born Free, were eventually released. We decided to try and drive into the block and see what we could see. The man at the tourism info had thought there might be a community campsite open to camping very close to Pontdrift, but didn't know for sure and was unable to get an answer on the phone from anyone.
The landscape we drove through today varied again from thick green mopane scrub to grassy acacia, with baobabs scattered amongst these and a few rocky outcrops, but not as high as we had seen approaching Francistown. We drove to Seruli and onto Sefophe, through many vet check points mostly just being waved through and on towards Zanzibar. We started seeing the double electrified game fences so knew we were approaching the Tuli Block. We drove on the gravel road towards Limpopo River Lodge, entering the Limpopo Lipadi Game Reserve. This is apparently a new reserve only having been open for a year or so. We were met by a uniformed ranger at the gate and welcomed in. There is no fee charged to enter this reserve, believe it or not, and it's in Botswana. We drove through for a bit seeing lots of impala, a kudu, a warthog and 2 giraffe on our way back towards Martin's Drift. We could see where the Limpopo River ran by the green trees lining its banks. We and Duzi2 got our first glimpse of South Africa, as we got the closest to it that we've come so far. We joined the road from Martin's Drift to Palapye and up to Serowe enjoying the open cleared road with animals grazing behind fences rather than along the road. Ron and Maureen would've driven up this same road just a few hours before us.
Ross drove all day while Heidz tried desperately to catch up typing the updates, before we met up with Ron and Maureen and Jack and Shirley. We arrived at the Khama Rhino Sanctuary (P33 p/p/day park fee + P41 p/vehicle/day + P53p/p/night camping) to see the blue metallic Discovery with its roof top tent open and the awning out and two parents with huge big smiles. Jack and Shirley were also all set up with a huge fire about to be started, with a little help from the gas lighter. After much excitement and lots of chattering we all settled down around the fire and enjoyed catching up with everyone's news. Mom and Dad had only seen a very few donkeys on their drive up very surprisingly.
We had a yummy braai with veggies and lots of SA meat. We eventually climbed into bed at just before midnight to a comfy nights sleep.
Happy birthday Uncle Rich. We hope you have a very special day and that this year will be a really good one, with a successful summit of Mt Kilimanjaro in a few months.
Tuesday 13th May 2008: Khama Rhino Sanctuary, Serowe, Botswana
GPS Info: S22° 15' 03.7" E26° 43' 41.8"
Miles Today: 24 Total Miles: 22 953
We woke up to a lovely morning with the kettle boiling, and Mom and Dad showered and ready for the day. We showered and all sat around the stoked up fire enjoying something hot to drink with some rusks. We all enjoyed a 'Stead breakfast'...a late fry up of bacon, eggs and toast. Such a treat to have instead of cereals everyday. We packed up and went for a drive all around the sanctuary managing to spot two rhino, a mom and a baby, impala, zebra, gemsbok, eland, vultures, and a martial eagle. We stopped in at the bird hide and were lucky to see a big herd of male kudu leaving after they had just had a drink in the bright green stagnant water.
We went back to the campsite passing Jack and Shirley on the way, having fixed their vehicle's fuse problem. We had a sandwich, did some washing and then drove off for our late afternoon's drive. On our way out of the campsite areas, we came face to face with a black rhino who wanted to cross the road over to the other side. There are only supposed to be 2 black rhino in the sanctuary, and we saw one so close! It was very placid and didn't seem fased by us at all. After crossing, it promptly broke down a mopane bush and started munching on it. We drove to the pan to try and see the sun setting over the pan and were surprised to see another rhino drinking from the water, this one was a white rhino. In the distance, we could see another white rhino coming towards the water to also have an afternoon's drink. There were gemsbok, springbok and impala drinking too. The beautiful red colours of sunset settled over the vast open plain, silhoueting the animals against the orange and red sky.
With Mom and Dad in front, we drove back to the bird hide, but saw nothing. It got dark quite quickly so we decided to head on back to camp before it got too dark. On our way back, we had a cute little hare jumping in the road in front of Duzi2 for a lot of the way. A beautiful owl also flew and perched in a tree close to the road, but flew off before we got close enough to identify it. It was so lovely to be able to drive around and see so much game, and they all seemed so calm and not scared of the car, maybe due to it being a sanctuary.
For dinner we were astounded by a mouth watering roast pork and veggies done in Mom and Dad's COB. This is an amazing 'oven' that works on a similar concept to the webber, but only uses 11 pieces of coal and in 1 1/2 hours we had a heavenly dinner, almost like a Christmas dinner in the middle of the bush! Camping like this with a blazing fire each night for warmth is world's away from our camping so far. We spent hours chatting and laughing around the fire before eventually climbing into bed just before 11pm. The stars were amazing again tonight with the moon nearing full. We were very grateful for the fire which kept us all very warm while we were sitting around it.
Congratulations on your anniversary Pete and Janet. We hope you are able to spend some special time together today to celebrate.
Wednesday 14th May 2008: Khama Rhino Sanctuary, Serowe, Botswana
GPS Info: S22° 15' 03.7" E26° 43' 41.8"
Miles Today: 154 Total Miles: 23 107
We both enjoyed piping hot showers due to stoking up the donkey and getting it to slowly burn a HUGE log all night. We sat chatting around the fire enjoying a cup of something hot to drink and some rusks. Ross is so chuffed to have rusk-eating company. We decided to have a quick cereal breakfast with toast as we had a fairly long drive ahead of us.
With the clean washing and us all packed up, we set off in convoy on the road from Serowe, through Orapa, and on to the outskirts of the Makgadikgadi Pans to the moonlike baobab island of Lekhubu Island (P120p/p/day park fee + P50p/vehicle/day + P30p/p/night camping, think it turned out to be about P185.00 p/couple). We had read that you should not stop for anything whilst driving on the pans as this might increase your chances of breaking through the hard top crust and getting stuck in the sticky toffee pan below. We made sure we all kept to the well used hard main track across the pans shown on the GPS. Finding the Lekhubu Island sign, off the main road, was something we all sailed past until we were no longer on our red GPS track so we turned back. The long golden grass was floating in the breeze and the stark white nothingness of the pan was quite beautiful. We drove for a long way over the pans and saw where people must have previously got stuck going off the main road and onto the soft pan. Apparently the dark surface is to be avoided as it is soft and damp. We got out at one place for a photo session and realised just how soft the ground was and how close to the surface the water is.
As we approached what could only be Lekhubu Island we suddenly saw loads of baobabs, grouped together on a rocky outcrop, forming an island in the middle of nowhere. Huge ancient baobabs standing out against the vast flat expanse of nothingness. At the entrance to Lekhubu Island there is a giant baobab with an information board explaining the believed history of the baobabs, and the stone wall ruins, which are linked to the Zimbabwe ruins from the 17th century. We chose a campsite with a pit loo and an enormous baobab that with all 6 of us standing side by side holding hands, we wouldn't have managed to even go a small way around its wide stem. It was hot and we were all very grateful for the shade the huge baobab gave us. We had lunch and chatted and then drove round the island to watch the sunset over the pan. The baobabs go shades of purple and pink in the light the sunset gives off and we felt like we were on the moon with the vast, flat, open pan ahead of us for as far as we could see. The rocks on the pan were greenish in colour and there were thousands of animal footprints pressed into the pan's crust.
With wood for a fire, we sat around and enjoyed the fire's warmth and beauty and decided to have cuppa-soup and bread for dinner as we had only had a very late lunch a short while before. The views, stars and natural moonlight were beautiful and we all just enjoyed taking it all in. What a stunning spot out in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by the flat open pan. A moonland with enchanting ancient baobabs, which could probably tell fascinating stories of what they've seen in their lifetime.
Happy birthday Justin. Hope Becks spoils you on your special day.
Thursday 15th May 2008: Lekhubu Island, Serowe, Botswana
GPS Info: S20° 53' 38.8" E25° 49' 23.0"
Miles Today: 218 Total Miles: 23 325
Everyone was up early to walk over to watch the sunrise over the pan. Again the colours were amazing and the baobabs were shades of pink, purple and red reflecting the sky's colours. We all felt like we were on moonland and took lots of photos. We walked around the island on the pan, noticing all the cattle spoor and red flamingo feathers and some bits of flamingo eggs. The flamingoes are in this part of the pan when it's full of water, during the rainy season, and have their chicks then and fly off when it dries up. It isn't possible to drive here during the rainy season, the only access is by boat. Seeing the cracked pan in the morning light reminded us of the part of the movie 'Beautiful People' when the pelicans all start walking in search of water as the pan water dries up, some of them sadly die along the way. It is a dry harsh environment, but beautiful to see.
We had breakfast and set off to the Central Kalahari. We stopped off at Choppies in Lethlakane to get fresh supplies for our time in the middle of nowhere. It was a really nice shop and we were able to get fresh hot bread. We filled up with fuel, water and some beers for beer bread and after all getting split up in Lethlakane drove around for a while before eventually regrouping. We were off on our way to Rakops, driving briefly through Orapa, the main diamond area in Botswana. It's hard to believe that a town with so much wealth being extracted from its earth is still so primitive and poor.
We entered into the Central Kalahari through the Matswere gate and after much confusion about payment and money exchanges, were on our way to Sunday Pan for two nights. At the moment the bush is thick and dense and so made spotting game very difficult. We drove for most of the day and didn't really see the numbers of game we were expecting to see. We saw gemsbok, impala, red hartebeest, steenbok, jakkal and lots of Pale chanting goshawks. We arrived at our pre-booked site to find 4 other cars already there with their fire going and a booking too. We drove to the other campsite at Sunday Pan, as there are only 2, and found a German family there too, but they were very kind and allowed us to share the site with them. The sites are big and luckily they had a pit loo and a shower cubicle with a bucket, but you need to provide your own water as there is none provided in the park. Due to us not camping in the normal area, there were lots of thorns and our shoe's soles were always covered in a thick layer of devil thorns.
It was quite late and dark when we arrived, so we set up and got supper on the go before it got too dark. We had chicken curry and rice done in the potjie and all headed to bed wondering what we would hear in the night, and if anything would visit the site while we were in our tents.
Friday 16th May 2008: Sunday Pan, Central Kalahari National Park, Botswana
GPS Info: S21° 19' 58.1" E23° 41' 18.7"
Miles Today: 25 Total Miles: 23 350
Woke to a stunning view over the African plains overlooking Sunday Pan. There were lots of gemsbok and springbok grazing and relaxing in the shade of various scattered thorny acacias, a corey bustard walking through the long grass, looking for bits to eat and lots of little noisy white-browed sparrow weavers busy building their nests in the trees around the tent. Mom and Dad were up and had the kettle going to make a hot cup of something to drink, to warm us all up. We each had a quick Coke bottle shower in the shower cubicle at the campsite and then sat down for a cup of hot choc and cappachino with some rusks. Everyone had slept very well with no other animal noises to report on, other than the lions as we got into bed and which we heard later in the night. We chatted to our very accommodating campsite neighbours who were on their way back to Windhoek in their truck, after 7 days in the Central Kalahari, with no lion sightings. They had heard them most nights and seen their spoor, but hadn't seen them yet. Maybe they might be lucky to see one before they leave today.
It was still quite chilly when we left for our morning's drive around to Leopard Pan and a bit further on, with us seeing lots of gemsbok, springbok, wildebeest and cute little busy ground squirrels. There was lots of long flowering grass, which is great for the animals, but very difficult to view game through. We turned around on our one drive as the thorny scrub got too thick to see through, so we decided to drive passed Sunday Pan to see if there was anything else there. it was so weird to be driving in convoy, behind Mom and Dad with their rooftop tent on! We stopped to turn around just after the pan, when we heard a horrible noise that sounded like the gearbox had fallen down. Duz struggled to move forwards or backwards and when she/he did, the back wheels looked a bit stiff when they rolled forward. Ross jumped into the drivers seat, juggled with the gears and it all suddenly seemed fine. Nothing was visibly wrong underneath and nothing had fallen off or down. With Ross driving, he tried to change gears as often as possible and it all seemed okay, thankfully.
Jack cooked up an amazing brunch of bacon, scrambled/omlette eggs, mushrooms, tomatoes, warmed up chilli con carne from last night and toast. We decided to relax for a bit, with Mom having a power nap, while Ross tightened the shock mountings. Ross noticed that the back shock had been put back without it's correct metal mounting bracket, so the rubber had completely worn away. McGyver came into play with the drill, vice and scrap pieces of metal to remake a new bracket and put our tyre bushes (from the Ghana saga) in to support the shock in the back. He made another McGyver plan with the loose plate on the front shock to tighten that, so that should stop some recent rattles.
We drove for an afternoon's drive on to the pan hoping to spot more game, maybe even spot a cat or two. We didn't manage to see any cats, but we did spot an aardwolf, a member of the hyena family, and many jakkal. We played our animal sounds to one jakkal close to the car to see its reaction and were amazed that from nowhere all of a sudden four jakkal came sprinting across to the car, regrouped and headed off behind us. It was so lovely to be driving around in the African bush in Duzi2.
We all had another delicious potjie dinner and sat around a warm fire chatting. We could hear owls, jakkal and lion in the far distance. It was cold and we were once again so pleased to have our duvet on.
Saturday 17th May 2008: Sunday Pan, Central Kalahari National Park, Botswana
GPS Info: S21° 19' 58.1" E23° 41' 18.7"
Miles Today: 96 Total Miles: 23 446
Up to a relaxed leisurely start with potjie on toast for breakfast before we drove on to Piper's Pan for the night. We stopped in at a few campsites on the way to try and find our booked site, but didn't manage to find it. Some sites are more like bush camping, with absolutely nothing provided, while others have a pit loo and shower area behind wooden pole walls. We spent the day driving through the park treating it like an all day game drive, but were surprised to not see very much game at all. Central Kalahari has thick mopane and grass scrub, which makes it very difficult for the game to move through and even more difficult to spot any game in. We did see quite a number of black-backed jakkal and even a honey badger / ratel digging furiously to try and get something out of the ground.
We found a lovely vacant campsite, with toilet and shower areas, so claimed it as our own and had a late lunch before driving off on a late afternoon game drive. There is a waterhole on the side of Piper's Pan, but it seems to never be used by animals other than vultures, bateuleurs, and other birds. There are many gemsbok, springbok, wildebeest and even some red hartebeest in and around the pan, which was full of short golden grass. The animals seemed to be all huddled in the middle of the vast pan where they are far from preying predators which may be lurking in the long grass around the pan edge.
We went for our own game drive with Dad in Duzi2, while Mom decided to have an afternoon's snooze in their rooftop tent. Jack and Shirley were busy with dinner prep so we would join up with them later. We decided to drive around the pan and then onto the next nearby pan, joking about bumping into lion. All in conversation Ross suddenly said , "There are lion lying right next to the road". Amazingly there were 3 male lion all lazing in the late afternoon sun right next to the road, totally exposed and unperturbed. We couldn't believe our eyes. All three of them looked fairly young as their manes weren't properly grown, and they were all in perfect condition. We tried to radio the Steads to get them to drive in our direction, but they were too far out of reach. We decided to race back to camp to fetch Mom, and to hopefully catch the Steads, to see these three lion. With Mom and Dad and us in Duzi2 we were on our first real game drive together. The Steads were now close behind us in their vehicle, and we stopped at the waterhole to tell the two Landy's there of the lion ahead. Feeling like the Pied Piper leading all the cars to the lion, we hoped they were still there. Luckily they were still enjoying the last of the sunshine before sunset and didn't mind suddenly having the papparazzi around them. After watching them for ages, two of them got up and started walking down the road away from us. We decided to slowly move on after them, giving the other vehicles a closer look at the remaining lion. As we snuck past, this one stared at us intensely with his huge, alert yellow eyes. Very intimidating, even in the safety of a vehicle. The two ahead of us now walked in the middle of the road until they branched off and almost disappeared into the bush. Wow, what a sighting. These three must have been about 4km or less from the campsite, which made us all a bit more on edge than we had been, especially when it got dark.
We had another delicious dinner and then spent time just chatting and laughing around a big fire, until we started to hear roaring and rustling around us. A big ground hare hopped through the site, but didn't seem interested in our lettuce at all. We retired up to bed and were very thankful for our rooftop tent, especially as we knew the three leo's were close by. The Steads were a little less fortunate, being on the ground. When we were all in bed, we heard the lions roaring around us, but quite far away, accompanied by the sound of jakkal too. We also heard various owl sounds.
Happy birthday AM. We hope you have a wonderful birthday and are spoilt rotten by Brad, Josh and Caroline. We can't wait to see you guys when we stop.
Sunday 18th May 2008: Piper's Pan, Central Kalahari National Park, Botswana
GPS Info: S21° 46' 05.8" E23° 11' 54.4"
Miles Today: 26 Total Miles: 23 472
The lions came snooping around in the early hours of the morning, before sunrise, and made us all aware of who was boss in this turf. It sounded as though they were close, so we were trying to spot them through the mozzie net windows of the rooftent, but couldn't see anything. We had all heard the lion and were wondering where they were today.
After a hot drink and rusks we then went for a drive around Piper's Pan to see if we could spot our feline visitors. Mom and Dad came in Duzi2 again to save them having to pack up their tent, just to go for a morning drive. There were gemsbok, wildebeest, red hartebeest, some jakkal and a number of pale chanting goshawks. We saw bateleurs in the sky, as well as a kestrel and other hard-to-identify birds of prey. We met our lion trio about 900metres from our campsite, this time lazing in the the long grass on the side of the road. The game were once again in the middle of the pan surrounded by short grass, so the game would've been able to spot these three lions more easily. The trio had obviously had an encounter with a porcupine, as two of them had the evidence of quills in their nose, jaw and chest to prove it. We were wondering if the porcupine had got away or not, with a few less quills, but it's life at least. It was horrible to see them with the quills sticking out and we wished we were able to run up and remove them. They were so relaxed flopping around, enjoying the breeze which was blowing quite strongly off the pan. With the wind blowing this way, their scent was been blown away from the game in the middle of the pan. Their fairly short manes were ruffling up in the wind and made them look like they were having a 'bad hair day' at times. They were again totally unfased by us being close to them. They were totally lazy and not planning on moving anywhere in a hurry.
After much encouragement to play our lion sounds on the ipod, Ross played the sound of lion roaring and we all watched to see their reaction. These three must dominate this area of the pan, so when they heard the different lion roars coming from the car, they each got up and went over onto the pan to investigate who dared to enter into their turf. They started marking their territory, spraying as they went.
We went back to camp and enjoyed breakfast and had the rest of the windy day to do our own thing. The wind got quite strong, but this thankfully kept the temperature down. We showered in the warm sunshine, with Heidz even managing to wash her hair with a miniscule amount of water. We did washing and tried to catch up on diary updates. In the late afternoon we went for a game drive again, but didn't see anything new, and didn't see our lion trio anywhere.
A young German couple drove into our campsite with a booking for the night, but they were happy to share it as we had had such a mix up with our site. They were on their honeymoon and this was her first time to Africa. We sat around a roaring fire chatting and enjoying being outside, noticing the stars above us. By now the wind had stopped and it seemed to be a bit warmer. We enjoyed a yummy dinner and then heard very close rustling in the bushes nearby. We heard lion roars closeby and then a chorus of jakkal screams. The roars were heard again, but closer this time. We weren't feeling that brave even though there was a roaring fire going. After the third set of now very close roars, everyone very promptly dissappeared into their tents, clearing everything away very fast. From the safety of our rooftop tent we heard the roars again and they were coming closer to our campsite, with the three lion sounding like they were encircling our site. We tried desperately to see the lion, but couldn't. This must have been one of our earliest nights since having met Mom, Dad, Jack and Shirley, but no one was brave/stupid enough to stick around when the lions were so close.
Happy birthday Claudine. We hope you have a really special day and are blessed out of your socks. We also pray that God answers and opens all the doors you are praying for.
Monday 19th May 2008: Piper's Pan, Central Kalahari National Park, Botswana
GPS Info: S21° 46' 05.8" E23° 11' 54.4"
Miles Today: 254 Total Miles: 23 726
With the lions being really close last night, surrounding our campsite, and all three again being very vocal from just before 5am onwards, we were not too keen to get up and out in too much of a hurry, even though we all knew we had a long drive ahead of us today. We needed to get from Piper's Pan to the main northern Matswere gate (130km) and then on to Leroo La Tau along the Boteti River, next to the entrance to the Magadigadi Pan before dark. The Steads had stayed there a few years ago. We had decided against spending the night in another government owned reserve as the fees are expensive (P120p/p/day + P50p/vehicle/day + P30p/p/night to camp) and we were all looking forward to a hot shower to have a proper clean, which wouldn't be in the Pan!
Our German camping neighbours came out of their rooftop tent when we were all moving around out of ours, and were most impressed with the lion last night and this morning. This must have been quite an introduction for Nicole, on her first time out of Europe, to sleep in the African bush with three lions roaring so loudly and so close! Ross and Jack went for a spoor tracking walk, to spot the lion spoor who had sounded like they were a stones throw away from Jack and Shirley's ground tent. We then set off, driving the rather bumpy, dippy and corrugated road through the park, leaving just after 8am, knowing we would never make it out of the park by 11am. We passed gemsbok, red hartebeest, ostrich, wildebeest, springbok and a lovely big family of giraffe on our speedy coverage of the 130kms. The grass and bush is so thick most of the way that it looks too thick for the animals to pass through, let alone to be able to see them in.
We had lunch at the gate, before setting off to find Leroo La Tau. We followed the GPS, turning off onto a gravel road, as there were no signs. We then met a very disinterested couple who told us Leroo La Tau was closed and there definitely was no camping. We think they were the owners and they couldn't be bothered to help us out at all! We decided to give Baines Baobabs a skip too, as it was nearing dusk and this would mean a whole lot more park fees. We decided to rather drive through to Nata for the night.
Driving on towards Nata we noticed that the water around Gweta had dropped a lot since we last drove through here a week ago. We pulled into Planet Baobab (P49p/p/night camping) to enquire about camping just as the sunset colours were forming in the sky. The whole debate about whether it was or wasn't full moon tonight still not having been resolved. We were met by the very smiley Lucy and stunning views of scattered baobabs growing wildly around the grounds. Lucy told us about how much rain they've had and that they had been forced to close their campsites for 10 days a few weeks before, as they were flooded from all the rains. She walked with us to show us the campsite she recommended we take, due to it being close to the ablutions and wash up basins, while Mom, Dad, Jack and Shirley drove around. With us being the only campers we had every site to choose from, but Lucy's recommended one was the one we chose. We parked up and then the wheel-barrow load of firewood (P25) we had ordered arrived, and we started a fire, getting our braai stuff ready for dinner. Planet Baobab has been so beautifully done with little traditional looking thatched huts with different traditional painted designs on their walls. The bathrooms were beautiful and both the mens and ladies had tree stems in the middle of the circular room. The basins, with mirrors, surrounded the central circular stem and the loos and showers were around the edge. Each mirror frame was made out of recycled coke cans. The whole room made you feel like you were walking inside a tree, with soft uplighting and Moroccan style cement walls and sitting areas.
The fire was so lovely and warm that we all only felt how cold it was when we walked away from it. There was much chatter and laughter and many photos were taken of the moon by Ross and Jack. We enjoyed a delicious braai and sat huddled around the hot fire for hours just chatting. At about 11.30pm we went for a hot shower, to warm up before jumping into bed for a night of the sounds of donkeys breighing and bells clanking, rather than roaring lions very close-by.
Tuesday 20th May 2008: Planet Baobab, Gweta, Botswana
GPS Info: S20° 11' 22.7" E25° 18' 26.6"
Miles Today: 0 Total Miles: 23 726
It was quite chilly this morning and had been chilly through the night. All a bit keen to do some washing and catch up, we unanimously decided that Planet Baobab was a really lovely spot to stop at, catch up a bit and enjoy a rest day. With washing lines hanging around each vehicle, we'll all have our full range of clothes to chose from over the next few days. We had a cooked breakfast and enjoyed slowly warming up as the sun rose higher and gradually got hotter. We went for a short walk around Planet Baobab to explore and see their hutted thatched chalets, lovely big swimming pool and the waterhole outside the electric fence. There is still a lot of water around at the moment, especially in the Gweta area. There were cows lounging around the sludgy water which looked deep in the middle. We climbed up a rickety, wooden look-out treehouse-type structure to get a better view. There were ducks and other water birdlife swimming in the water, which Jack and Shirley enjoyed identifying. It was hot and the sun is strong here so we decided to turn back and stop off in the shaded bar area for a cold, refreshing drink. Such a hard life in Africa... We spoke to Lucy about the headdress the ladies at Planet Baobab wear as part of their uniform.
We heard a parrot sound and managed to see three wild parrots in the tree around the bar/restaurant area. Feeling refreshed and revived, we wandered back to our campsite to have some lunch, passing the immaculately clean kitchen and restaurant area encircled with decopaged plates made from pilchard labels. Very clever. There is also a huge circular ball chandelier made from Black Label beer bottles, unlike the green Heineken beer bottle chandeliers in the main bar. Mom and Dad went for an afternoon snooze, while the Steads and us sat around chatting and reading magazines. It was our turn to do supper at last, which we were going to cook the way we usually do on our stove. We were only doing a really easy spaghetti bolognaise, which we all ate around a perfect fire which Ross had made. The mozzies came out tonight so we were glad to put on our long clothing and got more valuable tips from Jack and Shirley about where to go from here on. We all had interesting conversations about South Africa and the situation there at the moment, with all the land claims which are quite hard to accept and believe, for us wanting to go back and invest in a very uncertain property market.
After much chatting and yummy peaches and ultra-mel custard, we headed off to bed. We then got chatting to the security guard who was coming to sit and enjoy our fire while he looked after us through the night. He was a Zimbabwean and we ended up having a very interesting conversation with him until 12.30, by which time we were both yawning and too tired to shower, so brushed our teeth and headed straight to bed.
It was full moon tonight, but there had been so much cloud cover we hadn't really seen it. As we were heading to bed however we noticed that the whole sky was completely clear of cloud and the full moon was bright and clear with lots of stars sparkling. This is the same as what happened last night. It was still quite cool, but thankfully not as cold as last night.
Happy birthday Nats. We hope you have a fantastic day and are treated like a princess on your special day. You will be in our thoughts and prayers all day. We wish we could be with you today, but hopefully one day this will come true. Enjoy your birthday cake and however you celebrate your birthday, we know Clint will make it very special.
Wednesday 21st May 2008: Planet Baobab, Gweta, Botswana
GPS Info: S20° 11' 22.7" E25° 18' 26.6"
Miles Today: 93 Total Miles: 23 819
After lovely hot showers and a relaxed breakfast around the stoked up coals we were on our way towards Nata. We passed a lot of water along the roadside, which is fantastic for all the donkeys and cattle in this area as they have plenty of water at the moment. From Nata we took the badly pot-holed Nata - Kasane road up to Elephant Sands. Luckily there were people filling up some of the holes in the road with a sand mix as we were driving north, so the holes weren't so big and we could drive fairly normally, dodging a few on the way. We drove in to Elephant Sands to have a look as it was just after midday. We met a chatty SA couple there, who have an incredibly well kitted Toyota Landcruiser. They were telling us the elephants come to drink from the waterhole that the main building looks onto, and lion and hyaena sometimes come into the camp. Elephant Sands (P40p/p/night to camp) is in a huge unfenced area, so they benefit from the local game coming onto their land to drink etc. After much chatting, a decision was reached to camp here for the night as the setting is so beautiful and hopefully we would see some ellies come to drink.
While we were getting things out for lunch Ben, the owner, came over to tell us some elephant were on their way to the waterhole. We had already spotted two ellies in the grass quietly eating on the outskirts of the campsite and were slowly making their way around the campsite to the waterhole. Two came down to drink and then quietly disappeared. We all got involved in chopping up various veggies for our potjie dinner and once that was on the go we heard and saw another 5 elephant coming across to the waterhole. We had sundowners overlooking the water with the ellies right there.
Ross raced back to our campsite to chase off some cheeky and inquisitive monkeys who were very interested in our spot.
The elephant at the waterhole were so lovely to watch. Ben came over to tell us that if we were quiet the elephant would probably come up to the swimming pool to drink too. The waterhole has fresh water from the recent rains, but the swimming pool and all the domestic water at Elephant Sands is very salty. The sandy area where the pool's backwash water runs out is where the ellies love to eat the salt crystals from, and they play with the pool water rather than drink it. Slowly and without any fuss all 5 elephant moved up close to us and towards the pool. They patiently stood waiting, until one of them eventually moved onto the side of the pool stretching it's trunk down into the pool to slurp water up and splash it around.
It was almost as though they were naughty children, knowing they shouldn't be drinking the pool water, but just couldn't resist the urge any longer. At one time there were 3 with their trunks in the water, blowing bubbles, splashing and just having fun. It was amazing to be so close (16metres) and to be so priviledged to be accepted into their world for a bit, to see them doing their thing. There was total silence in the main lodge building as everyone watched and photographed with smiles on their faces. Then again without any sound the ellies slowly walked off through the campsite and disappeared into the bush. There were so many people at the lodge by now and everyone was in awe of what they had just seen. Some elephants tried to push down some trees on their way through, but then left them when they realised they were too big to break down. Others enjoyed lingering on for a bit breaking branches and munching on the thorny acacia leaves and only left later to continue eating in the bush on the outskirts of the campsite.
Supper was ready early and we all thoroughly enjoyed the very yummy potjie. We could hear movement at the waterhole and went over to vaguely make out two ellies drinking. There were lots of people who filled up the place from the late afternoon, staying in the chalets, watching football and eating dinner on the open deck area. The moon rose and with another perfect fire blazing we chatted for a while before everyone set off to bed for an early night. Brushing your teeth with salty water is a rather horrible experience. There was a generator running until quite late which was a bit unfortunate for hearing bush sounds, but we did hear the trumpets of more elephants coming to the waterhole to have a drink.
Heidz woke to the loud sound of splashing and breaking branches at around midnight. There were 3 or 4 elephants having a ball around the pool and with the small acacia trees and branches around the swimming pool. After they had stopped splashing, they moved onto playing with the pool pump cover, scraping it, lifting and dropping it. They were playing for over an hour and then silently walked off. The hyaena calls started and continued in the distance for a lot of the night.
Thursday 22nd May 2008: Elephant Sands, 50km north of Nata, Botswana
GPS Info: S20° 11' 22.7" E25° 18' 26.6"
Miles Today: 168 Total Miles: 23 987
After a really good night's sleep, we all slowly arose and sat around the fire enjoying our hot drinks and rusks. We had lovely hot showers even if the water was salty. It's salty, but you don't get sticky like you do with sea water. The showers and ablutions are so lovely, being open to the sun and stars. Ross even had a cute little tree squirrel sharing his shower cubicle, Ross showering while the tree squirrel enjoyed munching on the bamboo 'walls' around the shower. We decided to have cereal and toast for breakfast as we were driving to Kasane today. The sun rose higher and it got warmer, as it is really quite chilly in the mornings and evenings. We all went over to say thank you and good-bye to Ben, the owner. He is such a lovely guy and so interesting to talk to. Elephant Sands is a lovely stop over place and we'd highly recommend staying here.
We drove on the "open-cast mining" road up to Kasane, passing two accidents on the way, with trucks and cars rolled and squashed. We crossed over into an electric-fenced area which had been cleared of the mopane and natural bush and was cultivated with fields of sunflowers for 8km on one side of the road and some other wheaty type crop on the other side of the road. Unbelievable to see, the sunflowers made us feel a bit like we were driving through the flowering sunflower fields in Tuscany, France. Afterwards, back in the mopane bush again, we past giraffe on the side of the main road.
We finally reached over 40 trucks parked one behind the other in a row along the side of the road and knew we must be approaching Kazungula, and that this was the beginning of the long truck queue we knew about, all waiting to cross the ferry into Zambia from Botswana. Luckily cars just drive to the front of the queue and are put on around the trucks, otherwise we would also have to wait many weeks here. We drove into Toro Lodge and checked in, getting two sites. After lunch we then headed into Kasane to get a few bits and bobs. There is a big Spar, a hot-bread bakery with fresh bread, curio sellers and clothing shops. We all stopped and smiled at the sight of warthogs grazing along the main road and walking in the centre of town. We managed to get a gas regulator to fit our new Cadac gas bottle and also replaced our broken fluorescent light globe etc. at a very efficient shop called Haskins. From there we went to a Cash and Carry across the road and bought some real kid's sweets including round "apricot" sweets, which Ross remembered and loves from when he was a kid. The apricots were a hit with all the adults too, but they are extremely sweet. Jack and Shirley drove to Chobe gate to find out about camping in the park tomorrow night and the night after, as they had been unable to make a booking over the phone, being told it was all fully booked. The lady at the gate told them we should all arrive tomorrow and she's sure we'll be able to stay. Yay, back to the bush for a few days...
We had another roaring fire and a delicious roast chicken done in the COB. We've got to get ourselves one of them when we get back. Roast chicken, roast potatoes and veggies, topped off with chocolate - this is truly camping in style! It got very chilly so we all got closer and closer to the fire until eventually it was time for bed. There is a KD dog, roaming around the campsite, which is ready to pop with puppies. She moved to lie close to the fire when we left, and a gorgeous huge boerbull-cross-staffie looking male dog also arrived and became our best friend, just as we were brushing our teeth getting ready for bed. We both loved him, but he would definitely eat us out of house and home. He ended up sleeping right under the tent base, so we would be perfectly safe no matter who came around.
Friday 23rd May 2008: Toro Safari Lodge, Kazungula, Botswana
GPS Info: S17° 47' 43.4" E25° 14' 24.1"
Miles Today: 49 Total Miles: 24 036
Happy birthday Dad! We hope your day today will be a truly special one as we are able to all enjoy it together in Botswana with you.
Up fairly early to try and get to Chobe entrance by 10am. The birthday boy kindly made us toast for breakfast and enjoyed opening cards with a hot cup of tea. We were once again very generously and kindly treated to our time in Chobe by Mom and Dad (P120p/p/day + P50p/vehicle/day + P30p/p/night to camp). After entering through the main gate, we drove slowly through the park towards Ihaha Campsite were we are to spend two nights. The bush in Chobe is totally different to Moremi and makes game viewing a whole lot easier. There is more open grassland, thinner bush/scrub and a lot of the roads where we were follow along the river, so visibility was excellent. We were so spoilt with sightings. We saw puku, impala, kudu, buffalo, hippo in and out of the water, crocs, lots of elephant and many different birds, including birds of prey. We stopped and watched the ellies for quite a while. There was a whole family, including a tiny baby, who were having a wonderful time playing in the Chobe river. They were splashing, rolling, sinking and falling and playing submarines using their trunks as snorkels, as they totally submerged their bodies under the water.
We arrived at Ihaha Camp in the mid afternoon and were met by a humourous, very switched on, game guard. He told us that all the official sites were still booked, but gave us a reserve site at the end of all the numbered sites. We were warned to lock everything away at night time, as there is a problem with theft from the Namibians coming over the Chobe river in their makoros and stealing stuff, which had happened just a few days before. They had even stolen the solar panels from the bathrooms. We had a late lunch and then went off for a late afternoon drive with all of us sharing sightings over the walkie talkies in each vehicle. We saw lots of buck - impala, puku, kudu, as well as giraffe, buffalo, birds and hundreds of baboons all out for their last drink, forage and play before bed. We also saw many ellies all on their way for a drink. Some of the young ones were being quite cheeky and didn't like silver Ford's one bit! We stopped and took photos of the spectacular red sunset over the Chobe river, with men in their mekoro silhouetted against the crimson water. Heidz scanned every tree, but didn't have any luck spotting a leopard in the trees.
As we arrived back in Ihaha Camp we were blown away by the sunset colours over the water, so beautiful! We drove to our allocated site far away from the ablutions and lights and got a fire blazing with Jack's magic gas fire-starter. On our way to the site we passed two buffalo along the water's edge, drinking in the dark within a few hundred metres of our site. Within no time we had a lovely fire roaring and sat chatting, toasting with champagne to Ron's birthday. It was cold, very dark and a bit exposed being so far out, but we felt brave around the fire. After a very yummy braai and potatoes, we tried to make Dad a perfect chocolate birthday cake on the fire, but managed to make two not so perfect cakes instead, which we enjoyed for pudding with custard. After much joviality and laughter we headed for bed.
We packed all our stuff away, but the others didn't...this meant us and Mom and Dad were woken up at about midnight to the sound of scratching, tugging and pulling coming from the stuff left out of the other vehicles, on the ground. Heidz thought it was someone who'd broken into the Stead's car, but after Ross shone the torch discovered it was a honey badger/ratel scratching in one of Mom and Dad's boxes under their car. Luckily it moved on after getting a good dose of Cob cleaner fluid, and that allowed Dad to climb down and move the box somewhere more secure. A short while after that, 12.45am, Ronnie spotted three dark men walking along the waters edge past our site, towards the main sites and Ross had heard them too. They were armed and made us four all feel a bit suspicious. Ron and Maureen decided to take it in turns to do night watch shifts through the night after this...
Saturday 24th May 2008: Ihaha Camp, Chobe, Botswana
GPS Info: S17° 50' 12.4" E24° 52' 55.7"
Miles Today: 36 Total Miles: 24 072
After a very long night broken by noises and splashes, we were glad to see the daylight. All four of us were tired, whilst the Steads had had a perfect night's sleep, not hearing a thing. The honey badger had opened the citrus COB cleaning solution and poor thing must have been very disappointed. We drove to the ablutions to shower and then to the office to see if we could move to an official site which had been booked, but was no longer going to be used, as the people had to leave a day early to carry on to Zambia. This was fine and meant we should all have a better night's sleep. We were also told the three men were BDF (Botswana Defense Force) doing patrols last night.
We all helped move the Stead's ground tent from our reserve site to our new site no.2. Shirley videoed the green ten-legged tortoise move, with us and Mom and Dad at each corner and Jack under the ground sheet in the middle of the tent. We must have been a site for the German tourists nextdoor!
In our new home, and with everyone more relieved that we should be safe tonight, we had a cooked breakfast and eventually left for a late midday drive. It was amazing to drive through the same area as last night, but see absolutely no game other than a sprinkling of impala. Our GPS suddenly died and wouldn''t switch on. A potential disaster and a VERY expensive item to replace. Luckily after Ross undid and checked every part of it, as well as carrying out a soft reboot, it started up and all seemed fine. We passed four zebra and stopped off in a private camp area for a drink and snack. We drove on towards the Simwanza Valley still not seeing much. This drive was very pretty and at times we felt like we were driving through an orchard. Sadly we saw a dead elephant and giraffe along this route, but no roan or sable which Jack had hoped to see.
Jack and Shirley headed back to the campsite to shower, etc, while Mom, Dad and ourselves drove on for a bit hoping still to spot a leopard in a tree. We didn''t see a cat, but saw the same ellie family all drinking close to Ihaha Camp. They all suddenly rushed through the water on their return to dry land, from a patch of riverbank surrounded by water. This was so strange to see, but maybe it was to protect the tiny calf from crocs that might have been in the water, or to ward off other things, but it was pretty special to see.
We arrived back at the camp to be greeted by buffalo and a cheeky young ellie who ran after our car twice trumpeting and flapping his little ears. There was also a female and bigger calf next to the ablution block. The sunset colours were amazing over the river and we were met by Jack and Shirley warning us of how close the animals were to the site tonight. As it got darker, there were lots of crackling, crunching and branch-breaking noises in the bushes and trees around us, and big splashes could be heard in the water close to the shore of our site. We had spaghetti bolognaise for dinner and all huddled around the fire, while hundreds of thousands of stars came out in the sky above us. The moon slowly rose and we all decided to make our way to bed. Ron and Maureen climbed up into their tent parked in its perfectly manicured area, which gardener Ronnie had carefully cut away.
Nothing more could be heard other than the murmur of snoring coming from each tent.
Sunday 25th May 2008: Ihaha Camp, Chobe, Botswana
GPS Info: S17° 50' 12.4" E24° 52' 55.7"
Miles Today: 40 Total Miles: 24 112
We awoke to more stunning views overlooking the Chobe River. There were Egyptian geese drinking and swimming in the water and other birdlife flying overhead. We packed up and set off on the drive back to the main gate, as we needed to be out of the gate by 11am when our park permit expired. We passed kudu, impala, puku, ellies, buffalo and giraffe on our drive. We saw a big pod of hippo out of the water on an island in the middle of the river. From the road we had a good view looking down onto them. They must have been the first pod of hippo we had seen when we entered the park. At 4km from the gate we pulled in for a last look at the river and game and came across a big family of about 15 banded mongeese (or whatever the plural of them is). They were so cute to watch, going about their day scratching with their front legs at the same time, to get at whatever they were munching on in the sand just under the surface. Some impala bulls were also rutting. A little further along this road we past two hippo out of the water and along the roadside. So much for them not being out of the water in the heat of the day...
We got to the gate with seconds to spare and signed out. One of the guards at the gate showed Ross a lion spoor in the sand right at the main gate, more recent than the human shoe prints all around. There are no fences to keep the animals in the park, so that lion could be anywhere. Mom, Dad, Jack and Shirley drove on to Toro Lodge to get a campsite there for the night, while we drove through Kasane trying to find the wood man who Dad had bought his beautifully made wooden cup-set from. We also tried to find WIFI, but had no luck there either. We stopped off at Spar to buy braai meat in case Steve's friends, who live in Kazungula, Robin and Kathy, joined us for a braai later. We arrived at Toro with everyone all set up and relaxing, having eaten an early lunch.
It was great to have time to catch up again before we set off for Zambia. We managed to contact Robin and Kathy and made arrangements to go over to their home later in the afternoon. They couldn't make it to a braai this evening so we'll have a final farewell with the six of us. We managed to clean out the fridge, do washing, download and resize photos etc. Later in the afternoon, we went over to Robin and Kathy's lovely home. They have a big beautiful home on a huge piece of land with lots of dogs and two horses. They look right onto the river and lose some of their garden when the river rises up high. They are originally from Pietermaritzburg, but are now so happy living here they won't ever leave. We had a long very interesting chat with them. We felt very comfortable with them and hope to meet up with them again one day in the future somewhere. It was very strange for us to just arrive at someone's house not knowing them from a bar of soap. They are an amazing couple and live in a stunning place and had very interesting stories to tell us of elephants constantly breaking their fences to get into their garden, frequent game visitors, bush babies in their roof and also sadly losing two dogs, one to a croc and one to a cobra etc.
We left Robin and Kathy and arrived back at the camp to one of Jack's magically lit flaming fires. We all sat around the fire chatting and us getting more tips of places to go from the Stead's. We also had a lovely chat to Mom and Paps. After a terrific time with Mom and Dad and the Stead's we could hardly believe it had all flown by and was nearly over. We enjoyed our last night all together and are so glad we'll be living somewhere down South so this can happen again.
Monday 26th May 2008: Toro Safari Lodge, Kazungula, Botswana
GPS Info: S17° 47' 45.6" E25° 14' 24.0"
Miles Today: 87 Total Miles: 24 199
We were all up and busy, trying to get things ready for our further trips, us onto Zambia and Mom, Dad, Jack and Shirley onto Namibia. Kathy very kindly gave us a number of a local guy who could help Jack out with his fridge problems, but sadly he was away until Friday. We packed up and got Duzi2 more neatly organised and said our sad good-byes, but it won't be long until we'll see everyone again for good! We drove into Kasane again in search of the man who sold Dad his lovely wooden cups and wine bottle, but he's a Zimbo and has apparently gone back to Zim. We also filled up with diesel before we hit the extremely expensive Zambia fuel. We stopped in at Marios Meat Market, recommended to us by someone at Nata Lodge, and bought some really lovely meat, which we were assured we could take across the border into Zambia. Jack and Shirley were told by the lady working there that she would not sell them meat as it would just be taken from them along the road to the Namibian border at the police/vet check points along the way. Here we also met Keith and Linda, an SA couple travelling through Zambia, etc. for a few days. We had a quick chat to them and were sure to bump into them again somewhere along the line today in our crossings.
All stocked up with lovely meat and fuel, we drove past the extremely long truck queue right to the front. We had our passports stamped and signed the necessary papers to get ourselves and Duzi2 out of Botswana and into Zambia, our 29th country. We drove past another long queue of trucks on the way to the ferry and followed the customs officer's advice of ignoring all the people offering to help and drive to the front, to where we would be waved on to the ferry. Keith and Linda had just driven on to the ferry and made space for us to fit on too. We didn't even stop to switch off the engine to wait, but luckily just drove straight onto the ferry. We chatted to Keith and Linda some more and took photos and a video of the very short ferry crossing. Heidz asked the ferry driver how many times he makes the ferry cross a day and his reply was "more than a thousand times a day"! The ferry crossing was very simple and uncomplicated, so we definitely didn't need any of the many helpers hanging around. There were a few foot passengers crossing over too, but the ferry was not overcrowded or overloaded like the ferries we've encountered so far, further up the west coast of Africa.