Blogs from Botswana, Africa - page 7

Geo: -19.0933, 22.4451 Waking up at 4AM today had not been my plan, but going to bed by 9:30PM ensures adequate sleep. Plus, an elephant was trumpeting and snorting outside, not too far from my cabin. What a treat to celebrate our last night at Baobab Lodge! It was sad to leave this part of Botswana and all the lovely, friendly people at this lodge. But more African adventures beckoned, and another group was scheduled to arrive this afternoon, so our group had to leave. While two lucky members on our tour got to fly in a 4 seater, the rest of us flew in a little 12 seater SSW to the Okavango Delta, the largest inland delta waterways in the world. I've always enjoyed flying in small planes. When I was little a friend of ... read more

Geo: -18.5421, 24.5105 Since first reading Alexander McCall Smith's books on the Number 1 Ladies Detective Agency series years ago, I have wanted to come to Botswana. What a stunning country it is! We arrived yesterday, a group of twelve of us travelling on OAT's Ultimate Africa trip. The Baobab Lodge is our home for three nights; this is a beautiful, remote camp in the wilds of Botswana, in my opinion much too elegant to be called a camp. Our tour guide is Sku, a very handsome, delightful and enormously knowledgeable guide. We are lucky to have him as our leader on this trip through these African countries. When I woke up this morning the almost full moon was pouring its light through my big front window. I just stood there looking out, watching this beauty ... read more

We moved on to Francistown and then Nata where we drove 7 km out to the shore of the Nata Bird Sanctuary to see the thousands of flamingoes and pelicans. There were no flamingoes (and the lady at the gate said they had never had flamingoes) and only a handful of pelicans too far away to see properly. THEN we got stuck in the sand. Tried digging the motorhome out, driving forwards and backwards and finally jacked it up, put loads of sticks under the wheel and with help from members of the group who had by then turned up we finally got the van out. It took us 2 hours and the temperature was 44 degrees centigrade. It was just a desert of sand but we were relieved to finally get out. Mind you, the ... read more

Up early again and left last followed by Christo the mechanic. Road good all the way but narrow towards Nata. Simon dropped one wheel off the road and in righting it we swayed alarmingly and I thought we would topple over. Fortunately we stayed upright and carried on. Christo said later he had also thought we were going over and Simon handled it well. We called in at Nata bird reserve on saltpans as we had heard there would be flamingoes and pelicans. It meant driving down yet another long bumpy track. When we got there we found other Bobo campers but only a handful of birds, about 2 pelicans and in 41 degree heat not impressive. Also Mark and Chris had managed to get stuck in the sand. Several people were helping. In the end ... read more

What an amazing adventure. We spent 3 days in Kruger Park and saw a herd of about 200 elephants, crocodiles, hippos, giraffe, wart hogs, velvet monkeys, baboons, rhino, zebra and much more. We had a herd of hundreds of cape buffalo galloping across the road in front of us which was very exciting. Longleat is toyland compared to this. Camper van is fine now that the cab air conditioning has been fixed, the water leak has been mended and various other bits and pieces have been dealt with. Weather is great, sometimes hot and sometimes very comfortable. Potholes at home are nothing compared to here where they are more like craters. On bad roads there are more potholes than tarmac but many roads are very good. Loads of litter though. Crossing the border into Botswana was ... read more