The Okavango River - Part 1

The first time I heard of the Okavango Delta was while watching the BBC series Planet Earth. A group of elephants are walking across the flooded plains of the delta on their annual migration. I had no idea then where the Okavango was or that I would ever make it there. Now we are here in Maun, the gateway to this vast region of swamps, river channels, island and sandy savannah. But there is so much more to the Okavango than just the delta, which we have been following down from before we even entered Namibia.

We left Rundu about a week ago. There, we were already camping next to the Okavango, called the Kavango in those parts, and the border to Angola. It was fast flowing, but narrow, lined with reed beds, and people were punting little boats across it and washing their clothes in it.

We took a southwards turn with the river as we headed for the Botswana border and the Mahangu Game Reserve, a tiny reserve anyone who wants to get to Botswana has to cross. Before that we spend a few days at the Mahangu Safari Lodge, again by the riverside. The river had changed now, become wider and more sedate, and the remote side looked dark and wild and forbidding. That night was the first time we heard hippos groaning in the reeds next to our tents, and on the opposing bank. The sound sounds nothing so much as a young boy trying to practice the tuba, a queer trumpeting sound that breaks off as if running out of air. The hippos were quite invisible to us, although we spotted one across the river one night, but they are shy and luckily not very inquisitive, so we didn't have to worry about them checking out our tents.

The morning mists rose moodily over the water as the sun came up, warming the tent quickly, although we always have really cold nights right now. I had hoped those would be over with the end of the desert camping, but the proximity to water makes for a lot of condensation and frosty toes in the mornings. The view of the filmy fog backlit by the strangely African yellow-orange of the rising sun makes up for any cold body parts, and a cup of tea really helps.

On our way to the border we had to perforce cross the tiny Mahangu reserve, which had been recommended to us by the lovely Swiss family we met at Etosha, who described it as a 'real safari', windy tracks through bush and lots of animal spotting. So it turned out. The river took on yet another aspect here, widening out to a broad marshy flat, edged by reeds and covered in a shallow layer of water, which made it very green and a popular place for hippos. We finally got a good look at one of those grunters, who was scoffing lush grasses on the bank in perfectly peaceful union with a family of warthogs, who must have felt honoured to have their big soggy cousin eating with them, and a few cattle egrets, who like anything that might yield a few insects off their skin. So thanks to the Swiss family, if you are reading this, we loved the place!

We also managed to meet up again with an Austrian family we shared a site with at Sachsenheim outside Etosha, and who took a similar route to us for a few days, so we kept bumping into each other. Stuart and the Austrian dad were actually contemplating tackling the hippo for a better photo, but then desisted. Hippos really don't like to be disturbed and are liable to run you down on their flight back to the water. The guide book actually recommends standing still and jumping out of their way at the last minute, but I'm glad Stuart didn't have to test that strategy.

The open plain of the reserve reminded me how close we are to the salt pans of Etosha, the heat and emptiness, the dry dusty days there, for the utter contrast we saw only a day's drive away. This was a paradise of growth and fertility. It became clearer soon just how much the Okavango and the many other rivers of the delta make this part of Botswana, when we drove to our camp site at the Tsolido Hills in the North West right after the border. We were back in the desert, as this is actually the Northernmost stretch of the Kalahari, and I was surprised to find out that the actual delta is located on Kalahari sands. The Kalahari is actually an ex- (or fossil)  desert, as it now receives too much rain fall to be still considered a real desert. Trees grow there, but mostly hardy acacias and Merula trees, grasses and small shrubs. The land the waters flow over are very very sandy, and not at all muddy or mushy as I expected. If the water disappears, as it sometimes does when the river changes course or it's a particularly dry year, trees die and the land goes back to desert.