Botswana

For a country roughly the same size as France or the state of Texas, Botswana has a small country feel to it, probably helped by its having a population of around only 2 million. Aided by its discovery of diamonds in the 60s, Botswana is a relatively stable and wealthy nation, especially compared to some of its immediate neighbours, notably Angola, Zambia and Zimbabwe. The people are warm and friendly and make you feel pretty damn welcome. Our stay in Botswana was to mostly consist of a natural world element. The majestic elephants of Chobe National Park, the reeds and bird life of the Okavango Delta and finally the stunning beauty of the Central Kalahari, with its still-present San people, known as the Kalahari Bushmen.

Chobe National Park, North East Botswana

Chobe is known for its mighty collection of African elephants, and for good reason. There are simply thousands of them in this riverine based national park in the north eastern extremes of Botswana.

Late afternoon frolicking by the river.

It’s a serene place and one you could spend countless days driving through and still discover new parts. We were slightly disappointed on our first early morning game drive as we hardly saw anything until about lunchtime when we were about to leave the park for a break when we spotted some two to three hundred elephants walking towards the river for an early afternoon drink and dip! The problem with seeing so many national parks and reserves on this trip is you get slightly complacent and you carry increased expectation with you to each new park. Terrible, but a typical facet of human nature I guess.

However, when we returned for an afternoon / evening game drive we were dead impressed by the variety of the animals and scenery on show.

This has to be the princess of antelopes!

Take a look at the ingenuity of this elephant. He was hungry and knew this little root at ground level would satisfy his hunger. However, he couldn’t simply pull it up with his trunk so he got the foot / trunk combo on the go and succeeded in his task. By pulling his foot over the root while pulling with his trunk he managed to pull it loose.

Look at the determination in those young eyes!

However it’s not all good news on the elephant front. As beautiful and gentle as they are, unfortunately they have large appetites and evidence of this scars the park. In recent years they have had to cull numbers to try and arrest the rate of deforestation.

An unfortunate habit they just can't break..

But don’t worry there are tens and tens of thousands of elephants here and their future appears secure.

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Most of the park’s tracks follow the river so it’s not just the land based mammals that get all the attention. I’d waited a while on this trip to get a proper hippo yawning shot and luckily I managed to get a few in with this tired little (massive) hippo!

It's contagious; I yawned straight after taking this shot!

That's one hell of a yawning position!

Water here supports a healthy fish population and where you find fish you often find these fellows; the Fish Eagle.

Pizza or sushi today hmm....

We also saw one of the strangest things I’ve ever witnessed in a game park. We came across this dead young elephant who had clearly been ambushed by predators in the valley we drove through.

It was like a scene out of The Shining!

The stench was overpowering but the strange thing about this scene was the hyena that sat next to the dead elephant smiling and rubbing himself against the dead torso. He looked like the Joker from the Batman films. Countless vultures just sat and waited for it to break open some of the incredibly tough skin to get a cheap meal but to no avail. The hyena was more interested in playing with the dead animal. Very bizarre. Take a look at the video..

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We camped right in the park on a beautiful spot overlooking the river. Elephants strolled past, we had antelopes just a couple of feet from our tent and plenty of eyes staring at us during the evening to keep us on our toes!

Another beautiful African sunset at Chobe.

The old favourites were here too!

Crowd pleaser; everyone loves a giraffe / zebra combo.

Probably my favourite small mammal out there, the humble warthog.

Motherly love..

Buffalo at a cleaning station!

A lone Sable Antelope contemplates his fate in the theatre of survival..

Love games; impala fight for the ladies..

And we were particularly lucky to see lions in Chobe as they are far and few between. They even crossed the sandy track in front of us as they went on their early morning stroll!

One of three lionesses taking a morning walk.

Yet another cat admires the Land Rover..

Although not the most impressive park of the trip Chobe is still up there thanks to its impressive elephants. Well worth a visit!

Shade is at a premium out here!

The Okavango Delta, North Western Botswana

Spread over a significant distance, the Okavango delta is a massive maze of waterways linking permanent lagoons with those that are fed during annual rains. At ground level you could be mistaken for being in Norfolk, traversing the reeds rather than Africa.

View from the side of a mokoro.

So we spent two chilled out days being poled around the southern extremes of the delta by our very competent poler and guide Habana. I tell you, it was bloody nice to be driven around somewhere for a change!!

Master poler; Habana, our Okavango guide in action.

We camped right opposite a nesting colony for herons, egrets and reed cormorants which made for a noisy campsite!

Egret hanging out with the kids..

But while they look sweet and fluffy when youngsters, take a look at the evil little beggars egrets grow into as teenagers! If looks could kill our mokoro would have sunk ages before I had a chance to take the shot!

Evil little beggars; teenage egrets looking mischievous.

We even had a leopard kill hanging in the tree above our tent which was quite eery!

The daily cycle of sunset, moon rise and sunrise couldn’t be more evident than when viewed from a mokoro, floating across a beautiful lake.

The sun sets..

The moon rises...

The sun rises....

The Central Kalahari Desert, Central Botswana

Before coming to the Kalahari I had my own preconceived views on what it would look like. Barren desert, not often punctuated by the occasional lone acacia tree. A lack of resources for animal and human alike; a true desert. Well I’ll be the first to admit my preconceptions where wholly inaccurate in every which way.

A lone Oryx looks out over the Kalahari.

The Kalahari is stunning. Yes it’s sandy. Yes in places it appears bare but the life it supports is surprising and the vistas are breathtaking. I was surprised that we managed to find three different sets of lions in one day and over a significant distance. But it’s not just the big cats that stand out here. The age old mantra of the small guys being as important really reigns true here. The Kalahari food chain has many notches. And bloody hell are some of them funny.

Derek the bird deals with yet another wasp. What a hero.

Check out these bush squirrels. The true work horses (sort of) of the Kalahari, they spend their days shopping for their next meal in the undergrowth. The bush squirrel in exhibit A, affectionately called ‘Big balls’ just couldn’t get enough of the camera. He posed for a good five minutes before moving and boy was he a proud squirrel.

You've got to have balls to live out here!!

Then peruse over exhibit B, who I call ‘Sid, the super squirrel’. Always ready for action, Sid would never miss an opportunity to deal with international calls of distress.

There's no problem too big for Super Squirrel!

Even when retiring to bed he’d still be attentive, in case his special powers were needed. A true bush hero.

Sid will not sleep until the world's problems are solved.

Or check out these elusive little fellows, the bat eared foxes of the Kalahari. For those of you that are old (or young) enough to know the film Gremlins, doesn’t he look like Mogwai in this first snap?

Like a gremlin appearing from the earth..

We eventually caught up with this funny looking couple long enough to get a picture. Notice how Berty (the fox in the background) notices something in Mabel’s hair that quite shocks / disgusts him.

'What on earth have you got in your hair Mabel..!'

Or how about the bird of prey that is so hungry that he calmly munches away on what he thinks is a juicy grub. And there I was thinking he was going to make a nest with that..

Everyone loves Twiglets..

Or the ‘sod the institution’ bird of prey who we found, quite literally camped out on a no camping sign. Comedy genius.

I laugh at the institution ha!

Or the chiropractors favourite; the bird with probably the best posture in the market.

Now that's what I call a straight back!

And finally, if you’re a dentist, would you want to conduct a root canal on this fellow?

Open up wide!

And talking of lions here are a few pics of three sets we saw during our stay in the Kalahari.

This pair of males were in pretty rough shape. Probably no longer affiliated to a pride (and thus access to lionesses that hunt for them..) they had to fend for themselves and looks like pickings are scarce.  They also had incredibly pale coloured manes, not something we’d seen before.

Fancy a drink?

We arrived at the watering hole to find the pair asleep. A group of eland, not normally targets for lions but nonetheless food, came tentatively in for a drink and the stand off began. We couldn’t believe how stupid these animals were to just stand around and wait for a moment to approach the water hole while being watched by a couple of male lions!

Why stare at him?! Run for pete's sake!

Maybe they knew how rubbish the lions were at hunting!

But take a look at his face after he had a drink. He must have heard me taking the mick out of him….

He would definitely win a stare competition!

This lone male we came across at a different pan looked in far better shape.

Keeping fit for the ladies..

He even had time to style his hair!

Looks are important out here!

To sleep or not to sleep..

And so our trip to the Kalahari came to an end, although after a tough and long drive out on thick sandy tracks. The end of our time at the Kalahari unfortunately signalled the end of our time in Botswana, which was highly enjoyable. It also signalled entry into the second to last country on my tour, Namibia!

COMING UP NEXT!

Namibia: Etosha National Park, The Petrified Forest, Swakopmund, Fish River Canyon and much much more!