Botswana: day one

Trip Start Apr 15, 2009
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Trip End May 15, 2009


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Thursday, May 7, 2009

Botswana, day one. Claire and I crossed the border earlier today at the romantically named Trans-Kalahari border post, what Namibians call East Gate, roughly 300Kms east of Windhoek. We went through immigration rather smoothly, even if the Botswanan official was quite adamant we needed to state a destination on our entry card...which always sounds odd to me when you're on a road trip, as you usually don't exactly know where and when you're going to stop, let alone have a specific address. In the end we settled on the Kgalagadi Trans-frontier Park as our destination, and the official gave us a two-week visa - rather than two days as she first meant to if we were only "in transit".

Sorted our papers, we drive for a few kilometres on the tarred A2 - what in Namibia was the B6, internationally known as Trans-Kalahari Highway - but then at Charles Hill we decide to try our chance and take an unnamed gravel which should take us south-east across the southernmost region of Botswana, just north of the border with South Africa ¬- and actually pretty close to the Trans-frontier Park, as per entry card.

We drive and drive, and then drive some more, along semi-lush countryside dotted by a couple of villages, and numerous cattle, that is a welcome change from the barren landscape of Namibia. By the time we reach the end of the diversion - which eventually we find out is not the road we thought we were on, but one much further to the north - wonderful African savannah is all around us, glowing in the golden late afternoon light that is a photographer's dream, and a treat to our eyes and spirits. We often spot wild duikers*, warthogs, and ostriches crossing the road or running alongside it, and at around five o'clock we stop for a solitary drink and absorb it all sitting on the roof of our Fox. Heaven.

I'm now writing these few lines from a campsite that we stumbled upon just outside Kang, the biggish town we were sort of aiming at as our first stop on our south-eastbound journey. It is called Kalahari Rest Camp, and at the moment I actually don't have any more info, as we just drove through the main gate, which was completely unmanned, found a sweet camping spot, lighted a fire, and had food. No contact with other human beings. We'll see tomorrow I guess.

Good night - and stay tuned.


*dui·ker or duy·ker: a small African antelope with short backward-pointing horns.



p.s.: The morning has two welcome surprise for us. Number one, we spot a giraffe roaming around the campsite! A young male called George, he turns out to be really tame, so we can stroke him and take some cool close up pictures. At the reception we also find out that one night of camping is only 120 Pula, roughly R138 ($14) for the two of us. Not bad considering Botswana's reputation of being an expensive country.
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