Day 11.
Got a bit of a surprise in the night when someone climbed into my tent and woke me up, apologised for the mistake and promptly left
. Her husband then came back again 5 minutes later, apologised and asked if she had left a hand towel behind. Managed to find it in the dark and managed to get back to sleep
.
Got up at 4:45am in the morning, packed up the tents, and got ready for an early morning game drive. Unfortunately we had to wait 30 minutes when some French people threw a hissy fit when they learnt they had to share a truck with us, and demanded a truck by themselves. After they realised they had no choice, they finally joined us and we were able to go. Was an open air cabin, so really cold, but luckily a few of us brought sleeping bags to use as blankets.
We were told beforehand it wouldn't be as good as the river cruise the day before, but still glad I went as was good to see some of the animals in the bush, and the small chance to see a lion or two. Unfortunately didn't get to see any cats, but still got some good shots of the other animals:
Warthog on the run
.
Sable.
Giraffe in the early morning light.
Swallow-tailed Bee-eater.
Yellow-billed Stork.
African Spoonbill.
Got back to the campsite at 9:30am, had a quick breakfast, then hit the road for the 300k drive to Nata. Stopped for lunch by the side of the road and had tuna and tomato sandwiches before arriving at Nata at 3pm. Last night in Botswana so bought a souvenir zebra made out of wire and beads. Another flat tyre on the truck so helped Alfred the driver to swap it for the spare. Abit harder this time since we were parked in the soft sand
.
At 4pm we headed out in 4WD's to the Makgadikgadi salt pans. They normally have flamingoes when it gets wetter but we got to see some pelicans and wildebeest instead.
Watched the sunset over the lake where we had some popcorn and drinks
. Headed back to the camp afterwards and had chicken cooked over the campfire, spicy chakalava and mashed maize for dinner.
Day 12.
Another early start and got up at 5:15am for a hot shower, packed up the tents again and were on the road again to Blouberg across the border in South Africa. A big day with 600k's of bumpy roads to cover. We made our way to the South African border at about 1pm, had chicken burgers again at the same place where we had lunch on the second day of the trip, and then crossed over into South Africa.
Continued driving throughout the afternoon, with landscape changing from dead flat to quite mountainous as we got closer to our destination, Blouberg. As we got closer, we drove through a few small villages. Apparently the locals don't see many white people, and the kids and some of the adults were all waving to us as we drove past. Finally got to our destination at about 5pm, put up the tents and put on some warmer clothes, and headed down to the village for dinner at a locals house. About 1000 people living in the town, none of the roads were sealed, and the houses looked ok, definitely not shacks anyway. As our truck pulled up the house, we were mobbed by school kids, waving and laughing
.
We made our way inside and our host gave us a rundown on the different dishes for dinner.
They included mango pap (mashed maize) and mopani worms which looked like black huhu grubs
.
Tasted a few, not too bad
.
After dinner talk with our hosts, we headed off in the truck to a local shebeen, or pub. Pretty basic, but everyone was happy with the beer
.
Then we went back to the campsite and talked around the camp fire before calling it a day.