This morning we ate a good breakfast at the ‘Old Bridge Backpackers’ together with our new friends Nick and Aisha. After breakfast it was time to say goodbye. We had such a nice time with this couple so it was sad to say goodbye. But we will see Nick and Aisha again and visit them in Oxford in the UK and they will visit us in Belgium!

We put some petrol in the car and we left Maun. Today it was only a 3,5 hour drive to Ghanzi. On the road there were again a lot of cows, horses, sheep, goats and donkeys so we had to be careful and concentrate very well. When we drove into Ghanzi, we went immediately to Thakadu Lodge, the place here we were going to stay. We booked a luxury safari tent with a bathroom. It is very nice accommodation! After putting our stuff in this huge tent, we went to Ghanzi to do some shopping. We bought some meat (meat is very cheap in Botswana!) so we can do a nice braai tonight in front of our tent. Off course Jan is very happy that he can braai tonight :)! In the afternoon we had a drink in the bar and saw some wildlife running around in the bush.

Tomorrow we will go to Namibia, again another country!

The Okavango Delta is very beautiful, just the water and the reeds alone, and also the wildlife around the delta. It’s just amazing travelling by a mokoro because it is so quiet and peaceful. The only thing you hear is the water, birds and the hippos making noise. Your main focus here is purely nature. As the delta is full of hippos that can attack a mokoro, they only go through shallow water and through the reeds. After 30 minutes you’re just completely covered in dust, insect and spiders. On our way to the campsite we saw a big hippo sleeping in the sun where we were able to get out of the mokoro to have a really close view of the hippo.
The delta contains thousands of small islands and our polers just picked out a random island where none of the other polers were going to. They didn’t want to go an island where mokoro groups were going as the wildlife tends to hide when there’s too much people/noise. It’s really like camping on a deserted island. The guides started a fire and dug a hole which we could use as a toilet while we pitched up our tents and at some lunch. Around 16h30 we left for a nice game walk. We didn’t see much because there were lions nearby and the animals move away from the lions. But we saw something very rare, a Pangolin, which is some kind of ant eater. Our guide was so impressed and told us this was the best thing we could ever see. It even brings luck! Later on we even heard that we are the first tourist group in Botswana that ever saw a Pangolin. If that isn’t something!

In the evening we sat by the campfire, sang for Hanne’s birthday and grilled some tender meat. A few drinks later we went to bed as it was getting quite cold. During the night you could hear the lions and the hyenas howl. We had to keep the fire going the whole night because this keeps the animals away.
The next morning we left for a big game walk on the island. We tried to track the lions as there were footprints all over the island. Unfortunately we couldn’t find them but the track itself was very nice. We do saw a huge herd of zebras running away and make some kind of strange noise which according to our brilliant guide means that one of them was killed by lions. So they were very nearby.

In the afternoon we packed our stuff and left for a 3 hour mokoro trip back to the boat point. We saw a herd of elephants where we were able to get very close by on foot. This mokoro trip truly was one of the highlights of our trip and a nice birthday present for Hanne!

In the later afternoon we packed our bag for our 2-day mokoro trip that starts tomorrow morning. A mokoro is a traditional dugout canoe. It’s going be just the two of us together with the poler who will be navigating and moving the canoe. At nigh we will camp somewhere on the delta and make a nice campfire. It will be a nice birthday for Hanne.

Around 14h we arrived at Nata Lodge where we were supposed to camp. At the last minute we decided to book a chalet as we still have to camp the next 3 nights. The chalet is amazing, very big, bathtub in the middle of the room, outside shower, simply pure luxury.

Nata is the place to visit the Makgadikgadi Pans, an extremely huge salt pan. If you look at the whole network of dry lakes, than the Makgadikgadi Pans are the biggest in the world. Even though we did not plan to visit them we were able to book a 3 hour tour for only 15 euros. This is the salt pan that the people from Top Gear crossed a few years ago. It is very beautiful and now there’s even some water in the pan. There’s a lot of animal species living around the pan. We saw flamingos, pelicans, ostriches, blue wildebeests, springboks, etc.

Tomorrow we will go to Maun, were we are going to do a boat trip on the Okavango Delta to celebrate Hanne’s birthday (7 July!). Maun is ‘only’ a 4 hour drive, so we can sleep a bit longer tomorrow.