Botswana - Chobe National Park

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Botswana - Chobe National Park

Chobe National Park was Botswana’s first park. It is famous for it’s elephants - there are more than 50,000 elephants in the park, the highest concentration of elephants in Africa.

I’m Not The Only One With Bad Feet

It’s yet another early start for us. We are on the road by 6a.m. which means we have collapsed the camp and had breakfast by 6a.m. We have a long drive ahead and we are expecting to be stopped a number of times along the route. Most of the stops are for foot-and-mouth checks. The first stop delays us about 30 minutes. We have to get off the bus and walk through what I presume is disinfectant, we have our bags searched {for shoes, I guess} and the wheels of the bus are sprayed. Ruth has advised us to keep a “spare” pair of shoes on the bus - something which I assume will make the police happy that they’ve seen all our shoes and something which I will have to do again in Swaziland. Everything at the checkpoint is fairly chaotic, we get different instructions from different people, but eventually we are back on our way.
Our next stop is when we come across three elephants splashing in a waterhole at the side of the road. We stop to take photographs but Mwangi starts up the engine and drives off in a hurry when one of the elephants starts coming towards us.
The next foot-and-mouth check is much more straight forward and we arrive at our campsite in enough time to set up the tents and make yet another attempt to dry out wet clothes.

A Regular Army of Hippopotami (again)

In the late afternoon we drive off to Chobe Park for a boat ride along the river. The river turns out to be a good choice - there are large numbers of hippos and elephants at the side of the river. I don’t think I’ve seen so many hippos out of the water before; that’s one of the benefits of the weather being cool and wet, the hippos don’t feel the need to hide under the water.
We also see a number of large herds of elephants who have also come down to the water.
And then came…..yet another downpour of rain! We can see the storm approaching as the boat is chugging back to the jetty wondering whether we’ll get back in time. We don’t. Most of the group decide to try and keep dry by taking their shoes and socks off {and most of their clothes} and sprinting back to the bus. The population of Botswana is spared the sight of me streaking back to the bus by the Manky Foot which dictates that I need to walk back to the bus. I arrive looking very dignified, very British and very wet!
We get back to the campsite to find it flooded, my attempts to dry clothes have failed yet again, but we manage to find somewhere to cook and keep ourselves fairly dry.

Luxury Camping

The next day we are due to go for a game drive followed by overnight camping in the Chobe National Park. This means we actually get a lie-in in the morning!
Our guide, Richard, collects us in the late afternoon before taking us to the campsite he has set up. The campsite Richard and his team have set up is a bit of luxury compared with what we’re used to. We get to eat sitting at a table - with a table cloth! - with chairs! - and real plates to eat our food off! Richard tells me that he set up his tour business after retiring as a park ranger. He is now 73 - not bad for a country where the average life expectancy is now less than 40!
That night we hear noises in the campsite and some of the kitchen equipment has been knocked over. It was probably just a baboon but none of us dared come out of our tents to investigate! We had already been warned not to go to the toilet tents alone during the night.
It’s another early start again in the morning as we are out looking for the “big cats”. Any self-respecting lion will be up at the crack of dawn to do the lion equivalent of going to Tescos so it’s a 6a.m. start for us too. We see quite a variety of game in the Park but we don’t see any cats. Richard had already prepared us for this, telling us the previous evening that there is now only one pride of lions left in Chobe. I will learn more about what has happened to the lion population when I get to Zimbabwe.

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Photos

Impala
Or are they springbok?

Comments

[kane]

travel
hey steve, been reading your blogs which have been great! Don't get down! Just remember all the great memories you have created and enjoy your trips!!!!