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Published: February 27th 2008
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Road? Swamp?
Is it driveable? Paula went to check. Our day started delightfully with coffee and granola. The plan was to head to Paula's office, check some email (Paula is a new (again) grandmother, and was anxious for pictures), and I needed to check on our hostel reservation in Zambia. Then we were to hit the road.
So off we went to Paula's office. I got on line to make sure that our Visa's were in order for Zambia, because when you book a hostel in Zambia the Visa fee is waived. Or so we thought. Turns out that on the 26th of January the Zambian government revoked the free Visa waivers, and now it costs $135US just to cross the border. Yikes! That is a lot of money for me, but it is even more money for the Peace Corps folks who make $6US a day. Our original plan was to go to Zambia to see Victoria Falls, but with the extreme hike in Visa prices we knew we couldn't go. Ahhh, the best laid plans....
Even with this setback, we still had to get going, so we returned to Paula's house, got our gear and hit the road.
The first stop for the day was
Mountain of the Gods
Tsodilo is the home of the Gods Tsodilo (sa-dee-low) Hills. One of the oldest know sites for rock paintings in the world. Tsodilo is "just" off the paved north-bound road on the western side of the Okavango Delta. What we didn't realize was that due to all the rain in the weeks before I arrived, the roads were more like swamps. But with our handy 4x4 truck we figured we wouldn't have a problem navigating the roads. We were wrong. The drive into Tsodilo is probably 5km, but it took us close to half and hour to get through all the water, and it took a bit of a toll on Jerry who was driving. But despite the hardships, we made it to Tsodilo.
Both Jerry and Paula had been to Tsodilo before, so we were pretty confidant that we did not need a guide to show us where to go. In fact we were so confidant that when a guide came up to us and asked us if we needed help we confidently told him that we knew exactly what we were doing, and wandered on. Well...please reference the comments I have made about the rain. When it rains in Botswana the grass grows very
Rock Paintings
I'm told this is a rat. fast, and in this case it has grown so fast that the grass had covered the paths up the mountain. Not only is that bad, but when there is lots of grass there are lots of snakes. It only took us a few moments to realize that we could not see the path, and had no idea where we were going, and if we wanted to see anything we needed a guide. So with our tails between our legs, we went back to find the guide we had so confidently sent away not a half hour earlier. Lucky for us, the guide had a good sense of humor, and with him we started our exploration.
The Tsodilo Hills are comprise of 3 mountains in an otherwise completely flat area. The 3 mountains are known as the Mother, the Father, and the Child. We learned via our guide that not only are the individual hills names the way they are because the indigenous San People believe that the "first people" were dropped, based on gender, on their respective hills, but that recent archaeological digs have revealed that on the Female Hill there are remnants of cooking pots and utensils, and
Afrika in Stone!
Don't know how this happened, but it is an Africa shaped rock. on the Male Hill remnants of hunting tools. We only had time to look at the Female Hill, but one can spend hours hiking to the tops of all of them and discovering all the Hill have to tell.
The rock paintings are amazing. The paint was made out of a combination of dirt, ground up roots and animal blood. It still baffles me that these images have lasted as long as they have, but they have. There are some images that are hard to identify, but many people think that there are images of whales and penguins, which infers that the San People had traveled to the coasts of either Namibia or South Africa and returned with stories, and images. Truly amazing.
With our tour of the Hills done, we regrouped and buckled down for the drive back out to the road.
Now let me say that we were driving a 4 wheel vehicle, and before we left with the truck I had asked if we needed to lock the wheels to make the truck a true 4x4, and I was told no. We found out later that that was not true. Ugh. Poor Jerry was
4x4 Damage
Hm.....time for a wash. driving what he thought was a 4 wheel drive truck, when in fact it was a 2 wheel drive. He managed to take out a tree (and by take out I mean knock down) on our way out, but otherwise he did a stellar job of navigating the really difficult road. When we got back to the paved road it was a blessing, and we continued north towards Seronga.
It is not too far from Tsodilo to the ferry that would take us east to Jerry's side of the Delta, but as we neared the ferry the truck started to lose power. So much so that Paula and I had to push the truck onto the ferry to get it in. This did not make Jerry very happy (and that is an understatement). I felt bad for Jerry, because I knew that he wanted to show me the best of the Delta, and the ferry ride was a big part of that, but due to the problems with the truck none of us could really enjoy the short ferry ride.
Fortunately the truck started when we got to the other side of the river, and we pushed on,
Butter-fly
There were thousands of these yellow butterflies gathering in puddles. hoping for the best. But the best did not happen. About 20km into the drive, on a VERY VERY rough dirt road the truck died. This did not make Jerry happy. In fact, in all they years I have known Jerry I don't think I have ever seen him so upset, and that was a bit unsettling.
Lucky for us, Jerry has a good friend in Seronga....and ex-pat from England named Simon who we called to ask for help. He gave us some good instruction and told us, if we could get the truck working, to stop by a boy's camp 20km up the road to talk with this fellow Steve (an US ex-pat) who is good with cars. Amazingly the truck started and we managed to make it to the camp, managed to find Steve, and got him to look at the truck. Turns out that all the 4x4ing...er 2x2ing we had done had jiggled a wire loose from the starter, and once we had that wire reattached we were good to go.
It was another 80km to Seronga, and needless to say those kilometers were tense. Jerry was tired, and frustrated, and Paula and I were
Satisfaction in Seronga
Paula, Jerry and Simon. Happily at home in Seronga. trying to not make a tense situation worse. But by the luck of the gods we pulled into Seronga before sundown....just on schedule.
I had learned that Simon, the English ex-pat, was one of Jerry's good friends in Seronga, and had just about gone out on a search party for us after hearing about our car troubles. Luckily we got a hold of him before he headed out, and instead of going to look for us he came to see us at Jerry's rondaval (house).
Simon is an treat. And Jerry tells me that he doesn't visit very often, he prefers people to visit him, but he came to see us this night. And we had a wonderful time. Many jokes told, many stories exchanged. Much alcohol consumed. It was great to be in Jerry's home.
And after an incredibly eventful day, and many drinks, I crawled under the mosquito netting and fell into a well deserved sleep.
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