Okavango River Lodge Maun

... Botswana. The country is about the size of Texas and 18% of its area is reserved for conservation and tourism.

Botswana is a very safe place. They have no crime. You know why? They have the death penalty for murder, rape and even for robbery in certain cases.

From the border, we head east then northeast on a paved road towards Maun, some 500 km. (300 mi) away. The terrain is extremely flat. Apart from some cattle ranches to ...

hi everyone!

We hve survivfed the okavango delta!

soooo surreal driving through the reeds on a mokoro powered by only a stick! We encountered lots of elephants and zebras in teh wild on walking safaris and we even watched elephants graze and cross the delta in front of our camp site :)

Tomorrow we head north and on to vic falls! This is short but i dont have much time! See you all sunday!

... wird). Das war der beruhigende Teil unseres Aufenthaltes. Danach mussten wir bis um 18 Uhr wieder aus dem Park sein. Ohne GPS und mehr Wegen als auf der Karte eingezeichnet waren kamen wir irgendwie nicht weiter. Die Zeit wurde knapper und schlussendlich standen wir zum zweiten Mal vor einem Sumpf durch den es zwar Spuren gab, wir aber absolut keine Lust hatten hindurch zu fahren. Schlussendlich blieb es doch die einzige Variante und es kam wie es kommen musste. Auf den letzten zwei ...

... plus the heat is very tiring for all but especially so for whoever is the main driver.

The weather has really warmed up since we entered Botswana and at the moment it is about 36 degrees around lunchtime. Zambia seemed to be fresher even though it was just as warm; there was nearly always a breeze about. This is the end of wintertime, and our next destination is the Kalahari and Deception Valley area so it could be even warmer.

... br>
After dinner, we had a crazy birthday party for Elena that involved a few drinks at the bar, many shots for the birthday girl, metal tins of wine, spindoolies, and crossing the bridge. For 24 days we would only have giant metal tins to drink all of our beverages from, the tins added a very nice taste to the already horrible wine we bought in bags. You may remember the spindoolies from Wilderness (spinning in a circle with a bag of wine over your head ...

... all they saw were birds. Alan went down just before bed with one of the lads but they saw nothing.

We had yet another very early start the next day as we needed to get to Rundu to get some shopping and spend the last of our Namibian Dollars. That night we stayed on the banks of the Okovango river that feeds into the famous Okovango Delta. There were crocs and hippos in the river but we didn't see any that night.

On Saturday morning we had to get up early as we had a long ...

THINGS WE LEARNED – Stephanie has a thing or two to teach Botswanan police officers! All official rules and regulations in Africa are negotiable.

INTERESTING FACT – The flood waters in the Okavanga Delta come from the rainforests of Angola and take six months to reach Botswana. Rivers in Maun were the highest in 30+years and some flowing for the very first time in those 30 years.

THIS IS HOW CHEAP WE ARE – We joined a gold ...

Crossed over into Botswana in the morning and made our way to our campsite in Maun. The next day we went into the Delta in Mokoros which are dug out canoes, though the ones we were in were of the fyber glass variety. It was still fantastic though lying back as we got poled to our campsite 3 hours away. Apparently the Delta was far more ...

... Oliver's intent on doing the lion walk in Zimbabwe so think we'll just put the money towards that instead.



So our first night in Maun proved to be quite eventful with Muzza once again working his magic and scoring with an Aussie lass from another Oasis truck headed for Cape Town. The single lads are starting to form a rule, that being always hook up with someone headed in the opposite direction. Very wise.



People were getting thrown in the pool ...

... and cultural preservation. Heady stuff for a day-tripper, much less a chronicler.

But in Shakawe I'm off to the races immediately, gone with TOCaDI staff over the Okavango river to collect some basket weavers for a quality control workshop further down the Delta. At the ferry launch dozens of people wait in the shade for the boat, the river floating imperceptibly by. Downstream, cattle roam the tall, swampy grass while beside them a young Herero ...