Of black maned lions and rampaging hippos

[bPeteb]

more from the cruise

 

[bPeteb]

Dinner was a la carte in the Bush Lodge restaurant.


Medium rare kudu. Delicious.

 

[kpc]

Chibe Bush lodge (and meals) was the best accommodation of the trip...and the 4 WD and River safaris in Chobe National Park, as posted above, were amazing!

The lodge at SwampStop by the Okavango River in Botswana whilst in an excellent location to explore the Okavango Delta, was horrible with very dim lighting, dusky smell and old toliet plumbing that leaked all night...one couple had to change room as the toilet stopped working and could not be fixed. Meals were very average...and it was a 2 night stop!

But exploring the Okavango River and Delta incl Heli ride was amazing!

 

[bPeteb]

Chibe Bush lodge (and meals) was the best accommodation of the trip...and the 4 WD and River safaris in Chobe National Park, as posted above, were amazing!

The lodge at SwampStop by the Okavango River in Botswana whilst in an excellent location to explore the Okavango Delta, was horrible with very dim lighting, dusky smell and old toliet plumbing that leaked all night...one couple had to change room as the toilet stopped working and could not be fixed. Meals were very average...and it was a 2 night stop!

But exploring the Okavango River and Delta incl Heli ride was amazing!

Sitting here at a lovely restaurant in Simon’s Town having lunch on the last day of our amazing trip. We just went and saw the penguins at Boulders Beach.

Our tour was sold as three and four star and Swampstop was definitely the three star. We had no issue with the food and the staff were all lovely. Gourmet wasn’t part of this tour and Swamstop camp/lodge was literally in the middle of nowhere.

We definitely think we’re getting what we paid for plus some.

We also had people on our tour complaining about lighting. Not sure why people need brightly lit rooms? We often comment when we’re out walking how people light their homes up like operating theatres.

 

[Quickstatus]

complaining about lighting

Must be scared of the dark.

Would have thought that in the middle of Africa, dim lighting would ve more appropriate. How does the Milky Way look?

 

[bPeteb]

Must be scared of the dark.

Would have thought that in the middle of Africa, dim lighting would ve more appropriate. How does the Milky Way look?

Amazing!! We sat outside in the cold at Desert Camp and were just mesmerised. Shooting stars. Satellites. The Milky Way just incredible.

 

[Quickstatus]

Satellites

Starlink trains?

 

[kpc]

We also had people on our tour complaining about lighting. Not sure why people need brightly lit rooms?

if you wear contact lenses you will understand ..I had to use a torch to increase the lighting to put them on.

 

[bPeteb]

Tue, 6 Aug

Of course another early start with bags out at 6:30. Same excellent breakfast spread but no fancy juice so we just had the bubbles on its own.



bye warthogs


the business end of the truck

 

[bPeteb]

542km drive - terrible gravel at the end

A very long day of driving on some very ordinary roads to Swamp Stop, Okavango River Camp Botswana.

It was an interesting drive to our next destination. We needed to drive out of Botswana into Namibia, along the Zambezi Region (previously known as the Caprivi Strip), then back down into Botswana where we followed the Kavango River to our two night stay.

From Kasane we headed through Chobe to the Namibia border crossing into the Zambezi Region.


Some ‘hope you enjoyed your stay’ elephants


We both found the drives super interesting. Mikesh was constantly providing information on the communities we’re driving through, the larger localities, the local tribes, regional and country history, vegetation.


Despite being told to be quiet when we entered the border immigration offices, this group just could not shut up. Mikesh came in and told the noisy ones to be quiet. It was clear the Namibian immigration officer was not happy.

Love the toilets!

 

[bPeteb]

Lots of interesting communities and small villages. Lots of beautiful houses with high fences made of thin sticks/branches. Some are mud brick, some are thatch, some tin. Some village groups have small market gardens. It is so dry and they must be very difficult to keep alive.


We stopped in a town called Katima Mulilo to get lunch. Great concern by the group about lack of access to toilets. One of the hlos clearly has an issue and has already needed roadside bushy bushy. We bought a couple of pastries at the Pack n Save for lunch on the move.


We had to stop at a weighbridge and there was an Intrepid vehicle in front of us. It pulled over into a park as we went through and then left. Mishek later explained that they did not have the necessary paperwork to carry passengers in Namibia and that they might have to drive on to Windhoek. He said they shouldn’t have even been able to leave Zimbabwe but that “this is Africa”. Usually an ‘incentive’ might have been provided to enable them to continue, but this day there was a senior official at the weighbridge and everything was being checked thoroughly and managed by the book.

Coffee stop rooster where we both had the most lovingly made coffee ever. Sadly not great despite the effort


We went in and out of Bwabwata National Park on the way to our two night Okavanga stay. This was our first entry.


Our bushy bushy and shop stops all took longer than they were supposed to. People are just hopeless at understanding you don’t need to shop in every place you stop and that you go to the toilet first, not after you’ve wandered around and bought nothing.



We turned down the road that ran parallel to the Kavango River. We crossed back into Bwabata National Park, that had previously been called the Caprivi Game Reserve, and then into Botswana. The road deteriorated as we drove further back into Botswana towards the delta. Gee it was terrible.

 

[bPeteb]

At least we saw our first ostriches, and then a couple of zebra.


It seemed like it took forever but eventually we arrived at Swap Stop, situated right on the banks of the Okavango Delta. Beautiful! Swamp Stop – Your Gateway to the Okavango Delta

Our local guide Cedrrrrrrrrrric (he hilariously rolled rs in every word) met us, ran through the delta programme, and handed out the room keys.


Quite simple, but perfectly adequate, some rooms were on the river bank, others like ours set in the lovely gardens. Loved our elephant towel animal.

The plan had been for us to take a sunset cruise but extra bushy bushy stops that took longer than Mishek had planned meant that we’d arrived too late. Hopefully tomorrow.


We loved the sound of deep natural silence, something that I commented on the whole time we were in southern Africa. The view from the elevated lounge area was beautiful.


Dinner was a simple but tasty buffet and beer was cheap.

 

[bPeteb]

Our full day started with another spectacular sunrise.


View from our room


Buffet breakfast by the river bank then onto the boat for a 90 minute trip along the river to our mokoro ride.

Lots and lots of birds and crocs


kingfishers


herons


water monitors


drongos


egrets, darters, fish eagles. This was a mum and son. He was apparently being naughty so she took him down!


Cedric showed us the line on the reeds to indicate how far the river level had dropped. In-flow was not expected for at least two months, more likely three.

 

[bPeteb]

Then it was time for the Okavango tourist staple - the mokoro ride. The rides are no longer in timber mokoros as there just aren’t enough trees to keep replacing them every five or so years. They are now fibreglass.


We were allocated our polers - ours was Mike - and after getting ourselves settled in our small unstable craft, away we went. It was excellent. Again, so very peaceful with the polers quietly chatting away and occasionally bursting out laughing.


We stopped and had a bit of a walk where Cedrrrrrrrrrric explained the delta system, the life of the local communities, the wildlife. The hope was to see some elephants bit that was not to be so back on the mokoros and through the reeds along very narrow channels


We both loved it after worrying it might be a bit contrived/Disneyland.

 

[bPeteb]

Back on the big boat and more croc and bird spotting. Cedric was a bit fixated on the beautiful, and numerous, fish eagles.


We stopped on an island where the lodge’s chef and assistant chef had set up a very excellent lunch. They had also constructed a very funny bushy bushy that everyone loved, Colin included. He had so far behaved himself very well.


Cedric had hinted to us that we could show some appreciation to the chefs for lunch. We were the only ones to do it.

Lunch done, the boat cruise through the delta continued. Spotted a huge croc, a good 4.5 to 5 metres. She just laid there and watched us


More darters


more fish eagles, more kingfishers. A couple of hippos sighted but each time a long way from where we were.


whistling ducks, maybe

 

[bPeteb]

The boat trip took a bit longer than expected and we got back just in time for our optional 30 minute helicopter flight. Six of us had put our hands up but a last minute addition pushed it to seven, meaning three flights, one with three and two with two. After some discussion the first three went off. We’d be the second two.

The R44 arriving for our turn in the sky


IT WAS FANTASTIC. Our young Kiwi chopper pilot was terrific. Despite only having been flying in the delta for nine months (we think that’s what he said) gee he knew his stuff.


He started spotting red lechwaes straight away


then hippos


and then elephants. The reeds are so high the elephants were down below the tops of them.


Our camp was in the narrow panhandle of the delta. The view from the eastern side near Maun would have been much more extensive and ‘delta like’ but nevertheless it was vast and amazing.


If you go to the Okavango delta, as well as boating on/through it, you must get up in the air and look down on it. I think this cost us just US$210.

 

[bPeteb]

Sunset cruise and to be honest from a wildlife perspective it was a repeat of the morning, just with a sunset. I love being out on the water though so I oved it in any case.



When we got back to the village the bubble run was on. Credric explained it was catfish moving down the river on mass just inside the edge of the reeds. As they moved they apparently blew bubbles. We couldn’t see anything, could just hear the weird noise as they passed by the lodge.

More beers, another very nice, simple buffet dinner.

Up early, of course, for the drive to Namibia, where we would spend the most time on this trip.

The proud chef and assistant chef


and around and about Swamp Stop


our room second from the right


While sat at breakfast I realised our passports were still in one of our large bags that had been packed on the bus. At least we realised before we got to the border crossing!

I had a few hundred pula left that wasn’t worth converting to anything so I pushed it into the tip box on the reception counter.

 

[bPeteb]

Back along the same god awful road to the border crossing. The bus has five rows of seats so with 16 of us no-one really needs to sit in the springboard back row. For some reason we had sat there coming to Swamp Stop. I jumped into that front row for the ride out. bAlt, Mr Nice guy is all “no, let someone else” and I said not an f’n chance.


Border crossing done we headed into Namibia, on a sealed road at least for a while. Stopped at Divindu for water where 15 minutes turned into close to 30, again! There’s a huge chest fridge at the back of the bus where we can cool our water, then shelves on either side where we can store water, fruit etc.

We stopped at Divindu for restocking H2O and for many (not us) the obligatory servo coffee.


Back out onto the highway, Mishek explained to us about the power grid. Namibia is part of SADEC - Southern Africa Development Community Power Co-interconnector. We followed, or saw in the distance, the high voltage cables, for much of our travel.



Mishek also explained that the road we were on led to Walvis Bay. The trucks we were passing were loaded with copper ‘ingots’. Much will have come from Zambia. There are huge reserves of copper, zinc and palladium in the region, and of course one nation is buying most of the mines.


I’m looking through my notes and at some point Mishek must have been discussing colonisation by the west. I’ve written ‘People without knees - people wearing long pants’ and ‘Swallows - people on horseback moving fast’. No idea the full context of that conversation.

Left the tar and back onto a short but atrocious corrugated gravel road into Hakusembe River Lodge, the first of four Gondwana Collection properties that we stayed at. 324km done.

 

[bPeteb]

Gondwana is a collection of lodges and private game reserves found only in Namibia. Mishek said they own half of Namibia. Not really.

Hakuseme River Lodge HAKUSEMBE RIVER LODGE is situated right on the banks of the Kavango River. When the river is high like in the promotional shots it would be amazing. With the river low it is still very beautiful.

We went straight into the lodge building for a late lunch, a delicious salad


then keys were handed out. We were allocated river chalet 1, one of the chalets ‘across the bridge’. It was another amazing room, huge, with a view right across the river to Angola.

 

[bPeteb]

We sat and watched groups of Angolan people do their clothes washing. Further along from them another group was fishing in amongst the reeds on the river’s edge.


We’d decided to take the optional all inclusive sunset cruise. N400 each. Only six of 16 went.

A few more pictures around the lodge



The boat was skippered by the delightful Fabian


He explained that he had risen up the ranks with Gondwana since starting at Damara Mopane. They have trained him extensively, allowed him to buy into the company via salary sacrificing to buy shares, given him somewhere to live. He is now training new staff. We all hope he goes far.

The cruise was a nice way to spend a couple of hours. Drinks offered as soon as we backed away from the river bank. Beers, cider, soft drink, juice, wine, bubbles.


The river was super shallow. We could see the sandy bottom most of the time and hit the bottom a few times. I asked Fabian how much longer cruises would be possible and he said they would not make it to the end of August.

We crossed the middle of the river so technically entered Angola more than once.