The last day of our trip through the Botswana bush would be the longest. From the Khwai area, through the Savuti area of Chobe. We were in for swamps, gravel and a lot of sand. This was the part we were the most anxious about.
Tracks4Africa proved invaluable again. Jeroen drove and Emma navigated us through the communities, villages and nature of Khwai. Without a guide we were not able to spot much wildlife, but that was not the intention. We just wanted to experience the bush. It seemed so strange to us that, without it being any national park or conservancy, animals like lions and leopards live so close to the villages with game vehicles driving through them. In hindsight we should have done a gamedrive, but we didn't really have the time.
We had a wonderful time driving through the Khwai bush, towards the Savuti gate. Until we went further into the swampy area and the tracks disappeared in the water. Emma got out of the car to guide Jeroen through the bush and see if the tracks continued. It worked, until we arrived at a river crossing.
We were not able to see how deep the crossing was and the other side of the river was quite far away. We debated whether we should give it a try, but we decided not to go for it. There was nobody around and getting stuck would have meant being there for quite some time. There was another option to cross the same river, but that meant taking a detour of about half an hour. If that didn't work, we would have to go back all the way. That would cost us about 3 hours.
Emma guided us to the next river crossing. It did seem more doable than the first one, but we didn't see any tracks going in or coming out of the river. We were debating whether or not to try this crossing. We didn't like the idea of taking the detour of three hours by going back all the way and Gigi should be able to easily cross this river. But what if we get stuck?
Then we saw some guys in a mokoro. They probably belonged to the lodge on the other side of the river. We asked if we could pass, but they were quite far away and just as we couldn't understand what they were saying, they probably couldn't understand us. We drove along the river until we caught up with them and asked again. They assured us (or at least tried to) that this was the only shallow part and that it would be an easy crossing. The other option was indeed to go all the way back and use a bridge. We decided to take the chance.
Arriving back at the river crossing, we saw that we were not alone. A lone elephant bull was drinking just next to the spot where we wanted to cross. We waited for some time until the elephant had drunk enough and left again. Then it was time for the moment of truth. We set Gigi into 4-WD and slowly made our way through the water. The guys in the mokoro told us that we would not get stuck, 'It is only sand, no problem'. They proved to be right. As we made a wave of water, we easily went through the river. Gigi once again proved to be very reliable. We probably would have been able to do this part without the 4-WD. We were more worried than we should have been. Looking back, we probably would have been able to do the other crossing easily too, but we were still glad we chose this option. It took us a little time, but we had a nice encounter with an elephant and a great river crossing.
After the river crossing we quickly reached the main road. We were out of the Khwai area an on to our next park, the Savuti region of Chobe. We arrived at the gate in happy spirits. We were nicely on schedule but we still had a lot of ground to cover. After checking in at the gate and noting that we were only transiting, we were good to go. Savuti was yet another beautiful part of Botswana. It was much drier than the Khwai area and the roads were mostly gravel and sand. We feared the sandy road, afraid of getting stuck. Gigi (and the both of us) did wonderfully and the roads proved to be no match for the 3 of us. We saw some wildlife, mainly on the plains at the beginning of the Savuti area, but we mostly saw bushes and tracks. The drive was great, but it was really long.
Around midday we arrived at the Savuti lodge. Despite having the initial plan of transiting through the park, we decided to ask whether they had some availability for us to camp. Sadly, the answer was no. We lingered for a bit, hoping they would come with another solution (as is quite often the case in Africa), but there was no other option. We just had to continue.
We were quite done with the same view of bush and tracks, but we just had to endure the road. Without a proper lunch, the atmosphere in the car was tense at times. Fortunately, we have been through worse, and we were able to mostly enjoy this last stretch of our trip through the bush in Botswana. Though quite long, it was a wonderful addition to our trip through Botswana and we were really happy to have done this. After having endured even the greatly feared 'deep sand' part, we arrived at the northern gate, on our way to our next stop, Thobolo's. Gigi behaved amazingly. The entire road she didn't make any strange noises and she didn't even come close to overheating. Except for the river crossing in the morning, we didn't even need to use the 4-WD and we didn't have to deflate the tyres for the sandy road.
When we arrived at Thobolo's we set up our camp and immediately jumped into the pool. It was great to cool down and relax. After a lovely shower we had a beer on the verandah watching the sunset and we had a private dinner, watching a large herd of wildebeest drinking from the watering hole. We enjoyed our final evening in Botswana and prepared for the next day.
Add comment
Comments