Blogs from Botswana, Africa - page 57

Our 3rd camp is located in the Moremi Game Reserve, which is actually located in the Okavango. Described as "the river which never finds the sea", the Okavango in northwestern Botswana disappears into a 6,000-square-mile maze of lagoons, channels, and islands. The river system brings more than 2 million tons of sand and silt into the Delta each year, yet less than three percent of the water emerges at the other end to either flood Lake Ngami or cross another 300 miles of the Kalahari, then to enter Lake Xau and the Makgadikgadi Pans. The Okavango Delta, in the midst of the Kalhan sands, is Africa's largest and most beautiful oasis. The River Okavango, which rises in the highlands of Angola, never reaches the sea; instead its mighty waters empty over the sands of the Kalahari. ... read more

April 20th I arrived safe and sound in Johannesburg airport after a 21 hour flight! The last 2 hours of the flight, I was starting to get a little stir crazy and was wondering when I could actually lay down and get some serious sleep. I stayed the night at Southern Sun Johannesburg, it is a very nice hotel. April 21st - 22nd I took a puddle jumper up to Maun to meet up with the rest of the people that would be on this safari. Helga from Luxemburg (age 64 - this was her 9th safari in Africa); Mark and Sue (from Brisbane - Australia) and our 2 guides (Thuto and Christine). From the airport, we drove about 2 hours to our first destination which is the Kalahari Desert. We stayed at Jack's Camp for ... read more

So much has been talked about the Okavango Delta in Botswana, often called the jewel in Southern Africa´s crown, that we did wonder whether the place was actually deserving of the label, especially after our unforgettable experiences in some of the less fashionable parks in Africa. As the thought of being stuck at our campsite in Maun, Botswana surrounded by backpackers reading about Mme Ramotswe´s latest adventures in her ladies detective agency wasn´t exactly appealing, we thought we would go for it and booked ourselves on a 3 day safari trip out into the Delta. Getting to the Delta involved a 2 hour truck ride across an unpaved track made difficult to negotiate by deposited sand from the encroaching Kalahari desert. We caught sight of a few Zebra along the way but little else. Arriving at ... read more

From Zambia, we crossed the Zambezi river on a Pontoon Ferry to get to Kasane, Botswana. Kasane is the gateway to Chobe National Park, which is home to 45,000 (yes, forty five thousand) Elephants. Due to heavy rainfall, there is water everywhere and hence, the animals are difficult to find. We did a morning game drive and an evening/sunset boat cruise on the Chobe River to see the wild animals. We have been spoilt by our experiences in Kenya/Tanzania and were dissappointed with the amount of wild life here. We found lot more Elephants on the highway rather than in the Park. But, Botwana is known for its sunsets and have seen some wonderful sunsets here. From Kasane, we headed to Okavango Delta. The mighty Okavango river from Angola flows into Namibia and river is stopped ... read more

Having bid a fond farewell to everyone who left the truck at Vic Falls we crossed the border into Botswana and spent the night in Kasane. Unfortunately, the campsite was a bit dismal and halfway through the evening some lightning hit an electricity line bringing all the power down. This coupled with the fact that the Mzungu's thought they had Malaria after Shane's very loud 'power chuck' did not make for a good night. The next day we were up at 5 for a (very cold) sunrise game drive through Chobe National Park. The park was beautiful and we warmed up as soon as the sun came up. Chobe is defined as one of the highlights on the itinerary, which it definitely is, but sadly as it had rained so much, the game viewing wasn't at ... read more