Blogs from North-West, Botswana, Africa - page 31

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After over a month of either getting lifts or having our own hire car it was back to using African public transport. An especially difficult task it would seem, if your journey is Windhoek to Maun in Botswana. We were told it couldn't be done without hitching, but a few enquiry's got us a phone number of some random dude that drives to Zimbabwe once a week and could drop us off on his way. A few calls led us to a down town bus station with the promise of a 3.30 departure. As the taxi driver dropped us off there he gave us the parting gift of telling us we "should not really be there, everything will be stolen". Thanks. In fact it was quite the opposite - everyone was dead friendly and helped us ... read more

We got up late, well rested and full of energy for the day ahead. We went into town (or village perhaps) to have a look around and to buy some food and alcohol for the afternoon's cruise. We saw a sign saying 'Hot Bread Shop' and followed the arrows hungrily (bread is not up to much here on the whole). Next door to the bread shop was something even better - a deli selling the sort of things you'd find in Waitrose and loads of nice South African wines. We spent a 'kitty' fortune in there, and it was almost all gone just a few hours later. Everything from peanuts and pickled onions to a selection of cheeses and over a litre of wine per person (and that included people who only drank beer). It was ... read more

We spent the morning hanging around the campsite, and at 11:30 Ed decided to catch a taxi into town. The first hurdle was that the phone line in the campsite office was dead. So Ed borrowed the manager's mobile to call for a taxi, following instructions to "walk down the track until you come to a huge termite mound and climb the tree next to it" in order to get a signal. That half worked and in between crackles it sounded as if a taxi was on its way. Half an hour later Ed borrowed the same phone and climbed the same tree, only to hear that the phone had run out of minutes. More time went by until the campsite manager realised that his landline phone could call other landlines, just not mobiles. So he ... read more

The town of Maun, and in fact the whole of Botswana's tourism industry, owes a lot to the Okavango Delta. The Okavango River starts in Angola, crosses the Caprivi Strip in north-eastern Namibia and eventually empties itself in what's called the Okavango Delta. The Kalahari is next door, so all this water attracts a lot of wildlife. We had the option of a 2 night/3day excursion into the delta, travelling by traditional pole-driven canoes called Makoros. For one reason or another, including the attraction of a bit of peace and quiet whilst the majority of our group went off on the excursion, we decided to remain at the campsite and take a closer look at Maun. So early in the morning we waved goodbye to most of our new friends before enjoying our first leisurely breakfast ... read more