Rocko King of the Jungle!
Ha ha...just kidding. We're walking with lions (and petting them...they really like tummy rubs!)
So we're starting the safari by cheating a bit...this is the Zambezi sun hotel. The hotel is part of a complex, there is a conference centre and a high end hotel called the Royal Livingstone but they share the same grounds and residents (sorry the impalas and giraffe were a bit camera shy)
This hotel complex is also right next to Victoria falls. Victoria falls is a little waterfall that cuts across the Zambezi river - kind of like the way that Niagara falls cuts across the Niagara river.
This is Niagara Falls:
This is Victoria Falls:
This is Niagara falls with a taxi circled:
This is Victoria Falls with a taxi circled, the big circle is the hotel and the arrow is roughly where i'm standing in the above pic(click on pic to make it bigger). During the summer months the water levels drop - but in the winter rain gear (or a bathing suit) is a necessity!
This hotel complex is also right next to Victoria falls. Victoria falls is a little waterfall that cuts across the Zambezi river - kind of like the way that Niagara falls cuts across the Niagara river.
This is Niagara Falls:
This is Victoria Falls:
This is Niagara falls with a taxi circled:
This is Victoria Falls with a taxi circled, the big circle is the hotel and the arrow is roughly where i'm standing in the above pic(click on pic to make it bigger). During the summer months the water levels drop - but in the winter rain gear (or a bathing suit) is a necessity!
Rocko's First Timers Safari Guide:
A typical safari day
You get up between 5 and 6am. You eat. You leave on your morning game drive and the sun starts to rise at 6:30. Between 10 and 12 you are back for lunch and siesta and possibly mid afternoon tea. Mid afternoon you are off again on a drive or a boat trip. If you are in the park you will be back by 6:30, if you are outside a park you will go for a night game drive and be back between 7 and 8pm. Dinner. Bed. Repeat.
Rocko's Tips:
1) Go in winter
Starting in late may there are no bugs! OK so there are bugs...rather big bugs...but no mosquitoes unless you are deep in the delta.
2) Items to bring:
It's cold, bring a hat and layers.
Morning and evening will be cool and even cold if you are bombing around in an open jeep. They give you a blanket but a hat, a sweater and a windproof jacket are necessary.
It's dark, bring a headlamp
It's sunny, bring sunglasses, sun hat and sunscreen.
Just because you are in a truck, doesn't mean you can't burn.
You're in the middle of nowhere, bring batteries
Bring extra camera batteries, extra camera cards and a laptop so you can clear your cards every night.
Bring a european adapters (for the truck) and one for south africa (for the lodge)
Note: a south african adapter is a special adapter and doesn't come on the multi adpater plugs (3 round pins).
Bring a european adapters (for the truck) and one for south africa (for the lodge)
Note: a south african adapter is a special adapter and doesn't come on the multi adpater plugs (3 round pins).
It's dry and dusty, bring sunglasses and eye drops
You will be driving through very dry terrain for 8 hours a day, it will be windy since you are driving constantly and dust may get in you eyes. If you normally wear contacts you might want to consider wearing glasses.
3) Camera recommendations
Bring both a point and shoot camera and a super zoom camera.
Point and shoot:
Telephoto (Panasonic GH1, 300mm zoom lens):
You may think that having a telephoto is the way to go, but in Chobe the animals tend to get a little close sometimes so having the point and shoot is useful!
4) Stay in the park.
If you stay in a national park there are rules - no driving before 6am and none after 6:30pm - but if you are in the park you can get to the animals first before the dozens of other trucks. You can camp or stay in a lodge, it's likely to cost a premium but it's worth it.
If you stay in a national park there are rules - no driving before 6am and none after 6:30pm - but if you are in the park you can get to the animals first before the dozens of other trucks. You can camp or stay in a lodge, it's likely to cost a premium but it's worth it.
5) Do your research
How do you get there?
Mobile safaris cover a lot of ground without flying, however if you do camp transfers by air please keep in mind these are tiny planes. The planes are small (the plane below fits 6 people), the baggage compartments are small, the planes are hot and they do not necessarily give a smooth ride - so if you think you will be well acquainted with that air sickness bag please keep this in mind.
For reference Chobe is a driving destination, but Sandibe and the start of the delta is 1h10min from Chobe (Kasane airport) and the far side of the delta is another 20 minutes (or more if they decide to make a pit stop along the way).
How do you get there?
Mobile safaris cover a lot of ground without flying, however if you do camp transfers by air please keep in mind these are tiny planes. The planes are small (the plane below fits 6 people), the baggage compartments are small, the planes are hot and they do not necessarily give a smooth ride - so if you think you will be well acquainted with that air sickness bag please keep this in mind.
What are the vehicles like?
All our trucks were covered but some other companies trucks are not, as it gets very hot during the day you should consider this before you book.
How many people do they cram into the truck?
Our company had a maximum of 6 people per truck even though the truck had 3 rows of 3 plus driver and shotgun. These people were crammed in like sardines...
How many people do they cram into the truck?
Our company had a maximum of 6 people per truck even though the truck had 3 rows of 3 plus driver and shotgun. These people were crammed in like sardines...
What are the activities?
Does your camp do water tours or just land drives? Go for the camp that offers variety but be clear when you arrive that you wish to do a water activity - sometimes the guides prefer to stick with the drives.
What do you want to see?
Sandibe is known for wild dogs but also has about 10 resident leopards, Chobe is known for elephants, Xudum is known for birds - research before you go otherwise you might be disappointed.
How much do you want to spend?
Sometimes less is more. Even if your safari is a splurge you might want to stay away from the super high end lodges. This might sound odd but people who can afford high end lodges can afford tens of thousands of dollars in camera equipment (which has to be mounted in the front of your vehicle or boat and sounds like a machine gun going off). In fact avoid any lodge that specializes in birding!
6) Temper your expectations
Wildlife viewing changes monthly, daily and even hourly and animals behave completely differently in different areas.
Chobe: the morning is completely different than the afternoon as the animals leave the river at night. In the morning you won't see elephants but you might see mongoose and jackals. The zebra don't arrive until late may. Most animals are so used to the cars you can be within a foot of an elephant or a few feet of a lion, though other predators will run when they see you. The best time to view animals in Chobe is when the water holes dry up and they are forced to go to the river in late June/July.
Sandibe: there is less wildlife here than Chobe, it is a mix of water and land but you will still likely do game drives. The elephants are considered dangerous here and might mock charge your car or trumpet when they see you, predators on the other hand might wander past your vehicle and let you follow them around. Wild dogs are known in this area but when a buffalo herd comes through they might leave to follow it (which happened to us - no dogs at all in the area).
Xudum/Xaranna (deep in the delta): the animals are trapped on islands in the winter because the water levels are high and they may not want to wade or swim across. We heard lions but they weren't anywhere we could see them, we saw a buffalo herd but it saw us and ran across a river so we couldn't follow them. Just because you are in the middle of a delta does not guarantee you will see hippos, we saw the head of one and saw another one frantically diving away from us but that's it. Hippos tend to hide in the weeds here so you'll be lucky to spot them. The best time to go to the delta is in their summer when the river is low, but with more animals comes rain and mosquitoes so there are pros and cons.
Welcome to Botswana!
We booked a tour and stayed at 3 &Beyond camps and lodges: Chobe under Canvas (far right), Sandibe (upper left), Xudum (lower left). We drove from Livingstone to the border, crossed by boat and then continued to drive to Chobe. Chobe to Sandibe (chitabe air strip) was plane. Sandibe to Xudum and Xudum to Maun (was a mix of plane and boat as part of xudum air strip is under water and they have to fly into pom pom).
Sandibe
Xudum - I'm pretty sure our cottage was the same size as our house - too bad there wasn't much animal life here and the plunge pool was colder than Lake Superior.
The best quantity of wildlife was most certainly Chobe, here are some of the local residents:
Giraffes...
...giraffe with red-billed ox-peckers
...baby giraffes with their fluffy horns
Warthogs
Guinea Fowl
Impalas...Impalas...everywhere...or as the guide said "african mcdonalds for lions"
Buffalo...
...old buffalo
...baby buffalo
...drinking at the river
...impeding traffic
...with a friend
Sable boy...
Sable girl...see the colour difference?
Hippopotamus
Lions alert and on the prowl...
The tiny Pied Kingfisher
The beautiful Lilac-breasted Roller
Of course Sandibe has residents as well...
The Sandibe elephants are a bit less used to vehicles and thus a bit more fierce. This guy seemed to like our place so he came back to visit twice and we were only there 2 days. Makes it a bit difficult to get your stuff when there is an elephant (actually 2) in the way. Another elephant mock charged our car with a big show of ears and trumpeting!
The other animals in Sandibe almost seemed less skittish than in Chobe.
These hyenas walked right up to the car, sniffed it and wandered past.
We saw them the next morning and they just wandered by with their spoils.
The leopards in Sandibe are very used to people watching them, we followed this one down the road for about 30-40 minutes.
This is a different leopard, he's eating the spoils of dinner his mother brought for him. Apparently they can take a few days to eat a meal and will stay around it until its done. There were upwards of 4 vehicles that were cycling in and out of this area and the leopards didn't care at all.
This is the mother of both of the above leopards. She was waiting for her son to finish eating and then they went for a walk, but she sat and watched us watching her for a good amount of time.
This is a black backed jackal, we saw some of these in Chobe too but again for some reason they were more relaxed around us in Sandibe.
There were a few new animals as well...
Ostrich
Owl
Tessebee
Wildebeest
Xudum is beautiful, but doesn't have many large animals in the winter as the river is high. Giraffes, elephants and some antelope can wade and swim. A herd of buffalo passed through but they ran when they saw us so we only caught a glimpse of what was likely a few hundred of them.
The water lilies close at night and open once the sun comes up
You'll see tiny colourful birds like these bee-eaters...
and the malachite kingfisher if you keep your eyes open - they are tiny! There are three in this photo...
Of course the safari doesn't end when you leave the lodge. You never know what you will see on your way to the airport...
or in the air.
Check out the watering holes and rivers and you might see something!
Our final stop on this trip is Cape Town
We couldn't go all the way to South Africa without seeing Cape Town, but we only had a day and a half so we didn't do a heck of a lot. We saw table mountain, said hi to its residents and took a bus tour around town.
My first impression of Cape Town is that it's the land of the wealthy. You see these pretty little beach side towns with uber expensive houses and apartments...
...yet they still have shanty towns. Very odd.
Table mountain from the bottom... when you can see it. Table mountain came out of the clouds about early afternoon on the first day, but stayed completely hidden the day we left.
Table mountain from the top...note here: table mountain is 1km above sea level and feels that way - bring hat, mitts and coats if you don't want to freeze
Local dude...who is apparently related to an elephant...I don't see a resemblance...do you?
The Sandibe elephants are a bit less used to vehicles and thus a bit more fierce. This guy seemed to like our place so he came back to visit twice and we were only there 2 days. Makes it a bit difficult to get your stuff when there is an elephant (actually 2) in the way. Another elephant mock charged our car with a big show of ears and trumpeting!
These hyenas walked right up to the car, sniffed it and wandered past.
The leopards in Sandibe are very used to people watching them, we followed this one down the road for about 30-40 minutes.
Ostrich
Owl
Tessebee
Xudum is beautiful, but doesn't have many large animals in the winter as the river is high. Giraffes, elephants and some antelope can wade and swim. A herd of buffalo passed through but they ran when they saw us so we only caught a glimpse of what was likely a few hundred of them.
Of course the safari doesn't end when you leave the lodge. You never know what you will see on your way to the airport...
Check out the watering holes and rivers and you might see something!
Our final stop on this trip is Cape Town
We couldn't go all the way to South Africa without seeing Cape Town, but we only had a day and a half so we didn't do a heck of a lot. We saw table mountain, said hi to its residents and took a bus tour around town.
My first impression of Cape Town is that it's the land of the wealthy. You see these pretty little beach side towns with uber expensive houses and apartments...
Table mountain from the bottom... when you can see it. Table mountain came out of the clouds about early afternoon on the first day, but stayed completely hidden the day we left.
That's it for our trip...of course no trip is complete without a gratuitous canon shot!
Until next time...
Until next time...
