Miss Lily

My first week of overlanding has gone and what a week it has been!

Starting in the coldness of Joburg I met up with my fellow travellers at a backpackers and found a interesting group of people, most of them whom had been travelling for 5 months through western Africa, all the way from Marocco and down south. The stories I hear every day is incredible!

We sat off for Botswana and had two days of full travelling. The truck is as comfortable as expected and I find myself in my sleeping bag not only in my tent but also on the truck during the early mornings when we have all the windows rolled up and the wind is refreshingly cold ;) The rewards for having to go through the wind blowing everywhere are astonishing though and I would not change it for the world! To be able to follow the landscape change in this way shows that is the best way to travel with no doubt. Even if it means getting the cucumber and yogurt up your nose thanks to the airflow there is!

We crossed the border successfully  the first day from South Africa to Botswana (I was a bit scared since I still have not gotten my visa which I applied for 1,5 years ago, but were able to get out of the country no problem) and drove a bit further Botswana’s roads are full of cows and goat but more so the donkeys. They are everywhere! I heard that there is 3 donkeys to every citizen and used for everything. We stayed over and continued our journey early next day, another full day of driving in order to arrive to the Okavango Delta, so much heard of. The first view of the delta we got from the air as the whole group went on a plane ride over it. Amazing! To see how big and flat it is and see the animals, elephants, hippos, giraffes and crocodiles. Absolutely magical! Little did I know that there was more of that to come. We got ourselves ready and headed out to the Delta early morning next day for two nights bush camping. With a small pack and our tents and equipment we got acquainted to the nkorokoro, a small boat that goes between the reeds and water lilies thanks to a polar who poles the boat forward. We unpacked and set up our tents and then we had some down time due to the heat so the group bonded over some nice card games. We had three bush walks and one sunset nkorokoro ride in the days we were there and in between we went fishing, got to learn how to do the poling and swam in the delta which also was the substitute for our showers. Cooking on an open fire and not having any shower or toilet facilities just has a special feel to it. Especially when you know you can have leopards, elephants and buffalo outside your tent at night. Our bushwalks gave us amongst other things my first wild dogs! Just as we set up for our first morning walk they were at the bank of the delta just observing us. Our driver said that he had not had anyone seeing them there in 3 years! How lucky were we?

The beauty of the delta and its water lilies will stay in my heart forever.

Our next stop was Chobe River but before that we stopped in Elephant Land. The first time I saw an elephant on the side of the road the others did not see it and the doubt was high in the truck that I told the truth. Haha lillte did they know how many more we would see! The camping was called Elephant Sands and the reason for it being that due to them being the only fresh water source in the area they have hundreds of ellies coming to drink just 15 meters from the bar. It was a night filled of elephant watching by the campfire and after a toilet break we found an elephant 10 meters from our tents. Luckily I had put my tent in between two piles of elephant dung, I figured that they had already marked their territory that night so no more needed. ;)

Chobe river was very nice with a beautiful sunset cruise watching the animals, elephants, giraffes, hippos and the most spectacular being a 4 meter long croc! The next day we went on an early game drive seeing buffalo, giraffe, sable and puku which are new kinds of antelope for me and of course elephant before heading off to Zambia. Again we had a successful border crossing over the Zambizi River which connects Zambia, Zimbabwe Namibia and Botswana.

I have been quite sick this week and it is a very stubborn flu so hard to get rid of when only sleeping in tents in the cold nights but finally now I am starting to feel better. I also tore a muscle in my back so you can imagine sleeping on a mattress and on the truck being an amazing experience. =) But it has all been in the shadow of so many wonderful experiences that it does not damper my mood too much.

We have spent 3 days in Livingstone, Zambia now and seen the Victoria Falls which is such an incredible sight! I went up in a micro light airplane over the falls and what a feeling! After chasing the baboons off the field we took off and it was such a thrill to go through the rainbows and mist it creates when the water comes thundering down in the gorge and splashes up again by its own power. You know how small and powerless you are as a human being when you see the magnificent falls in its glory. We dropped of one of us for a day on the Zimbabwe side and realized as we were taken in to Zim to the border post that some of us was without passports. If we would be stopped right there it would have been a bit of a pickle. ;) Oh well living on the edge in Africa, nothing more exciting than that.

Tomorrow we are leaving north again, Lusaka and Malawi is far away, so we are setting us up for some days on the truck again! Sleeping bag and book packed so it’s all good!