Jeff and Courts do the Okavango Delta, Botswana

Our journey to one of the world's largest inland deltas takes us to Botswana's 3rd largest city, Maun. A 600km drive awaits us. 300kms South, then 300kms West. There is rarely a direct route from one point to another in Botswana.

We wander the small city centre for a few hours while others on our tour take a small plane ride over the delta. There is not much to it. We grab some essentials and head to our campsite which is situated on the banks of the Boro river, one of 3 main channels within the delta which extend from the Okovango river.

Day 2

We are set for our 2 night camping experience in the heart of the delta. We take a motor boat to the Mokoro Station where we meet our guides and load up the Mokoros. These are canoes (now usually made of fibreglass instead of wood) that are propelled by a poller at the back. Ideal for navigation the vast, shallow delta waterways.

Teebee is our designated poller. Like the others, she is quite quiet and we have to continually ask questions to keep her talking. She tells us of her parents who grew up and lived out in the delta until the government moved them out years ago.

The ride to our campsite takes about an hour. The water never gets deeper than about 1.5 metres, but we are still not keen to go in. Hippos love it in this environment and will be lurking around. The vessel seems pretty unstable. With more time we realise it actually is and we don't have to stress as much.

Our site is situated on one of many small islands in the heart of the 18,000 square km delta. We set up our tents and make a fire and our guides construct a toilet (hole in ground).

Exduse is our delta guide. He gives us a similar safety speech regarding animals. There are large amounts of elephant droppings scattered around our site, so this may be interesting.

He also informs us that there will likely be a number of hours dedicated to siestas in the afternoons where it is too hot to do anything. He is right. We have a dip in one of the delta channels (much against our travel doc's advice, but everyone says it's fine). The water is clear and cold. We head to our tent and snooze till the sun loses its bite.

Closer to sunset we head off on our first game walk. A short mokoro ferry ride across to another island and we head for a large hippo pool. It doesn't disappoint. A number of hippos are wandering around and are the most active we've seen of these lazy beasts. They watch us, we watch them, we watch the sunset and then call it a night.

Back to the camp for dinner and a show. We gather round a camp fire and the guides and pollers launch into song, nervously at first before they gather some momentum and smash out some local hits. The African style is pretty cool. Lots of harmonies and some interesting dance moves.
Some of the songs have stayed with us. Especially the one in English - "Beautiful Africa, beautiful Africa. I shall never forget, beautiful Africa". Repeat again and again replacing "Africa" with "Botswana", "Delta" etc. and you have hit right there. We sing ourselves to sleep.

Day 3

We have an early start for our 4 hour game walk today. A 20 minute mokoro ride to a bigger Island this time.

We first spot some red lechwe, the water loving equivalent of the impala and the shell of the leaporad tortoise (still decomposing on the inside).

One of our guides, Dreamer hears some splashing in the distance. We head that way. We see a small herd of zebras on the other side of a waterway.

We hear baboons making some noise for off as well, so head that way. There could be something (lions) disturbing them. Its a fair walk, but we find a journey of giraffe and a lot of wildebeest. It's funny how different and more exciting it feels seeing these on foot. They aren't dangerous or anything, but not having a truck to jump into changes the experience completely.

We wander back, on the way nearly stepping on a steembok. These are a very small, fast antelope, too quick for a picture. Our guide spots a croc on the mokoro ride back. He parks up right next to it. It's too enthralled in its sunbathing to care though.

13.5 kms later and the sun is back to its brutal best. We just make it back to the campsite alive, have a quick dip and it's siesta time again.

We wake from the slumber in time for a sunset mokoro cruise. We do a lap of our Island and head for a hippo pool. It's empty, but that's cool. The serenity is fine in my books. We head for another island, park up and watch the sun set.

Back at the camp, Misheak digs a few roast chicken out from the coals and we tuck in with a glass (plastic cup) of red to go with. Decent work, team. We hit the sack and zzz instantly.

Day 4

One more quick game walk this morning before heading back. Plenty of hippos noises but no hippos this time. They are too far away and we didn't bring flippers either. We have to settle for an awesome sunrise instead. A good consolation.

Our time in the Okavango delta is coming to an end. We mokoro it back to the station. I drift off listening to the polers chatting to each other in the lackadaisical manner of the Botswanian language.

We say our goodbyes and head back to our camp. An incredible experience.

We take a quick trip into Maun for supplies, mainly water. After purchasing a few 5 litre containers I see a stray dog struggling to find water near a leaking pipe. I offer some of mine but he's not interested. I hear a whistle from behind me and see 4 ladies running a stall baking in the sun, asking for a drink. Seems fair enough since it was going to a stray dog. They gratefully accept the bottle. Tough gig they have there. It's easy to understand why the Botswanian currency, the Pula, means "rain".

We are treated to a traditional South African BBQ (Braai) cooked by our South African cook and driver. Steaks, Boerewors (sausage) and toasted tomato, cheese and onion sandwiches - all done over the camp fire. Courts is in heaven.

We get to bed and look forward to being back on the road again tomorrow as we head to Namibia.