Chobe National Park, Botswana

In the morning we easily packed up and departed from Zimbabwe for Botswana.  It was only about an hour drive once we crossed the border to get to our campsite near Chobe National Park.  

For our game drive, we climbed into a safari vehicle and headed into the park. Comparatively Kruger was more flat than Botswana. The hills were not very big but the landscape had more folds to it. The Chobe River is on the edge of the park and forms the border between Botswana and Namibia. There is an island in the middle of the river that was highly contested as to whose country owned it. Finally a ruling was made by the World Court that the land belonged to Botswana. This was determined because the river is shallower on the Botswana side and deeper on the Namibia side. Thus it is meant to be a part of Botswana.

Our guide was not nearly as intelligent as Lloyd in Kruger.  He did find us plenty of animals including four of the Big 5, but his knowledge about the animals and the plants was not up to scratch.

Animal Sightings:

·         Giraffe: Eating dinner

·         Baboons: Monkeying around. They had cute little babies! The baboons were strolling along the river’s edge.

·         Birds.

Big 5:

·         Elephants: Botswana is known for having the highest concentration of elephants in Africa. Chobe has 50,000 elephants alone.  Strolling in the river, climbing the small hills, roaming the beach, etc.  Apparently they always come out in the afternoon at this time.  Of course there were baby elephants frolicking around, acting just so cute.

·         Buffalo: The buffalo were mainly across the river lounging on one of the islands. They were all together and not up to much activity.

·         Leopard: I finally got to see a leopard! This completed my task to see all of the Big 5 on my trip to Africa!!!  The leopard was lying alone underneath a tree near the sand and river. It barely moved. So many safari vehicles were near it trying to get a closer look. Our guide drove us over one of the sand dunes and we thought we were going to completely tip over directly in front of the leopard. The vehicle was at such a high angle we were holding on to not slide right out the side (a railing is there, but not very secure nor like the ones at Kruger). Thankfully we managed to stay right side up and drive forward onto more level ground. But the view of the leopard was amazing.

·         Lion: We went off-roading (which you are not supposed to do in the park) to drive around this bush in the dunes and get close to two female lions and three little cubs! The cubs were so precious. They were sitting together and looking around before playing and then hiding in the giant bush. It was absolutely adorable and I love baby lion cubs! The two females were lying around and watching us carefully. They see the vehicle as something they can’t attack but if one of us were to get out or stick a body part out they would come for it as they are wild.  Dan preceded to accidently DROP his camera right in front of them. The guide said we would have to just leave it there, but another safari vehicle came around the corner. The vehicle pulled between us and the lions to block their view of us and the guide quickly opened his door and grabbed it.  Later we came upon a male lion sitting far back from the road. There was no room to get closer as the trees and general wood debris was in the way. The lion had a huge main.

·         Rhino: There are no rhinos in Chobe National Park. At least I got to see them in Kruger.

In the morning we went on a river safari on the Chobe in a small boat to see more of the animals. Unfortunately the elephants were not out and about as it was too early for them to be at the watering hole.

Animal Sightings:

·         Crocodiles: There were tons of these on the land, sliding into the water, and swimming. I would not ever go swimming here in the Chobe River.

·         Hippopotamuses: These were also all over the place. They were standing on land or swimming in the water. At one point we got so close to one that it turned around and was chasing our boat as we shot away through the water. We also were moving fast at one point and we hit something under the surface and thankfully just shot forward with a loud clunk noise; I was convinced we hit a hippo while he claimed it must have been a large piece of wood.

·         Waterbuck: The waterbuck were eating grass on the side of the river.

·         Buffalo: They were doing the same thing as the afternoon before.

·         Elephants: Same.

·         Birds: Different birds were flying around and sitting near the river’s edge. The best part was actually watching a group of birdwatchers on the boat watching the birds. They had huge lens on their cameras that were all in camouflage colors and sticking out far past their faces.

After the safari we headed out to drive all day until we would reach Palapye that evening to camp.  While driving south, we had to go through several disease control check points. We passed through them on the way north, but there are no restrictions on driving up Botswana. Driving down however, there is the threat of spreading Foot and Mouth Disease. To prevent this at each check point we must all climb out of the car and take every pair of shoe we brought with us. Thankfully I only brought my sneakers and my sandals. Then you step on this wet cloth that is sitting in a puddle to completely coat the bottom of your shoes in the liquid.  Then you put your other shoes down and rinse them off too. Next you walk to the other side as the driver gets back in the car and drives it down into a ditch containing tons of the fluid so that the entire tire gets coated as you drive through. I am not sure how effective this is, especially because some of us left shoes in our bags and they don’t check them.

We stopped in Francistown to drop Dan off where we had picked him up at the start of the week. We didn’t arrive in Palapye until late at night. Early in the morning we started the rest of the journey to return us to South Africa. We made it through the border crossing and reached the Tropic of Capricorn. The sign was knocked over and on the ground; we got out and picked it back up so we could take a picture.  After a few more hours’ drive, we dropped off the Australian couple, and then Caroline and I were picked up by Beyers. We spent the last night at his house. We were so tired that we fell asleep on the couch. It was very nice to have a real mattress to sleep on again. Bright and early the next day we caught a flight home to Cape Town!