Katy & Richards travels

Day 65 - 19th August - more fishing and flying

We got up at a slightly more reasonable time, 7am, for fishing. Richard was
determined to catch a fish after Katy had (well Jonathan had caught the fish
and given the rod to Katy to reel it in - nearly the same thing). It was a
lovely morning, but cold and we were laughing with Jonathan about his choice
of clothes - shorts! We were sitting on towels so any dew would not soak
through to us and snuggled under blankets.

We went upstream this time to find the elusive Tiger Fish. Past the rapids
and it was strange to see so many eddys and whirlpools on the surface. The
river here was a lot deeper and narrower.

After Katy got her lure stuck many, many times, Jonathan snagged another
Tiger Fish which Richard could 'fight' with reeling it in. It was only a
baby, so we let it go. After more unsuccessful attempts, we headed back to
the lodge to finish our packing. We saw the next couple being briefed on
Daisy (the Defender) and told them to look after her!

We were picked up and dropped off at Livingstone airport which was busy.
The flight was overbooked and people were being bumped off onto the next
South African airways flight. Richard gave in his BA Silver card along with
the tickets and passports and suddenly they found some room in Club Class.
Katy was very excited, never having flown anything other than economy
before! Richard in turn was amazed that she had only gone economy, being
used to the improved service when flying with work! Our Club Class ticket
along with the silver card also managed to get us into the Livingstone
lounge. This offered as many 'wotsits' as you could eat, as well as some
soft drinks - not quite up to Terminal 5 on the way out!

The flight was fairly uneventful and we soon were checking back into the
Intercontinental in Johannesburg and started blogging. We have been so
behind, that we did nothing else (other than considering purchasing a new
computer for Richard - seeing as the last one blew up before we went away,
and getting a massage at the spa for Katy) for the evening, so no photos I'm
afraid!

Day 64 - 18th August - fishing and flying

We had considered going to Livingstone Island today. This is an island on
the river which is right on the edge of Victoria falls, and you can go and
sit on the edge and peer over if you are slightly mad. For the more mentally
unstable it is possible to actually dive into a pool where you can look over
the edge, known as Devils Pool, safe in the knowledge that there is a lip
that prevents you being washed over...unfortunately it was already fully
booked, so we settled on a crack of dawn fishing trip down the Zambezi. It
was beautiful seeing the sun come up over the misty river, albeit absolutely
freezing - fortunately we soon defrosted with a cup of coffee from the
thermos and it was time for Jonathan to teach us how to fish.

We were 'spinning' which is where you have a brightly coloured metallic lure
and the idea is to cast it far into the water and then real it back in to
simulate a small swimming fish. Our first few attempts ended up in various
levels of disaster, ranging from the relatively minor tangling of the reel,
to getting the lure stuck in stones on the riverbed to Richard's more
impressive casting which caused the top half of the rod to fly off into the
water. Poor Jonathan had his work cut out with us but was very happy to
help.

Eventually we got into our stride and had a lovely time in the cool morning
on the river, albeit without any fish in sight! Finally we tried trawling
around a bit (lazy fishing) with our lures in the water as the boat was
driven around. Jonathan's rod got a bite and so he handed it to Katy to reel
in. We'd managed to catch a tiger fish - so called because of their large
teeth and striping - although it wasn't the biggest specimen we were still
quite chuffed to not come away empty handed, and resolved to give the
fishing another go the next morning.

After the fishing we were heading back to the Falls to see them from a
different angle. A lot of people had recommended the helicopter flight, but
we decided to be slightly more daring and take the micro-lite flight. For
those of you not familiar with this method of transport, it involves a
hang-glider bolted onto a Sinclair Z5 with a lawnmower engine on the back.
We were slightly reassured to see one take-off and land without falling to
pieces but were then worried again when we saw the pilot with the other
microlight and a spanner..... We had a bit of a wait to go as they seemed
to tell everyone to come at the same time that afternoon, but after an hour
or so, we were up in the air (albeit separately as each micro-lite only has
space for one passenger). Not only was it a pretty exhilarating experience,
but the views were amazing, and we spent around 15 minutes flying close to
the Falls. You could really get a sense of the size and could see how much
more water there is on the Zimbabwe side. We then had another 15 minutes to
fly upstream over the Zambezi - buzzing elephants, hippos, rhino, giraffe
and other game - definitely the easy way to spot things! Katy's pilot
decided that she should have a go of the controls which she did very briefly
until she asked him to take over again - she didn't enjoy being in control
when she was this high up!

Relieved to have both survived we had a chance to stop into the local
'shopping mall' on the way back, where we found a good bookstore to
replenish our reading material, and an internet cafe to print off all the
boarding cards and e-tickets we would need for our flights over the next few
days. It was then back to the Waterberry for a BBQ/Braai dinner where we had
a good time chatting to an English family with two young boys who had just
arrived and were suitably excited by Africa, before heading back to the room
(seeing a great big orb spider for good measure on roof of our roof - Katy
was thrilled!)

Day 63 - 17th August - exploring the falls

Having decided that we weren't going to do any more driving, we decided the
easiest way to go and see the falls would actually be to drive down there
ourselves. We still had the use of Daisy (the Defender) for the day, and so
headed past the very small game park to the nearby town of Livingstone. We
had been warned about overly officious police, and sure enough we were
stopped at the checkpoint. We were asked a series of complex questions, such
as 'How are we enjoying Zambia?', 'Have you seen the falls?', 'Have you been
in Zambia for long?', 'Where are you from?' before being sent on our way.
Clearly the police don't have much to do and just wanted a chat!

We arrived at the falls on the Zambian side - we had considered going over
to Zimbabwe as well to see the falls from both sides, but didn't fancy going
through 4 more sets of customs and immigration! The falls were about
half-full versus their peak - still very impressive, but without the
thunderous rumbling that you're meant to get earlier in the year. We
followed the slightly precarious trail facing the falls (getting only mildly
damp) and enjoyed seeing the signs warning you not to fall over the edge,
and people disregarding the notices and clambering over the slippery rocks
to get the picture they wanted - quite mad. We then went for a longer walk
around the falls area to see it from a number of angles, and had some
additional highlights including: Zimbabweans who had snuck into the falls
park from the neutral border zone to sell trinkets and sob stories; giant
baboons eyeing up bags and foodstuffs with the menace of a back-alley
mugger; people dipping their feet in the water just metres upstream of the
falls!

After a quick visit to the information centre, which appeared to be a random
stream of encyclopedia entries on topics ranging from geology to
anthropology (with a big empty pit in the middle for good measure) we drove
on to the Royal Livingstone Hotel. We'd been told it was well worth dropping
in for tea to enjoy the grounds and the view, but as we were a bit early we
settled for a light lunch on the veranda overlooking the nearby falls. Very
pleasant, although I think we probably lowered the tone in our somewhat
grimy safari gear and lack of designer accoutrements....

We then drove back to the Waterberry, waving to our best friends at the
police checkpoint and passing yet more bushfires that no one seemed
particularly concerned by. Back at the lodge we handed Daisy back over and
did a debrief with the Safari Drive team to update them on the route and
whether we had found any problems with the vehicle. They then started the
mammoth task of getting the vehicle spotless in time for the next couple to
pick it up. Katy almost had a tear in her eye as she said goodbye to Daisy
who had been our transport and home for the last month and a bit.

Day 62 - 16th August - border crossings galore

Today was going to be an unexciting day of border crossings! We had been
warned off the Kazangula ferry crossing as it can be exceptionally
frustrating when it's busy (in retrospect there's probably not much
difference overall between the route we took and the ferry route). Therefore
we set off early through the park - seeing some very sleepy looking baboons
as well as a vast number of pelicans, wedged into the narrows of the river.
However we had reached a 'saturation point' of game, and decided that we'd
rather get to the next lodge in good time rather than see yet more elephant,
giraffe, buffalo , zebra etc! We have been so spoiled!

The border between Botswana and Namibia was extremely simple. It helps
having a Namibian registered vehicle! We were soon across the river into
Namibia and making good progress along the tar roads. We stopped off a
Katima Mulilo for fuel, although it was close thing as they had run out of
fuel in the normal pumps, and just had it at the HGV depot. From here we
crossed out of Namibia (very easy) and into Zambia. This was a slightly
surreal experience, as there is not the usual border gate - in fact if you
were a hardened criminal, you could put your foot down and simply speed past
the collection of run down buildings and trailers by the side of the road
which passed for Zambian immigration. Fortunately the waiting lorry drivers
found it all quite amusing, and directed us to where we needed to go.
Richard was somewhat distracted by directions from about 10 people at once,
and almost reversed into a taxi - fortunately its horn still worked....

Once inside we worked through the paperwork. It was not as painful as we
expected, although involved multiple payments for random items (carbon tax,
vehicle import duty, VISA, road tax etc). We had been prepared for all of
this by Safari Drive, and it apparently is quite legitimate. We were also
prepared for the hard sale of insurance - apparently this is a usual scam.
The guy was very persistent that we needed to pay it, Richard was on the
verge of capitulating for the sake of $25 and getting on the road again, but
Katy was adamant that she was not going to be ripped off! So after failing
to reach agreement on the insurance, we simply got back in the car and drive
off. The fact that no one tried to stop us was a good indication that they'd
realised they had been rumbled!

The road from the border was pretty good and we made good time to the
Waterberry lodge. Along the way we saw a couple of snakes (some alive and
slithering quickly) and some splatted on the road. This was actually quite
interesting for us, as we hadn't seen a snake the entire rest of the time
(at least not a good look!). We also saw a number of wildfires - apparently
quite common this time of year in Zambia, all it takes is throwing a
cigarette butt out of a window.

It was great to drive into the Waterberry lodge, knowing that we had
survived the route without needing to call for help or damaging either the
car or ourselves! We were shown to our riverside room, with all the luxuries
- bed, roof, door, shower and even a bath! After a bath (which was really
quite dirty after our use!) we enjoyed watching the Zambezi drift by with a
cold drink or two - bliss.

We then joined the sunset boat trip down the river. This was pretty relaxed
with only another English couple for company, Richard acting as the barman
and a cheery local boatman called Jonathan. On getting close to the
Zimbabwean side of the river we persuaded Jonathan to let us leap out and
illegally enter Zimbabwe to pose for a photo. Fortunately Robert Mugabe
seemed to have bigger issues than us violating immigration procedures. We
saw a number of crocs, hippos, water monitors and lots of bee-eater birds
before stopping to look back as the sun set over the river.

We then enjoyed a tasty dinner and a bottle of cold white wine before
collapsing into a very comfy bed!

Day 61 - 15th August - part 6

It was getting late, and we were aware that 'time was against us' in getting
back to the camp before 6.30pm. However our speed was limited by the uneven
river bank terrain, and even more so by yet another giant herd of elephants
- this time crossing directly in front of us. We could only stop and wait,
and as usual the herd quickly surrounded us - fairly unbothered by our
presence with the engine off. However the matriarch and one of the other
juveniles took exception to our presence, challenging us with an ear flap
and a determined fast walk in our direction. Having coped with the highly
aggressive desert elephant before in the 4x4, and the easy to anger Okavango
elephant on foot, we were not too bothered by the Chobe elephants. A rev on
the accelerator and driving towards it showed the juvenile's aggression for
the bravado that it was, and the matriarch was appeased by us backing
slightly away from her (albeit into some of the smaller herd members). It
was an amazing sight, being surrounded by so many elephants at sunset and on
the banks of the river. If only we had known that elephants were scared of
the cars the day before when we were surrounded and Katy was terrified -
this information would have calmed her down a lot!

Once the herd had finally past it was time for rally driving action to get
us back to the campsite in time (the guides from Muchenje would have been
proud) and we sped back through the gates with time to spare! Given it was
already dark we had a quick dinner (while continuing to fend of baboons, and
look out for buffalo, elephants and the other creatures which would wander
through the campsite). We also opened a small bottle of champagne to toast
Shelly and Guy's wedding after a whole afternoon with the firms firmly stuck
in our heads - thee animals had some lovely renditions from Katy! Katy was
for some reason attracting beetles which were flying at her. She finally
had enough after being hit between the eyes and we decided that it was time
to head up for our last night's sleep in a tent.

Day 61 - 15th August - part 5

We turned back towards the campsite, and begun slowly following the river
bank back. There were a huge number of elephant on the river bank, as they
fed on the lush vegetation in their hundreds. We also saw a lot of baboons,
and we stopped by one of the youngsters to take pictures of him playing in
the dirt. His protective sisters and aunts tried to pick him up to move him
away from us, but he was having none of it, and fought them off so that he
could keep playing. Eventually his mother appeared and forcefully picked him
up, leaving no room for disagreement! So like humans! We also saw a large
croc by the water's edge, although at this time of year they tend to be
relatively docile as its fairly cool compared to the summer months.

Day 61 - 15th August - part 4

We had a great afternoon for game viewing - lots of elephant, zebra,
giraffe, antelope (including the ever amusing waterbuck with its shaggy coat
and white bullseye on its rear). The highlight however was seeing another
leopard by the side of the road. We had seen a car stopped up ahead, and
peering through the bush we could see a leopard relaxing under a tree.
However as they are nervous, solitary creatures, it soon moved on deeper
into the bush. We drove around for a while seeing if we could spot it
emerging on another side, but to no avail.

Day 61 - 15th August - part 3

It was a boiling hot day, and we decided to stop to have lunch and also cook
dinner (so we could stay up later that night). We got several pots boiling
and made enough pasta to feed a small army. Katy also realised that Guy and
Shelly would be having their wedding ceremony now, so we joined in with a
few rousing hymns from their order of service that we had brought with us
(thankfully there weren't any nearby campers!). After lunch we had a quick
shower to cool off - they're surprisingly good quality showers, although you
can't get too stressed out by spiders or bat droppings if you're going to
use them. Richard was also amused by the 'Bain drain' that he found (he
works for Bain & Company), and was wondering whether they had branched out
into the bathroom fittings market in his absence.

As we set off again we came across a lot more elephants, including several
very young calves. Fortunately the elephants are relatively relaxed here, as
demonstrated when a guide with an empty vehicle screamed past a group of
elephants crossing the road, and while smiling and laughing drove up to us
and said 'you don't need to worry about the elephants here - see they
weren't even scared of me!' Richard thought it would have been amusingly
ironic if an elephant had followed him and stomped on his car at that
moment. Unfortunately (or fortunately) they really are quite relaxed!

Day 61 - 15th August - part 2

We drove on up into the low hills up from the river to see if we could have
any more luck up there. It was full of Kudu and not much else - although it
was really nice to see so many Kudu up close. They tend to freeze when you
get close and then make their escape, so if you're lucky you can get nice
close up photos of them. This is unlike giraffe who tend to turn their backs
on you given half a chance!

We then curved back down towards the river to see more warthog drinking and
cooling down, as well as a lot of magnificent fish eagles perched on the
large trees bordering the river. There were also a lot of smaller blue
pastel coloured birds - we haven't yet identified them, but they're very
sweet!

Unfortunately while trundling along quite slowly there was a loud
'pfffffttttt' from in front of us. Our first reaction was that it was the
tyre going, but then we realised it was coming from in front of us, not from
one of the sides. Richard hopped out (having checked for lions, leopards and
other creatures first!). The tyres seemed fine, and the engine wasn't
showing any high temperature or low oil warnings. Therefore we carefully
drove to a nearby open area where you can have picnics (as you should be
able to see any predators before they jump you!). We then popped the bonnet
to find that there was coolant sprayed from the radiator cap all over the
back of the engine block. However it didn't seem that there was any leak,
just a cap that needed re tightening. We dried everything off with a towel,
checked the oil and water levels, and reassured that the car was not about
to explode, drove on.

Day 61 - 15th August - last night of camping - part 1

This was our last day of camping, and we were missing Shelly & Guy's
wedding. We thought of them both getting ready.

We set off to see which animal were about today. Katy's game eyes weren't
functioning first thing in the morning without a coffee, so it was Richard
who saw the Hyena standing by the road. It quickly turned and ran away, but
it was nice to see one relatively close. They really are scary looking
animals. They have a fairly bad reputation - being the skulking creatures
stealing food from other animals but actually they often make kills and are
chased off the food by the lions who are not the most active of creatures.

You could tell that we were getting close to the dead elephants and the
lion's meal from the day before as we saw lots of vultures still in the
trees waiting for their turn. The lionesses weren't very active, obviously
they had managed another meal and felt stuffed and ready for a sleep after
their excursions. We drove on a bit further, and although we didn't see a
lot of game for a while there were some more beautiful birds.

...and some more fun photos from Chobe

Some pictures of the baboons

Day 60 - 14th August - leopard!

We had to go on one early morning drive with Muchenje, so we got up after
having a gentle knock on the door at 5.30. We met round the fire for coffee
before heading off. It was cold this early!

There seemed to be very little game around, so we were all scanning around
hoping to see anything. Then Orbert let out a cry - 'Leopard, down there!'
It was right next to the road sitting slightly behind a bush. It was
beautiful. He sat there looking back at us for a couple of minutes before
having enough of the attention and leading off back to the hills. The
leopard is the most common of the big cats in Africa but is also the least
seen. They are very secretative animals, normally being solitary and also
nocturnal. All other cats seem to notice the overall shape of the the thing
next to it, so will see a car and think, thats bigger than me. The leopard
looks out for eyes, so will check out everyone separately in the car! We
were really pleased to have seen it because this was the last large predator
we hadn't seen, and was the fifth of the big 5 (being elephant, rhino, lion,
leopard and buffalo).

One of the guides had seen a lion the day before, we so headed off in the
direction to try and find it. Orbert then got a call on the radio saying
that they had found the lion but it was a distance away from us. A high
speed chase followed. Another company saw us pass and shouted, 'Which way
is it?' and this seemed like a very obvious answer - the direction we were
speeding in of course! We arrived at the spot only to hear that the lion
had wandered off a couple of minutes before we arrived. We were still high
on the leopard sighting, so could cope without the lion.

This morning there were so many zebra by the water - perhaps they could
smell the lion and leopard and stuck to the open grassy area for safety.

We also saw buffalo up close. Both the male and female have horns, but the
males are across their heads whereas the female do not have then between the
points. Its a bit difficult to explain, so here is a photo instead! They
are huge animals and we could see why they are considered to be dangerous.
They seemed to respect the cars but we wouldn't want to be out on foot with
these.

We got back to the lodge, had breakfast and packed everything back into
Daisy (the Defender). The lodge had gone above and beyond hospitality with
cleaning hear. The amount of dust we had picked up was a lot and we were
very pleased to have a clean car. If only they had had the keys to do the
inside too!

We headed off to Kasane to fill up on petrol and to buy a couple of bits of
food for the final few days of camping. As we drove into the town, a large
warthog crossed the road - clearly not so wild after all!

We got back to the park and drove some of the north side. We saw lots of
hippos all resting themselves on each other in the head of the day. There
were a few grunts and definately a few farts!

We went back to the spot where we had seen the lions the day before. Whilst
the dead elephant was still there, the lions were not. The vultures had
obviously heard about the kill as there were loads in the all the nearby
trees. This is likely to mean that the lions were still around somewhere,
protecting the meat for themselves, but despite trying, we couldn't see
them. We headed off to the spot we had seen the leopard the day before and
again saw no sign so headed off to the campsite.

We had been chatting to the guides at Muchenje about Richard's wish for a
toy leopard to heep them away. They can be very persistance and annoying,
playing on tents, stealing food and other things. The leopard, being one of
their main predators keeps them away according to a book Richard had read.
THe guides at Muchenje had problems with baboons breaking into the rubbish
(which is stored in a locked metal cage). They tried throwing things,
shouting at them and neither worked. Tehn they found a plastic snake and
put that on top of the rubbish. The baboon came along, watching the guides
to see if anything was going to be thrown at them right up until the last
minute. The baboon spotted the snake and started walking in reverse
immediately. Apparently another way of scaring them off is to pick up a
stick and aim it at them. If they have been hunted in the pst, they will
run away and even faint with fright. Our favourite story (although we are
not sure if this one is true) has to be when you catch a baboon and paint
him white. You then release him, he goes to look for his troop who are
scared by this white creature and run away. The baboon runs after his troop
only for them to continue running away! Richard was very busy trying the
stick trick which wasn't incredibly susccessful, but Katy found it very
funny to watch all the same!

We chatted to the very friendly guard who said that other campers had seen
the leopard further east. This could be the same one we saw the day before
moving through the park. We had a spot of lunch and left our table and
chairs locked up to reserve the site. When we came back later in the day,
it was clear that the baboons we saw in the trees had visited our site and
had a nice relax in our chairs!

We also bumped into the French family we had met at Moremi South Gate and
again at Kwhai. It was nice to see a friendly face and had a nice chat.

There were a lot more baboons close to the river than we had seen before.
As we mentioned before, they are funny to watch. One baby having a ride on
its mothers back whilst having a tasty leaf snack, before getting tired and
lying down on her back, then falling off and finally having some milk. If
that is what happens to your body when you have children, then Katy isn't
sure she wants any just now!

We headed off towards the river to see more animals but got a bit confused
with the paths. We ended up on Puku flats - an area between the river and
the smaller channels. It was a great place to see birds, and as we had seen
so many mammals, we were getting keener on te birds. There was some tough
driving and finally we came to some water. We had decided after Moremi and
Kwhai, that unless we needed to cross the water, we wouldn't anymore. It
was time to turn around and take a few more photos of the fish eagle!

We also saw the Red Leche, an antelope that likes to stay in marshy area.
It will then run into the water and away from predators who don't like to
get wet. The male seemed fairly relaxed in our company, but the female was
less sure.

We also saw a much more serious looking Impala fight than we had seen before
- these guys meant business. It was interesting to watch as one would
charge in with his head down hoping to stab the other. Then the horns
locked and one or both would be forced to the ground, only for it to start
again.

We drove further west and found some bee-eater birds. They are really
colourful with their green body and yellow head. We liked them because the
bees in Africa are huge and really don't look very friendly! An Egret later
and a Kudu with cleaning birds on its back and it was time to head back to
the campsite.

We decided with the baboons around, we would have some snacks rather than a
cooked meal and it was soon time for an early night.

Day 59 - 13 August - More Muchenje (Part V)

It was time to get off the boat and back in the car. Orbert had managed a
nice sleep whilst we had been gone. Then it was off to spot some lions. An
elephant had died and there were 2 lionesses and 2 cubs making the most of
the free meal - they would stay near such a large food source for a few days
so we planned to come back and see them when we were camping. The elephant
is thought to have died from anthrax but as lions have strong stomach acid,
they won't get infected. The body (once eaten by carnivores) would be take
away by the park rangers, otherwise the anthrax would be passed onto other
herbivores that ate nearby. The guides are not allowed off the road, but
Orbert risked it quickly for us to get up close to them say 'Please be
quick, we are not allowed here.' He certainly wasn't the only guide to do
this as we saw clear tyre marks and more followed where we had been after we
left. It was good to see the close, but lions are fairly stationary
creatures, conserving energy (or loafing about) for about 23 hours a day, so
there is a fairly remote chance of seeing any action from them.

Although Katy was banned from taking more giraffe photos after Etosha, she
managed to sneak one in (of the birds who just happened to be on a
giraffe). They eat the ticks and clean up the coat of animals, who are
happy to transport them around.

Then as we were heading off for our sundowner, we saw a large group of
elephants crossing the small channel. The elephants, being so tall, can
easily get through relatively deep water. The babies will hold onto their
mothers tail and be lifted up by sisters on either side to get them across.
It was lovely to see.

There was no game drive this evening, so we had a relax after dinner and
managed to stay awake chatting to a couple living in Dubai (also on their
honeymoon) and an English couple who were now living in Spain. We managed
to stay awake until about 9.30 which was quite impressive given our normal
bedtime when camping is about 7!

Day 59 - 13 August - More Muchenje (Part IV)

On the shore, by the hippos were some elephants, having a good drink, a good
splash, a scratch on a handy rock and a roll in the mud. They secrete fluid
from the side of their face when they are stressed or when they are in musth
(ready for mating). We hope that coming to the water calmed this mother
down.

The baby elephants are so funny as they cannot control their trunks well to
start with and this skill improves as the muscles develop, We enjoyed
seeing one trying to splash about with some (but not great) success - her
feet seemed to be better than her trunk.

After enjoying the view, the boat was moving off when an elephant heard us.
He came back to the water (elephants do not like to share their waterhole as
we had seen in Etosha ) and assumed that it was the hippos that had
disturbed them and stood there trumpeting and walking into the water. The
hippos quickly hid underwater and as they can hold their breathe for about 6
minutes, the elephant got bored and wandered off.

Day 59 - 13 August - More Muchenje (Part III)

Richard was also becoming obsessed about taking photos of the Fish Eagle -
although it is a pretty impressive bird!

Moving down the river we came to some more active hippos including a baby
hippo which stand on their mothers backs to be deep enough to be safe but
shallow enough to breath. Poor Mummy Hippo had to strain her head back to
get her nostrils out of the water to breathe.

Hippos have huge lower teeth which can bite through a boat. It is
understandable why we kept our distance. They are the biggest killer of all
the animals in Africa, because they can hide so well in the water and will
kill if they are disturbed.

We saw another type of antelope - the Puku which is only on the Namibia side
(the river being the border between Botswana and Namibia) as they can't swim
across the river.

Day 59 - 13 August - More Muchenje (Part II)

More close elephants, more giraffe, warthogs, zebra. We were getting
spoilt. Orbert was also telling us the collective nouns to describe groups
of animals - like the herd of cattle, the parade of elephants (when they are
moving), the memory of elephants (when they are still), the tower of
giraffe, the crash of rhinos, the bloat of hippos or our favourite, the
dazzle of zebra.

Then it was time to get on the boat and to have some lunch before heading
off to see the water based animals. Being on the water also allows you to
get up close to some of the land-based mammals having a drink in the day as
they feel less threatened having a clear escape route.

We saw our first close crocodile. He was big and busy eating - he would go
under for a minute or so and then come back up and throw his head back to
swallow the fish he had caught. Suddenly, we didn't feel like swimming in
the river to cool off any more.

There was a small pod of hippos doing very little as they sleep in the day
when they could get sun burnt, coming out of the water to graze at night
making the occasional honk - they really do make a strange noise.

We also saw one of the sillier birds in the area - the African Spoonbill,
busy wading and searching for food. There were loads of Kingfishers about,
hovering above the water before diving in and there were Reed Cormorants
drying their wings off in the sunshine. We also saw one of the ugliest
birds - the Maribo Stork with its bald red head.

Day 59 - 13 August - More Muchenje (Part I)

Today we decided to miss the early morning drive and appreciate the comfy
bed and do some unexciting things like blogs and washing underwear (the
lodges won't do this as part of the laundry). The colour of the water after
the socks were washed was quite disguisting!

We spoke to JJ the night before about our puncture and he would take off the
tyre, fit the spare and take the punctured one into Kasane to be repaired.
We hadn't expected this - we were just pleased that we could change it
somewhere relatively safe without the need to look out for lions, etc. JJ
also asked for the keys - they were petrol heads really and wanted a good
look at the engine. He came back very excited saying it was a TD6 and there
were loads of sensors in the engine.

We joined the other guests for breakfast and then it was time to head off on
our all day safari. We would drive on the main road to a part of the park
further away, then go on a river cruise over lunch and back on the game
vehicle for an afternoon drive.

Along the road we saw Steenbok, the Ground Hornbill and some Baboons. We
were becoming experienced game viewers by now and some of the more common
animals are not as exciting as they were at the start (when we got excited
by a single Springbok). The baboons were fun to watch - the large male
ignoring us (the theory being if I don't look at you, I'm not challenging
you and you might go away), with the younger ones being more interested.
Mums were grooming the younger baboons and there was a bit of fighting over
food. They are so human in their mannerisms that it is fascinating. The
baboons can also be a nuisance as they know that campers mean food, and as
they have long canines (longer than a leopard's!) and the males are quite
large, we didn't want to upset them too much.

We saw massive herds of Impala. They come together when there is plenty of
food and can split into several smaller herds in the dry season. There is
one dominant male for all the female who he has to keep happy (not an
enviable job really) and he will constantly be challenged for his leadership
by other males and the fight can take up to 3 days. Immature or quiet males
are tolerated as long as they don't attempt any mating, if they do, they are
quickly chased off. There are also bachelor groups of Impala and they will
often have play fights to improve their skills ready for the real thing.

Chobe was also one of the areas that was well known for the large numbers of
roan antelope that could be seen. They are beautiful with their horns
curving backwards.

Day 58 - 12th August - Drive to Muchenje (Part III)

We continued to the river and saw a breeding herd of elephant having a drink
and a play in the water. It was lovely to watch the younger (and some
older) elephants having a good play and splash about.

Some would go right into the water for a drink, cooling themselves down at
the same time. One poor guy was obviously left behind and came running
along on his own after all the others. The big bull of the group dug
himself out a good mud hole and then got down for a facemask! The smaller
elephants would wait in turn until he was done for their own go.

One young elephant managed to get into the water for a drink but really
struggled to get up the bank again. After a few attempts, a helpful sister
gave him a nudge up.

Elephants are very protective animals and will surround the younger calves
if they feel threatened. Sisters act as part-time Nanny's looking out for
their siblings and don't seem to have the sibling rivalry seen in humans!

Day 58 - 12th August - Drive to Muchenje (Part IV)

Once the elephant had quenched their thirst, they were off. We carried on
driving and saw warthogs 'praying'. Their front legs are too long to be
able to graze on grass so they have to bend down on their knees. They have
calluses here to protect them which baby warthogs are born with. We also
passed a large flock of pelicans. We were really surprised to see them in
such large numbers, as it didn't look like there could be enough fish in the
river to support all of them.

Then it was time to drive on for our sundowners. We stopped by the river
(away from the elephants) and got out to stretch our legs to watch the
African sunset - beautiful! We had a couple of beers while watching the sun
go down behind the game, and then it was time to head back to the lodge.

The guides need to be out by 6.30pm or they get fined. We therefore had a
speed safari on the way back, seeing giraffe, baboons, elephants very close,
and more, but Orbert kept saying 'Time is not on our side' and zoomed on.
The guides need to stick to the National Park rules or risk losing the
guiding licence so everything is taken very seriously as this is their
livelihood - except for the speed limit when 6.30 is approaching! I think
we got out of thee park at 6.31 which was close enough to be allowed.

It was time to head back to the lodge, and call home to reassure our parents
that we were still alive.

After dinner, we decided to go on a night drive. You aren't allowed inside
the park after park, so this was around the lodge and down to the river. It
was very cold without loads to see - this is the way with drives, sometimes
they can be amazing and sometimes they are sleeping safaris! We were lucky
enough to see a hyena, an owl and the local disco!

Day 58 - 12th August - Drive to Muchenje (Part II)

After checking the bed was comfy (yes), the shower worked (bliss!) and that
they had a free laundry service (much needed!), we were taken off for the
afternoon game drive. The lodge were very good and liked to keep the groups
in the game vehicles small. They could have squeezed us in with large
groups, but there was just us and a couple, Elizabeth and John, with our
guide Orbert. They were on a SKI holiday (Spend the Kids Inheritance). The
advantage of going game driving with a lodge with multiple vehicles is that
once one finds something interesting, they radio the others and you get a
better chance of seeing more animals.

The North of Chobe had much more game, as it was next to the river. As we
drove down We saw lots of zebra, some kudu, lots of impala and some
elephants. We also saw our second Monitor Lizard of the day - this one was
a water monitor made a hasty get away.

Day 58 - 12th August - Drive to Muchenje (Part I)

We had a leisurely wake up but were keen to start the long drive to
Muchenje. We had been told that this was the longest drive of our trip and
was expected to take about 10 hours (although was only about 280km - so that
tells you something about the condition of the roads!). We had knocked
about an hour off by finding the new dry road to the south gate of Chobe the
day before and happily sung Christmas carols as we passed through the new
road white-out that sprayed up around us. Katy had decided to treat Daisy
(the Defender) the day before to say thank you for being so good and gave
her a bit of a clean, including the windscreen. All this hard work was
undone in a second of going through the white dust as Richard had to turn on
the windscreen wipers to have any hope of seeing anything.

It was quite early, and in the dim light in the distance we could make out a
dark shape in front on the road. We drove past it and saw that it was a
Spotted Hyena. They have a very different shape and style of running from
the cats and it was good to see one (for a second) in the daylight.

We got to the South gate of Chobe in good time, and made it through the
checks on our Park Pass (we imagine that the gate guard was half asleep).
and started to look out for animals. We had been told that elephants move
in herds of 100s in this park so we were hopefully for lots of game. At the
start we only saw antelope - Steenbok - a small antelope with large ears,
and the Kudu - a large antelope who's males have beautiful horns.

We were making reasonable time, so we decided to try a detour to a waterhole
as the park was very dry and hoped the animals would be there having a
drink. The waterhole was also bone dry which meant no animals. The roads
were going through dense vegetation and after spotting a couple of elephants
at a safe distance, Richard drove past one bush to find an elephant on the
other side. It surprised him as much as the elephant and with a burst of
speed we got past him before the trumpeting started. Eagle-eyed Richard
also spotted a Savanna Monitor Lizard who was basking in the sun (and
investigating some elephant dung) but moved off as we stopped beside him.

We saw some nice birds and Katy's favourite by now is the lilac-breasted
roller. These birds are beautifully coloured - the underwings are a bright
turquoise with a purple belly. They are fairly common in Botswana and it is
their national bird. They are also very fast so despite many, many
attempts, this is the only photo of one flying.

We were a little disappointed with the lack of game and the professional
guides were also stopping us (while they had tourists in the back) and
asking if we had seen anything - a sure sign that it was a quiet morning.
After an early brunch by a waterhole with some water and Impala, we decided
to press on.

The roads were sandy but once we got out of the park, the sand got deeper.
Richard had asked about driving on sand on his 1/2 day 4x4 course and its
all about building up some speed, so we zoomed through the sand which is
very tiring (needing to manhandle the car back to the ruts fairly often
without power steering). We made great time and soon arrived at Muchenje at
1.45 - just in time for lunch!

As we parked, JJ (who was a star) said he thought we had a puncture. Once
we stopped, we had a look and it seemed OK. Later on, Daisy was looking
very wonky - JJ was right. But at least it was a good place to get a
puncture!

It seemed that they had saved us food and it felt rude to say no so we had
lunch on top of our earlier brunch before being shown to our room which had
a great view over the river complete with Zebra, Kudu and Impala. The lodge
was just outside of Chobe National Park and had built some lovely wooden
chalets.

We have a lot of photos coming up so we have had to split each day into more
than one blog entry, hopefully you will understand why we found it so
difficult to chose our favourite photos as you see them!

Day 57 - 11th August - recuperating in Khwai

The good news was that we had emerged unscathed from the previous day,
although the Defender was convinced its handbrake was stuck on (probably
some reeds and mud caked to the bottom) and the mental trauma! The other
good news was that we didn't have to get anywhere this day as we had two
nights at the same campsite.

The bad news was that the route on the map looked like it would take us
through more water hazards the next day. Richard wanted to check to see
whether it was driveable, in case we needed to change our plans (the next
day's drive was meant to be a 10-hour monster of a drive anyway).

Speaking to one of the other camps, they pointed out that there were two
routes - the normal one which had some water, but which wasn't too bad, and
a cut through to a new road which was water free. This was very exciting and
we eagerly set off. After a few minutes meandering through the bush, we came
to a great big gravel road - really quite exciting!

We also saw a game vehicle parked up down the road, and on closer inspection
we saw that they were waiting for a herd of buffalo to show themselves. Sure
enough they got closer, and we added another creature to our list of animals
spotted, and had now seen four of the 'big 5' african mammals - only leopard
left to see. The Buffalo seemed slightly reticent to fully come out, and so
we continued down the road leaving the several tour groups now parked up to
watch them.

The road was very good, although completely unmarked on any of our maps - it
was heading broadly in the right direction though and so we pressed on. One
bit was particularly interesting, as it appeared to be great mounds of soft,
crusty salt. Driving through this was like going through a snowdrift, as it
would shoot up huge clouds of thin dust. All the surrounding trees and
landscape was covered in this, and it looked just like some winter
wonderland scene - quite surreal.

After a few wiggles in the road we made it to the entrance gate to Chobe
national park. Now knowing that we would be able to make the trip the next
day water-free, we headed back to the campsite in much better spirits!

Once back at the campsite we went on a drive to see some of the nearby game
along the river. There were a lot of elephants playing around, including two
that seemed intent on dunking each other in the deep water. These were great
to watch, but one of the juveniles took exception to us being near the herd,
and came trumpeting towards us. With elephants this size, it's nearly always
just for show, but we decided not to press our luck and drove on further
down the river. It was quite amusing when we heard a further angry
trumpeting behind us - another vehicle had also stopped to watch the
elephants, further infuriating the irritable teenager!

We found a nice spot to stop by the river and watch all the wildlife. We had
hippos on one side in the river, an elephant on the other side breaking
branches off the tree, and lots of birdlife that came in to visit us once
we'd switched the engine off and waited a while. Our favourite sighting was
a saddle billed stork - which is a brightly coloured large bird with a
distinctive red and black striped bill. It walked right past us and caught a
frog which it had a bit of difficulty swallowing.

After a while it was getting too hot in the middle of the day, so we
returned to the campsite. It was fairly empty and so we moved to a better
site which was very shady and secluded - here we relaxed under the awning of
the Landrover. Eventually it cooled down and we decided to head out again to
look for animals. On the way out we met the French family who we'd seen in
Moremi - they were very excited to have made it through the water in one
piece, and had also been lucky enough to see a big pride of lions at a
Buffalo kill in Moremi.

As we drove around we saw more guides who had been traumatised by the deep
water - one was concerned as to whether he was going to make it across one
of the shallower bits, so we didn't hold out much hope for them making it to
Khwai!

We decided to have an early night in anticipation of the very long drive the
next day. We also had some logs left over by a previous camping group, and
so had a large campfire. Just before going to bed, Richard had headed
slightly out into the bush to answer the call of nature, and was disturbed
by Katy's forced whisper of 'Richard - get into the car now!'. Richard
looked across to see that an elephant had managed to sneak up quite close in
the dark (and elephants don't make a sound while walking due to their broad,
padded feet) and was now about 10 foot away from him.

Hastily making his escape back to the car, we sat in the front seats,
looking to see what the elephant would do next. Fortunately it was only here
for the succulent Acacia branches, and having snapped off a few it ambled
round to the other side of the campsite. One of the nearby campsites saw the
movement and shone some bright torches towards it, and it reluctantly ambled
off into the darkness for some peace and quiet.

After this we decided it was probably time to go to bed, and so headed up to
the sanctuary of the roof tent.

Day 56 - 10th August - getting wetter!

Today we were driving to Khwai Campsite which had to be close to the Khwai
Gate of the park. We decided to go the direct route after the watery
excitement of the previous day. Before we set off we checked with the guard
that we had the right tickets - the dates it covered were a bit confusing
and after we confused the guard and the guard confused us, we all jointly
decided that we had the right number of days paid for. This was a relief as
the rules had recently changed and we could only buy more permits from Maun,
which was a 90 minute drive away.

We set off on a leisurely drive to North Gate and got there in good time
having seen an kingfisher hovering above the water, a reedbuck sitting in
the grass and some African Jacana birds (also known as the Jesus Bird as it
walks on lily pads so appears to walk on water). We also did a bit of
driving round the other side of the park, visiting the Hippo pools where
there was a lookout hide (although somewhat unstable).

We spoke to the other guard who seemed to agree that we had the right
permits and Katy asked for some directions to the campsite. It was about
24km from the gate and you needed to go over a couple of streams. When Katy
asked if they were deep, she was told that in our car we would have no
problems. Phew!

Driving through the Kwhai village, we stopped off to give our papers to the
office and were asked if we needed someone to guide us. The only problem
being that we would need to drive back to drop him off and then drive back
to the campsite. He seemed certain that we would get lost or stuck in the
deep channel - we were looking forward to it already! After taking down the
GPS co-ordinates we decided to try it on our own and the guide said that he
was sure he would see us later!

The first challenge was not a 'stream' as it had been described by the guy
at the National Park Gate, it was definitely a river. Luckily we had
followed 2 South African cars from the gate who were travelling together.
Suddenly having 2 cars seemed very sensible. One car drives into the water
and if anything happens, the second car can pull it out. Both managed to
get through but it was deep, so off we went after a minor panic by Katy.
The water was up over the tyres and a little started coming in under the
door which is a bit disconcerting but we made it through to our great
relief.

We followed the road and came to another water crossing that looked massive
(as in, we couldn't see where it came out the other side). It looked
impossible and we weren't going to attempt it. Then Katy (who has never
been good with remembering directions) thought that we should have turned
off the road earlier so we did a multiple point turn (the Defender has the
turning circle of a bus) and looked for another route. On our way back we
saw the 2 brave South African drivers who were trying to get to the same
place and we mentioned that the water looked too deep to cross but off they
went. We didn't see them again that day so they either got stuck (the most
likely) or powered on through and sped ahead of us (lets hope it was this
one!)

We had tried charging the satellite phone the day before but it seemed to be
temperamental so we weren't really sure if it had any charge or not. This
made going into the water that bit more nerve wracking because if we did get
stuck, we weren't sure whether we could call up the company who organised
the trip and beg for help. It would obviously be a bit embarrassing and
would really ruin the schedule so we didn't plan on getting stuck. The
water can go up fairly high on the car as Richard had learnt on his 1/2 day
training course - the air intake is on the bonnet so as long as this doesn't
go below the water level, we should be fine.

We met a Dutch family on the second water crossing (albeit on the opposite
side!). They had a lower Toyota and after a bit of shouting across and
agreeing the best route would be to follow the grass just sticking out of
the water we made it cross. Once on the same side, we asked about the rest
of the route and how they chose the routes through water. Apparently the
children would be sent out to wade it and if it got too deep for them, then
the parents would get out and take it seriously (needless to say, we saw
numerous crocs and hippos in the rivers....). They also mentioned that the
water had gone over their bonnet and that they had a guide with the some of
the way. It was getting better and better! They had the added disadvantage
of a trailer but had stopped to take out their sleeping bags so they didn't
get wet - at least we didn't have that problem. The only way our sleeping
stuff would get wet was if the water came over the roof, and I think having
a wet blanket would be the least of our problems.

We headed off again wishing them luck and saying that they only had one more
stream to cross and they would be out of the worst. We carried on and met
some professional guides who were asking us the way - it made us feel a lot
better if the professionals were also struggling to get through. At this
point Katy wanted to turn around and drive back to Maun and give up on the
whole driving thing. It was just too scary for her!

We came to a third water crossing and after checking all alternative routes,
we had 3 crossings to chose. We were standing on the roof of the Defender
to try and get a better idea of the depth. The water was so muddy that you
really couldn't tell how deep it was. There were trees in the middle, so
perhaps this was a sign that it was OK but the again, we also saw some
elephant having a bath on the other side, so it looked pretty deep. As we
were standing there considering our options, we heard another car crossing.
We jumped back in and followed the sound to one of the other crossings. If
they made it through, then so could we. In we went and it started OK, up to
the top of the tyres and then we seemed to nosedive. We must have been
driving over a log and now we were off it, the water was deeper. The water
came over the bonnet and splashed the windscreen. Richard's feet were wet
and we could hear the burbling of the air intake. Oh no - it was going to
be time to try out the phone when Daisy (the Defender) listened to Katy's
words of encouragement "Come on Girl, you can do it...please" or Richard's
swear words and struggled on through and then came back up. Phew, we had
made it through, but only just. Katy then decided that Richard was her
hero. Richard then decided he needed a hovercraft.

Katy was shaking and Richard had definitely had enough of off-road driving
by now. We continued following the road getting closer to the GPS
co-ordinates we had been given when we came to our 4th water crossing. You
could hear hippos very close by and we waited and revved the engine in the
hope of scaring them off. It just attracted another one but this helpfully
walked partly through the water we needed to cross which helped up
understand the depth. After waiting for about 5 minutes for them to finish
eating the grass (we can understand the hungry hippo game now - they really
don't stop scoffing once they start), it was time to see if these hippos
were like the one we met yesterday - scared of cars. The water looked a
little less deep but a bit more muddy, so on we went. Hearing the roar of
the engine the two hippos ran past the front of the car and we made it
through the water.

We saw some tents in the distance but these looked like large professionally
run camps, so we headed over to ask for directions. When the guy said that
this was Kwhai Community Campsite, Katy could have kissed him (she didn't -
not an appropriate thing to do now she is married!) There were more sites
nearer the river but we had seen enough water for the day, we parked in the
shade and poured ourselves a large G&T.

Sorry for the lack of photos of all this excitement, but Katy was just too
scared to think about the camera at all!

We set up camp and created a bush toilet as this campsite had no facilities
at all other than trees to provide shade. It was time for wine, some food
and an early night after all the stresses and strains.

Day 55 - 9th August - getting wet

Today we had a whole day to explore Moremi. It was quite different to Etosha
in that to get around you needed to use 4x4 only tracks, and it was much
more enclosed by vegetation. This was quite evident as only a short time
after setting off we had a close encounter with a number of elephants. There
seemed to be some disagreement, as one male chased off another, which then
looking for someone else to pick on spied us! We decided to drive on rather
than challenge a disgruntled elephant.

As the Okavango had flooded so much, a lot of the outer areas of Moremi were
much wetter than normal. We saw a lot of animals that were adapted to the
water, like the Reedbuck and the Waterbuck, which have wider hooves so that
they don't sink into the mud. We also saw an antelope we hadn't seen before
(there are a lot of types of antelope!) called the Tseebe. We also saw a
lot of birdlife, although have not become avid 'twitchers' yet so pressed on
to find some more animal life.

The disadvantage was that the route was slightly more challenging given all
the water. Our first obstacle was a seemingly fairly deep pool that we
couldn't go around. We stopped for a while to consider our options, and
decided that we couldn't really spend 2 days sitting in a campsite and we
had hired the 4x4 for a reason, and so pressed on. Although slightly
unnerving, it wasn't as deep as we thought (although still nearly up to the
bottom of the doors - which would be up to the bonnet of a normal car!) and
we were soon back onto dry land feeling very relieved.

From here we drove up over 1st bridge (which was non existent - replaced by
a muddy and sandy mess), we then drove over 2nd bridge (which had collapsed
into the water, and we took another wet, swampy leap of faith around the
side) and finally up to 3rd bridge (which although intact, the wooden logs
appeared to fall apart as you drove over it - we have a good video of this
if anyone is interested!).

We celebrated reaching 3rd bridge with a cool drink and a toilet stop
(there's a small campsite there). Apparently they have real problems with
baboons, and people leaving food around for them or leaving the doors to the
toilets open. It would be quite a shock to find a large male baboon (about
the size of a 5 year old child) sitting on the toilet!

We were keen to find a lion if possible, and so tried to find a route
towards Lions Den Pan. Unfortunately our route was blocked at every turn by
impassable muddy traps. We drove a bit into some of them only to quickly
reverse out as we started to sink into deep, boggy mud and as water started
coming in the doors. This was definitely a time to have the low gear
engaged, and the differential locked (for those petrol heads amongst you!).
Eventually we gave up, figuring that we would look quite silly if we had to
call for a tow out of the mud, and so pressed on along a slightly drier
route.

Here we had some great sightings, with a lot of elephant and hippos. One
particular hippo seemed relatively unbothered by us (they're normally scared
of big things out of water) and so we ended up having to drive a few foot
away from it. Again, we have a good video where Richard drives up to it and
then speeds away in case it decided to take a chunk out of us!

We met another self-driving couple at the Xananka Gate who were having
trouble with their oil and stopped for a chat. They were also planning on
going from North Gate into Chobe but weren't sure they could make it over
the River Khwai. They had a lower Toyota and were a bit envious about our
car!

We then started heading back to the campsite, having had enough adrenaline
for the day. We passed the airstrip complete with elephants on the runway.

We had another early night after the elephants just in case they came back
to look for more fruit. We also opened up the windows on the tent so we
could see out. The moon was close to full and gave out an incredible amount
of light. Luckily we didn't have any visitors that night!

Day 54 - 8th August - reaching Moremi game park

We had a more leisurely wake up this morning which was just as well as
neither of us had slept very well given the elephant excitement the night
before. We were leaving Oddballs this morning at 11 so we didn't have time
for a mokoro trip but instead went to the local village.

Here we saw the sin bin - this appears to be a bus shelter but is where you
go (and you would be sent there by the village head) if you have done
something bad and need to be punished. The seriousness of the crime will
determine the length of time you have to stay there. There is no need for
guards as the other villagers will make sure you stay put. Although
apparently the village head has also been in there many times - I'm not sure
if Information was having a good laugh at us for believing this.

We were followed by some dogs who all seemed very friendly and this is
because they were given injections by some Europeans vets who had fed them
lots of meat. The dogs remembered this and hoped that every white person
who came to the village would have more meat with them!

We were shown how the houses were built - from empty cans that cool the
houses in the summer and are then stuck in place by mixing dirt dug from a
termite mound with water. The termites will then not attack the house as
they will think they have been there already as their scent is there and the
dried dirt is very hard meaning the houses are stronger. This was
Information's house and it will take about another 4 weeks to complete it
and thatch it with reeds. We also saw the bakers house - he was obviously a
busy man with the smartest of houses with yard.

Information was explaining how most of their food is tinned and flown in
from Maun as when they try to grow anything, the elephants will come in and
eat it. They will knock down a storage hut if they think there is fruit
inside but they will not normally attack a building with humans.
Information was much more relaxed in the village about elephants than he had
been on the islands of the delta.

Villagers were chatting to him as we went, all asking the same question -
are they going to look at baskets? Then they got very busy and rushed off
to set up the market stall of woven bowls, baskets, table mats, etc. One
little boy was crying hard and Information mentioned that he was sad because
his mother had gone to sell baskets - we felt guilty then. We bought a
couple of things, not because we wanted them but more to put some money into
the local economy. Its not much, but we both feel fairly strongly that we
are happy to give money for something and its so hard to know when to give
money away - you never know if its going to the right person, so we now have
to pack the mats!

On our way back, we saw another elephant and we started teasing Information
that he attracted them. There was another even closer to the lodge, and
very close to the runway. We asked the pilot if the had to dodge elephants
often but apparently they aren't too bad as they will be scared off by the
aeroplane. Information mentioned that some bulls in musth (when they are
ready for mating and become more aggressive), will chase aeroplanes and even
trumpet when its raining trying to scare the storm away! According to the
pilot, the worst animals are ostriches which don't move!

Once we landed back in Maun, we were transferred back to Montsentsela Tree
lodge where we picked up Daisy (the Defender) and we headed off shopping for
fresh food. We were going into Moremi National Park in the afternoon and
were not allowed meat. We had been given varying interpretations of what
'meat' meant - only red raw meat and anything processed or in vacuum
packaging would apparently be fine! We bought some chicken and hoped that
this would pass the test.

After an uneventful drive (if you count dogs, goats and sheep coming into
the road as normal now), we arrived in Moremi. It was the afternoon so we
decided to save the game drive until the following day and set up camp for
the night. After a bit of confusion we were directed to a lovely spot under
some trees and set a little apart from the rest of the camp. Time to open
the roof tent (we are now experts at this), cook by the campfire (not so
expert but Katy is coming up with easy BBQ food) and sipping some wine
(another area of expertise!) We saw a large fast animal moving in the
shadows and after some discussion had ruled out cats and jackals so we think
it was a hyena. This sighting encouraged us to have an early night!

Before bed, Katy saw some fruit on the trees and joked that we would have
elephant visitors that night. She was right - luckily they arrived after we
had got into our tent but ate all the fruit and came within metres of the
tent. They were in the camp all night, so we both managed some sleep but
not always at the same time. At one point another camper zipped their tent
making a noise and immediately all the elephants stopped their chomping and
ripping branches off of trees to listen. Richard was asleep at this point
and snoring. It was the only sound and Katy wasn't sure whether she should
wake him (to stop the noise but had a high risk of making him jump / say
something else) or let him snore (the noise continues but they may have
heard it already). She opted for the do nothing approach but was nervous!

Day 53 - 7th August - Oddballs and elephants

We woke up to the sound of the fish eagles calling - having had a decent
night's sleep, although Richard kept looking out of the mesh windows on the
tent to see if he could see the hippos which sounded like they were
wandering around the camp.

The schedule at Oddballs was organised to minimise time in the heat of the
day, so we were going to start with a quick coffee at 6.30am before going
out for an early morning mokoro trail. It took a while to wake up, but we
were soon back in the mokoro and Richard was helpfully clearing a way
through the spiders webs with his head!

We went for quite a long way, seeing reedbuck along the way and lots of
birdlife. The island we reached was quite large, and two of the other groups
skirted round the edges to also walk on the same island. It was quite nerve
wracking being in the bush, listening out to the animals and watching
carefully where you put your feet. The night before we had spoken to a
German family who had gone out camping in the delta and their guide had
woken up feeling a puff adder writhing around underneath the tent...so we
were definitely on the look out for snakes!

We saw some Impala and a lot of animal tracks, but suddenly Information
raised a hand to stop us, as we were quite close to an elephant in amongst
the trees. As we started to move away it caught a whiff of our scent and
trumpeted an alarm call and a warning. We sped up, only to realise that the
rest of the breeding herd had already moved around where we had come from,
blocking our exit. We moved towards the edge of the island to see if there
was a way around them - elephants have bad sight, but very good hearing and
smell, so the main thing is to get downwind from them and to be very quiet!
How ever we tried to avoid them, it seemed that we accidentally moved closer
to them, crouching next to a termite mound and some logs. Information went
off to see if the way was clear as he had heard another elephant behind,
while we stayed in cover (although snapping off a few pictures for good
measure!). He soon returned, and confirmed that the elephant had moved off -
so we quickly moved through the gap and started to skirt around the
elephants. The breeding herds are the most dangerous with the mothers being
very protective of their young and the juveniles being a bit hasty to attach
at times. The juvenile males are chased from the herd at about 15 years old
so they don't breed with their sisters. At this time they often are adopted
by a couple of older bachelors who teach them how to behave - i.e. not to
chase everything in sight.

We heard another large trumpeting, and were concerned that we had been
rediscovered somehow - however we could see the elephants heading off away
from us. We only later realised that they had spotted one of the other
couples, and had moved in to deal with them. Apparently the other couple had
been forced to hide in a bush with their guide as the elephants went past,
while the guide got himself ready to light a bush fire if he needed to scare
them off! We were pleased that Information had a healthy respect (or you
could describe it as a fear) of elephants and we had confirmed the day
before that he had been guiding for 5 years - he must be good at keeping his
clients safe!

After all that excitement we were pleased to be heading back to the mokoro,
but had a nice sighting of a herd of zebra and impala together - apparently
different species will often mingle to complement each others senses in
detecting predators. Impala have very good eyesight, and zebra have a good
sense of smell and hearing.

On the way back through the reeds we spotted a brightly striped reed frog,
just one of the many creatures that make the most of the Delta flooding! We
came back to a large breakfast at a lodge where we shared our stories of
narrow escapes from the elephants on the island. Then it was time for a
siesta and to read some books during the heat of the day, and a leisurely
lunch.

That afternoon we headed out to another island. Now more interested in how
to avoid an elephant attack, Information filled us in on the details of how
to avoid or deal with each potential threat in the bush - he had a
particularly unusual method of avoiding elephants in a worst-case scenario.
What he does is he wears a fairly brightly coloured hat when elephants are
near (which he never seems to wash) and should an elephant get close to
catching him, he will drop the hat, which the elephant will then stop to
investigate, allowing him time to make his escape. Richard thought that his
socks might have a similar effect...

Apparently lions are like dogs (we weren't so convinced by this one), hippos
are wimps out of water and you shouldn't look at a leopard in the eye as
this is considered to be a challenge!

We had a nice walk around the island, investigating some of the holes dug by
the jackals and aardvark and seeing more game. It was relatively quiet
however, and we all started to relax after the morning's excitement.
However, as we were getting fairly close to the mokoro we saw an adult
elephant quite close to us and shaking a tree to get the nuts. This time we
were the right sound, and downwind, and could easily sneak by to safety!

On the way back to the lodge the guides stopped in some reeds and pointed
towards the main channel. We were told to stand up (not an easy thing to do
on a narrow canoe, while holding a telephoto lens) and saw a pool full of
hippos about 50 metres away having a good meal on the reeds. They make a
great chopping noise along with the odd snort.

After a good meal and a good chat to some American medical students who were
doing an exchange with a hospital in Gabarone, it was nearly time for bed.
As we sat round the fire chatting, we heard a noise and Joyce said, 'Oh we
have elephants in the camp'. One male had made it quietly past the tents
and was busy shaking the palm trees. Joyce went and got a very powerful
torch and we all walked along behind her investigating where the elephant
might be. He was behind the toilets and seemed to apply the children's
logic of if I can't see you then you can't see me. He is a lot bigger than
the toilets so it was pretty obvious. Joyce explained when I say run, we
run and then watched the elephant who was named Elijah as he is a regular
visitor. He then came out of hiding, destroyed a couple of plants before we
were told to run. We decided that as we were running past our tent, that
this would be a good time to run inside it and try to sleep! We heard
various noises throughout the night, some elephant and some not. He decided
to leave before dawn, but it was an exciting night especially as he had gone
an arms length away from the tent a couple of nights before (as evidenced by
the footprints).

Day 52 - 6th August - flying deep into the Okavango Delta

We were up early as we were flying out today into the middle of the Okavango
Delta. Fortunately it's much easier in a lodge as there's no tent to pack
away! We reached the airport for an 8am flight, and passed through the
domestic departures. This was perhaps not the most effective security
screen, as Richard happily walked through with a Swiss Army knife in his
pocket...

We were walked to our plane which was a prehistoric (perhaps antique)
Cessna, with a cheery South African pilot. We were squeezed in with Richard
in the co-pilots seat, Katy behind with some large boxes apparently
containing dinner for us and the other guests at Oddballs, and a small
Botswanan boy who was going back to the nearby village for school holidays.
He was very shy and was struggling to see out of the window but would
pretend he was sitting perfectly still each time Katy turned round to chat.
He had clearly been told that he HAD to behave!

It was a short 20 minute flight to Oddballs, but extremely picturesque as we
flew over the islands in the flooded delta, seeing herds of elephant
crossing between them below us. Landing was a slightly hair raising affair -
with only a small dirt strip to land on. However the pilots clearly do this
all the time, and we were soon safely on the ground after a surprisingly
smooth landing.

Here we were greeted by one of our hosts, KT. This was quite confusing, as
this left us with Katy and KT - causing great amusement to the rest of the
staff. We also met our guide who was called, aptly, 'Information'. Clearly
his parents had decided early on his future career.

Oddballs is a very rustic or 'traditional' camp. You are right in the middle
of nature sleeping in a canvas tent right next to the water. KT took great
delight in showing us a picture of our tent with an elephant about 2 foot
away from it - he took even more delight in showing us the recent elephant
footprints next to our tent!

After a quick briefing, tour round the camp (with its one inside shower and
toilet for the shy/scared and three outdoor showers and toilets for the more
adventurous) and our second breakfast of the day, we were taken out by
Information on a mokoro trip. A mokoro is a dugout canoe - made from the
trunk of a tree, and used to navigate the shallow waters of the delta. It is
propelled in a similar way to a punt, with the 'driver' pushing off the
bottom with a pole. Apparently a common mistake is to put your pole in to
deep between the reeds, and then to grip it firmly when it doesn't come out
easily - leading to the poler remaining stuck to the pole while the mokoro
floats off!

Fortunately Information had been on mokoros since being a young boy and was
considered to be an 'expert driver' so we were soon squeezing our way down
the narrow waterways. Richard got to sit at the front, as this was typically
where spiders, frogs and other river life disturbed by the mokoro would jump
in, and Information thinks it's best that women don't bear the full force of
such an amphibious assault. Katy couldn't help but agree with him and
happily sat behind.

There was also the added challenge of avoiding the Hippos. Although often
depicted as cheerful, podgy creatures, they are fiercely territorial in the
water, and will happily overturn a mokoro or other vessel, and kill its
occupants for good measure. The good news is that they tend to lounge around
in the daytime, and will stick to the deep channels. The bad news is you
still need to cross these deep channels, and so only do so after a careful
inspection for hippos while loitering in a smaller waterway.

After a short mokoro trip, we arrived at a nearby island. The other
attraction of Oddballs is the opportunity to do lots of wildlife viewing at
close quarters, and in as 'real' an environment as is possible. This meant
we would be going on foot to see the wildlife, with no vehicle or backup on
hand, and due to the rules of the game reserve, no rifle as a last resort.
Fortunately all the guides have grown up in the delta, and are experts in
survival in the wild (or so we were told....)

We had a nice walk around the small island where we saw some antelope, and a
lot of signs of elephant and hippo, including their bedrooms. Apparently
elephant like to use a termite mound as a pillow (or to help them roll over
to their fronts so they can get up). Hippos are just very messy and like to
spray their dung around with their tail. We also saw an elephant footprint
which, when compared to Katy's size 8's are really quite big!

It was back to the lodge for lunch when we met other guests who had been out
for a 3 day camping trip in the wilds. It sounded great until they
mentioned the puff adder (one of the deadly snakes in the area) that had
been found under the guides tent. May be camping at the main lodge wasn't
such a bad idea after all.

Lunch was followed by some siesta time before it was the afternoon mokoro
trip. There was a yellow bird that was very focused on scaring off himself
in the mirror making some very unbird-like sounds. We set off in the same
direction but planned to go to a different island. Unfortunately there was
a 'delta road block' in the way - an elephant who was busy shaking the palm
tree next to one of the channels we needed to use. We sat an enjoyed his
shaking - the lift their trunks up vertically, hold it against the trunk and
then push it a few times very hard to try and shake off as many ripe fruits
as possible. There are also a number of palm trees that have been pushed
right over when an elephant was feeling a bit too peckish.

After some shouting and splashing by the guides, the elephant did some
typical aggressive moves - holding out his ears so he looked bigger, holding
his trunk in the air (to smell us) and a bit of trumpeting. We were pleased
that there was a deep river channel between us at this point. He looked for
a moment like he was going to go away but then seemed to change his mind and
was simply not budging. It was time to look for another route or another
island.

With the water being so high, Information wasn't sure how big some of the
other islands were so after a couple of stops we found one big enough. We
were talking to Information about the different animals and which were the
most dangerous - his view was that elephants are the worst as they will
never maim you but always kill if they attack. After this we managed to see
another elephant but kept down-wind of them so they couldn't smell us. We
also saw some waterbuck and impala.

Then it was back to the lodge where the ever cheerful Joyce was dishing out
drinks before dinner and bed. The tent was a lot more spacious than we were
used to, so we slept quite well with the various noises around.

Day 51 - 5th August - Arriving in Maun

After carefully getting out of the tent and checking that no snakes had made
themselves comfortable on, in, or under the car, we packed up and were soon
back on our way. We had a fairly long drive today, albeit on pretty good tar
roads. Richard was getting the hang of the emergency stop from 70 mph when
random animals wandered out onto the road.

We passed a number of villages, easily identifiable by the 'Orange' mobile
phone adverts before each which had the name of the village. This seemed
fairly out of place in what were still mainly mud huts. We also went through
another veterinary fence where you have to walk in disinfectant and have
your tyres sprayed - all to prevent the spread of foot and mouth from Angola
to Botswana cattle. Apparently the buffalo that roam free are a major risk.

After a long and fairly uneventful drive we made it to Maun - the gateway to
the Okavango Delta. Our SatNav was convinced that we needed to take a right
turn off the main road through some bushes and into a tree to get to our
lodge for the night, but we decided it was probably best to disregard it and
follow the directions we had been given! Maun seemed quite a hub of activity
as we drove through it - but we were quite hot and tired and went straight
to the lodge. This proved to be one of the most complex pieces of navigation
- with multiple tracks (it only became clear later that all lead in the same
direction), while we were armed with the instruction to 'keep to the top
track'. Unfortunately it was not exactly clear which way was 'the top'...!

We eventually muddled our way through and arrived at the entry gate, where
you need the combination to the padlock. The code we had been given didn't
work, but fortunately we now had mobile phone reception and called the lodge
to find it out. Passing through the gate we saw quite a lot of game - the
lodge buys in the animals, normally enough to create a breeding population -
creating an attraction for visitors and a future source of revenue from
selling on the animals.

The Motsenela tree lodge was very smart, and we were instantly less hot and
bothered after a cold towel and some iced tea. We were shown to our room
which was their honeymoon suite, a really nice room with a bath (the first
we'd seen for about a month) and a large comfy bed. Unfortunately we needed
to restock on food, fuel and money, and so headed straight back out to Maun.

Here we found a busy shopping area with what seemed to be pretty secure
parking. After a bit of a challenge finding an ATM that would give us money,
and a minor disagreement with the supermarket security guard as to whether
we were trying to steal the supermarket trolley by taking it out of the
store we were heading back to the lodge.

Here we had a very well deserved bath and relax, before joining the rest of
the guests for dinner. We were all sat round a large table and swapped some
stories. The couple next to us were about to head out on their 14th safari -
which we thought was slightly excessive! They were also very surprised we
were driving ourselves, as they were going in a guided group along the same
route as us. Then it was off for an early night in a real bed!

Day 50 - 4th August - crossing the border into Botswana

After a good night's sleep we filled up on breakfast and started the journey
to take us out of Namibia. We passed by a small national park which we had
been recommended to check out - Mahango was nice and quiet but was the total
length of about 30kms and fairly narrow.

We saw plenty of Impala (by now they are not so exciting as we have seen
them many times), elephants at a distance and some new types of antelope -
the Roan Antelope. This was a bit of a rarity, but apparently Mahango is one
of the best places to find them. Luckily we have a Southern African Animals
book with us so we can believe that we have identified what we have seen
correctly. We also have a Safari Companion book which explains the
different behaviours of the animals - particularly useful for checking
aggressive behaviour in some of the more dangerous animals - so we know when
to make a hasty retreat! We are ticking them off as we go and noting down
where we have seen them. Not sure that it is very useful, but fun all the
same.

We stopped by a large Baobab tree, which grow very slowly and have a large
trunk but relatively few leaves and very small branches - in fact they look
like they're growing upside down with roots instead of branches reaching
into the sky. As we continued past the river we had our first sighting of
Hippos. They sleep in the day in the water when it is too hot and they can
get sunburnt, grazing in the water in the afternoon and on land at night.
They are incredibly noisy with grunts and shouts and water squirts. The
noises from their other end is also surprisingly loud, but the noisiest and
smelliest farter we have encountered so far has to be the elephant with the
smell carrying long distances! We also saw a lovely bird of prey - we think
this one is the Bateleur.

We then found a tree that was down across the road (the elephants seem to
enjoy wrecking havoc on the local flora) so turned back and went along the
main road before entering the border post. We had really enjoyed our time
in Namibia so we were sad to leave but looking forward to the excitement of
Botswana.

We left with no problems - all the staff were very friendly and were happy
to point out what we needed to fill in (including such key details as our
engine and chassis numbers...) and lend us pens to do it. A quick stamp in
our passports and we were out of Namibia and into Botswana. We think we woke
up the Botswanan border official as he was very grumpy when he charged us
road tax for the car.

It was surprising how different Botswana felt, as we were following the
river it was much greener, and the villages seemed more spread out with even
more livestock wandering around the roads. We were glad we filled up in
Divundu in Namibia, as there was no sign of a petrol station over the
border. We drove on the relatively short distance to Drotsky's. We got a
warm reception and were directed to our campsite. It was clear that camping
in Botswana was also going to be slightly different, as we noticed a lot
more animal life around the campsite - baboons, antelope and other
creatures. There were good toilet facilities, but these had been taken over
by a lot of wasps so you had to be speedy! We saw a fellow camper attacking
the wasps with a can of 'Doom' insect spray which seemed like a fairly
effective, although short termed measure. Also on walking to the main
reception area we saw some snake tracks, so were slightly more nervous about
our walk back that evening!

The main area was lovely though with great relaxing views over the river,
and we caught up on our books while watching kingfishers and other birdlife.
Richard also noticed a couple of crocodiles floating down the river -
something else to add to our list of things to look out for! As we hadn't
brought a lot of food with us (there's a veterinary fence where you can't
bring fresh meat across) we decided to have dinner there. We were sat with a
South African who was telling us about his time doing IT contracting in
Botswana, and warned us not to attempt to bribe any officials if we were
caught speeding or for any other offence as he had been arrested and put in
prison for doing just that! He also warned us of the dangers of running into
goats, donkeys or other domestic animals on the roads as they wander freely.

After a good meal we walked back to our campsite. Richard in front armed
with a walking pole and torch, and Katy going behind with a lantern.
Fortunately we didn't find any snakes, although we did find a rather large
Baboon spider which Katy wasn't too fond of. However we soon got into the
safety of the tent, while the monkeys and baboons climbed over the spare
tyre.

Day 49 - 3rd August - A river (!) in the Caprivi strip

Unfortunately we had to leave Onguma and head off again. We had a
particularly uninteresting drive ahead of us as we covered long distances up
into the North East of Namibia. This was mainly long stretches of tar road
and scattered villages and towns along the way. We stopped off in Tsumeb,
and old mining town, and we were impressed by quite how smart it was! We
even managed to find an internet cafe to upload some of the blog pages and
check on our emails. We realise that we are a bit behind at the moment, but
hopefully we will catch up again soon!

As we continued to drive up the landscape changed quite a bit, becoming
increasingly lush, green and with numerous trees (something we hadn't see
much of in the rest of Namibia) as we neared the giant Kavango river. The
villages along the side of the road also changed, with nearly all of them
being primarily mud huts with large amounts of cattle, goat and sheep. We
were nearing the Caprivi strip, where due to previous conflicts and general
neglect, most of the population survive through subsistence farming.

Driving on we arrived at the frontier town of Rundu which was quite a shock,
as we went from dodging donkeys crossing the road to seeing some relatively
upmarket shops and people driving smart 4x4s. We filled up with fuel here
and turned off towards our stop for the night - N'Kwasi lodge (named after
the national bird - the Fish Eagle - 'N'Kwasi' in the local language)

The track to N'Kwasi was suitably dusty and bumpy, and we passed a number of
smiling and waving children (although with the obligatory cry of 'sweets
sweets' from some of them). We also went by a colourful 'pre-school'
playground with swings, slides and a mini-football pitch!

We were pleasantly surprised when we arrived at the lodge as it had a number
of nice thatched bungalows and a comfy large bar and restaurant area under
shade. It was right on the Kavango, and had suffered from the recent
flooding - so the swimming pool was drained and definitely out of action! It
also had a huge bougainvillea (no idea if that's the right spelling) - so
was certainly colourful!

We also received our 10th free bottle of wine - this travelling on honeymoon
plan was a good idea!

To make the most out of being on the river, we asked to go out for a trip.
They put a crate of beer and some ice into a small speedboat, and off we
went with a guide. It was fun being on the river for a change, and we caused
no end of amusement as it was wash time for all the villagers on both sides
and so we passed some bashful and some not so bashful nude bathers!

However there was more excitement to come, as we were given a sign that said
'Illegally in Angola' and dropped off on the Angolan side of the river to
pose for photos - the river being the boundary between the two countries!
Finally it was time to watch the sunset over the river, before heading back
while watching the birds return to their nests.

A tasty homecooked meal finished off the evening and we retired to our room,
along with its resident guard gecko! For once even Katy was warm enough
with 3 blankets and a duvet!

Day 48 - 2nd August - relaxing at the Fort at Onguma

Today we had decided to do absolutely nothing. We woke up and opened the
front tent flat and sat in bed admiring the view. A few springbok were
unconcerned about us.

Then it was over to the main restaurant for a big breakfast before returning
to the room to read books, update blogs and admire our Etosha photos. Some
Kudu wandered past along with some zebra taking a drink at the waterhole. A
family of warthog also came past but were a bit more concerned about us.
Whenever they are scared, they run with their tails up (so their young have
something to follow) which looks very silly.

We had managed to stuff ourselves at breakfast with the delights of pate,
smoked fish, eggs and soldiers, fruit, muesli and yoghurt with the plan of
not needing lunch - it worked a treat.

In the afternoon, we sat in the cocktail pool having a drink - this is a
pool with shallow water and seats - you relax on the seats and dangled your
feet into the water to keep cool. The water was very cool and it took some
time for the feeling to return to Katy's toes despite the warm sunshine.
When wee ordered the food, we were told in no uncertain terms that it was
too early for whisky (not that we had or were intending to order it!) More
afternoon tea followed.

After getting mildly burnt, we went back to our room for shower - Richard
opted for the outdoor shower where only the animals could see him. Katy
opted for the indoor shower where only the gecko could see!

We went back to the Fort for sundown. They have a number of seating areas
at different heights up the tower where you can see the view, the waterhole,
the pan and the setting sun. Sipping our cocktails meant we got a lovely
view of the colours the sky turns - these sunsets are something that we will
really miss when we get home - it helps to be able to see the horizon which
is virtually impossible in London!

Another lovely meal passed with two bottles of wine (we had successfully
relaxed after our day of nothing) and as Richard drove the very short
distance from the main reception to our room (it's apparently too risky to
walk), it wasn't too hard to fall asleep. The turn-down chocolates were
once again in the fridge to stop 'furry friends' from joining us in the
room!

Day 47 - 1st August - super luxury at Onguma!

It was our final day in Etosha, but we weren't expecting to replicate the luck of the previous day. We drove out a bit after sunrise, and visited the Etosha viewpoint. This spot allows you to drive out onto the salt pan itself and take in its vastness. It was a bit like the salt flats of Bolivia in terms of its extreme flatness and nothingness and was a decidedly different start to the day!

From here we drove on to one of the nearby waterholes. On one side there was a lionness looking hungrily at some of the numerous game using the waterhole. We took up position on one side and saw as she tensed up at the arrival of a large warthog and kudu. It was incredible to see the musculature in her shoulders - clearly extremely powerful. She stood up and started pacing towards her prey, causing all hell to break loose as the animals fled, yelled and generally made good their escape. Thwarted in her subtlety she returned to the long grass to sulk and have a bit of a doze before the area quietened down again. Knowing that lions often sleep/doze 23 hours out of 24 we decided not to wait around for long, and drove on.

One thing we haven't mentioned is the beautiful birdlife in the area. We're not 'birders' but are starting to see the attraction, given the diversity of the species, and the neverending goal of trying to see them all! One particularly attractive bird is the lilac breasted roller, so named as the male shows off to a prospective mate by performing a series of acrobatic manouveres in mid-air while displaying its multi-coloured plumage.

Driving on we found a large family of wilderbeest crossing the road. They seemed to be performing a bit of a taxi service for a number of birds that would sit on their backs, apparently pecking at parasites, but mainly just enjoying the ride...!

We passed through the next campsite of Namutoni which is set around an old german fort. It was a nice place to enjoy another ice-cream and a cold drink, and have a look around some of the curio shops that had been added into the interior. We drove onto 'dik dik' drive - hoping to see some leopards. We failed to find any leopards (they are mainly nocturnal) but succeeded in finding a number of dik-diks. These are the smallest antelope, about the size of a rabbit with stretched legs and are very endearing. Unfortunately, being so short, they have real difficulty in reaching their favourite food of leaves - apparently they don't much interest in the grasses that they can normally eat!

Time was running out, as we had to be out of the park no later than the time we entered the park (as the permits are strictly 24-hour increments). As we drove out towards the exit we saw a lot of giraffe crossing the road, that would gallop away when we approach in their gangly and gawky way!

On leaving the park we drove the few hundred metres to the entrance of Onguma game ranch. This is where we would be spending the next two nights and is just outside the Etosha boundary. We were very excited by the prospect of sleeping in a proper bed!

We had originally been booked into the Bush camp, which is the more basic of the options in Onguma, and decided that we would treat ourselves to an upgrade. We had been told by a couple of people that 'the Fort at Onguma' was a real luxury, and if we could get in we should try to. The Onguma team were happy to oblige (albeit at a price!) and we soon found ourselves in the incredible luxury of the Onguma Fort. The main building is a mock Moroccan / African designed fort - filled with flowing water, beautiful terracotta colours and large towers. It also had a stunning setting, right on the edge of one of the pans, with a waterhole just in front of it.

We decided to go on the sunset drive, and after a filling tea (with fresh scones and strawberries!) we set off with our private guide. He showed us all the different small antelope - from the dik dik right through the duiker. We then stopped by a termite mound as he explained their fascinating ecology. We then wound our way through the game ranch with some nice sightings of jackal, zebra and wildebeest by the setting sun before stopping on the edge of the property. He then pulled out a table, cold bottle of white wine and some delicious canapes for us to enjoy. Superb!

We headed back to the Fort and were shown to our room. There are only 10 rooms, with two in the fort itself, and the rest separated by about 150 metres, with ensuite indoor and outdoor shower and a great view of the pan from bed! Given there were lions on the property we were also given an air-horn in case we came back from dinner to find an unwelcome visitor...however you could pull down canvas awnings to dissuade any animals looking for a midnight snack.

Dinner was a delight, with soup followed by a springbok carpaccio, followed by an oryx fillet with onion marmalade, before we finished off with a great tiramisu. This was all washed down with one of South Africa's best pinotages (a type of grape that we had learnt about during our stay in Stellenbosch) and we drifted off to sleep quite easily. Katy did however wake up in the middle of the night, convinced that a lion/hyena/leopard was trying to push the awnings open - on inspection it was just the wind - no need for an air-horn this time!

Day 46 - 31st July - 2nd day at Etosha

After a distinctly warmer night we managed to get up slightly earlier and pack up. We were heading to the middle campsite of Halali today and so exploring a new area of the park. We made good time getting out of the campsite and were driving along the side of the road when Katy spotted something in the long grass. It was a pair of cheetahs! Having learnt some basic game tracking skills we drove back a way - hopefully to see them emerge from the grass. We were rewarded with some lovely sights of them heading out towards the pan to track down some breakfast! Unfortunately we were too far away to follow them for long, and so left them to enjoy a morning stroll.

On driving along the road we had also seen signs of elephants. A fair amount of tree branch destruction, along with some fresh dung. We soon found them by the side of the road and watched as they crossed from one side to the other. There were some particularly brave / foolhardy people in other cars who had parked across their path. Fortunately the elephants in Etosha are relatively used to such intrusions and stepped around the obstructions - elsewhere this could well have led to a smashed car or worse.

We drove on to a nearby waterhole and were surprised to see a cluster of cars around one side of the waterhole, which didn't seem to have particularly good views. We drove up to investigate and saw there was a very large male lion, who had clearly had a very good meal the night before as he had a swollen belly and was barely keeping awake! Although he still kept an eye on the passing antelope, it was clear that he was going to spend the day snoozing!

We drove back to the main track and saw that a huge herd of zebra had arrived at one of the waterholes we had previously passed by. We stopped for a while to wonder at the massing of a good five to six hundred zebra, and the ensuing braying, kicking and general chaos between the different herds.

We decided to move on, and took a less well-trodden path in following the rhino drive. We didn't expect to see a rhino in the day as they are well known for being fairly elusive - however we thought it was worth a try. We didn't find any rhino, however we did spot a lionness on the move. We got a particularly deadly stare from her before she moved on, and it was clear that if we hadn't been in the car we would have been lunch.

We continued to follow the rhino drive without any success, and arrived at the Goas waterhole near the Halali campsite. This was a large waterhole, with a lot of reeds and succulent grass surrounding it. It was also full of elephants, with a good two families playing in the water and chewing the tasty grasses. Particularly endearing were the numerous calves, who were energetically spraying themselves with mud and water, or splashing through the waterhole to the disapproving glances of their mothers.

After a good time splashing around the elephants moved off silently into the bush and we headed onto the campsite. The great thing about Etosha is that it allows you to get close to wild animals in their natural and entirely free-roaming environment, while still having all the comforts of home fairly close to hand. As a good example, Richard had a mint magnum on arriving at Halali and we saw another dust-covered 4x4 driver also enjoying an ice-cream!

The campsite was quiter the Okakuejo, but also not quite so well set up - and it wasn't entirely clear where one pitch ended and the other started. However wwith good natured neighbours on both sides we soon worked out how to divide up the space. The ablution blocks were particularly smart and we treated ourselves to a refreshing shower to cool off. As the sun begun to dip we could see Lesser Bushbabies jumping around the trees, grabbing insects attracted by the lights of the camps.

We wandered over to the waterhole, which was a more natural setting, with rough seating on a steep rockface looking over the spring. The elephants we had seen earlier at Goas had moved onto this waterhole and were again enjoying the refreshing water. However as the sun begun to set there was commotion in the elephants' ranks. It soon became clear that a spotted hyena was seeing whether the calves could be picked off. The mothers closed ranks around their calves and the juvenile males formed a posse to go off and hunt down the spotted hyena. It was however more agile than them, and soon reappeared from another direction to harry the mothers. The elephants were incensed and with loud trumpeting and rumbling the entire herd chased after the hyena - determined to put an end to its threatening behaviour. Unfortunately as they all rushed off into the bush we didn't have a chance to see what happened next - but it was a lot of excitement all the same.

A number of rhino arrived at the water hole and displayed their usual grumpiness towards each other. Although it was good to see them again, their bolshy behaviour kept any other animals from venturing close, so we decided to call it a night and head back to camp.

Day 44 - 30th July - First day at Etosha

Unfortunately we had to say goodbye to the comfort of Hobatere. However we still had a guided walk to enjoy before we left. This did come at the cost of an early morning wake up, and we were up and on the move by 6.30 (fortunately with a cup of coffee to get us going!). Given there might have been lions in the area, Peter brought his rifle with him, hopefully a shot in the air would scare them off if we encountered them.

Elias also joined us and we ventured off into the reserve. There is definitely something more exciting about being on foot, and needing to have your wits about you. As we walked down the track, Elias pointed out the tracks (spoor) and dung of the different kinds of animals. We were soon experts in the relative size and consistency of oryx and giraff dung - guaranteed to be useful for when we return to Wimbledon.

We didn't see any large game up close, but Peter did point out a White Tailed Shrike which real birders would pay good money to see. Peter and Elias were also looking out for the tracks of 39 black faced impalas that they had released the day before in the park. No sign was spotted despite a trip to the small local watering hole. Whilst we were checking out the mud, the birds were lining up in the tree next to us, clearly thirsy and wanting their chance.

After packing up everything it was time to set off to Etosha. It was a fairly quick drive on the tar roads, and we stopped off briefly at Outjo to do some shopping. It was clearly a touristy place as the level of hassle definitely increased with everyone from the car guard to the lady who pushed the shopping trolley back to the car to the random guy on the corner looking for a handout! We also had a problem with neither of our cards working to take out cash - after a long time on the phone to our respective banks (not cheap at around £1 a minute on the mobile!) we found the solution was to choose 'Transmission' on the account screen, rather than the 'Cheque' option that we'd used all the rest of the time on our trip! This being resolved we were back on our way with cash, fuel and food!

On arriving at Etosha we passsed the park gates and immediately turned off to see a watering hole. In the dry season all the game come to the watering holes so this is normally the best place to see them. We weren't too lucky at the first stop with only a lonely zebra standing around so decided to head into the park to pay the fees and find our campsite.

We were near the fence at the end of the campsite which was good because there wasn't lots of traffic (Etosha is a popular place and only has 3 campsites) but was a way from the loos! The whole campsite was pretty well kitted out, with decent toilets, showers, two swimming pools and a restaurant. Really quite smart compared to some of the basic ones we were used to.

After setting up the tent, we went to the watering hole at the site - this is floodlight at night. There was an elephant having a drink which was a lovely sight at sunset. Then it was back to the tent to cook dinner before returning to the watering hole for the evening's entertainment. There were a lot of ground squirrel and black backed jackal that were clearly unafraid of people, and chasing around after scraps. Apparently it was the peak season for rabies, and so you are well advised not to get too friendly with them. We also had a huge social weavers nest near our site - it looked like it had at least 50 birds in it!

After finding a comfy place to sit by the waterhole, and having brought a bottle of wine with us (to ward of the cold nights of course!) we sat down to enjoy the view. There was a giraffe which was doing its usual uncomfortable approach to drinking, which involves sticking its legs out at extreme angles to get low enough to take a sip! In addition there was an elephant still enjoying having a drink. All of a sudden there was a new arrival on the scene, as a stocky rhino walked out of the darkness to have a drink. A huge elephant then lumbered onto the scene and 'encouraged' the rhino to move round to the other side of the waterhole while it said hi to the other elephant.

The entertainment wasn't done there though, as another two rhinos came out of the darkness. Rhinos are well known for their aggressive nature, and two squared off against each other, clashing horns with great force before one decided that he was going to come off worse, and retreated. In the background there were a number of zebra waiting to come down and drink at the waterhole, but decidedly nervous of the elephants and rhinos!

However we were slowly freezing in the cold desert night and so decided to call it a day and head back to the camp - one of the disadvantages of being in a tent! Tonight the blanket came up with us, and we were still decidedly chilly!

Day 43 - 28th July - Hobatere - luxury at last!

It was great waking up in a proper bed after a good night's sleep! The room was effectively part of the fence and so you could look out straight onto the reserve as the sun rose. Breakfast was a leisurely affair, and as we sauntered down, one of the staff said "quick - get down to the hide by the swimming pool and you'll see the elephant!". We headed down (although still not quite awake) and saw a very old elephant drinking from the waterhole just the other side of the fence from the swimming pool. He seemed very relaxed, and we noticed that he had a collar, and so clearly was one of the many animals that the conservancy had tagged so that they could check on their movements. Elephants can rip brnaches off trees and chop through them easily, but as this one was elderly her teeth had gone (they have something like 6 sets) and was only eating the softer stuff!

After such excitement we returned to breakfast, where we had very tasty boiled eggs and soldiers - just what you need after a series of cold starts with cereal! We decided not to go on the game drive today. One thing we failed to mention in our last entry is that the previous night we had headed out on the night drive. This involves taking a very bright torch out, plenty of layers and driving off around the reserve. Our guide, Elias, would shine the torch around and look for the reflections of the eyes of the game - based on the colour, size and location of the reflected light you could typically tell what you were looking at. The night drive had started slowly, with just a few birds which are effectively stunned by the light and needed to be lifted off the track so we could progress! However it soon picked up with a sighting of an African wild cat, and then to everyone's surprise, a cheetah prowling in the dark. In very good spirits about such a good sighting we headed back. Unfortunately about 800m from the lodge, the steering went on the game vehicle, and it slowly trundled off into the bush as the guide brought it to a halt. We had two guides, Elias and Peter, and Elias volunteered (or was encouraged..!) to swiftly walk the distance back to the lodge with a torch to get the other vehicle. To make things slightly more interesting there had been lions spotted about a week beforehand - Elias certainly walked quickly and Peter thought he ran as soon as he was out of sight! Fortunately he made it in one piece and we were soon transferred to the other vehicle to head back for a good night's sleep! One of the guests asked Elias if he was nervous and he said a very certain "Yes".

Back to the next day, we were driven out to the hide by the watering hole. This is effectively an elevated viewing platform, with enough shade to hide us from the animals. Unfortunately the excitable Italian family joined us, and so every appearance of a new animal was met with loud cries of delight, which dissuaded the animals from approaching to closely. However it was a great time to relax and watch some of the wildlife interact - whether it was zebra males having a fight or the black backed jackals prowling around on the lookout for food.

Lunch was another large and tasty event. We'd been told it was only going to be a 'light snack' and so were surprised when we got a large plate of toasted sandwiches and a big bowl of salad!

We had a relax in the afternoon before heading back out to the hide with a beer. This time we had it to ourselves for a while, before a much quieter German group joined us a bit later. Given we were all much quieter we were lucky enough to see some of the animals get really close, including a family of zebra. We also saw an owl that comes out at sunset and lots of other wildlife. As it was getting dark we were picked up by Peter, and had a very close encounter with a surprisingly brave giraffe that was quite happy to pose for photographs by the side of the track before ambling off into the dwindling light - a real treat!

Dinner was outside, and they had set up a large fire in the middle of a 'lapa' - a stone circle where we all sat looking into the middle. It was a great BBQ with spare ribs, oxtail and creamy potatoes and veg. After warming up (with some wine helping us along) we were back off on another night drive. This time we saw a civet in the tree - which we first thought could have been a leopard given the spots. We also saw more wild cats and some of the other animals we'd seen in the day going about their business in the dark. There was less excitement tonight with no mechanical failures and we settled down for our last night of luxury before we resumed camping.

Day 42 - 27th July - luxury at last!

We got up feeling a bit weary as we hadn't slept too well with all the wind but were keen to do our first bit of game driving on our own. We had picked up some of the tricks of the trade from our guide in Puros - we knew what to look for in terms of dung and elephant destruction.

The first hurdle was getting in the game area as they didn't have any change and were very concerned what would happen to the N$50 (less than £5). We agreed that we would stop on our way out to check whether anyone else who came in had paid them in change. The good news is that we pretty much had the reserve to ourself - the bad news is that this meant no change. He seemed ok with the suggestion to donate the difference to the Save the Rhino camp just round the corner when he next saw them. He did tell us that there was a well-known conservationist working with the lions in the park, so we should look out for his tan Landcruiser (although I'm not sure he'd been impressed with us crashing into the middle of some BBC wildlife documentary).

The small map we had from the lodge was not entirely accurate - the roads marked as suitable for normal cars were challenging in a 4x4 and some of the roads had recently become no-entry. We'd swapped the GPS for the Tracks4Africa maps, which are incredibly detailed, although they don't route you in the same way as you'd normally expect from a satnav so you need to pay close attention! This stopped us from heading off merrily towards the skeleton close due to a blown down marker - it would have been a long way!

It was still windy so to start with we weren't sure whether there was any life in the park, but once we got to a more sheltered area we saw lots of Springbok, Zebra and Oryx. It is difficult spotting some of the animals as they are so quiet and although there markings look strange, they blend into the landscape so well.

We saw some signs of recent elephant activity - more holes dug in the riverbed, dung and tree distruction. We carried on driving slowly in the hope of spotting them but Katy was a bit nervous that they would suddenly appear out of nowhere. Its amazing how trees and rocks can look like elephants!

It was fun trying to spot everything ourselves - we also saw an Oryx with their calf - Mum and Dad were very protective of the little one. The Zebra are terrified of everything and run away from the car, unfortunately they don't run away from the road so they get more scared as we followed them, but eventually they turned away and could stop. We did eel guilty! Katy also spotted a tree trunk that looked like a lizard and then realised that the head seemed to be moving - it wasn't a trick, it really was a large monitor lizard!

After enjoying our drive, it was time to leave. We drove through the veterinary fence which prevents you taking animal products from the north to the south. They have large cattle farms in the south and don't want to risk passing on foot and mouth from Angola and the northern areas of Namibia. We were stopped and asked what we had. We must have looked less than trustworthy as they wanted to check our fridge. It is a well known fact in Namibia that the tastier animal products will be confiscated and those less sought after are fine to be let through. In fact the veterinary control officers are decidedly rotund! Needless to say, the UHT milk made it through the border intact...

We drove onto to our next destination - a lodge with a real bed and more hot showers - heaven! Hobatere is a game park bordering onto Etosha (Namibia's equivalent to Kruger) so we had high hopes of seeing more game. We were also told that their game drives are recommended and it is one of the few places where you can do a night drive.

We arrived in time to join the afternoon drive and whilst we didn't see any new large game, it was great to get some explanations around the animals. There are two types of zebra - plains and mountain. The plains zebra (as we saw in Etosha) have a sadow stripe of brown between the black and white stripes but the mountain zebra is just black and white. The male Oryx has shorter and thicker horns as these are used for fighting so need to be stronger than the decorative horns of the female.

We were also told some less appealing information - the community spider is tiny and weaves its web with thousands of other spiders to create a large ball. Yuck!

We did see something we had heard a lot about - the secretary bird. It walks through the grass looking for snakes and insects. It has very powerful legs and is just beautiful. We aren't sure where the name came from but think it is probably due to the way it walks. We also saw a Hoopoe bird which has a crest. We are starting to get into our birds as there are so many types and they are all so interesting and beautiful. Even the starlings are irredesc

Day 41 - 26th July - driving to Palmwag

We got up early, using the Spurfowl as our alarm clock and started the long drive back to civilisation. At least this time, we knew the roads so made good time but it was a bumpy ride. The views were stunning again - it is amazing to see nothing man-made (apart from the road) for miles and miles. Most of the buildings are wood and dung, so if unused would just melt back into nature. We saw more giraffe along the way and are getting used to the Oryx and Springbok that we see everywhere.

We noticed the 'fairy circles' next to the roads which Robin had explained the day before - these were perfect circles where no plants would grow in the middle of the grassy plains. Apparently these weren't caused by fairies (shame...) but by a toxic plant which poisons the soil under it, and this poison remains even if the plant dies.

There is no way that we could have done the trip to Puros without Daisy the Defender - she has the clearance underneath to let us go over big bumps without scraping the bottom. She has however become increasingly dusty as the trip is going on. The amount of dust that is around means that it is impossible to keep it all out of the car. We normally drive with the windows down, so we hope everyone is looking forward to checking out Richard's trucker tan (i.e. he has a tanned right arm only...). This also means that the dust gets everywhere. Katy has tried to clean up the car's insides with wet wipes, but this only lasts for about 1 day before you can wipe mounds of dust off the dashboard again. All the bags we have are dusty and who knows what the poor lodges think when we turn up covered in dust - all you need to do is touch or brush past part of the car to have a big line of dust on you. We have almost given up trying to look clean - we just don't have enough clothes with us to change whenever we get covered!

We arrived at Palmwag in the early afternoon and Katy was very excited by the hot shower. It felt so good to be clean! We enjoyed the sunset with a gin and tonic. Palmwag is a concession area meaning that they have a large area of land set aside for game and this is predominiately used by one lodge, but you can also drive in privately. It had different accommodation options - rooms, posh tents and the campsite where we were staying. Therefore we snuck out of the camping area to invade the posher bar area and watched the sun set between the palm trees that the lodge is named after. We also took full advantage of the bar food that night.

It was a very windy night so we tried to sleep as the car rocked and the tent threatened to detach itself and carry us away into the distance. Fortunately it's all quite solidly attached, and we're heavy enough to give us confidence that we're not going to fly away!

Day 40 - 25th July - Desert elephants

We were woken up early by the spurfowl, who sounded like they were hosting a 'who can be loudest' competition on our tent. After putting the tent away, we drove over to the hut where we had checked in the previous day. There was a guide waiting here, Robin, and we agreed to have him join us in the 4x4 to show us round the local area area - hopefully tracking down the elusive Desert Elephant which live in the river beds in this area.

As we headed up the river bed it was clear that today was going to be about tough driving. Very deep sand, steep banks (often off sand) and other treacherous conditions. However it really felt like we were true explorers, heading up some uncharted river bed! We passed ostrich, baboons, springbok and a lot of other wildlife, but the elephants were seeming to be hiding well.

On one of the banks Robin saw his uncle, who was looking after his cows, and ran over to talk to him about when he had last seen the elephants. Enthused by the news that they were nearby we continued upstream, before coming across some very fresh droppings and some large water holes that the elephants had dug (although the riverbed looks dry, there is water only a few metres below the ground). This meant we were getting close, and so it was slightly more cautiously that we crept onwards. Richard had also managed to overwork the clutch by the stage, and so there was a slightly unpleasant rubbery smell grating on our heightened senses. However we seemed to lose the trail - how could we have missed the elephants? Robin took us to higher ground to a nearby lookout point, and although we scanned the surroundings we could see no sign of the elephants (although it was a beautiful view all the same!).

He decided we should double back on ourselves, but follow a trail next to the river. Finally we spotted the elephants - first one small one, then another and then we spied a huge bull elephant hiding back in the bushes. There was another vehicle the other side of the river from the nearby Elephant lodge (catering for slightly more upmarket groups, as they fly all their guests in with a very competent bush pilot!).

The smaller elephant was not looking altogether impressed with the other vehicle, and stood there staring at it - apparently testing the scent to try and work out what it was. Elephants have very poor eyesight and tend to make up for this with their other senses. The older elephants seemed less concerned, tearing off branches from trees to eat. However the smaller elephant stayed concerned, throwing dust over itself as an attempt to act nonchalant.

We then saw some other elephants emerge from the tree, including a small baby calf. In total there was the giant bull, a large matriach, two youngsters and a calf. The matriarch seemed to come over to the youngster and check what was wrong, and then the family group agreed that there was something worrying there, and there was a huge low booming from the bull that lumbered out from the bushes. The other vehicle quickly drove some distance further away to avoid the risk of being charged. The desert elephants were known for their aggression, and there had been a number of incidents in which elephants had charged and attacked people in the area, including damaging cars and the people inside them! The elephants then started heading down towards us. Unfortunately as we'd been sitting in deep sand for a while, we had sunk down, and on turning the engine back on, promptly stalled! Fortunately with low gear and more acceleration we soon popped out, and made our escape from the approaching herd!

After the excitement of the morning we had a more gentle drive back to the camp through the tough terrain, and had a quick lunch under the shade. After this break we picked Robin up again and drove to the 'traditional' Himba village in the area (as Puros is in a transition phase, and has shrugged off most of its traditional buildings). This village is a little bit fake, and basically consists of a group of Himba who go about their daily business primarily for the benefit of the few tourists who venture to the area.

It did however give us a chance to see how they lived, and we had a tour of their cattle dung houses (surprisingly it didn't smell at all), saw how they prepare the red body paint they adorn themselves in, as well as learning a bit more about their culture and traditions. The guide looked very embarrased when we asked whether themen wore the red paint too and said only when they rolled with with women and then apologised and asked if he had offended us! We also saw a lot of very cute Himba kids, who were overjoyed when we tracked down some sweets in the 4x4 for them, and then went somewhat wild on a sugar high!

After all this it was time to head back to camp for our last night. We were running low on fresh food, so we attacked some corned meat and remaining vegetables for what turned out to be a very tasty stew!

Day 39 - 24th July - Adventure to Puros

Today we were driving to Puros. This involved driving from middle of nowhere (near Sesfontein) to somewhere really in the middle of nowhere. We had been warned that it was a tough journey, and told to allow about 5 hours to cover the 100km to the next campsite. We had also been using much more water than we expected, drinking about 6 litres of water between the two of us, versus our original estimate of 4 litres of water a day. This meant that we were running short, and would have to either find some more, or resort to boiling up water (as a real backup we also have a chemical and filtration pack that can process about 80 litres of water in total, but is quite slow, and we're saving it in case on emergencies). Richard came prepared with all of the gadgets he could think of!

Therefore we stopped off briefly in Sesfontein, a relatively small village but which had a basic store. Unfortunately they'd sold out of large bottles of water, so we cleaned them out of their small bottles and took a large bottle of flourescent coloured fanta as extra fluid! There was also quite a bit of attention in us, with curio sellers, elephant guides and a couple of people simply begging, so we didn't hang around.

The road onwards to Puros started off very well, in fact a lot better than some of the supposedly main road we had just come from. However it started to get a bit tougher with a few steep rocky sections. Coming round one bend we saw a 4x4 truck labouring to tow another 4x4 up one of the tougher sections - both filled with people, goats and sheep! A few friendly waves were exchanged and we squeezed past, reassured that the going couldn't be too tough if you could tow through it!

The road remained bumpy and a little awkward as we wound our way through some of the passes. The scenery was amazing, and we continued to see a lot of small game like oryx and springbok. We also saw more giraffe - they were keeping themselves cool by sittting in the shade. We then passed down into the river bed itself. This was when the going got a bit tougher, with a lot more sand, some of it pretty deep. However Daisy the Defender powered on through.

We finally made it through to Puros, ahead of schedule, and not quite as exhausted as expected. The campsite was beautiful, with a huge amount of space given over only six camping spaces. We were shown to our site at number six, which was completely isolated, although had some great facilities tucked away under a few shady trees - with running water, a basic shower and even flush toilets! There were also a number of signs warning of the dangers of leaving food in a place where elephants might smell or see it, as they wouldn't hesitate to help themselves, even if it was through a car window!

We saw signs that elephants pass through the campsite (there are no fences when you get this remote!) in the form of a couple of large dung piles. We'd been warned that there were predators in the area, but also that they tended to keep away from humans having been attacked and hunted by the Himba people in the past.

We had a relaxing, although sweltering afternoon under the shade of the trees, and had a chance to watch the local (thankfully smaller) wildlife go about its business, as spur-fowl fought each other, the 'go away' birds shouted abuse, and ground squirrels rushed around. As the sun started to go down, we even saw a mongoose rush around some of the nesting birds, before giving itself a bath in the sink under the tap!

After an early supper, and having exhausted our gin and tonics we headed up for the night before too many predators started investigating. We were amused (somewhat evily) to hear a shriek from the nearby campsite, as the over-confident French daughter of the family was frightened at something that we guessed at a mongoose in the bin! It was still stiflingly hot in the tent and we were regretting buying thermal underwear and asking for extra blankets - what a waste of packing space!

Day 38 - 23rd July - driving North to Ongongo

We were one of the first to leave Brandberg - seeing as how conscientous we are at clearing up each evening! We also had a longish drive ahead of us, so didn't want to arrive in the dark.

We drove back to the main road, and started heading north, through Damaraland and up towards Kaokoland. We'd been told to expect more game as we headed north and got closer to some of the wetter river beds.

As we headed up we passed more of the tiny roadside stalls where people were selling crafts as well as 'gemstones' which looked like lumps of quartz from a distance. However we were clearly up too early, as none of them seemed occupied - obviously the 'shopkeepers' hadn't yet made it out of bed!

One of the highlights of the morning was coming round a bend to see another two vehicles parked up, and one of them giving us the 'slow down' signal. As we slowed down we saw a wild desert elephant by the side of the road. It was an amazing sight and so we also pulled up along side the road and switched the engine off. The elephant seemed fairly unconcerned, slowly making its way into the bush as we watched it trundle off. We drove round the corner hoping to see it reappear on the other side, but it had made good its escape!

It was a fairly long and dusty road as we curved around the Brandberg massif to end up on broadly the other side. There were a couple of sights here - burning mountain which had a colorful palette of reds on its side, which meant that when the sun was low, you could almost imagine it was on fire. We carried on round to the 'organ pipes'. These were lava formations that had formed sets of pillars. We saw a family here and the kids were having great fun playing 'keep off the ground' by jumping from pipe to pipe.

It was already starting to get quite hot, so we drove on to the Twyfelfontein rock paintings site. On arriving here we were given a guide with the admission price, and so we set off on the longer trail to have a look at the rock art. The first site we came to was that of the famous 'Lion man' engraving. This was a drawing of a lion, with a human hand coming out of its large tail, and apparently signifies that the shaman had a dream about being a lion (therefore drawing it as having certain human characteristics). It was also interesting as it was a very different style to what we'd seen before, engraved into the rock with quartz tools rather than painted on.

After seeing the Lion man we walked around the other sites on the trail - although there were apparently hundreds if not thousands around the whole area. There was a good one showing all the different animals you could hunt, including penguins and seals, which was interesting seeing as we were quite some way from the sea! There was also another one which showed the animals alongside their tracks, so that it could be used as a teaching aid by the elders. Finally there was one which was fairly eroded, but which was a map showing where watering holes and game could be found (although we'll stick to using our maps for now!)

It was boiling by now in the midday sun (and remember that this is their winter..!) so we had a cool drink at the reception area to the site before heading off. The road was quite bumpy and dusty, although we were beginning to see more little rivers. As we continued to head north the road worsened, and we had to ford a number of small streams before heading on.

We stopped briefly at the veterinary control point, which restricts the flow of animal products from the North. While we were waiting there, an enterprising guide attempted to sell us an engraved nut. We'd been prewarned about this, and were told to expect people to ask us our names, before engraving them into a large ornate nut, before then guilt-tripping you to buy the nut. Fortunately I caught him on the first engraving mark with an emphatic 'no nut, no nut!' which seemed to do the trick.

After this we stopped at the somewhat spartan fuel station - it consisted of a man with a few pumps and nothing else in the area! It was good to have a full tank again though!

We stopped by the side of the road to see the giraffe who were sparring. They swing their heads in a wide and low arch to try and hit the others legs or head - the horns made of bone on the male's head are for this reason. It was a lovely spot and we felt very lucky.

Then we saw a lot of zebra by the road and enjoyed watching them drinking from the river. They are the mosat nervous of the animals and run away from almost anything so when Richard got out of the car, they were off!

Finally we reached the turn off to Ongongo. The other campsite option, Fort Sesfontein, was unfortunately no longer an option as it had burnt down a while ago! The dirt track to Ongongo was 'interesting' as it was in pretty bad repair, and the local villagers had set up a veritable gauntlet of curio stores and pleading children to navigate...! Eventually we escaped and were then presented by the extreme 4x4 course which was Ongongo campsite itself. A low 1st gear descent down into a rocky river, before a 3-point turn on a steep rock edge. How one of the groups we had met earlier had attempted even part of this in a 2WD I have no idea!

We were fairly hot, dusty and tired so as soon as we had parked up, we changed into our swimming gear and went for a dip in the warm spring. This had created a beautiful natural pool, and was perfect for cooling off after the hot day. We only relaxed for a short while, as the colony of water boatman bugs was starting to venture out into the spring as the sun went down, and we saw a couple of terapins that were thinking of also joining us!

After drying off we set up camp and started to cook dinner. Tonight we were attempting to roast a whole chicken using plenty of coals stacked around it, with it packed well in foil. We also had some sweetcorn also wrapped in foil to go with it. While waiting for it to cook (and it takes some time) we could watch the nearby flocks of birds swooping in and out of the reeds. In fact, there were so many of them in a flock that their swooping would create a loud 'whooshing' noise that shocked us the first couple of times we heard it!

Finally it was time to head to bed - the disadvantage of being near the running water was that the midges and mossies were definitely coming out, so we retreated to the safety of the tent!

Day 37 - 22nd July - A white lady and a pool!

We woke up early in the tent with all the bird calls but decided not to rush - we were going to see the White Lady rock paintings and we were very nearby.

We arrived first, but whilst we were making sure all of our valuables were well hidden, a large group turned up and beat us to it!

We started walking at just gone 8am and it was a 45 minute walk to the rock painting site. We saw something we didn't expect - a stream with some water! Very amazing, but on closer inspection we saw the number of large pond skaters and were put off!

The rock art is thought to be about 2,000 years old. It was first found in 1912 but got its name when a novice at rock art interpretted this as a European lady as it was white. There was much discussion at the time about how and why a European would be in Africa. A few years later an expert interpretted it as a local man (probably a shaman) who was dancing a ritual around the fire, so the ashes would stick to his skin and appear to be white. Not such a great first go at guessing what it was! The name has stuck though.

Katy was very impressed with the drawing of the zebra too - someone had spent a lot of time with the stripes!

The paintings we saw in Bushman's Kloof only had part of the picture as the whites and yellows had faded only leaving the oranges and browns. Here we could see all the colours including more of the half man, half animals and more local wildlife. It was very impressive to see and very well organised.

The nearest city used to be the administrative centre of the country but this has been moved meaning that there are a lot fewer jobs than there used to be. This is the town we were told not to stop at. At the White Lady paintings, guides form this town were used to take groups to the paintings - a good use of people and tourists are happy to pay the huge charge of £2.50 per person to have some explanations.

Our guide was trying to teach us the local language - Damara which includes clicks with spoken word. There are 4 different types of clicking - the lateral click (like urging a horse forward), the click against the front of your teeth and two more which are fairly similar but understood by the locals. We also learnt some words that we would have more hope of remembering - ta ta is goodbye, ynnneee is yes and no is nahh.

We also saw lots of flowers on the way back, lizards, and some interesting birds - we will attempt to identify them later.

We then were feeling really quite warm and with the large number of very annoying flies at the campsite, we decided to go back to the pool for a cooling dip. More local wildlife were pets - with guinea fowl happily wandering around and then the less than native peacocks also joining in. After a beer to watch the sunset, we headed back to the campsite for another warm evening in the tent.

We are now lazing by the pool after a cooling dip. It really is tough!

Day 36 - 21st July - driving up to Brandberg

After an exciting trip to the supermarket and filling up with diesel, it was time to leave Swakopmund and head towards our next stop - the Brandberg Mountains.

We drove along the skeleton coast which has its name apparently due to the trecharous conditions for boats. We saw a couple of wrecks as we drove - you can see that it is a reasonably modern ship and really quite big. If this is what happens today, it must have been tough in the days before radar!

The day was warm and once we turned off the coast road and headed in land, it was a very straight road, but you could see the mirage, with the road disappearing and only the electricity cables showing that it did infact continue!

It was a warm day and we decided not to stop for lunch as we had a big breakfast and it was too warm. We did manage to see something very rare - a cloud! Every day we have seen the skies completely clear - it was a very small cloud that didn't hang around for long, but we were impressed all the same!

We were pleased to arrive at the Brandberg White Lady Lodge. It had all mod-cons 2 swimming pools which we were very excited about - we would be using the facilities later!

We found a good campsite - big with trees providing shade and a pre-built Braai pit. We settled down for so much needed water and a snack as the Lodge's pet came by to visit us. We had been warned in advance so weren't too scared to see a Springbok coming running over to us. Alexander was very friendly but apparently sometimes likes ladies a bit too much.

He watched us, got as annoyed as we were about the flies and then dug around in the sand for some seed pods from the trees. He was happy relaxing wiht us and soon sat down in the shade. Richard found a seed pod for him and fed him, but he tasted a bit before staring staight at Richard as he spat it out!

Time to change into our swimming gear before trying out the pool. Lets just say that it was very refreshing. We sat up to our necks in the baby pool cooling down nicely before heading back to our tent for a dinner of pork kebabs, red wine and of course, the obligatory marshmallows before bed.

Day 35 - 20th July - Quad biking in the dunes of Swakopmund

We had a leisurely wake up and breakfast before heading off into town to check out the local camping equipment shop. It was a boys heaven with all the gear and each time we went to pay, Richard would wander off again - its only fair as Katy quite often does it with nice 'stuff' shops!

We picked up 2 more gerrycans - 20 litres each so we can relax a bit more on some of the long journies we have. There aren't petrol stations all that often as there aren't many towns and only one that we have been told to avoid (Khoriaxis).

We also picked up another box so we could pack away all the random bits that we have in plastic bags - they get very messy, bump around and we have no idea what is in each one.

After this we found an internet cafe so we oculd upload the blog entries Richard drafted the day before.

We had heard that there were lots of flamingos in the next town and as we were free over lunch, we made a quick had and cheese roll and set off in the Land Rover. The next town, Walvis Bay, was only about 30 mins away along the skeleton coast. Once we got to the lagoon, we were disappointed with the few and grey flamingos. Where are the 100's of birds all pink? We sat in the car eating our lunch wondering if there was somewhere else that we should go to, but then a tour group arrived, so we had to be in the right place!

In the afternoon we went dune bugging. It is basically a quad bike that you drive as quickly as you can up and down dunes. It was good fun, but after Katy scared herself a couple of times, she was less sure. The most fun / terrifying part was called rollercoasting. This is where you drove up a dune as quickly and as high as you could go before turning the buggy back down when you ran out of momentum. It is meant to be a controlled arc, or if you turn down the dune too quickly, a scary rapid acceleration!

We stopped for a drink and then it was time for more fun. Katy got better at controlling the buggy in the second half and did some non-deadly attempts at roller-coasting. Then we stopped to watch the sunset over the ocean before ending all the adrenelin rush.

In the heat, Richard had left his debit card in his pocket and it was nicely bent in the process. We have tried flattening it again without huge amounts of success so far. This hopefully (touch wood, fingers crossed) won't be a problem as Katy has a card, but if the fraud guys look too closely and stop transactions because she is out of the country, we could have problems. Relatively few places take card, so we currrently have cash hidden all over the place in the car and in our luggage.

We went out for dinner at a restaurant called the Tug which was an old ship lifted out of the water and a restaurant built around it which was fun before enjoying our last night for a while in a real bed!

Day 34 - 19 July - Nature trail and Swakopmund

We had a leisurely wake up at Bloedkoppie and enjoyed seeing the sun colour the granite rock faces. We set of Westwards towards Swakopmund and the sea. It was only a relatively short distance, but we made a side trip through the nearby 'nature trail'. On the way we saw a huge group of Ostrich - probably a good 40 or so strong, that were close to the side of the road. We turned off the engine and watched them for a while before they moved off, and it was great to see some of the displays between them.

The start of this trail had some of the worst corrugations we'd come across, and driving along at 40km/h would rattle Daisy, us and everything we owned to pieces. Fortunately it didn't last forever, and we took a side turn to see the famous Welwitschia plant. This plant has all kinds of unique properties and is also only found in this area of Namibia - however in the dry season it looks slightly like a large pot plant which someone hasn't watered for a while. We pressed on to see the largest example of the species which is thought to be over 1,500 years old - plants grow very slowly in the desert! This example was much more impressive - it looked like the carnivorous plant in 'Little shop of horrors' or a triffid. It was fenced in, which added to the effect that it might suddenly uproot and come looking for its next meal....!

We passed through a riverbed which looks very dry but there has to be some underground water as non-desert plans are thriving here which seems very strange in the middle of an area which has absolutely nothing!

Next stop on the nature trail was the moon landscape. It was an impressive viewpoint over some rugged terrain, although didn't resemble the moon (which I believe is relatively grey and flat with some meteor craters)! We then trundled round the rest of the trail enjoying the views and descriptions of some of the areas - one which was somewhat unimpressive was the site of a German army base in World War I. From the description it seems like they set up camp there for a night or two, and there's absolutely no sign that anyone was there!

From the nature trail we drove on to Swakopmund, taking only a slight detour for a picnic lunch on the beach between the dunes and the sea. We then drove on to the Stiltz lodge - we had a 2 night stay under a proper roof and a real bed with an en suite bathroom in our itinerary - luxury! After a much needed shower, we put virtually all of our clothes into the laundry - everything gets covered in dust within 5 minutes of getting dressed. Even when we make an effort, we see to chose the wrong place to sit by the campfire and end up smelling very strong of smoke!

In keeping with the rest of the trip we still had some great views, and our balcony looked out over the estuary and the ocean, with a lot of bird life around. We spotted a flamingo and were enjoying the various calls of the birds - so far on the trip we have decided one bird (not sure of the species) sounds like a puppy getting overly excited with a new squeaky toy and another has an evil laugh cry (mwahhh-haah-hah)!

We celebrated surviving our first few days of camping with a cold drink from the mini bar. After cooling down we talked to the lady at reception about Swakopmund and booked up dinner and some activities for the next day. We then went for a quick drive around the town to get our bearings before coming back to the lodge to settle down with a book and to catch up on our blog entries and watched the sunset over the beach.

We ventured out again in the evening (via a number of wrong turns - the one-way streets aren't shown on our map!) to the Lighthouse restaurant which was very nice but we must learn that the portions are large here and we should never again order a starter. We were absolutely defeated by the seafood platter!

Day 33 - 18 July - Namib desert and Bloedkoppie

We both had a good night's sleep, and Katy awoke fully recovered from her migraine. As she was packing up the tent ready for folding down, she spotted a large cricket that she wasn't willing to deal with - Katy is tidier and Richard has to deal with the bugs!

We made ourselves a nice breakfast of sausages and beans before packing up and setting off again. We weren't entirely sure what to expect from today as we drove up further North through other parts of the Namib Naukuft park.

The first part of the journey was relatively uneventful, just covering some distance back up the main roads. We stopped off at Solitaire, which looks like a big town on the map, but in reality is just three buildings - a fuel station, a general store and a bakery. We made good use of all of these, and met 'Moose' who is the proprietor and baker and who sold us some cheese bread, and some apple pie. Not quite the tinned food that we were expecting to be surviving on for our time on safari!

We drove on up to another couple of passes and the sandy landscape turned more mountainous. As we had national park permits we could take some of the off-road 4x4 side routes and found a couple of spectacular view points over the changing scenery. One area the stood out was where lava flows had forced themselves between the existing granite rocks, causing it to have dramatic spines between the layers of rock. We also did some more low gear practice, crawling up and down one of the more sheer lookout points.

After we had made it through the passes, we turned off into the most Northerly area of the national park. This was a very flat and dry grassland, and we didn't expect to see much in this area. However we were soon proven wrong when we saw a very large group of springbok, who made good speed in running away, demonstrating their 'springing' ability as they went! We also saw a lot of ostrich, and one of the males had a broken wing hanging limply by its side - we assume through a tussle with another male! We then were extremely lucky to see a group of Zebra in the distance and some warthog.

Katy also took the opportunity to have a trial drive in Daisy - having confirmed that she was indeed able to drive Daisy she then decided she preferred her usual role as navigator, chef and general 'organiser'! It is very important to know exactly where everything is in Daisy and its a nightmare to have to look everywhere if you forget - Katy's OCD tendencies are coming on nicely!

However it was soon time to stop for lunch, and we had only a quick stop to eat the pasta we'd cooked the night before and the apple pie for pudding. Even here we were kept amused by the antics of the Tok Tokkie beetle which were fighting amongst themselves - obviously after the premium territory next to the picnic area!

From here we drove on through some more sandy areas, again we were very glad to have brought a 4x4 as we easily ploughed through the deep sand. We took a side trip to go and see some of the huge granite boulders in the area, which had been shaped into some interesting features, including a giant rock arch at the end of the side trip. This also had some more fun 4x4 driving, passing through some rock fields with razor sharp chunks of cooled lava and a lot of corrugated roads which shook us to pieces. The 3 point turn on a steep slope was a bit nerve-wracking when Richard couldn't find the reverse but it was a good learning experience - he knows where it is now!

After a long days drive we were pleased to arrive at Bloedkoppie. This basically means 'Blood mountain' and is a huge granite upwelling in an otherwise fairly flat area. We found a nice spot and set up camp. This was quite different however to the other campsites - no facilities to speak of and right in the middle of the wilderness. We did see another couple of campers however, a friendly South African family who came by to say hi and another Namibian family who had taken out their 5 kids for a night of camping under the stars (the grown-ups got a tent, the little ones a sleeping bag on the back of the pickup!).

After cooling off a bit we decided to climb Bloedkoppie. It was a smooth although steep gradient, but we made good time to the top with the chance to see some great views of the surrounding area. It was meant to have amazing sunsets, but making our way down the slope in the dark didn't appeal, so we decided we'd leave that to another time! Instead we had a gin and tonic as we set up the campfire for the evening - we decided to cook a stew of steak, potatoes, onions and spices. It worked surprisingly well, and we had a delicious meal under the stars with a nice bottle of red wine (tip - buy screw tops to save hunting round for the corkscrew!). Although we had escaped the wind of previous nights we were actually quite warm in the tent - it's surprisingly well insulated for something so simple!

Day 32 - 17 July - Dunes and relaxing!

The good news about our balloon flight being cancelled is that we didn't need to be up at 5 am...! Therefore by the time we'd woken up and struggled out in the cold morning air, most of the big groups had already set off. The wind was very strong again, and so we gave up on boiling water for tea and quickly packed up camp and headed off into the national park.

This was a amazing drive, heading further West towards the coast. The rugged landscape soon softened to deep red coloured dunes, bordering a salty dried up river bed. There was also still quite a lot of small game living in this area, with many a solitary bachelor springbok or ostrich wandering the windswept landscape.

We reached the beautiful Dune 45 - probably the most photographed dune in the area, with beautiful orangey-red sand curving up to a high peak. It's also popular to walk up it, and so we began to struggle up. The wind didn't make this particularly easy, and had to stop a number of times and crouch down to avoid being blown over! After a long workout we had made it most the way up, but decided we had both eaten too much sand for one day and ran down the side of the dune. This was great fun, but resulted in us taking on even more sand, with our shoes and socks absolutely full! It was beautiful in the bright sunshine.

After a cool drink in the car we drove on towards Sossulvlei. This was an area of salt flats bordered by the red sand dunes, which often turns up in photographs of Namibia. However today was not the day to see this, as the high winds had whipped up a mini-sandstorm. Normally it is quite a long walk from the parking to the main sights, but as we were in a 4x4 we could drive on (and initially we felt very smug about this, driving past lots of walkers). Almost instantly we were in very deep sand and saw a number of other 4x4s bogging down. Fortunately the half-day 4x4 course Richard had taken proved its worth, and we crawled out of the tough spots in low 1st before speeding through the dunes in the higher gears.

Driving towards Sossulvlei we saw several very windswept groups emerging from the sandstorm - it wasn't overly apparent what we were meant to be seeing, or even where we were going. Therefore on reaching what we thought was the end of the track we decided that if we got out for a walk, we wouldn't be able to find the car again. Enough was enough and turned round for some more deep sand driving practice!

The winds had continued to pick up, and we crept along the previous tracks back to where we were. Fortunately we have a GPS on hand with very detailed electronic maps from both Garmap and Tracks4Africa, so can pull these out if we need to (they are so detailed they even have the coordinates for individual camping areas at a given site, so if you are incredibly lazy, you can look up 'campsite 23 at Sesriem campsite' rather than listening to their directions. Hopefully these will help keep us on track for the rest of the journey...! Having said that, Richard has been pleasantly surprised by Katy's navigation skills - no wrong turns so far. It does help having so few roads, so Katy can tell him to turn right in the next 5km!

Making it back on the main road we heading back towards the campsite and the boundary of the national park. While we were here we stocked up on wood, charcoal, water and diesel (along with an ice cream each!) before heading North. It was only a short drive to our next destination, and we soon reached the Agama River campsite. This was very different to Sesriem, with only 6 sites and was much more isolated. However it still had good facilities, with hot showers from 5pm to 7pm, and some more good quality flush toilets (although with views of the stars this time!).

We settled down here next to a river bed - with a lot more wildlife than the much busier Sesriem campsite. One of the best sights was a Goshawk that had killed a smaller bird and stuck it onto one of the large thorns on the tree next to us. This allowed it to eat its meal at leisure, without having to hold onto it. This gave us a good chance to try out the telephoto lens we had brought with us.

We had a nice relaxing afternoon, and watched the sunset from the campsites elevated sundeck after some much needed showers. We were trying out some 'cheetah logs' tonight for our fire, which are slow burning reconstituted wood (supposedly also much better for the environment), but they were so slow burning it took about an hour until they had turned into hot embers to cook on! Unfortunately during this time Katy had been struck down by a migraine - probably brought on by the stress of nearly being blown off sand dunes, along with the extremely bright sunlight all day (not to mention the chocolate she had). Therefore she went up for an early night, and Richard finished cooking the pasta which we would use the next day, did the washing up and packed up the table and chairs.

Day 31 - 16 July - Soussuvlei and first night of camping

Dwayne came back round in the morning to go through our trip with us. Here we opened the maps and he ran through a suggested route for each day, and what things we should look out for, or areas to avoid. This was incredibly useful, as he added a lot of flavour to the areas and gave us some excellent tips on side-trips or scenic routes to build in. We also talked about some of the more challenging days that we'll be facing later in our travels, such as the day which he promises will make our livers ache as it's so bumpy, or the 10 hour drive through sand and wild game, where there is a distinct possibility we could run out of fuel if we are not fully prepared!

Fortunately Safari drive have planned our route so that the difficulty slowly increases, so we don't tackle the toughest stuff too soon, but can build up our confidence slowly. Therefore this first day started us off on tarred roads for the first hour, so that Richard could get used to the 6-gears and the stiff clutch and brakes on the Land Rover. It's important to note that by this time the Defender had been christened 'Daisy' (Katy's choice eventually won out over Richards - 'the Monster').

Then we turned onto a dirt road where the benefits of the 4x4 where already apparent with better control on the loose surface, although slightly counteracted by the weight and top-heaviness given what we were carrying. After a nice gentle drive West we then turned onto one of the yet smaller dirt roads to cross Spreetshoogte pass. This is a 4x4 only track, and so Richard eventually found the low gear selector and we climbed up the steep slopes. A few bends later and a spectacular view suddenly appeared at the top of the pass, looking out over the arid landscape of the Namib-Naukuft desert. It was also time for a bit of rest, so we got out a picnic lunch and tried to keep hold of it as the winds over the pass threatened to blow it away!

We then drove down the other side of the pass in the desert itself. As we were progressing further West and then South, it became increasingly sandy. We also saw a number of small creatures, including Ground Squirrels and what we think were Mongooses, there were also quite a few springbok and ostrich around roaming free.

Joining back up with the main (i.e. slightly wider and flatter gravel) road, we made our way down to Sesriem. This was to be our campsite for the night and is based in the National Park. As with nearly all of this part of the trip, this was all pre-booked by Safari drive, so while other prospective campers were being redirected to the underwhelming 'overflow' area, we had a nice spot waiting for us, with its own braai (BBQ) spot, water tap and thornveld tree to shelter under. It really felt strange when a lone springbok wandered between our camping spot and the neighbours and didn't seem too concerned with us!

The roof tent was surprisingly easy to set up. It just folds out to set up and then folds back in half and gets tied down on the roof of Daisy. We leave all the bedding in there and there are ties across the tent to keep this vaguely in place. Nice and simple! It isn't the biggest of beds but it is surprisingly comfy. After all our concerns about how potentially difficult it was going to be, we were soon in the possession of a fully set up campsite! Richard was setting up a huge inferno, caused by the very strong winds and a liberal application of wood and fire lighters. This rapidly cooked our dinner of borewors and we toasted our first night camping with a bottle of champagne that Safari drive had snuck into our fridge - cheers! We expected the cork to fly with the amount of bumping it had suffered in the back of Daisy, but surprisingly it was fine!

The relative piece of the campsite was disrupted a bit by some of the larger tour groups who would fit 10-12 tents on the same amount of space we had for themselves. The more experienced groups were well behaved, but what seemed like one recently arrived group were a bit of a pain, traipsing through our campsite on mass as a shortcut to get to the toilets and showers. However this all came with the territory of being broken in slowly, and we benefited from the same great facilities - hot and cold water, a nearby shop and bar, and flush toilets that were cleaner than a lot of hotels we've stayed in before!

It all settled down soon enough, and the tour groups realised they had paths to use (and probably were slightly more concerned as the sun went down about what they'd find by going cross country). We then headed over to the bar for a quick cold beer, before heading up to the roof tent. On turning out our lights, Richard heard noises outside. We'd been told we were in a predator free area, so it is safe to go outside your tent - looking outside he saw a jackal licking the cooling braai area!

It was not the end of the excitement for the night, as very high winds were passing through the Sesriem area. This had caused the balloon flight we had planned for the next morning to be cancelled, and also made the tent rattle around loudly. After some experimenting we found that there were a few clips we could do up outside and inside which made the tent a lot tighter, and we could eventually settle down for a (half) decent nights sleep.

Day 30 - 15 July - Finsh River Canyon and the 4x4

We woke up early as we had another long drive and needed to be briefed on the 4x4 on the same day. We aimed for 30 mins before sunrise to head off but the sky looked surprisingly dark. As we got to reception, we understood why - the Namibian time is an hour behind South Africa so we actually arrived to check out at 5.30am and found no-one there other than cleaning staff. They found this quite amusing, and so We waited until 6am in the car - during which time the sky was starting to get lighter and then headed off to the main look out over Fish River Canyon.

This canyon is actually one inside the other and is very dramatic. A small river (it is the dry season now) winds in way around the bottom and we stood there freezing watching the sun gradually lighten the canyon. It was beautiful but very cold so once we were suitably freezing, we jumped back in the car and started the journey to Windhoek. It was quite nice having it almost to ourselves, with only one other car for company.

We were also starting to realise the limitations of our Toyota Corolla. Heading down yet another gravel road it began to shake itself to pieces on the corrugated ruts. Given it didn't have the highest build quality we were a bit concerned that large parts were about to start falling off. This was made worse when we didn't spot a large stone in the road, and the noise of it pinging up against the bottom of the car was a little bit worrying!

After our 'gourmet' feast the night before, our stomachs were rumbling, and so we were amused to find a Wimpy at the service station. After we finished and were back on the road, we were waved over to the side of the road by a policeman. We had been speeding and whilst many people would think Namibia wouldn't have the equipment, we were caught by what seemed to be a fairly hi-tech speed gun.

A South African was stopped seconds after Richard for the same reason but they had slightly different approach. Richard was very calm, jovial and laid back, knowing that he was in the wrong and had been fairly caught. The South African was arguing against everything possible - where the speed gun was made, that it was physically impossible for him to have accelerated that quickly, that his wife was ill, etc, etc. Whilst Richard was being questioned, Katy was quickly reading up about the police in Namibia - they are very honest and should never be offered brides and the best approach was to be laid back as this avoids any chance of arrest (unless you do something a lot worse than speeding) and gains respect.

Once spoken to, Richard was issued with a notice which he had to take to the police station to pay a fine - it was down the road on the right and was obvious (apparently). we finally found the police station only to be told that we had to go to the magistrates court, back down the road and you couldn't miss it. After Richard attempted a 3 point turn on a one way street outside the police station, we were redirected in the right direction and went stopped by a big building which had lots of traffic police cars - this must be the right place. No, it was the head quarters of the traffic police but not the magistrates court. Finally after some more vague directions we found it. Richard went inside whilst Katy stayed with the car. She was getting nervous that Richard was a while - this was because they needed to find the correct paperwork to complete - the admission of guilt form! Whilst this was being searched for another 2 tourists came in to pay their fines too - Richard wasn't the only one but did have the biggest fine (as he was speeding the most). Quite a money spinner for Namibia but the fine was cheap by UK standards - only £15!

After all that excitement, Richard paid more attention to speed limits and we successfully made it to Avis in Windhoek after a long and relatively uneventful drive. We did have a minor tragic experience when a small bird turned right rather than left when we drove past it (unlike the rest of its flock) and bounced off the bonnet and window. The only good news is it would have had a quick and painless death, and is now hopefully in birdy heaven... We were concerned with the massive nests we had seen by the side of the road, and with more inspection, this is a communal nest for large groups of swifts and not for a giant bird - thank goodness.

Once in Windhoek, we dropped off the car with Avis, and were met by Dwayne from Safari Drive in what would be our new Land Rover and he drove us back to their base. We were taught how to put up the roof tent in about 3 mins and another 2 mins to take it down again. We ticked off the list of equipment and packed everything in - this included everything from a spade to a fridge to the seemingly armour plated egg container. Then it was time to take to the road and drive to our B&B for the night. For those of you who haven't driven a Land Rover Defender, it similar to driving a tank when compared to our Toyota. It weighs about 3 tonnes fully loaded, carries 120L of fuel and takes about a dual carriageway to turn around!

We crashed around Windhoek downtown, with Richard learning the clutch and the gearbox in real time while crying out 'get out of my way you puny cars' while laughing (evil villain style) - clearly all the driving that day had taken its toll....we finally parked at our B&B which involved a 10-point turn in the car park, before heading off to buy food at the supermarket. One of our wedding presents was a '2 pan' cook book (thanks Andrew!), so Katy ticked off the ingredients whilst Richard found other essentials - marshmallows, skewers, wine, etc.

We stuffed everything into the Land Rover and left it at the B&B whilst we went out for a meal at Joe's Beerhouse which was great fun. It is a somewhat chaotic assortment of indoor and outdoor spaces, with large fire pits and giant servings of meat. Perfect for stocking up on good food before we set off camping! Richard ordered the pork knuckle and was massively defeated by the huge portions served here!

Day 29 - 14 July - Long drive to Namibia

We woke up early, had breakfast delivered to our suite and finished packing up. It was time to say goodbye to luxury but we have decided that we go back to Bushman's one day to see it in the summer which gets up to the high 40s!

It was quite clear up at Bushman's but we then passed through a cloud as we went down the valley. It was going to be a long driving day for Richard - close to 700km (note that we've been converted to the metric system by South African road signs and the GPS mapping program we're using)

We were amazed how the landscape changed as we headed North from Bushman's to a river valley with vineyards and orange groves to mountains to more arid regions. It was quite a journey seeing the slow transformation to desert.

We got to the border and were told that we had to visit doors 1,2 and 4 (visa, customs and the police). We had our passports stamped, the customs guy took one look at the car and waved us on and the policeman asked where we got the car and that was it - we were out of South Africa and driving onto the Namibian border post. We had a few forms to fill in, temporary road tax to pay and more passport stamps and we were in! We also had a first sight of one of the 'overlander' vehicles - these are big converted lorries with some off-road capabilities that take large tour groups round some of the wilder parts of Africa as an alternative to taking a 4x4.

The main B1 road in Namibia was amazing - a lot better than we expected - very straight (as in you don't need to turn the steering wheel for 30 minutes), very flat, tarred and with very little other traffic.

We eventually had to turn off the B1 onto gravel roads - again these were surprisingly good and you could easily do 80 km/h+ on them, as long as you're happy with the constant mini-skids you get on a loose surface (and don't try any rally-esque 'power slides'!) We got to Fish River Camp (Canon Mountain Camp) just before the sun went down and with a bit of searching, we found reception, got our keys and went to our room. There wasn't any food supplied at the more rustic camp and as we didn't fancy driving back to the main lodge in the dark, we made do with the food we had in the car - wildebeest pate (very nice!), crisps and biltong. We have to say that Lays (aka Walkers Crisps) are much more imaginative in their flavours that at home - sweet chilli, balsamic vinegar and onion, tomato, chutney are all fairly nice flavours and they still have the old favourites of salt & vinegar.

We went to bed early as it quickly got bitterly cold as the sun went down. Richard filled up the hot water bottles provided and we tucked ourselves in for a cold night. Before we had a chance to fall asleep, we heard noises outside near the car and a loud clanking of the gate. On looking at the window Katy saw the shadow of a horned shape, and hoped this was just a trick of the light and not some demonic beast. Richard opened the curtain to check what the disturbance was and came face to face with a great big cow. It had been trying to bump the gate open to get to the nice grass inside the Camp area but saw Richard and wandered off into the night...! Not sure this classes as a big game sighting!

Finally we fell asleep and managed to defrost!