Day 13

For some reason, I get really excited about border crossing days. I don’t know if it’s because I really like getting the new stamps, or because I’ve never really done land crossings before, or what… but I woke up super excited (and super early, since I needed to use the Urban Camp WiFi to get some work done!) and ready to go on day 13!

I cranked out some work on the bus as soon as Maja woke up (somehow I was up before her… whoops!), ate a quick breakfast while everyone else was slowly getting ready, and essentially worked my tail off some more until we took off from the camp.

The Botswana border crossing was pretty easy, and similar to the last one. We hopped off the buss on the Namibian side, cleared immigration to exit, hopped back in the truck to cross the border, and then for a second time hopped off to clear customs and immigration to enter Botswana.

After we boarded the bus again, Kris happened to be on last and turned to me with a puzzled look and asked if I had gotten an entry stamp. I replied in the affirmative, noting that they’re red as well, so pretty easy to find (Silia and I had been obsessing about the unique color for a few minutes already). Kris flipped through his passport again, and then I did as well… apparently he hadn’t gotten a stamp.

W.T.H.

Sooooo he had to go back in and go through the entire process again.

So strange.

Anyhow, crisis averted, and we all entered Botswana legally and continued on towards Ghanzi and our evening bushwalk.

When we arrived, our bushman guide was already waiting for us, so we quickly got ready and headed out on the trail! Our guide was excellent, and we were able to be educated about not only the flora and fauna local to the area and how they’re used, but also about the current struggles that the bushmen face as they try to continue to practice in their traditional ways and methods. The most interesting thing we learned, in my opinion anyway, is that hunting any animals across the entirety of Botswana, was made illegal 2 years ago. That means NO ONE, including bushmen who are striving to live their lives in the traditional ways, are unable to legally hunt game. Thus they’re forced to acquire meat from places like… ShopRite.

Mind bending, eh?

After the bush walk, we settled in for dinner and then since there was NOTHING at this campsite, we sat around the fire and just had a really nice, chill bonding night. With goon, of course.

Day 14

Maun, Botswana was our destination on day 14… another kind of heavy driving day on our way up the continent… but so worth it! We FINALLY enticed Amberlee to let us listen to her 96 song Disney playlist, which included the Lion King soundtrack on the truck, which frankly turned into a gigantic dancing and karaoke bus party, so I’ll always be eternally grateful for her Disney obsession.

Basically, we’re the shit and there’s nothing you can say to convince me otherwise.

I mean, come on.

This happened on our safari truck on the crazy Botswana roads!

Once we finally rolled into camp, we did one of our usual (and now well practiced) eat and runs… and we were off for a boat cruise along one of the VERY DISTANT tributaries of the Okavango Delta, via Delta Rain (our campsite)’s safari company.

This was an included activity, which was awesome because I was STILL smarting a bit from all the expenses in Swakopmund… whoops.

Anyhow!

We had to split into two groups for the cruise, which we weren’t thrilled about, but we ended up having a really peaceful cruise. We even asked Silia to teach us how to do a Hippo call… which I recorded because it was just so accurate I had to share it with the world.

Here you go:

 

After Silia made her hippo noise… lo and behold… a hippo appeared! Somehow only Jane was able to capture a photo though, so I took a picture of her picture so I could share it.

So. Beautiful.

Really though, we didn’t see much other than cows on our cruise, but that was ok because we just had an awesome evening together, watched the sunset, and enjoyed having WATER around. We’ve been in the dry desert for so long, seeing such a huge body of water was almost culture shock for all of us — we’ve lived in dust and sand and now there’s WATER! Of course, we can’t drink it, but just having it around is so pleasant.

We all were so excited we were constantly touching the water with our hands and feet… which I’m sure our guide didn’t really appreciate, but we just couldn’t stop doing it. The weather was so hot and the water was so cold… and we didn’t really see any wildlife! So we took pictures of… ourselves. Because we’re resourceful kids.

After the cruise, we headed back to the campsite for our usual shower, dinner, etc, adventures… and then we chilled out under Mara’s lights until it was time to pass out since tomorrow was the OKAVANGO DELTA!

Cannot. Wait.

Stay tuned for more excitement!!! (And probably more $ spending… whoops.)