Botswana: The Start of the Tour

1^st of all sorry for the delay in posting but internet in Botswana is not generally available but we have some now so here is the first report and a long one it is!!

After a long flight on the new Airbus A380 we arrived in Johannesburg an hour later than scheduled due to late departure from Paris. Met eventually by a representative from the car hire company we went of to get our home for the next 5 weeks. They ried to say we did not need the vehicle we had booked (a double cab with tents on the roof) as these were for 4 people, We should have the single cab but I disagreed as we has specifically wanted the double so that cameras etc were at hand on the back seats. After a little while it became obvious they didn’t have one so they offered us an upgrade to a Land Cruiser with a “pop up” roof and our sleeping accommodation in that. We checked and agreed it was ok but then they didn’t have half the equipment needed such as tables, chairs, air compressor for the tyres, spade for digging out of trouble, axe for chopping wood etc. Not a good start and no confidence in the company. We did set of agreeing we would buy what we  needed and charge them so of we went to the nearest store for a few bits and pieces before driving out of Jo’burg and onto the motorway system and heading north across South Africa. The Sat Nav we had purchased in UK, uploaded the Tracks4Africa maps for South Africa, Botswana and Namibia worked well. I had sorted the route on the computer at home before downloading to the sat nav and so the route was easy to follow to our first night at Thula Meetsa Mountain lodge. This was a wonderful place set on the hills some 150 miles north east of Jo’burg. We were only around for a night and had a chalet booked instead of using our camper vehicle.

The next morning was a drive across the rest of South Africa to the border of Botswana at Martin’s Drift and onto a night at Moremi Gorge in south Eastern Botswana. On the way we stopped in South Africa for supplies as we would be cooking for ourselves at Moremi Gorge although still in a chalet. We knew we could not take fresh fruit and vegetables across the border so we did get a lot of tinned and dried foods that would become useful around the tour route.

We were really pleased to see that the ‘Official’ system in places such as borders was in place giving employment to many. You first go to one window in the long desk to get a stamped piece of paper that you take to the next window and hand in to get a form to fill in. This you take to the next window to get it stamped and then hand in at the next one to be checked. This system is quite quick until the final window called ‘cashier’ where there is a queue as only one person is allowed to handle the fees and he has numerous forms to fill in before you pay the money and are free to go to the border control in the car where they search for forbidden fruits (and veggies). No they never did find the stashed supply of fresh corn on the cob we had!!

Moremi Gorge was another wonderful place, superb chalets overlooking a long hill with a large ‘sacred’ gorge. We took a walk in the gorge with a guide the next morning before setting of on our longest drive to date. The guide was a member of the local community and he explained how places in the gorge are sacred to the ancestors.

The route now took up further into Botswana and we stopped for serious supplies in Palapye as we were going to the Central Kalahari Game Reserve  (CKGR) approx 350 kms drive away. We stocked up on fresh meat for BBQ, veggies plus lots water and other essentials like wood for fires as you are not allowed to collect wood in the CKGR. We also called into see the guy who had arranged our trip from a company called Drive Botswana as he lived in Palapye. We explained about the car hire company and lack of equipment. He was not happy and gave us lots of equipment that we needed.

The next night was our first in the vehicle and was at Kharma Rhino Sanctuary near Palapye, another  great location. We checked out the sight we had been told to go to and then went on a drive though the tracks of the reserve, my first ‘off road’ experience in the Land Cruiser and a very small taste of things to come. We did try 4 wheel drive and all worked ok. We had sightings of Rhino around a water hole and plenty of other animals around. Now back to the camp site and set up the tent for the first time. The roof pops up easily for me but Jan cannot push far enough. The bed slides out and all is good. A fire is lit and BBQ commenced. The land Cruiser has 2 large fuel tanks, on board water tanks giving hot and cold running water to a sink and a shower you can attached to the side of the vehicle. There is enough room to stand inside. All in all a good vehicle to have and a comfortable nights sleep was had.

The drive from Kharma up to Rakops, a village close to the jumping of point for the CKGR, was uneventful, quite good roads many villages and places to stop. We topped our specially equipped Land Cruiser with fuel in all the tanks as we were now on our own. CKGR is a wild area about the size of Wales where there is no water, supplies, roads or villages. A few tracks are across the area and these are sand or gravel at best. There are official camp sites but these are few and far between but do have the luxury of a ‘long drop toilet’ and ‘bucket’ showers plus a fire pit. The pitches are often many kilometres form the next one. We had 4 nights in the CKGR, 2 at Deception Valley, 1 at Passarge Valley and 1 at Motopi before exiting the opposite side to where we entered. We left the tarmac road at Rakops then it is 40 kms on a sand track to Matswere Gate where we sign in and enter CKGR. Our first sight of a luion is within a few kms of the gate and it is a sad one as it is a dead lion cub. Lions, Hyeanas are frequently seen and the camp sites have no fencing so you have to be careful. The drive to Deception Valley and out first camp site is another 40kms further in. Our Sat Nav has been set with the co-ordinates of where we are going and serves us well and we make the site easily. This pitch is fairly close to a few others and is in the most visited area. The nearest pitch is another 2-300 metres away but no one is on that one. We do see others when out driving all searching for animals. The CKGR is a series of ancient dried up river beds and lakes in the bottom of the valleys with sand ridges or raised areas between. The dried up lake beds are perfectly flat and anything from grey hard packed salt like surface to soft sand. The ridges are soft sand. Scrubby tress and undergrowth covers the ridges and some areas in the valleys and pans. There is very little natural water and a few pumped water holes around.

We drive along Deception Valley made famous by Mark and Delia Owns in their book ‘Cry of the Kalahari’ where they live here for 4 years studying Hyaena and Lion and find a water hole at Sunday Pan where we sit and wait for animals. 2 or 3 others are also waiting in cars and many animals pass through to take a drink. The first lion we see is a really skinny sad young male carrying an injury. I doubt if this lion had that long left as it is a hard place to live.

We drove back to the camp site to cook and make the place secure before it got too dark as that is when lions are around. We had a good nights sleep and no sound of Lions but it was nervy getting up at 2.00am for the obligatory ‘Comfort Break’

Next morning no sign of too many animal tracks around so light the camp fire again early for coffee, clear the tent down and get out for a game drive to another waterhole. Before we left the site we were visited by a group of Yellow Billed Hornbills that enjoyed our company and pestered us for food as well as taking a liking to posing for the camera as well as attacking their own reflections in the car windows and mirrors.

After 2 nights at that site we moved on to Passarge Valley, a further 60 kms into the CKGR and a lot more lonely. This beautiful valley had just 3 camp pitches and each approx. 20kms from each other, We had the middle one and as no one was at the other two we knew our nearest neighbours were at least 40kms away and this place was even more wild. We were on a slight rise overlooking the valley bottom and could see many animals around including Giraffe and Gemsbok along with many other antelope, Jackals and bat eared foxes. Again we lit a good fire, got dinner on the go and settled in for the night hoping for Lion or Hyaena but again none visited. The 4^th night was a further 80 kms into the area to Motopi where there was a water hole. We drove past the water hole seeing ostrich, kudu and many others as we passed at lunch to check out our pitch, it was again one of three down a 6km track with ours being the final one. A really great pitch up on a hill with lion tracks through the site as well as the other two. We had now not seen any other person or vehicle for 2 days as this area is not so often visited. We cooked dinner at lunchtime, had a shower and packed up as we thought if no one else around we would stay at the water hole, some 10 kms back until it was nearly dark then go to one of the other 2 pitches if no one there. The water hole was excellent viewing with warthogs, giraffe, springbok and jackals around all the time but still no big lions. Back at dark to the 1^st site and no one there so we grabbed it and lit a fire and heated up dinner sitting out hoping for a lion visit. When I say sitting out we sat against the campervan rear doors and ready to jump in at the first sound. Nothing so bed it was and although we did hear lions in the night they did not enter the camp. OK we thought we cant help it but lions don’t like us so we packed up for an early morning start and left for the 100km drive through the CKGR back to a road. We got about 5 kms down the road when walking towards us were a pair of big male lions, one with a huge dark mane and they were heading towards us. Stop, wind up windows and get camera ready. The pair walked by and continued on so I jumped out and went to back of van, doors ready and got some great pictures with the lions not far away.

We did get lions and very close to the final camp so we were happy and took in the drive to the road and out of the CKGR elated and on a high.

The next instalment of up to the Okovango Delta (part 1) to follow whenever plus pictures as and when we get internet