Over land, delta, and falls

You get what you pay for.

We just concluded an 8 day “Overland Tour”. These are typically one way budget tours that travel long distances and end in a different city than they start while incorporating activities and sites along the way. Botswana has adopted a policy of low volume, high quality luxury tours and has some of the most amazing wildlife parks around….however it makes it difficult for the budget traveler. We tried to do Botswana on the relative cheap by joining the Overland tour.

We picked one up in Windhoek that had started in Cape Town. One of the most appealing things about this style of travel for us was the chance to spend a few days with the same group of people and get to know each other. In the past we have made some dear friends this way. When we joined, the group had been together nearly 2 weeks. They were very welcoming to us and we eventually melted into the “village” as we called it. Our village (19 people including us and two guides) included folks from US, Zimbabwe, Germany, France, Denmark, and the Netherlands.

Our first day was one of Heidi’s favorites. We stopped at a campsite in the Kalahari Desert and met with the local San people. These are the oldest continual inhabitants of Southern Africa. Over the years they have been steadfast in protecting their way of life from being altered by modern influences. They are starting to lose that battle, but they seemed very proud to take us out to show us their ways, both to share their traditions and knowledge with us, and also to give a purpose to the younger generations of San to continue to learn these things as well. We saw other ethnic groups in Namibia, namely the Himba. The Himba are famous for their appearance, coating their skin and hair in a mixture of ochre, herbs, and oil for fashion, sunscreen, and insect repellent all rolled into one. The Himba seemed to tolerate the foreign attention as it brings in money for them, but the San seemed proud and eager to show us their ways. Perhaps it is the difference for being famous for how you look, rather than your traditions and knowledge. The San performed some traditional songs and dances around the campfire for us and then in the morning we went out on a walk to see what herbs and roots they use for different medicinal purposes, how they tan their leather, their ostrich egg water bottles, what food they find in the desert, and how they start a fire to cook it. Their tradition is nomadic so they carry a simple bag and hunt and gather as they go. Now with poaching problems and wildlife conservation, laws make it very difficult for them to get permission to hunt. This seems to be changing their lives the most, forcing them to adapt to a cash economy to purchase meat. We had an interpreter who had learned the very cool language of the San, filled with a variety of clicks that they include in the words so seamlessly that they remind me of a ventriloquist. Namibia was quite fascinating with so many different ethnic groups that all have strong community ties and their own unique language. English is intended to be the universal language, but not all speak it and most speak the language of their ethnic group at home. Even the San have multiple languages within their tribe. Namibia seems more like a combo platter than a melting pot with its strong communities.

So this San visit was near the border with Botswana. From this point of our overland we would cross borders so often it was hard to keep track of where we were and what currency we were supposed to be using. At least English was the working language everywhere! In Botswana we visited the Okavango Delta and Chobe National Park. The Okavango Delta is where an inland river coming from Angola seasonally fills a vast floodplain with water, it is the largest inland delta in the world. This water will never reach the sea, the earth and animals will drink every last drop of it. We arrived via boat and truck to a tented camp that at times is an island. When we arrived it was 45 minutes drive to the water. Talking to the manager he expressed concern about drought the past few years and how desperately they need the flood. He said it is late, but he hears it is coming. We went on a Nature Walk in the dry floodplain near the camp. Didn’t see much other than zebra in the distance but it felt good to walk after driving in the overland truck for some long days. It was also quite thrilling to be on foot where elephant or lion could be sighted. Unlikely as it was, it was possible and kept my adrenaline going.

The next day folks were quite excited that the flood was coming and now it was only 25 minutes drive to water and some of where we had walked the night before was under water. This brought interesting challenges for the staff. They have mokoro canoes that go out into the delta. They had to find them since the flood waters came in and moved them. Roads that they had been using became impassable so they had to figure out how to get to the put in and take out. Guests coming in were stranded on the other side of a new river. Clearly to live in the delta you have to expect the unexpected! The mokoro was fun despite the pouring rain. It is like a canoe and a guy stands in the back with a long pole to push it through the waters, like a Venetian gondola. We weren’t in the water long when a hippo popped his head out of the water about 20 feet away and looked at us with a loud huff. They are cautious to avoid the hippos, staying close to the sides of the waterway and banging the boat periodically to announce our presence and avoid surprising one of these massive animals. It was so beautifully calm and peaceful on the water. There were so many birds fluttering about. It felt like the nature was celebrating the arrival of the water all around us. This delta area is home to some of the most high end safari experiences available. And from what I hear, the experience is incredible in the innermost sections of the delta. The overland trucks move at a quick pace and with a budget traveler in mind, so we skirt the edges of these reserves, where the wildlife isn’t as prolific and we don’t have as much time. So at this point, we enjoyed everything we did and saw, but had a bit of disappointment that we were “close but not quite” to an amazing experience. However one benefit we noted of our style of travel was that we got a better feel for the village life. We drove through so many villages, watching the kids play and wave, women carrying bundles of firewood home on their heads, a new waterline was going in along the road bringing fresh water closer to their homes, the tiny shacks and roadside stands that are their shops, and families sitting on the ground around a cooking fire outside of their round homes. It is amazing to imagine living here with seasons of drought and flood. More elephants than people live in the delta, with 95,000 elephants that migrate seasonally through the delta, we could see the broken trees right alongside the villages showing that they came through. It was fascinating. Also, Botswana is a very wealthy nation so families can send all their kids to school, they have retrovirals provided for AIDS, villages have access to clean water, if your livestock is killed by a lion, the government reimburses you, etc. It was a simple life but they seem to have good support.

This part of the trip is when we started to merge into the group more. Coughlins flowed in conversation from the family to our fellow travelers and back again. Liam was eager to learn new card games that they were playing. We learned a german game called Eleven Takes. It was very fun. Liam taught the Dutch couple how to play Gin. And he had a couple of favorite guys who he would challenge in a chess match. We were definitely enjoying our new friendships. And we still had nice family time too with a great volleyball match.

We continued to cover great distances in our truck, crossing back over the border into the Caprivi Strip of Namibia. Here we had a great pool and an incredible sunset over the river that feeds the delta. We hadn’t had internet for nearly a week by this time and we were all anxious to get back to WiFi but on arrival we asked about it and he said that it was struck by lightning and was down. We stewed about that, wanting to confirm some upcoming reservations and check in with the grandparents that we are alive and well. Then we realized we are travelling with a router/signal booster/firewall device that we could ask them to try. We hooked it up their line and after a few minutes it started working. All of us were so excited and since we had the magic hardware we could all use it for free! That was a nice little victory. We have gotten a lot of use out of this device, but using it this way was new.

Then we crossed back into Botswana to visit Chobe. By this time, Chad and I were pretty anxious to see some major African wildlife again. It started out on another sour note however. William, our guide, informed us that we would arrive in Chobe on a transit route. Basically a highway through the National Park, one lane in each direction. He advised us that if we see something cool, they cannot stop. Well, as luck would have it the other side of the truck shouted out as we zoomed past a leopard resting not far from the road. It broke our hearts that we couldn’t see it. But we were hopeful that we would have such luck again on a game drive.

In Chobe we did a game watching cruise, which started out great with loads of hippos out of the water grazing on grass that seemed to glow neon green against a royal blue sky. The sky was a sign of what was to come. While we were watching two elephants drinking from the river near our boat we saw what appeared to be a curtain of rain pulled across the sky behind our boat. We watched it approach and it came just like it looked. In a second it changed from no rain drops to a full on downpour. Despite the rain we had a cooler filled with cold drinks for our group and we had great viewings of Elephant, Crocodile, Buffalo, and Hippo. During a brief break in the rain we spotted a couple lion, while we were watching a buffalo walked near and the lion and buffalo had a stare down for a few seconds before the lion chased him away. We were soaked and happy when we docked. Next morning we did a game drive in Chobe and it again started slow, but towards the end we came upon a pride of 9 lions, half of which crossed the trail right in front of our truck. Chobe ended up being one of our favorite parks and the water and greenery of the park was a vast contrast to the dryness and heat of Etosha in Namibia.

Our final destination on the Overland was Victoria Falls. Depending on how you measure it (width, height, volume of water) it is either the largest or second largest waterfall on the planet behind Iguazu. The park itself is much smaller and much less crowded than Iguazu. It’s a higher waterfall than Iguazu and the canyon it falls into is relatively narrow, so it is difficult to get a full view of it. Add in the clouds that were present that day and the mist that it generates and we got much less spectacular views (and pictures) than we did in Iguazu. Vic falls has loads of adrenaline activities and we finally settled on a zip line across the gorge. The kids were lobbying for the Gorge Swing or Bungee Jump, but they will have to wait to do that on their own.

Yesterday we crossed yet another border, from Zimbabwe into Zambia, where we will fly out today to Uganda. The Victoria Falls bridge is the border between Zimbabwe and Zambia and after exiting Zimbabwe we decided to walk the 1.5 KM bridge to the Zambia post so we could enjoy the view of the falls. Along the way we had to deal with the touts trying to sell us and the kids their wares, but it was a great walk. As we approached Zambia there was a very large group of Baboons that hang out on their side of the bridge. We were enjoying being so close to them and seeing their interactions…until a very large baboon walked straight for Chad. We had no idea what his purpose was until he got very close and swiped at the plastic bag Chad was holding, ripping it open and dumping our various snacks on the ground. After quickly grabbing some fruit and a bag of chips the baboon ran off back to his group. The kids were thoroughly entertained by this theft of our food while Chad was a bit ashamed that he couldn’t protect the family rations.

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