It’s still dark, and I am awakened by the loud roar and growl of a large cat, followed by the even louder roar of a larger cat. I push the light on my watch, it’s 5:30am, and a lay there very still for a moment, then drift off back to sleep. Awoken again by the dawn, and the movement of my neighbors from Belgium, who I know are headed off to Naxi pans park today, I peak outside and figure the big cats have gone by now and join my friends for a cup of coffee, before they hit the road. We explore the camp and find large cat paw prints all around the ablution building and our camp site, and rather than being scared, we want to see the cats too. Crazy?
I bid farewell to my friends, and adopt their site, because I like it’s location better, and I’m told no one else is coming to the camp tonight, in fact, everyone is leaving but for me, and one other couple who’s in the camp next to me.
The ablution next to my site is being worked on today, so I have to use the one at the other side of the camp, and it’s far enough, I don’t like the idea of walking that far alone. The buildings were built by the Swiss government as part of a fund they established to help Botswana attract more tourism. They are very well made, but rather complicated and as such seem to require a lot of maintenance with the plumbing, and biggest issue is they were designed to be totally “green” so they are 100% solar-powered. Which is great but the pumps for the flush toilets don’t begin working until around 11am, and obviously by then they have been used a lot. Large bottles of water are placed in the buildings for people to fill the tank on the toilet to make them flush, but all too often no one knows how to do this, or the bottles of water are empty, and it gets gross, the toilets clog, and then the pipes clog, and then the whole thing has to be cleaned out.
The water is also heated for the showers by solar, but this wasn’t a problem as I preferred to shower at the end of the day, before getting my fire going and settling in for the night anyways. But, certainly the Swiss could have come up with some other options, like a battery backup maybe?
I take a much longer trek today as it’s been reported there’s a den of lions feeding on a zebra out near the park boundary. After an hour of driving, on a road that’s not so deep with sand (still can’t figure out why my Land Cruiser doesn’t handle the sand that well) I find the zebra, by watching the vultures overhead, or what’s left of it which is a head and a couple of hoofs. I’m reminded of the fragility of life, not just out here but in general. Sadly, no lions.
I take a wide path back toward camp, spending the bulk of the day out in the bush, exploring and finding various animals, swamps, termite mounds that are in the process of devouring entire trees. The sun is bright, and intense, but the temperature remains cool enough to enjoy. My journey takes me back to the river, which I begin to follow back toward camp, and am stopped by a dozen elephants bathing and drinking on the other side of the river.
I stop to take pictures, and notice on the top of the hill next to me six giraffes and a few dozen zebra…now I’m between elephants and other animals, and just in complete awe.
As I wait, I notice the elephants are heading across the river toward me, but at least it also seems the giraffes are leaving too, so I not getting sandwiched, I don’t want to move and interfere with the animal’s movements.
As I wait though, the bull elephant that seems to be the leader of the herd comes across the river and stops right in front of me, and now it’s too late to move, as when I even try to he raises and lowers his foot to indicate to me: stay where you are or I’ll squash you! So, I did!
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After a half hour all the elephants were out of the river, and on their way up the hill, and big bull papa just headed up the hill behind them, letting me be on my way. None too soon, as the sun would be setting soon, and I wanted to shower, and get a fire going.
After my shower, and walking back to my camp I noticed something hanging near the inside of the right rear tire on my Land Cruiser. Crouching down behind the bumper I see that the leaf springs on the right side have broken, and some are even missing half the spring! What’s dangling is part of one spring that is about to fall out.
As I’m under the vehicle checking the springs and taking pictures, and here a movement off to side, and I slowly crawl out from under the Land Cruiser, and see an elephant walking right by. At first startled, I get in the truck, and then less afraid, I decide to take a few pictures.
After my elephant distraction, I look at the time, and decide I need to call Britz in Johannesburg. When I had taken the vehicle they assured me that in case of break down, they would have a replacement vehicle for me in a day. This wasn’t ideal, but I could stay here another day, and then head up to Moremi reserve a day later, they are both SKL camps so should be able to coordinate that from here.
After a series of phone calls back and forth, which ended up costing me $126 (which has never been reimbursed) Britz would only offer that I take the vehicle to the city of Maun on the way or Moremi, and get the spring replaced. They assure me have made arrangements with the shop for the repair and the expenses. I wasn’t happy to spend any part of my adventure in a tire shop waiting for my vehicle, but couldn’t see much of any way around this.
So, change of plans a bit, I’d get to bed early tonight, and head to Maun at first light in the morning. Get the repair over with as early as I could, and then be on my way to Moremi. So, back to my evening! Time to build that fire.
And a fire did I build, I was alone in my campsite, with only the aloof Germans next door, so I wasn’t taking any chances and built a nice large, smoky fire. Grilled another steak, and wrapped a potato in foil to bake on the coals. I was impressed with the beef in Botswana, high quality and grass-fed, very tender…and cheap. It was a great night, I was getting more comfortable with the idea that I was camping in the bush. I camped a lot as a kid and into my youth, but the only predators we had were occasional bears, wolves and mountain lions/cougars, but having grown up with these I knew their habits, and what to do to minimize the threats. This was a new and different environment and there is a learning process which demands an abundance of caution.