On to Savuti

Trip Start Jul 09, 2008
1
14
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Trip End Jul 30, 2008


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Tuesday, July 22, 2008

We packed up early and made our way to our next camp at Savuti. It was a fairly boring and uneventful drive with hardly any wildlife. The sand on the road was very thick in places making it difficult to drive. Savuti Campsite is located next to the Savuti Park Rangers Post. The showers and loos at the campsite are very basic and protected by an elephant-proof embankment, an incredible structure that looks more like a nuclear bunker. Although elephant-proof it has been cleverly designed so that smaller animals like cats can easily get out over the wall, but not easily get in .Prior to going on holiday we had heard about an incident with a rogue elephant that had attacked campers staying here. Apparently elephants are a huge problem in the dry season as they will stop at nothing to get to the clean water. Even the stand pipes on each site were elephant proof, encased in concrete with a tap located within a hole.
There are ten camping pitches with number one thought to be the best, we were booked in four sadly. Each are separate and marked, but not that clearly. It is very sandy under foot here and the sand seemed to get everywhere and we ended up being continually dirty. The habitat in this area is mainly thorny scrub with lots of camelthorn and mopane trees. Lots of the trees appeared dead and apparently are thought to have seeded when the marsh was dry and drowned when it became flooded in the 1950s. Head to head
Head to head
 The fact that these trees have a very hard wood and are practically termite resistant means that they still stand today.
We hoped that we might see some big cats here as the area is noted for its lions. Apparently it was the wrong time of year and the large pride had separated into smaller groups. The lions at Savuti have a fearful reputation and have been known to take down large bull elephants. They also kill other large predators in the area just to reduce the competition. As with all the other campsites it is not advisable to walk anywhere in the dark and we had heard of a women who was stalked by two young male lions as she walked to the ablution block. However despite their fearsome reputation they were not in evidence and we failed to see any big cats here at all. Once more as with all of Chobe there were loads of elephants to view, particularly large old bull elephants that often seemed to have the water holes to themselves. As it was the dry season the water here is getting scarce and there appeared to be a lot of jostling between elephants at the water holes. On one occasion we witnessed two head to head pushing each other. We were also lucky to see elephants having mud baths, a great way to keep their skin protected from the sun's rays.  We also saw hartebeest and wildebeest in the area. As for birds the campsite is filled with Yellow Hornbills and Glossy Starlings who appear in large numbers particularly if they think there may be food about.

As dusk came the spotted hyenas start to come around the camp, you can see their green eyes reflecting back at you as you shine a torch into the bushes. They are ever present in the evening waiting for us to retire to our tents before coming round to find any food we had not packed away. They are huge loping animals but they never came close while we were there, preferring to stay in the shadows.
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