Okavango Trip Photo Drop

We've got new visitors coming on Friday, so I've got to get through the rest of A's parents' trip! The Okavango Delta is a really...big...delta. It's quite pretty. The water flows down from Angola, and bring minerals that end up in the Botswana salt pans (I visited some of these in September!). People go there to see the water, and taking a small, low-flying plane is one of the main activities--also mokoro rides, which I previously blogged.

We were led through the delta by our terrific guide, Judge, who was from the village right next to the entrance to the Moremi Game Reserve. The people who live in the village are a mix of Setswana and San. Interestingly, Judge told me he doesn't mind the word "Bushmen" and thinks that his village is better off outside the Reserve (they were relocated decades ago, unlike the people in Kaudwane, where we went in December).

He told us a story about an old woman in the village. When she was a toddler, the Bushmen were still living in Moremi. They were forced to abandon anyone too sick or weak to travel with them, and her mother was one such person. They left her and her mother in a kraal, and moved on. When they saw vultures overhead, they knew the woman had died, and they returned to collect the baby and moved on. Weird story--why not just take the toddler at the beginning--but anyway, his point was that maybe we romanticize life in the bush a bit and there are some advantages to life in a village with opportunities to capitalize on tourism and advance your family's lot in life through education.

While we visited in the off-season, and the grasses were high, we did see some game, including lots of elephants, some giraffes, zebras, impala, baboons, hippos (out of the water--absurd!), warthogs, etc.

It was also just really, really pretty. The scenery was really different from other parts of Botswana I have visited.

(Elephants! We saw a ton of them.)

(Looking at giraffes makes A's face fatter?)

(Spider safari.)

We flew in and out of our campsite on a tiny little plane. You know how my dad used to work on planes? And even so, one time when I flying with him, right before the plane took off, he said, "I still don't understand how these things get up in the air." That feeling is even more acute when you're in a 6-seater. But we survived, and I was mostly distracted from my anxiety by my nausea.

On to Madikwe!

Solitaire, together (Part 2)

When we last left you, it was New Year's Eve, and we had just pulled over to the side of the road in Middle of Nowhere, Namib-Nauklaft Desert. Our fan belt was broken and we were stuck.

We hopped out of the car and checked for snakes in the high grass. The loud buzz of desert beetles was ominous, but we had plenty of drinking water. I checked the fish--still frozen.

Less than a minute after we pulled over, we flagged down the first car that passed us. In it was a friendly Portuguese family of tourists. They offered us water. We had plenty. They offered us petrol. We had plenty of that, too. The dad offered to tow us to the next town, even though their car was only 2WD. The mom tried to dissuade the dad, in Portuguese.

Luckily, the conversation was moot because a minute later, a huge truck drove by. They pulled over, hitched our car to theirs like they'd done it a thousand times and we were on our way.

(Our view for the next 45 minutes)

We had to keep the car turned off, which meant no a/c. And we couldn't open the windows because clouds of suffocating dust would blow in. A rock shot up and cracked D's front windshield. We were trapped and sweating buckets. Feeling useless, I took it upon myself to make sure we all stayed hydrated, even if the water we had was warm and unappetizing.

The truck driver and his companion towed us to the nearest town, a little rest-stop called Solitaire. It was about 80 km north of Sossusvlei, where we were headed. He dropped us off near the gas station and we climbed out.

We waved at the Portuguese family eating lunch at the little restaurant next to the gas station. They waved back.

(Um...okay, I guess.)

We got the car looked at by a couple of mechanics who had a small repair shop there. They didn't have the right size replacement fanbelt. We called a tow company in Windhoek--it would cost $600 to be towed. Not to mention that it was New Year's Eve and they weren't willing to tow us for a couple of days. We talked to a Land Rover parts store in Windhoek. They'd send us the fanbelt but were we sure it was just the fanbelt and not the wheel that had seized? They were right. The wheel had seized because the bearing was shot (hey, you'd know a lot about Land Rovers, too, at this point). We talked about getting a tour company to drive us to Sossusvlei for the day, but it was expensive and we decided it wasn't worth it. Our car was broken and we weren't going to see the famous dunes of Sossusvlei. We were feeling kinda down.

Then it started to rain.

(Drizzle on Tando's hood--D's car is named "Tando," not sure if I mentioned that.)

Did I mention we were in the desert?

(Someone does a really poor job of filling out this chart, but I gather it does not rain much in Solitaire.)

We were feeling pretty darn sorry for ourselves. But then, the rainclouds lifted. We put up our tents and lit some coals to grill the miraculously still-cold fish. The sun started to set.

(D slept in the small tent and A and I slept in the huge tent. We were carrying jerrycans of petrol in the trunk, and they spilled all over D's sleeping bag and our sleeping pad, so our tents basically stank of petrol. Also, we were highly flammable.)

(Oh wait a minute, it's really beautiful here.)

(I really do wear that shirt a lot! Also, take stupid pictures!)

We got some beers and even a tiny bottle of champagne at the town general store, and started to slow down to the Solitaire pace of life.

(Beautiful sunsets. Grilled fish. Beer. If we'd meant to end up here, it would have been charming.)

That night, we also ran into A's Doris Duke friend and her family, whom we'd seen in Swakopmund. They were on their way to Windhoek the next day and offered to take one of us to the Land Rover store to get the parts we needed. We didn't know how said person would get back so we declined.

The guy who seemed to run most of Solitaire threw a big party that night for New Year's. Lots of people were up late dancing. A and I fell asleep, actually, but we woke up at midnight to light sparklers and drink champagne.

(A ran around waving his sparkler like a kid with a sparkler.)

We woke up the next morning and set out to explore Solitaire. We walked through a flock of peacocks (no idea why there were peacocks) and started our day with breakfast at the surprisingly delicious bakery. Apparently, it is famous for its apple pie. They also had excellent filter coffee (aka REAL coffee). We started to loosen up a bit.

(Thank god for this place.)

(Really good scones, too.)

The bakery was awesome, not only because of the baked goods but because of the eccentric owner and head baker, Moose McGregor (doesn't that sound like a character from a children's book?). Moose was alternately rude and overly friendly, both snapping at me and insisting I check out the burn he'd gotten that morning--on his (rather large) belly.

(Charming Solitaire.)

Probably the saving grace of Solitaire, even more than the bakery, was the pool. Technically, it belonged to the small hotel, where we were not staying, but we figured our situation earned us access. We spent most of our time there.

(I read one and a half books in those lounge chairs.)

On our second full day in Solitaire, we started to get bored. What time was it? Why was it so hot? Was there any cold water? Should I get some ice cream? What's the point of it all?

After two nights in Solitaire, growing increasingly antsy, we were planning to get towed the next day. We were eating breakfast in the bakery, when D started up a conversation with a guy from Swakopmund, also a Land Rover owner, named Charles, who was passing through. Charles told us we were crazy to get towed, and that his son surfed with someone who worked at the Land Rover parts store in Swakopmund and when he got there he would send the part down to us via a tour company. It was a big risk to stay another day and wait for the part, but we decided to put our trust in Charles.

A few minutes after we said goodbye to Charles, the Portuguese family came to the bakery. They were on their way back from Sossusvlei. They could not believe we were still there.

The next day we sat nervously by the gas station, waiting for the tour company to bring the parts. There were so many things that could go wrong--Charles not delivering the order, the store not having the right parts or being closed, the tour company not getting the parts to bring down, the parts not actually fitting onto the car. But amazingly, it all worked out. The bush mechanics fixed us up, free of charge.

That night we tried to celebrate by making homemade pizza over an open fire with bread from the bakery and sauce and cheese from the general store. It did not work.

(The general store where I sat and used the wifi. Of course they had better internet access in Solitaire than we do in our apartment.)

But we didn't even care! We were going home! After five days and four nights in Solitaire, we were finally free!...to drive to Windhoek, over bad roads and frightening cliffs, and then another 12 hours to Gabs.

And from that day on, Solitaire always held a special place in our hearts as somewhere we never, ever wanted to go to again.

THE END.

I mostly survived.

(The sun here will eat your face off.)

Thanks for all your concern over whether I was eaten by lions or not. I am alive. It's taken me a while to post because I've been sick since I got back. Anyway, I hope the suspense gave you some insight into the anxious mind.

So, our trip to the pans was many things--awesome, boundary-expanding, educational--but primarily, uncomfortable. You aren't allowed to hike in the national parks because you might get eaten or trampled, so we were basically in a Land Rover for four days straight. Temperatures reached about 100 degrees during the afternoon, and the only way to cool the car was rolling down the windows, which let the dust in. In between, we slept on the ground. Also, the last two days of the trip, I had a bad headcold and my throat was killing me. It was primal.

So back to Thursday. We left Gabs around 9 am and headed north on the A1 highway, which runs from Gaborone to Francistown, another major city. The first site we passed was the Tropic of Capricorn. It means we're closer to the equator than you:


It's good we saw one sight early on because that was pretty much the only thing we saw for the next Nine Hours. The scenery basically did not change the entire day, except for a quick stop at the nicest gas station bathroom I've ever seen and a stop for peanut butter sandwiches in the parking lot of a grocery store in Francistown.

We did discover that the sunsets in the region are unreal. The sun was unbelievably round and huge.


When we finally got to Planet Baobab, our digs for the night, we were all extremely relieved to get out of the car. Planet Baobab is this bizarre, hip campground and lodge in the middle of nowhere. They had a great restaurant, bar, and a huge swimming pool.

Baobab trees are these weird Dr. Seuss creations that look like they are growing upside-down, with huge trunks and weenie little branches. According to Joe, our driver, guide, and source of all wisdom, the local legend is that God was really pissed and threw some trees down upside-down, which I guess makes sense.

They're also big!





As we ate a lovely breakfast of oatmeal, canned peaches, and tea, we kept one eye on the giant ants crawling over our campsite. Joe explained they were "meat-eating ants," which I assumed meant they should be avioided. After breakfast, we drove to the Nxai Pan National Park.

Once we got to Nxai Pan it quickly became clear that this was the real outdoors. This is what a salt pan looks like.


It's basically a big flat, white expanse of nothingness. It's also salty.

We dropped off our trailer on the edge of a pan at our campsite, and headed over to the waterhole to track some animals. On our first drive, we saw lots of kinds of antelope (kudu, springbok, steenbok, impala, oryx), elephants, jackals, ostriches, and lots of kinds of birds. We drove around looking for lions for a couple of hours, with no success.




That night, we camped in an isolated spot. It was pitch black. For the first time on the trip, I started to feel nervous. It didn't help that our guide kept saying things like "Sleeping in Nxai Pan with the lions...what a rush" and "When you enter the National Park, you become part of the food chain." He warned us that lions or hyenas might enter our camp at night, and not to wander even a few feet away from camp on your own without a flashlight. He did Not warn us about scorpions, so when I found a big black scorpion as we were setting up tents, I was taken by surprise. We shooed it out of camp, and that was when I decided that maybe if I took my wise mother and aunt's advice and took a Klonopin, I could enjoy the gorgeous stars and dinner cooked over an open fire a bit more.

It was the right decision.


In the middle of the night, I heard something pawing around the flap of our tent. Appropriately, I flipped out, but after a few minutes, it scampered off. In the morning, I asked Joe about it and he said it was probably a mongoose.

I wasn't warned about mongooses!

I thought that was pretty lame because since I had already survived it, it might as well have been a lion.

We watched the sunrise as we drove toward the water hole for an early morning animal viewing. This time, we did see a huge male lion in the distance. He sat near the water hole and a few antelope kept lookout nearby. As soon as the lion got up and walked away, tons of animals came to the water hole, including antelope and zebras.


As we drove out of the Nxai Pan toward our next stop, Khama Rhino Sanctuary, we stopped suddenly. On the side of the road, outside the park, was a giraffe.


Definitely my favorite animal of the trip. Very weird. We spent the rest of Saturday driving to Khama, which took about six and a half hours. At Khama, we were back in a populated camping ground. I was in charge of dinner that night and I made rice and (unintentionally) smoky beans and chakalaka, this weird curry tomato sauce that comes in a can (I made it by opening the can). Sunday we did a rhino drive, saw four rhinos way in the distance, another giraffe (I'll spare you the photos), a bunch more antelope, ostriches, and birds, and then headed home to Gabs.

*

This is embarrassing.

I still think animals are boring.

Driving around, stopping to look at every steenbok and yellow-beaked hornbill, this does not get my pulse racing. The giraffes were cool, but we looked at giraffes for like all of 20 minutes of the entire trip. We spent most of our time looking at grass or the sun or a rhino that was so far away you could barely see it with binoculars. I got really, really bored.

I actually enjoyed the camping elements a lot more than I expected--cooking on the fire, looking at the stars, waking up early while it was cool and beautiful out. But looking at animals seemed somehow manufactured. There was always this barrier of the car between us and animals, which on some level made it feel like we were watching a program on television. It may have been The Wild, but it didn't feel like it. It felt like an organized, on-road, human-arranged viewing of animals placed there for that purpose.

It's sort of disheartening because I had this suspicion that safari, which is the main thing people do for vacation in Botswana, was not my thing, and it turns out safari is not my thing.

On the plus side, this trip was fun in other ways, and it got me excited for taking more trips in the region and seeing other parts of the country.

*

Also, I look great in a Land Rover.