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Published: March 25th 2013
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Bathroom rest
On our way to Maun we stopped for a bathroom break. This is where a local approached our guide and was willing to buy one of the white chicks... After the night at Khama Rhino Sanctuary, we drove to Maun. In the town of Maun, we stocked up on food, snacks, and alcohol (though I did not pick up any alcohol due to the weather/heat). Right outside of town we camped at a hotel. The hotel was nice but I did not upgrade to a room, I remained faithful and tented it. Here we had internet connection, a pool (though not one I would swim in), and for the evening, we ate at the buffet.
In the morning, we packed up our tents and supplies and headed about 40 minutes via 4WD vehicle to water. We basically drove to the Delta edge. Here we met Okavango Polers (Key, Judge, Morgan, Bryan, Candy, Nikole, there were a couple of others), we hopped into our dugout canoe (called mokoro) and they poled us into the Delta. It took about a little over an hour on the water. We passed many water lilies (some white, some were light purple), hippos in the water, and a reed frog. Well I am pretty confident that it is a reed frog-no one could tell me what type it was but thankfully for google....
The river is called the
Pitstop
Decided to go off road onto saltpans. Okavango River. The river loses a lot of the water to the sands of the delta. During the rainy season, the water can be seen throughout the Delta and can create little islands. But right now, it was the drier season. This allows for the animals to have far more access to other areas than during the rain season. In one sense, this is okay for us as we were not confined to the campsite, nor was it the peak tour season. In another sense, when we did walk, we saw birds and zebras. Oh and elephant footprints, Rhino footprints, and the African Serval footprint but not the animals themselves because now they have this vast land to roam.
After settling into the camp, we walked to the river where we left the canoes. Some people took a swim (I did not) and others tried their expertise in poling the canoes. These were long canoes (not sure if one can tell from the photos). So maintaining balance while poling two humans and cargo all the while dodging the hippos....lets just say I will not quit my day (errrr....night) job anytime soon but I did not tip the canoe either! So kudos
to me!! There were no hippos when I poled, I am speaking in general for the regular polers.
After having lunch, we took a stroll around the Delta where we did indeed see Zebras and birds. A lot of "bee eaters". But they do not just eat bees, infact bees were not a common site. Eventually we made our way back to camp and had supper. The Delta people cooked up the supper. It was a little strange. Almost out of the 1950s-1960s. These people, mostly the women, cooked up the food. We, the campers, ate. The Delta people waited for us to finish before they ate themselves. We, campers, normally do our own dishes at the camp...however while we were in the Delta-the women of the Delta did the dishes. Of course my attitude towards that was 1) uh....no but 2) invited them to eat while we ate and the rest of the crew agreed. Well one in the group agreed until she tried to go back for seconds and the "vultures" (her word, not mine...as I don't agree) ate all of the food.
The following day we remained in the Delta and took two more strolls towards different areas of
the islands. We even took off our shoes, rolled up our pants and got a little wet and went through the water. It was squishy and cool. In my opinion, it felt nice between my toes but then I am not much of a girly girl. On the way I found a feather. Danny (50+ Aussie) also found a different feather. I took mine home and Danny gave me the one he found because Australia evidently has strict custom rules. I am not all that sure what America's policy is but I smuggled them in anyways. :-)
After supper on our last day in the Delta, the polers put on a song and dance. Judge was basically the lead guy dancing. During three different songs/dances he brought up three different people to dance. We all thought for sure he would have picked his "girlfriend" (Amy...who is in my group...she's 24 year old from Perth, Australia) but nope...he went for Daniel (different from Danny), Amanda, and me...ugh....again, no worries, I am not quitting my day job!!!
After our last night, we loaded up our tents, coolers, and headed back into Maun via the mokoro. Upon our arrival to the hotel/camp site, we then
boarded our travel vehicle and headed to Maun airport where we purchased our ticket for the scenic flight over the Delta. The cost was $70, the experience was priceless. I attempted to take photos but I was mesmerized by the area that I more focused on the landscape then I did trying to take photos of the animals.
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