Botswana…
Let me first just say WOW… Wild animals and elephant capitol
in the world (not sure if that’s true just saying).We crossed the border again with no problems what so ever.
We crossed early afternoon and spent the rest of the day driving towards Moun.
We found a good free camp somewhere off the road a good distance.
Early next morning and off to Moun where we were all looking
forward to the Okavango Delta. We arrived at Delta Rain campground around
1500hrs. We got briefed and had to pay for the Delta $150, and either the
helicopter or fixed wing flight if we wanted to pay for it (highly recommend
the plane). That night we just chilled and relaxed a little bit. Suse explained
what the plan for the next two days at the Delta. We also had a few beers with
some other short distance overlanders. I
called it a pretty early night knowing we had to be ready to leave at 6 in the
morning.
The next morning we were all packed and ready to go. The
truck picked us up and we were off to the delta. After a bumpy hour ride we
arrived at the delta where we got to meet our polers (locals who pole the
canoes). Back in the day the canoes were carved out of wood but now the
Botswana government doesn’t allow it. We each paired up with a partner (shocker
but Cecilie and I teamed up) and loaded our gear (long pants, shoes, sleeping
bag, sleeping roll, and camera). Got into our mokoros (canoes) and headed deep
into the delta. We had a 3 hour ride until we got into our bush camp. Our
polers name was Timba. He didn’t speak much English but damn did he make poling
look easy. Once we got to our bush camp we were told to put our tents no
farther than 7 meters from the fire. Being stupid tourist as we were (Denise
and Sarah, Kev and Marie, and Cecilie and myself) we put our tents about ten
meters away. Denise and Sarah’s tent was the farthest away then Cecilie and
mine were just to the right of them. We had a relaxing day until 1630 where we
went for an hour and a half bush walk. I honestly didn’t think we would see
much wild animals because we were on foot, but during the walk we saw a herd of
100 elephants, a herd of wildebeest, and bunch of Zebras. So all in all it was
a really good bush walk. That evening after dinner I called it an early night.
Just read a little bit and passed out… That is until 1130 when I woke up to Kev
telling Marie to get into the fucking tent. Then I heard it… The trees snapping
and breaking, there was something large very close to us. I asked Kev what was
going on. He said two elephants 100 feet away. I woke up Cecile and told her
there were elephants very close and we may need to run. She said ok then looked
around a bit, then said they sounded close then fell back asleep (thank you
very much)… I listened for a while and it sounded to me there were very close.
Kev said he had binoculars for me to look at them. While I unzipped my tent
Cecile woke up again (this time a little more alert). I grabbed the binoculars
and saw two elephants very close. It was a very spectacular sight. When I gave
the binoculars back to Kev and got back into my tent another elephant 5 fucking
meters away (15 feet) came out of the bushes in front of us. Ears up trunk up,
this thing knew we were here. By this time Sarah and Denise were up, but
luckily for Denise sack they had their rain fly halfway up and couldn’t see
behind them. The elephant started turning around walking away then must have
heard one of us talk then turned back towards us and charged a little bit. At
this time both Cecilie and I were in complete shock. She couldn’t talk and I
started laughing out of fright. Right when I grabbed my camera and kindle. The
guide Mix through a fire stick at the elephant and it ran off. We all let out a
sigh of relief then started laughing. Note to anyone wanted to do this. The
Delta is wild country and listen to your guides. Turns out that the elephants
don’t know they can’t break the tents so they would have stopped, but we didn’t
know that at the time.
We got a 0600 wake up and by 0630 we were on our 3 hour game
walk we were all still so jacked up from the previous nights encounters. We pretty much saw the same animals as the night before but added a few
tracks and elephant skulls. We relaxed the rest of the day until 1630hrs where
we went on a sunset cruise with our polers and mokoros. Within an hour we were
150 feet away from a hippopotamus doing a little show. He would disappear then
turn up either farther away or closer. That went on until sunset.
The next day we woke up at 0600 again and loaded up our gear
and headed back to camp. By 1100 we dropped off Yoshi, Sarah, Denise, Cecilie,
Jareb and Talbot to a 20 minutes helicopter Delta flight while. Myself, Nico,
Alexis, Fred and Maria did the 45min fix week flight over the Delta.
Unbelievable! We saw hundreds of elephants, 50 hippos, wild buffalo, and
countless other animals. Not only that but a spectacular view of the Delta. By
1530hrs we were off to drive to a free camp.
Next day we had a 6 hour drive until we got to Chobe
national park. By 1530hrs we were on a boat full of beer and soft drinks doing
a sunset game cruise. It was absolutely spectacular. For only $32 bucks we had
3 hours on the Chobe watching elephants, crocodiles, elephants, hippos, and
buffalo. Right before sunset we had the fortune of watching a herd of elephant
cross the water to the other side. It was a spectacular show watching them swim
with the trunks up, and the babies holding on to dear life.
The following day Cecilie, Jareb, Brittany, Maria, Yoshi and
myself did a game drive that was by far the best we have done. We had elephants
so close we could spit on them go between the front and the back of the game
truck and we saw a leopard 30 meters away. After the morning game drive we took
off towards Zambia where we will be doing the adrenalin part of the trip.
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