While describing the
weekend I spent in the bush with four incredible women is fairly
straightforward, processing everything that happened and articulating
everything I felt during that weekend is not.
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| The ladies and Xena on the floodplain |
The courageous ladies
and I rented an automatic Hilux and ventured into Savuti and Khwai, in Chobe
and Moremi Game Reserves, respectively on a self drive safari.This time of
year, Savuti is one of the most incredible places I have ever been (I was also
there last year with my mom; the experience inspired last weekend). As I
mentioned in my previous post, Botswana is an inferno right now. Everything is
dry so animals flock to water, such as the Savuti Marsh. We saw incredible wildlife, and the weekend out in the bush challenged my companions
and me in ways we thought it might as well as in ways we had no idea to expect.
Aimee and I had done extensive research on how to this trip; we had no desire
to become a sensationalized news story on five young women who disappeared,
presumed to have been eaten by lions. We were warned of deep sand roads, where
to watch for water crossings, to carry plenty of fuel and then some, to
haul in our own drinking water, to make sure to have the tents completely zipped
up (because curious animals may want a look), that if you
do get stuck, to not under any circumstances to wander from the vehicle, and to
bring shovel, because digging your truck out of the sand with a cooler box is
no fun. I may or may not have compiled a very nerdy document full of safety
information and tips.
So, with plenty of fuel,
water, and a last minute tossing out of an orange (elephants really like
oranges, to the point of trying to get into your car to get them), we set off.
We found the roads to be far kinder than expected, though full of bumps and I'm
still glad I did so much research on driving in sand! The incredible sightings began
early- within 15 minutes of entering the reserve, we see a pride of lions
hanging out near the road! The rest of the drive did not disappoint, with plenty
of elephants, giraffe, and other game. From there we set up and went back out
on a game drive to the marsh, with stunning results.
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| After the first water crossing! |
The first day was full
of magic. Everything went as well as it could have; we spent time sitting on
the marsh just overwhelming happy, handled the sandy roads with ease. A friendly guide in another vehicle even convinced me to drive through a fairly
shallow water crossing to see a leopard on the other side (before leaving, I
had decided we were just not going to mess with water. Throw a leopard in and
guide who tells you 'Ah, that crossing is dry!' to encourage you and you feel
like you could make it through a river). When we got back to camp, we were making
dinner when we saw wild dogs (highly endangered!) across the stream. We watched
them play for about 15 minutes; it was incredible to see them romp around like
your own dog would.
After such an enchanting
first day, we were feeling pretty confident. We hadn't even come close to getting stuck; in fact, we hardly even needed four wheel drive. We had seen really
incredible things in an 8 hour period. We had crossed water and bumpy, sandy
roads with no problem in our tough Hilux, which we had dubbed Xena, Warrior
Princess. We needed the reality check Day Two was to provide.
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The leopard print is circled...
and inches from the tent. |
We awoke to sniffing
noises in the early morning and then leopard prints, inches from the tents
(actually pretty neat as opposed to frightening, as long as the tent is fully closed, creatures will not bother
you). We continued on to yet another lion sighting, this time a pride munching
on a fresh breakfast along the river. From there, we moved on towards the
marsh. We came across another water crossing, and full of confidence, spent a
short time discussing whether or not we should cross and see what all the cars on
that side were watching. We eyed the depth, decided it was probably okay, and all
leaned towards just going for it. Luckily, another safari vehicle
(coincidentally driven by the guide who had taken out my mom and I) was coming
our way, so we decided to sit back and see how it did. Well, as my
foreshadowing suggests, there was no way we could have made that water crossing
without a snorkel. There was a hole in the middle, which we would have hit and
probably flooded the engine. There were several things that went wrong on this
trip, but that was the easily the most stupid thing we did. So with our egos in
check and a very important lesson learned, we continued on, in the opposite
direction, to view more incredible game that morning.
During our afternoon drive, things got a little more interesting again. About
15 minutes in, we came up on some elephants close to the road. Certainly, we
are not elephant experts, but I have been around many of the giants, sometimes very
close, without them minding. As long as you’re respectful and go by at a
moderate speed, they're usually okay with you, especially in the parks. These
elephants did mind how close we were though, as we had unknowingly split them
on either side of the road. So, in what felt like five minutes but was likely
only a few seconds, we saw the matriarch (that's a guess) get all sorts of
irritated and we hurried on our way past them, looking back to see her charging
after us! In the charge itself, everything happened so quickly we didn't have
much time to react, but it was when we came up against another herd of elephants
crossing the road that our anxiety surged, building off each other. We crossed
two more groups slowly, awkwardly, and full of anxiety before making it down to
the marsh, where we promptly sat and discussed our feelings about the event
(some parts remained of a stereotypical 'girl's weekend'). Discussion made it better;
we were able to see elephants without cringing... well, for the most
part.
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| On the Marsh, with several herds of elephants around us (black specks)... when they no longer incited anxiety. |
Savuti was kind to us
the rest of the weekend, giving us another leopard sighting, a beautiful, juvenile
male lion at sunset, BABY LION CUBS, four adult full mane lions (thanks to a
friend we saw out there, he led us through three water crossings to get
there!), and another leopard, which we spotted walking from across a water
crossing that we weren't entirely sure where we had gone through, and again,
all it took was a leopard to make me courageous.
|
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| Viewpoint for the Hippo Pool |
From Savuti, we made our
way to Khwai, an area in Moremi National Park. Again, we had been told to
expect deep sand; not so much, though just a few confusing points in
navigation, which with the help of several maps, a GPS, and finally, confirming
by asking directions (to play into stereotypes- another benefit of an all women
trip, no issues with asking for directions), we made it to Khwai after a
sketchy bridge crossing and a few more animal sightings. Our time in Khwai had
some surprises in store for us, the most notable being the fact that our rental
car company had given us a flat spare tire. But I'll get to that; first, the
crew took a drive out to the hippo pool, about 20km away from camp. We saw
hippos, baby zebra, and some goofy horned creatures; it was a lovely ending to
our adventure. Unfortunately, the um, most adventurous aspect of the trip was
yet to come.
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Our badly degraded tire in the morning light... but, we
made it back and saved the rim. |
About 15 minutes and
10km till camp, around 530pm, we clipped the side of a large fallen branch,
resulting in a flat. A bit stressful so close to dark and at the end of the
trip, but certainly nothing we couldn't handle. We expected a flat on this
trip, so when it happened, Tate jumped out of the car, ready for her moment to
shine (she had read up during the drive where everything was in the car... she
was prepared). Aimee and Tate took charge of the tire, and all seemed good to
go. Around half an hour until complete darkness we begin lowering the jack...
And our stomachs drop with it. The spare tire is completely flat. The sun is
about down. There have been numerous cat sightings today. Without much time to
panic, we all jump back in the car, and decide to see if we can go really slowly on the flat without riding on the rim. We realize in about
30 seconds, we can’t. We have about 20 minutes of daylight left, and we're
forced to make a decision: Do we sleep (well, try to sleep) in the car tonight,
with the cooler in the back, and hope we don't attract anything unwanted (most
likely just monkeys that would bother us… but…) and wait till someone finds us
in the morning? Or do we try to change the tire back, which is punctured in
such a way that it could probably, maybe, hopefully protect the rim to get back
to camp? We decide that while there is a chance to do something about it, we
might as well. I have only seen one person change a tire faster than we did the
second time around and I do not know if I can put into words the relief we all
felt once that tire was changed and we were all back in the car. I take over in
the driver’s seat, and Aimee has her head out the window, keeping a close eye
on the tire, while the women in the back take over navigation, making sure we
don't make a terrible wrong turn through the unmarked and now-dark roads.
Crawling at about 2km/hr, it takes a two and a half long hours to get the 10km
back to camp. We could have walked faster, except for the whole lions,
leopards, and hyenas thing. We kept an eye out for animal eyes (and we're a bit
disappointed we didn't see hyena… well in the morning, after we had slept back
at camp, and were safely on the road home), a close eye on the steadily degrading
tire, and dodged a staggering number of potholes that threatened to rip the
tire away from the rim. But, we made it, saved the rim, and left the spare tire
in a condition that it could be repaired so we could make it back to Maun. We
were a little traumatized... but also left with the feeling that we were able
to handle a lot, that we were pretty tough, and that the weekend was full of
accomplishment.
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