Bewitching Botswana

We've had such an adventure since we last posted. I am here in Kasane just near the border of Botswana, Zimbabwe and Namibia on the second last day of our magical safari through the Okavanga Delta, Moremi Game Reserve, Savuti and now Chobe. I will be very sad to leave it behind - I have been totally captivated by the landscape, the people and the animals.



We've certainly had an adventure getting from Dubai - our luggage didn't show up in Joburg and so we got a great guy called Sidney to take us to a mall where we got underwear and a change of clothes for the next day while the hotel provided a toothbrush. Hitting the airport at 7.00 am the next morning we discovered that our safari bags had turned up with the lock on Lonni's broken, my suitcase had been ransacked and gone are my laptop (with photos), a lens, some Oz dollars and my expensive 100th anniversary edition Mont Blanc fountain pen bought in Dubai. Unfortunately Lonni's whole big bag is yet to surface - we are just hoping against hope that it will be waiting for us in Joburg again. Her new jewellery is in it as well as all her chargers etc. and clothes of course and Dubai souvenirs. The jewellery is the big concern (no it's not it's the crappy I heart Dubai key ring I got Lahni as a souvenir, you can't replace that! - Lonni).



However, we determined not to let it ruin our trip and so faced Botswana with happy faces. And it has been amazing. On the fringe of the Kalahari and in the dry season it's hot (as Lonni keeps saying, it's hot, damned hot! - remember Good Morning Vietnam), dry, incredibly dusty (we've given up on fingernails, you're filthy again about an hour or two - or in Mum's case its more like thirty minutes - more from Lonni thank you, sweetheart) but totally bewitching, exciting, entrancing and magical (don't forget surreal). At least it is for me. The only animal we've really missed so far (there's still this afternoon and tomorrow morning to go) is a leopard and there are no rhinos here (though I would like to see more hyena).



We've had a fabulous and full of it guide (Kaiser) and two wonderful camp hands - Timan and Amos. I would bring them all home if I could (so would I you should see the muscles!). There are only four of us in the group, we are with a great young Texan couple called JD (Jeremy Daniel) and Shelley. Kaiser is always joking and smiling and is incredibly knowledgeable - we are often the first and only to find animals - but all the guides share information around. We've seen impala (Fast Food for the Big M on their butts), lions, elephants, hippos, kudu, sable and roan antelope, cheetah, warthogs, zebra, giraffes, steenbok, red letchwe, crocodiles, Cape buffalo, jackals, hyena, wild dogs, mongoose and squirrels, baboons and monkeys, honey badger and birds far too numerous to mention, except for the gloriously coloured lilac-breasted roller and the carmine bee eater. We've lunched with the hippos, taken tea with elephants and zebra, had lions around our camp scaring the **** out of the Texans the first night, us aussie girls were either excited (mum) or asleep (Lonni). And I managed to sleep right through a honey badger trying to get into our tent while Lonni almost had a heart attack. A hyena also trotted through camp while the boys were preparing dinner and raided the trailer one night.

We also have been through some small villages and stopped a couple of times to talk to people and buy locally made goods. The people are SO friendly and beautiful - we have all been totally entranced. The country is so dry I have to keep asking Kaiser - but what do people eat? How do they live? And speaking of that we've been having pa pa (mealie porridge) for breakfast - it's the local staple and we all think it's pretty good. Kaiser is a great cook as well so the food has all been fantastic.

Anyone who knows us well will be hugely surprised to know that we are awake before our 6.00 am wake up call as Amos or Timan pour warm water into our basins outside for us to wash faces, have a quick bite and go out on our first game drive. We have another cuppa and a biscuit whilst out (maybe at the hippo pool or beside the river watching zebras or elephants) and then back to camp about 10.30 for Kaiser to cook us a substantial brunch. Then maybe it's in camp in the shade, doing the washing or reading until we take a bush bucket shower and head out again around 3.30, have another cuppa out and back at sunset. Kaiser gets us a magnificent feast for dinner and under the brilliant stars (Scorpio right overhead), listening to hippos or lions or hyena or elephants, with a glass of wine beside the camp fire we chat away by candle and firelight (listening to Kaiser's stories as he answers all our dumb questions - often with a big fat lie until his contagious laugh gives him away) until at a fairly early hour everyone drifts away one by one to get a good night's sleep - unless the animals wake us up.

It's a wonderful life - I have no idea of the day of the week or the time and am totally relaxed!!! When I have more time I'll tell you more about Botswana, it's an interesting country and the way the villages are organised by community trusts an interesting model.

No photos to add - with the laptop gone and being unable to charge batteries or download I am starting to conserve and can't do anything here - maybe later. Hopefully what I have will last me until we get back to Cape Town. The 400D is on the blink - the dust is very pervasive and I suspect that's the problem. With the big lens gone I have been really lucky as Shelley has lent me one the same size but without stabiliser. She has been very generous.

Boat trip in around an hour so better go - down the Chobe River - we might even see a leopard! If we don't, as Kaiser says, there will be an excuse to come back!

Love to all

Lyndall & Lonni