Okavango delta boat trip - the group

Picked up at the airport, we never saw the capital, Windhoek, until the last day (a nice place but not one to rave about). Flat land, dry bushy scrub as we went east through infrequent small townships - the bush getting gradually greener and taller. Lots of birds - not exactly what I imagined in the "Kalahari Desert". It was supposed to be the "rainy season" (which can mean deluges, but normally means a few mm 2 or 3 times in the week) but we were very fortunate - I never unpacked anorac or umbrella. What no one had realised is that it's low-water in the Okavango Delta in the rainy season, and high water later on. The area is a landlocked inland sump for the Okavango River that fills with the rains in Angola around September time. Most of the land is farmed (cattle, goats) but not intensively (roughly 1 beef cow per 20 hectares). That means relatively little wildlife, though the Delta is built up to be a wildlife experience.
Also we (I had done almost no reading up beforehand) imagined wide waterways with reasonable views here, not being pushed through reed beds, protecting one's face (hence no view) by the mokoro (long narrow punts) polers.
Not unpleasant or uninteresting, simply unexpected, as was sitting cramped for 1½-2hrs in mid-afternoon sun. But we did a few 'game walks' on the islands (solid ground) and saw water buffalo (a dangerous animal, because unpredictable) and red letchwe (an antelope). And when Julia went to stand in the shade of some bushes one time she almost got bowled over by 7 warthogs (a super

Difficult to depict the tall broad trees under which we camped for a couple of nights, with our "bush shower" of a little water dribbled through a small shower nozzle behind a tarpaulin hung between bushes - just a freshener before the next application of anti-mosquito spray (though the mosquitos weren't nearly as uncomfortable as in other areas of the world). A hole-in-the-ground loo with a shovel and soil to cover one's work of the day, also between bushes, but without the tarpaulin. Strange, too, the swishing of the thick grass/reeds on arms and head as we were poled through almost invisible channels; the nighttime sounds "off" of hippo, lion and hyena (not so far off either), and the disappointing walks through (unworked) farmland hoping to see elephant and not seeing a mouse even, the sapping heat and the almost complete lack of contact with the "natives" (not meant pejoratively) – though we did have a camp fire where they told a folk story, ably translated by Ben.

lilac-breasted roller On the way to the Delta we had stopped off at a sort of self-help co-op where the Bushmen used to make cochineal and still make trinkets such as bracelets, in traditional manner, for tourists. However, the enterprise has more or less gone to the dogs in the last year now that there are no foreign NGO workers to chivvy the locals to keep going. It took the west several hundred years to get to a market economy, so it's hardly surprising the semi-nomadic Bushmen of a hot, arid (and hence energy-sapping) climate can't see the point of merchandising. But the traditionally soft leather they work with is from the desert animals (it's what the Bushman wears, if anything)

Leaving the Delta, going north and west, the landscape became drier, but no less flat or green. The kilometres we travelled became very noticeable - if it hadn't been for bird-spotting it would have been pretty boring (Geoff slept well bouncing in the van but very badly at night - I shared a tent with him). We spent a night on the campsite of a farm owned by 3rd generation Germans (a lot in the area - they speak a surprisingly pure language - this used to be German SW Africa), getting invited, after much hinting and cajoling by Julia, to a neighbourhood party, followed the next morning by a tour of the cattle farm (800 cattle on 160km²). By now the scenery was drier, with acacia (thornbush) trees more sparsely spaced, sometimes with individual weaver-bird nests and sometimes with huge sociable-weaver nests filling the boughs. I had read about the area over the years (Laurens van de Post, etc.) but never "seen" it correctly in my mind.
Up by Rundu we stayed at a lodge on the banks of the Okavango and had dinner in the restaurant sitting at a table at last – I wasn't brought up to eat off my knees in front of the tele. And I had the tent to myself – all the others took a room for the night. Am not very good at sleeping with others, but I'm prepared to try! Some rain the next morning, but we were in the bank at the time standing in a lengthy

And thence to the Etosha National Park - probably the high point of the trip, though only 3 nights (and perhaps not as exciting as the Kruger Park in S. Africa). For a salt pan region it has immense herds of beautifully-coloured springboks (the young were playing at running and "sprotting"), zebra and giraffe (doing their "necking" or ritualised stand-off behaviour) – that's a beautiful, elegant and impressive animal. A herd of dust-covered elephant, about 30 with young, ambling through the bush - others scooping trunkfuls of water at a watering-hole. Some lion too - what a snoringly boring animal as it sleeps, perhaps 8 or 9 in a group, in the shade of a thorn tree. Hyena, jackels, wildebeest, together with birds such as kori bustard and ostrich, all there giving life to this hot, rain-forsaken, heat-hazy land. The young springbok we saw sprotting in the evening were bounding in the air out of line as regards to their running track,

rock engravings The park was the beginning of the drier, western, section of the trip, and by the afternoon we left we were already among rocky hills. This was where we saw a large number of petroglyphs, amazingly well-preserved even though there had been major rockfall since they were carved a long time ago (no dates given). Quite impressive. A day-long dirt-road drive to get round the Brandberg massif (about 2000m high), towards the end of which was empty gravel desert. The sea mists come some 40-50km inland but there's no precipitation as such – any animals and plants have adapted to use the frequent mist. Fortunately there was none the day we visited the fur seal colony at Cape Cross – hundreds of them at a particular promontory and thousands of black babies, furrier than I remember them in the Galapagos. Smelt rather strongly as we had our late lunch by the ocean – nice to see the water. That evening and the following morning we had in Namibia's second city, Swakopmund. A Bournemouth of sorts, but smaller, and the major resort for Namibians. Wide streets, low buildings, a prom and some pleasant cafés where one could while away an hour or so. A sleepy outback town.
A long afternoon through the gravel and low sparsely green hills to reach Sossusvlei, a region of sand dunes. You certainly have to travel to see the sights here. Two nights at this gentle site with our tents pitched under a huge camelthorn tree. Over 20 of these trees, a fair distance between them so giving a bit of privacy to each. I wasn't getting to sleep easily so had plenty of chance to see, by moonlight, male springbok fighting for mates and oryx with their long straight horns come right up to the low wall behind which we camped. Not quite as magical as the owl and badger I saw in Germany (so why go to Africa? !) but special all the same. These animals, together with the ostrich, don't need standing water – they can survive for years on