A few days earlier, after leaving the colonial grandness of The Victoria Falls Hotel, we made our way by road, even passing a pack of wild dogs on the
side of the road, to Kasane Airport, which was much more modern than I was
expecting.
In fact, in that Airport in Zimbabwae, we had better, free
wifi than we had experienced in many other places. There was a steady
stream of people coming and going, to and from safaris, hysterically many of
whom had decided needed an entire wardrobe of matching kahki clothes, hiking
boots and other gear which defied the actual needs of a 'safari' of sitting in
a very comfortable Lodge 4WD and taking photos - no trekking involved.
Anyway, a very young, good looking guy in a smart uniform came out to ask our
names, guide us to check in, arrange our bags to be collected, and introduced
himself as our pilot, for our small aircraft flight for just over an hour or so
to the airstrip of Xakanaxa - my birthday base. To say I was hesitant of
small planes is an understatement, however, there being no other way to reach
our destination, and convincing myself that hundreds of others had gone before
me (and I only knew about one disaster that killed six people), I took my
allocated seat in the rear of the six seater plane, beside quite a bit of
luggage and behind another couple. John, my husband, who was experienced
in small planes and had been reassuring me, was allocated the front seat next
to the pilot. This was not what I expected - whose hand and arm was I
going to grip on take off and landing, and when the turbulence occurred, and
when I was scared and wanted to cry? I was not happy at all.
Take off and the first fifteen minutes were very tense for me. I was
expecting to be terrified, of feeling very ill and feeling like I was just
moments away from my imminent death. But I wasn't! With mind over
matter convincing I started to relax and enjoy the view. The absolute
vastness of nothingness blew me away. As far as I could see, there was
brown land, with clumps of dull, green trees and bushes, with scattered
waterholes. I could see one, solitary, dead straight, dirt road with not
one car on it. Where did it go to? Who used it? It also
appeared we were roughly following this road. I checked out the pilot and
could just make out his dashboard instruments over his shoulder. I could
see the fuel gauge, the horizontal indicator thingy, the compass, the speedo
thingy, his clock - it all looked good -- no flashing lights or other warning
signals going off. I looked at the back of John's head - he seemed okay,
looking through the front windscreen, camera in hand and occasionally chatting
to the pilot. Back to my window, and I noticed some dark shapes at a
waterhole and realised I had a bird's eye view of elephants, and that inspired
me to keep looking for more waterholes and counting elephants and looking for
other animals, like giraffes and rhinos. Our flying time passed quickly, and
another glance at the instrument panel and I could detect our descent, and then
what appeared to be a wide dirt road but was really our landing airstrip.
Our landing was quicker than I expected, a bit bumpy, a bit noisy but so
exciting - we were finally here - here, far from anywhere! I was a bit
stiff from being cramped in but felt okay, but one look at John told a
different story. He was green, sweaty and very quiet. Our Lodge
driver bundled us and our luggage into the open safari vehicle and we were off,
through the bush, to our African glamping adventure.
On this trip, we had
deliberately chosen three different types of camps so we could experience three
different types of African safari adventure. Our first was a land-based
camp, and our last was on a river houseboat. This camp was chosen because
it was in the Okavango Delta, where the massive amounts of rain waters from the
wet season gather before draining away into the river system. A complex,
intricate maze of waterways fan around this vast area. To the visitor,
many of the waterways look like each other, and it is woefully easy to lose
your direction. To the many people who work at the Lodges and have grown
up in this environment, individual waterways are as easily identifiable as main
streets in our home towns are. There are areas of solid ground where the
vehicles track and follow all the wild animals you could hope for. There
are also small boats that can take you for a cruise to see the many other creatures
that inhabit this area.
It probably really is a stretch to say we were camping. A gravel path
led in one direction from the reception building to the lounge, restaurant and
deck areas, and in another direction to individual 'tents'. Up the five
or so wooden stairs to our front 'deck' we got our first 'Out of Africa' safari
feel... the small wooden table with two canvas chairs and an oil lantern,
overlooking the reedy edges of this part of the Delta. Unzipping of the
flyscreen doorway revealed our bedroom.... suddenly I was channelling Katherine
Hepburn. There were a beautiful, big bed centred in the room, with solid
timber side tables, a dressing table, a desk, hanging lanterns and candlesticks
with drippy candles, there were beautiful, worn carpets and leather chairs.
On a shelf behind the bedhead, there was also matches, a torch, bug spray and a
siren thingy in case of a middle of the night emergency.... I guess like a lion
entering your tent, or a stampeding buffalo bailing you up. There are no
phones where you dial 9 for reception and between about 8pm and 7am there is no
electricity either for lights, and of course it goes without saying, there is
no mobile reception or internet. You can't leave your tent by yourself in
the night time due to the wandering wild animals through the camp, so if you
need help of any sort during the night, you set the siren thingy off and
someone will come to you from the staff quarters.
Also behind the bed was
another wooden door, with a square of holey wire inserted at viewing height.
This door led to our tent's bathroom and you could check through the wire
before entering to make sure there were no monkeys or other creatures in
there. There were walls and a roof but they weren't connected to each
other. There were more lanterns and candles, a wooden ladder with huge,
white, fluffy towels, there was a shower on one side, a big basin area and
mirror in the middle, and a proper flushing loo on the other. We were not
able to leave any toiletries bags or cosmetics in the bathroom, as the baboons
have been known to enjoy many hours playing with toothpaste, shave foam,
lipsticks and the like, whilst unaware guests have been out spotting animals.
The day’s routines were like our
previous safari camp’s – early morning wake up with a hot drink and something
small to eat, safari for a few hours and back to camp for a slap up brunch,
then time to rest, nap, read, charge batteries, edit photos and chat to other
guests, then high tea at 3pm of delightful savoury morsels and sweet cakes,
back into the vehicles for another few hours of safari with sundowners and
canapés in the bush somewhere to watch the sun setting, back to camp for drinks
on the deck, followed by a wonderful dinner, swapping stories and photos with
other guests, discussing the history, culture and geography of Botswana, the
Delta in particular, and being escorted by lantern light back to your tent to
sleep and dream, ready for the next day’s adventure. So easy for the days
and nights to slip by in this relaxed routine.
No comments:
Post a Comment