Into the wild

Trip Start Sep 04, 2008
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Trip End Oct 13, 2008


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Flag of Botswana  ,
Wednesday, October 8, 2008

We drive from Chobe National Park to Maun which is the gateway to the Okavango Delta, a massive area of water, completely different to anything we have seen for the last month. We pack our small bags for 2 nights camping in the wild. When we arrive I take a photo of the mokoro's (traditional dugout canoes) that we are riding in, convinced that we will capsize as soon as we sit in them. We are told to carry our cameras in our hands so we have more chance of holding them above water if we do flip. We all load up and ease our way into the mokoros and surprisingly we stay afloat, albeit, most of us only have about 1cm between the top of the mokoro and the water, which ever now and again managed to leak in...
After an 1.5hours we arrive at our campsite right opposite a hippo pool. They weren't entirely happy that we paddled past their area, snorting and jumping up from the water. We pitch our tents and get the rules of the Delta especially during the night. We even have directions about the use of the outside toilet whether we have 'big business' or 'little business' in the middle of the night.
We have a quick swim in a hippo safe area and relax until 4pm when we head off on a walk with our local guides. It is hot, about 40degrees + even at 4pm, but we are in hope of some elephants. We find them, just before sunset and stand and watch 4 male elephants eating dinner. Then animals seem much wilder here and we don't get too close incase they charge, we even stand in the right place, so they can't smell us.
Dinner is cooked by our Acacia guide and we end up having a pretty early night. We settle in to listen to the hippos moan and groan to each other all night long, this is their busy time at night when they have to consume all their food for the following day. They are noisy and we can tell they have come closer to our camp - perhaps even out of the water to munch on the grass at the waters edge, Anthony has a bit of an upset stomach and at 3am, we indeed have to go in pairs to do 'big business' it was the most exhilarating walk from our tent to the 'hole' for a toilet, we had to keep shining our torches all around us to check that the hippos hadn't ventured into our camp which apparantly they do on a  regular basis. I must add at this point, that none of our local guides have a gun or any form of protection, we are just supposed to stay in our tents and hope for the best... the visit to the toilet was uneventful in the end, (no animals that we could see anyway).
Up at 5.30am for a 4 hour morning walk in the cool of the day. we see zebra, giraffe, impala, jackal and also the aftermath of a morning kill from a leopard - which was being devoured by about 20 vultures. After our walk we have bacon and eggs cooked for us and then settle in for a looooong few hours in the heat. It gets to about 45-48degrees. By 1pm, we are exhausted and in need of a swim to cool off, so our locals walk us around to another swimming hole and we end up staying there for about 2 hours. It was bliss to finally cool off.
Just before sunset, I head off for a sunset mokoro cruise (anthony stays back at camp with a few others, he doesn't feel like head out to wobble around and hopefully not fall in the water), so I get my own mokoro and poler and have a nice time take photos of all the water lillies and the sun going down. We arrive back, past the hippos again while the slowly swim in our direction. We have dinner and then head to the camp about 10mins walk away for local singing and dancing.
Overnight the hippos weren't as noisy as the night before, so we slept much better and got up early and jumped in our mokoros and paddled out. Arriving back at camp for dinner and many, many drinks. It is our last night on safari with a bar at the campsite, so we make full use.
 
 
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