The Okavanga Delta

 Our last night in Botswana with CIEE. Dinner at Thamalakane River Lodge

 Sunset in the delta during one of our game drives

 Swimming in a watering hole

 Hilary and I dug for tubers in the roots of the lilypads and then cooked them for a snack

 Sunset in the delta

 Boat ride in Maun

 Giraffe!

 African Wild Dog with the head of a baby impala

 Elephant reaching for the highest branch

 African Wild Dog

 Hippo-rare to see them out of the water

 Lioness

 Baboons

 Leopards

Leopard in the foreground and water buck in the background

Hello once again. It’s time I worked on my blog and this post should be one of the most exciting (and longest) as I will recount my time traveling around northern Botswana and the Okavanga Delta!!! However, I can’t leave out my last full day in Gaborone.  

So I got home from Mozambique late on the 29^th thanks to Intercape and their ridiculously bad planning. Anyways I woke up later than expected on the 30^th but as soon as I got up, I ate breakfast and got dressed as I had a shopping date with Tshego. Since her exams had finally ended and I was done with school we wanted to try to spend some time together before I left for the states and decided that a great way would be shopping. Luckily Tshego decided on going to Game City which we could walk to, although walking with Tshego is a pretty slow process. Anyways, the walk, although very long and slow, was really nice. I got to talk with Tshego and she showed me her old primary school and some different parts of the surrounding neighborhoods that I had never seen before. We finally get to the mall and basically wandered around a bit. The hard part was that I needed to head to the ATM as I had no cash left but since it was right at the end of the month, so did everyone else in Gabs. Basically every student gets their stipend at the end of the month and every employee gets paid which means that the ATM lines are ridiculously long as people either try to deposit or withdraw money.

Anyways, Tshego and I walked into and out of stores just looking around. She kept expecting me to buy things and want to try them on but I kept expecting her to buy things and try to them on as I was leaving in a few days and was trying to give away clothes, not accumulate them. We had a good time anyways and I was able to borrow money from Tshego to buy a gift for one of my Matswana friends and she ended up buying a lot of clothes from Mr. Price. Although just like walking, this took a long time and I was really late for lunch plans I had with some friends at the White House near the University of Botswana.

I made it to lunch just as everyone was finishing up eating, perfect timing. At least I got to eat at the White House one last time which has the best traditional Batswana food in Gaborone. At lunch I also learned that I would be having a much busier afternoon than expected. Originally our flight back from the delta was supposed to land early on December 6^th which would give me all day on the 6^th to pack and do some last minute errands around the city as I would be leaving Gabs forever on the 7^th. But at lunch I learned that our flight back on the 6^th would be much later and we wouldn’t get back until around 6pm! Eish!

So after lunch we all hurried back to campus. I went to the library to return some books and get to the internet one last time, then walked around campus taking pictures of the buildings, went to the ATM (which also had a huge line), took pictures of the dorm rooms and then got a call that I was needed in the CIEE office. And then this took much longer than it was supposed to as well because Tanya, the CIEE assistant who needed me wasn’t there so I had to wait for a half hour. She finally showed up and I was able to work with her on some last minute transcript/course description materials that were needed for Tanya and the states to transfer my credits. Then I wanted to borrow the external hardrive from the office since it had a lot of movies I wanted to transfer to my computer but there were a lot of people using it so had to wait some more time for it. There goes my idea of getting home early. On the other hand since I spent so much time at the office, Charlotte and I were able to go to RailPark together (she was busy earlier in the day) and do some souvenirs shopping before heading to our homestays to pack for our safari trip to the delta. Went to railpark and hit up Food Lovers one last time to stock up on stampa (hominy-like carb we wanted to bring home) and some other grocery stores to buy last minutes goodies. Then I had to walk a couple of blocks outside of the mall to the money exchange service to see if they would exchange my Meticash (money from Mozambique) but of course they didn’t. It was one of those hectic, crazy days where I didn’t really accomplish much but was busy the entire day!

The rest of the night was spent packing for the delta and trying to pack up my souvenirs and clothes to go home which proved to be much more confusing than expected. See I had this delta trip coming up, was in Gabs for one night, then left Gabs for Cape Town for four days and then was flying home via London where I had a 12 hour layover meaning that I needed to prepare for the delta which was going to be extremely hot, then for Cape Town which was mild and then for London which was cold==Too much planning! Finally got some stuff packed and my bag ready for the delta and headed to sleep as I had to get up early the next morning to go on the safari trip!!!

Saturday, December 1^st came by and I awoke early to get to campus to say good bye to Moleti, one of my good Matswana friends, before meeting up at the CIEE office to head to the airport. Said good bye to Mo and in true Batswana style, the combis taking us from the CIEE office to the airport were going to be late so I walked around campus with Kya, another CIEE student, and went to Shoppers at the student center one last time. Finally the combis arrived, we get to the Seretse Khama International Airport and board our Air Botswana flight to Maun which is a town in the northern part of Botswana. The flight was pretty uneventful except that I was the only one without a seat buddy because Connor who was supposed to sit next to me ended up leaving Botswana early. Anyways once we got over the really shaky and quite scary landing we had landed in Maun. At the airport we were met by Kyle, the CIEE program director who was there already, and shuttles that were taking us to the Audi Camp in Maun where we would stay one night before heading to the Okavanga Delta just north Maun. The camp was gorgeous nestled right on the Thamalakane river with cute little tents with beds inside, a pool, a bar, a restaurant.  We spent a couple of hours just exploring the camp site and sitting by the pool before getting into boats to take a river boat “cruise” down the river.  We didn’t see too much on the river except for some fish eagles, a huge termite mound that we were able to get out and climb on, and some elephants in the far distance. However, our driver did teach us how to make necklaces out of lilies by peeling some of the stem down. After a couple of hours on the boat, we got back to camp and had one of the best meals. I for sure overstuffed myself on butternut squash soup, warm bread, pap, chicken, beef and mouse for dessert. We were all so stuffed that we just went to bed to prepare for tomorrow and the beginning of our safari.

I woke up really early on the 2^nd so walked around the camp, wrote in my journal and then finally found someone else who was up and ready to eat breakfast with me. Kim and I headed over to the outdoor picnic area where we were served another amazing meal. After having a very satisfying breakfast, the safari trucks rolled in that were going to be transporting us from the campsite in Maun to our campsite in the Okavanga Delta, about a 3 hr drive. Initially I was super stoked to see the trucks/jeeps roll in that, in a very brief description, are like pick-up trucks with 9 raised seats in the back. However, after driving just about 10 minutes I realized that it was going to be a long ride. The wind was whipping our faces so we couldn’t talk and every now and then a bug or beetle would fly back and hit us in the face.

As soon as we entered into the Okavanga Delta, the wildlife was everywhere and we were truly in the bush. Right along the side of the road ( I mean a dirt pathway) a giraffe was on the side just looking at us. At one point during the ride we had to stop because a chameleon was crossing the road that our guide, Clinton, picked up and put it on Anthony’s shirt to see the colors change. While we were examining the chameleon, that giraffe we saw earlier just started walking straight across the road in front of us!! During the rest we also had our change to use the restroom which was the first of countless times of all the girls running in opposite directions trying to find a bush that was thick enough to hide us from each other. This in itself was a difficult feat as the bush is comprised of a lot of short, stick-like bushes so you can see for miles and miles, not to mention that amount of thorns and brush that is on the floor making squatting a dangerous feat.

Back in the truck and before we knew it we had arrived at camp, which was gorgeous. There were over 12 small tents all lined up in a row where we would sleep for the next 3 nights, a larger tent under which there was long table with chairs, another tent in the back where the support staff would cook our meals, two bathrooms that were set up (basically a whole in a ground with a seat over it) and two outdoor showers all next to a nice hippo-infested watering hole. We were literally in the middle of bush and Clinton had even told us that yesterday when they were setting up camp a leopard had walked through. The only advice we got though was to not stray too far and at night use a torch aka a flashlight if we needed to use the restroom. Okay!

We had a great lunch and then a siesta period before our afternoon game drive. During the afternoons since it is so hot the animals really do not come out and do anything and therefore all game drives are either done early in the morning or later in the afternoon around dusk. Since we had so much time to kill our guides decided to take us to a watering hole where we could go swimming and cool off even though the weather wasn’t as bad as it was supposed to be during this year. In December, Botswana’s summer, the delta can reach up to 110/115 F but we were lucky in that it was really only around 90 and bearable. The watering hole was great and really refreshing even though it was only about a foot deep so we basically just laid in it and had a mud fight with the clay on the bottom of it. We had to go in shallower water because deeper water is where the crocodiles and hippos like to live. In fact there was a hippo about 100 meters away swimming around. Came back from a great swim and still had time to kill so played a lot of card games before it was time for our first real game drive.

The drive was exciting within minutes as our truck, with the awesome Scotty as our guide, saw elephants within seconds trying to rip down a branch. The branch was so high that the elephant had to extend his trunk fully and reach his back legs as far as possible before ripping the branch down and chewing it up right in front of us. Elephants actually can get so frustrated with trees and not being able to get a branch that they will push the whole tree down which has led to a lot of problems in northern Botswana. Botswana has the largest population of African Elephants in the world and they are causing a lot of problems even though they are highly protected by the government.

We also got to see a pack of zebras, baboons, a water monitor, hippos, kudu, impala and a lot of different birds. Impala and kudu are basically antelopes while a water monitor is like a huge lizard. And we learned a lot of really cool facts like each print on a zebra is unique, similar to fingerprints on humans. A lot of looks like Lion King in that all the animals are just chilling with each other, all surrounding the watering hole. After a couple of hours into the drive we took our break at sunset by a watering hole, which again, was amazing. Ever sunset in Africa (at least the countries I have been to) has been ridiculously beautiful and breathtaking. By this time it was getting dark so we headed back to camp, of course using a high-powered spotlight in the hopes of finding some animals. We did get lucky and actually spotted a hyena right off the path just a few feet from our truck!! WOOT!!

Back at camp we got to sit around a campfire listening to cheesy stories before a mouth-watering, delicious dinner was served. Headed to bed early as we had to get up at 4:30 am for the game drive in the morning.

4:30am rolled around and we were woken up, ate a simple breakfast of cereal and toast before heading off for our first morning game drive. Boy was this a game drive and completely worth waking up at 4:30. We had been driving around for about 15 minutes when Scotty got a call on the radio that another guide had a pack of African Wild Dogs which happen to be one of the most rare animals in Botswana with only 10,000 left in the world. They are actually the second most endangered predator in the world. There is a guy who has been coming for 10 years staying for about 10 days in a row and never sees the wild dogs. They are gorgeous and look like a mix between a hyena and a wolf. Not only did we see the pack of about 20 but we saw them kill. Within minutes of pulling up we see a baby impala running, one dog sees it, chases after it, catches it and then all the other dogs come, pounce on it and rip it apart. We were so close we even heard the crunching of the bones and saw each dog come away with a different body part. My heart was pounding and I could feel the energy within the pack. There is nothing like witnessing pure nature. We followed the dogs for a bit longer before trying to find some other animals. We were lucky and did get to see a lot more elephants, hippos, kudu, baboons, just crazy, crazy things. It was actually pretty funny because at one point someone asked if the foreskin hanging from the elephant “were its balls” and Scotty told her the testicles and penis are actually inside the elephant. Then ten minutes we saw an elephant urinating and saw how large the penis really is. It kept extending and extending to the point where it touched the ground and swung as it walked. The elephant I think knew we were shocked by it because after it finished it walked straight towards us and got within a couple feet before Scotty moved the truck. The rest of the game drive was filled with more sightings of the beautiful animals of Botswana.

After our morning game drive it was time for lunch and a siesta back at camp. However, Hilary and I were not in the mood for a nap and instead decided to play in the water and dig for tubers. Apparently the beautiful lily pads have tubers on their roots that can be dug for and then cleaned and eaten. So we trudged into the water and dug and dug until we found the tuber, we pulled it out and it looked like a big pile of mud. However, the support staff showed us how to clean them and cooked it for us by charring it on the grill. It was actually pretty gross and really, really bitter but that’s just my opinion.

Our afternoon game drive was again filled with excitement as we once again found the wild dog pack. They were on the hunt and so we ran with them in the bush and saw their hunting tactics. They had chased something all the way to the watering hold but stopped abruptly and would not go in. Apparently the crocodiles eat the dogs and therefore the dogs usually do not go in the water. However we did get to see the crocodile eat whatever the dogs chased into the water. It’s amazing to see how the animals work together and the relationships between all of the species. After the dogs gave up by the water they turned and started hunting something else so we went with them. They found a wart-hog burrow and began scratching at it hoping the wart hog would emerge. We asked Scotty why they don’t just go down there but apparently the wart hog will emerge with their tusks pointed up and could slice through the dogs’ throats. Eish!

We soon lost the dogs though as they are so fast. Scotty gave up by listening to the sounds of the bush. He listened to the birds and watched the movement of the impala. A lot of birds will make alarm calls when they see the dogs warning the other animals while the impala will make abrupt movements when they hear the dogs. Since we heard and saw nothing we headed off for other animals before stopping at a watering hole for a nighttime break, sunset break. There were roughly 4 or 5 hippos in the water that we had fun playing with. Hippos are extremely dangerous and actually can run faster than Usain Bolt so we did make sure to stay pretty far away from them but if we took a step closer they would open their mouths showing us their teeth as a warning sign! Too cool!!!

We didn’t see much the rest of the game drive, had another great dinner and camp fire before heading off to bed for another early start.

Up at 5 and out of camp by 5:30, we wanted to see something good. We really hadn’t seen much then Scotty got a call on the radio that the other trucks had spotted lions. We were in a bit of a pickle because we all wanted to see the lions but also had to get to the local river as we were supposed to go on mocoros (little boats). We wanted to do both so Scotty put the pedal to the metal and rushed over the see the lions. They were gorgeous and the whole scene was completely worth it! There were elephants, hyenas, zebras and the king/queens of the jungle, the lions! No male lions but two females with about 6 or 7 cubs. Cub being very relative as they were older and huge! All they were doing though was just sleeping. Every once in a while one would get up, stretch, change positions, then go back to sleep. Although they weren’t doing anything I was still amazed by their beauty! We saw them for a bit before heading down to the river for our boat ride. On the way to the river though we got to see a pack of baboons running around, with a lot of cute babies, and came across two Cape Buffalo which were huge. Cape Buffalo look similar to water buffalo but are very dangerous and as Scotty said is not an animal you’d want to see as you walk around in the bush.

The mocoro is a type of boat that is traditionally used in northern Botswana. It kind of looks like a long kayak where a man will stand on the back and use a long pole to push the boat forward. Again we were in rather shallow water to avoid the hippos and crocodiles and were told that if we see a hippo we would calmly exit the river, carry our boats down a ways and then reenter. The mocoro boat trip was a great experience in that we got to see traditional transportation in the delta but it was very slow and very hot. Relaxing!

We returned for lunch, siesta, more swimming in the watering hole and then another afternoon game drive. We were just driving along and all of a sudden Scotty gets a call on the radio and quickly turns the car and zooms away. We all knew it had to be a leopard because usually Scotty would ask us if we wanted to go see an animal and then tell us to hold on but not now. We were flying through the brush!!!! And sure enough, a leopard we saw. Leopards are extremely rare and only seen when they want to be seen. I talked to the guide on the mocoro trip who said he only sees a leopard maybe once a month! The leopard itself was really hard to see as it was buried within a bush but I was lucky enough to be in the front row of the jeep which allowed me to lean forward enough and see the leopard through the cracks within the tree branches. It was gorgeous! A leopard wasn’t high on my list to see but it should have been. The coat was amazing, the pattern of his spots was so intricate and majestic. However, our glimpse at the leopard was quick because within a few minutes another safari truck revved its engine to get closer to the leopard and in return the leopard got spooked and darted out from the tree running right in front of our truck. I was disappointed that the leopard was gone but felt so lucky that we got to see him run right in front of us.

We spent some more time trying to look for the leopard and eventually gave up and returned back to the lions. It was approaching dusk and we were hoping to see a kill. The other two guides from our group went for a sunset break but my truck really wanted to see the lions so we skipped it, which was well worth it. We were able to see how the lions would set up for a kill. The two lionesses would leave the cubs and move towards the prey from the back, in our case some impala and water buck. By approaching the prey from the back the lionesses could cause the prey to move in a certain direction. In their case, the lionesses would cause the prey to run towards the stalking cubs. This was theoretically what was supposed to happen and we had great hunting conditions as a huge thunderstorm was rolling in so it was getting darker, windier with loud thundering claps, all of which helped for the hunt. What didn’t help with the hunt though were the cubs. As Scotty said, “They are quite stupid!” because the cubs would get bored of stalking and stand up, walk around and stretch which would allow the prey or warning birds to see them and give away their position. We waited as long as we could in the hopes that the waterbuck would be chased towards the cubs but the cubs kept moving and the storm was getting closer. We got out of there just before the storm really picked up.

We made it back to camp right as it started to pour which postponed our last night dinner braii but the wait was completely worth it complete with different kinds of meat, pap, potatoes and veggies (and some great adventure stories from Clinton about how a hippo once chomped through his kayak and his arm once swelled up putting him in the Joburg ICU because of a snake bite).

The next morning was our last game drive and it was another exciting one!  At first we spent a good hour or so hunting some male lions. Scotty saw the footprints in the sand and we followed them but the path kept crossing back and forth. As we were driving around all of a sudden Kylee goes, “Hey there are two leopards!” and sure enough right in front of us were two leopards out in the open just walking around-a very rare sight! We followed and watched the leopards for a good long time mainly learning about them from Scotty and watching their interactions. One was the mom and the other an older cub who the mom was actually trying to get rid of because he was too old to still be with her. She was even making mating calls hoping a male leopard would show up and shoo the cub away and would become irritated with the cub very quickly. Just like the lion cubs he ruined her hunt as well. The mother was moving towards a pack of impala and while she was starting her stalk the cub was playing with some waterbuck by pretending he was stalking them. In reality leopards wouldn’t take down a water buck as it is just too big but what did happen was the water buck would make a low growling, barking noise which in turn alerted the impala ruining the mother’s hunt. Eish!

After an exciting game drive we said good bye to our guides and went to a landing strip (basically a long stretch of road in the middle of the bush) where we got to take a ½ hour bush plane ride back to the city of Maun. But even on the landing strip there was an impala so Clinton had to race his truck over there to scare it away. They are especially careful about the animals because a couple of years ago they hit a wart-hog on the strip. The plane ride itself was great because it was in one of those smaller planes and allowed us to see the delta from above and see some giraffes and more elephants!

We arrived back in Maun and got settled in at the Okavanga River Lodge before some of us decided to walk down the road to a store that sells baskets. We weren’t sure how long the walk would be so were going to take a combi but we waited and waited and it never came so we just walked. Along the way we get honked at and low and behold Clinton was driving by and offer to give us a ride to the basket store. What great luck!! We all bought some baskets and began walking back when we see a combi looking van so we hail it. It turns out not to be a combi but instead is the same company and same driver who drove us from the airport to the river lodge a couple of hours earlier. So we hop in and then in the car are two Americans whose son is a friend of some of the kids from my program. What a small world????

The rest of the afternoon was spent sleeping and playing cards before we all got dressed up for our last dinner together as a CIEE program. We went to this fancier restaurant Thamalakane River Lodge which is actually where President Ian Khama eats when he comes to Maun. The food was alright, the atmosphere was lovely and the company was spectacular. We even had a mini-presentation where each person got a superlative. Overall it was a fantastic night!

We awoke early in the morning and headed to the airport to fly back to Gaborone but that flight was eventful. As a group we decided to do an activity where everyone would write something nice about each other person in the group. So on the plane ride home we had a conveyer belt of papers being handed from one person to the next. It took up most of the plane ride until we learned that the weather in Gaborone was too bad to land and we might be flying up to Francistown. Luckily that was not the case and instead we just experienced the worst turbulence ever.

The rest of the day was spent packing up my room at my homestay and preparing for a braii my family was having for me. My host mom had invited pastors from her church over for dinner to bless my travels and had invited a couple of my friends over as well. The family went all out and we had a great time playing cards and having my last Setswana food. It was the first time in months that my family had all sit down together and I was so appreciative to have one last dinner with them.

Woke early the next morning as Elt and Tshego were driving me to the airport. Said a nice good bye to them and a lot of the other CIEE kids as each person was leaving on a different flight out of Gaborone. Before I knew it, my flight was boarding and I had to say good bye to some of the best people and friends one could ask for. The only thing keeping me from breaking down was knowing that I was spending the next five days in Cape Town with Ashley and would soon be seeing my family that I missed so badly.

So, thank you Gaborone for teaching me more about myself and the people of Botswana than I ever thought possible! Go Siame!