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David Shepherd and Tracks For Africa

Posted on April 9, 2014 by Scott CableApril 9, 2014

Relaxing at Eureka camp was very pleasant and only 10km or so outside the mayhem of the city centre.

Another of its advantages is that it’s about halfway between Lusaka and the elephant orphanage at Lilayi.

This is the ‘nursery’ facility for the reserve in Kafue National Park, also run by Sport Beatie’s team. Here they bring orphaned elephants up to about 6 years old from all over Zambia and try to prepare them for transfer to Kafue at age 7-8, then after a couple of years there, back into the wild proper.

At Lilayi they currently have about 7 calves ranging in age from 18 months to 6 years.

As they gulp milk from bottles (3 litres in eleven seconds!) and play in the mud, they all look cheerful enough.

Under the care of a 20-strong team of specialist volunteers they are making great progress, but have pretty sad backgrounds.

Most are named after the area in which they were found.

One is named after the Park Ranger who was killed trying to defend the calf from the same poachers who had killed her mother for the ivory.

Another was found drowning in a Hotel swimming pool. His mother had been killed and he was dying of thirst when he fell in trying to get a drink – elephants can’t use their trunks to suck up water until they are about 2 years old.

A third was found at 1 year old dragging herself along a track by her front feet after been repeatedly struck on the spine by a farmer’s axe. She still wears huge steel leg-irons to support her rear legs, but is expected to make an almost complete recovery.

After their milk drinks, they get to play around in the mud-bath.

Getting in is pretty straight forward.

Getting out…

…is a little trickier…

…and sometimes needs…

…a bit of help from a pal.

“What! I could have managed on my own if I’d wanted to!“

Leaving Lusaka, on the way through town we dropped into Autoworld to pick up a new Tracks For Africa (T4A) SIM card for our Garmin Montana satnav (we’ve named the very pleasant, classy voice that talks to us on it Miranda, as in ‘Garmin Miranda’).

I bought the iPhone app version of T4A about 6 months ago and, while it’s good for Southern Africa, it hasn’t yet been developed far enough to fully cover N Eastern Africa. I spoke a couple of times with Johann Groenewald who runs T4A and he arranged for us to collect a free upgrade to the latest version of the SD Card from Autoworld.

Very generous and exceptional customer service. Not many businesses I know would go out of their way like that, or deal with it personally at such a senior level.

We took the single-lane, tarred T4 east through sparsely populated, fairly dull, flat landscape to Chongwe and then more interesting rolling hills around Shingela and Rufunsa.

It’s too long a journey to South Luangwa National Park to make it comfortably in one day so we stopped overnight at Bridge Camp. On the Luangwa River where it forms the border with Mozambique, it was built about 10 years ago by S. African Will and his British wife Lindsey.

A friendly couple, and chatty hosts but, I have no doubt in my mind that they must have been the bickering inspiration for Basil & Sybil Fawlty.

Great entertainment and cheap (but cramped) camping (90 Kwacha / £9 or $18) although the beers in the quirky bar are about 25% more expensive than most places.

View from The Penthouse of the Lusaka River.

The fishermen here are pretty enterprising. Every year another Aid Organisation turns up and gives the villagers more mosquito nets. They never use them, but sew them together to make fishing nets – which last about a year.

The campsite may not always be as cramped as when we were there. The ‘Tour D’Afrique’ cycling tour truck came in just before us, took up the whole campsite and left only room for us and one other couple of British overlanders to park next to their wagons in the car park.

They’re holidaymakers who cycle 12,000 km over 121 days from Cairo to Cape Town.

I guess that’s what makes them all so bloody miserable and unfriendly. Mind you, as with most of the tour groups we’ve met, the crews themselves are quite the opposite and very sociable.

We were woken the next morning at 5.30am by the cyclists packing their tents and the trucks running to warm them up – filling our rooftent with exhaust fumes.

We also left later that morning (fortunately east as they went west) over the bridge that the campsite is named after, heading 250km to Chipata, close to the Malawi border.

As we were stopped at a police road-block on the bridge and had our papers scrutinised, the smuggling villagers below the bridge bring in whatever goods they can from Mozambique to Zambia.

TIA – This is Africa, as they say.

Myukuyuku

Posted on April 7, 2014 by Scott CableApril 7, 2014

From Nanzhilla Plains Camp we had to go back to the Cordon Road as the Plains Road was still boggy & impassable.

The track from here up to the southern end of Lake Ithezi Thezi was easier than it had been from the Dundumwezi Gate. We were hoping to stay at the Shiluwe Hills campsite which is just inside Kafue National Park at the Musa Gate.

The camp has a beautiful ‘lagoon’ style setting, near the new Chinese-built dam which will be used for Hydro-electricity generation.

Unfortunately the camp was closed up so we had no choice other than to leave the park. We looked at a couple of campsites associated with Lodges just outside the Musa Gate – New Kalala was down a steep, appalling track and had no level pitches; Chibilla Camp looked like it just had some chalets amongst the rocks and at Masumgwa the lodge itself was nice but the camping area was just a small patch of grass behind the lodge with no views. Very friendly staff though. Camping 50 kwacha each ($10) so we stayed. Park fees 79 kwacha ($16) each plus 79 kwacha per day fro the car.

Top Tip: Visit the southern end of Lake Itezhi Tezhi. Stay inside the park at Shiluwe Hills – it’s the most beautiful spot on the lake and, although in the park, no park fees are payable while you are camping there.

The local village, Ithezi Thezi is just 1 strip of dusty shops with some tinned goods, onions, potatoes, tomatoes and a fridge of frozen meat. The fuel station (Zesco) is a bit of a novelty. You drive to the top of the hill, tell them how many litres of fuel you want, pay, then drive to the bottom of the hill where the fuel is dispensed. If the tank is filled before you get to the total you paid for, the surplus if forfeit.

The village has a really isolated feel about it as the road from here to Lusaka is 250km of very bad potholes. So bad in fact that, although it was tarred, the best way they could think of to reduce the potholes was to strip off the tar. Doh!!

Fortunately, part of the deal with the Chinese contractor building the dam was that they would re-make the road and tar it again as they leave. Work will start in the next month.

As an alternative, through the park there’s also the new Spinal Road. A gravel road that goes north through Kafue on the west side of the lake and river, that is not on any maps yet. Although it’s narrow, it turned out to be in excellent condition. They have built Irish Bridges for the shallow stream-crossings and 3 new concrete bridges at the northern end for the bigger crossings.

The drive is 4-5 hours from the southern end of Lake Itezhi Tezhi to Hook Bridge (our next destination).

About halfway up the Spinal Road we met Libby.

She’d got wedged when pulling off the road to collect wood for a new campsite her and her husband are building on the West Bank of the Kafue River, about 45km south of Hook Bridge.

We pushed her out, then went and had a look at the campsite under construction. A really nice, riverside spot, which will be developed with an Eco-feel, solar light, ‘bush-style’ showers, etc.

When we exited the park at the M9 we went to look up Sport Beatie who runs the Rapid Response Anti-Poaching Unit in the park and the David Shepherd supported elephant orphanages in both Lusaka and Kafue National Park. Unfortunately he was away at Ngoma filming fire-arms training with 50 of their 80-90 Rangers.

Liz, one of Sport’s colleagues, said there were a couple of camping options at this end of the park so we first tried Mukami Lodge (with a beautiful 2-storey deck, patrolled by Basil their resident hippo) where we had a beer. Unfortunately they stopped doing camping a year ago so we had to carry on another 30km to Myukuyuku Camp.

I’m glad we did. A lovely peaceful spot on the riverside where we camped for a couple of days.

Owned by Pippa, a BA Stewardess who built the place about 15 years ago. Built in a ‘traditional style’.

Very rustic – not sure how most Europeans campers would cope with the kitchen / wash-up facilities, but the place has character.

Camping 100 Kwacha (£10) or $20 per person (plus Park fees 79 Kwacha per day).

Top Tip: Pay in Kwacha withdrawn from ATMs, rather than in US$. Nearly everywhere uses the ‘historic’ exchange rate of 5 Kwacha / $ whereas at present the bank rate is around 6.

We also bumped into Liz again, who was treating herself to a weekend of hot showers away from the bush-camp where the Anti-Poaching unit is set up.

They’re heavily into sustainability and she thinks that the Fuel Briquette programme Helene has been working on with AWU in Uganda could be a real benefit to the local communities here in Zambia. Everyone cuts down trees or uses huge amounts of charcoal for cooking – really bad news.

Below, as we showed them the Fuel Briquette presentation, Helene explains to Loyd (camp manager, seated) and Blessed (an accountant with Zambian Wildlife Authority, ZAWA) how she will snap Liz’s neck and twist her head off if they don’t stop using charcoal.

Both Boyd and Blessed offered us a place to stay if we’d come back and show them how to make briquettes. We’re thinking about how we can make that happen and bringing some samples down from Uganda.

Camping at Myukuyuku next to the Kafue River was great.

The only downside was the vervet monkeys who flash-mobbed our camp. One group raided the bins (distraction tactics) and chased Helene backwards into a ditch. Another stole my box of eggs while I was cooking breakfast on the campfire 6 feet away.

Oh, and one night around 2am a hippo came out of the river next to the car, huffing and grunting, then loudly sprayed dung everywhere for 20 minutes (and I mean sprayed – they use their tails as a whirling fan to ensure it’s spread as far as possible) before belly-flopping back into the water with a huge splash.

Time to move on. East on the quiet, good, tarred M9 to Lusaka. The 280 km took around 5 hours, but that was mainly due to 5 checkpoints on the way. No hassle though, very friendly. The police and officials were more curious than looking for ‘gifts’.

It also took us a while to get through the outskirts of Lusaka. Although there is significant wealth in the city, coming in from the west is just a mass of dusty, congested, sprawling industrial areas. The streets are full of the flashiest and the tattiest vehicles. Every junction is swarming with people selling phone top-up cards, cold drinks, phone chargers, fruit, kids toys, and swimming trunks (!). Not really unlike any other capital city, just closer to the city centre than most.

There’s nowhere to camp in the city centre so we chose Eureka camp, 15km to the south. An oasis of calm, on a game farm.

Kafue

Posted on April 3, 2014 by Scott CableApril 3, 2014

About 20 minutes after we left Safely at the entrance to Dundumwezi Gate it started to rain. Heavily.
Just what we needed with the tracks already soft and deeply rutted. There is no bush-camping allowed in the park, due to the amount of game (particularly predators) around. So we had to make the 80-odd kilometres before it got dark.
The first few km along the Cordon Road were good straightforward tracks through teak trees and fairly thin forest.
Occasionally, even a good track has it’s difficulties.

Once we turned north on the Cordon Road, things got tougher though: some deep sand, tracks so deep that even with our lifted suspension the axel and sump guards would ground on the centre mound and stop is like a parachute.

In more open areas the track was straightforward sand.

In most areas though the grass was as high as the car either side of us.

We would certainly have filled the radiator with grass seed without the netting that Brad had given us.

Most areas were very boggy either side of the track and every kilometre would include stretches from 20-50 meters that looked like innocuous mud but was actually Cotton-soil (very thick, deep and enough to stop the car in it’s tracks if you don’t keep your right foot planted). Even the entry and exit that look sandy are generally just a dusting of sand over the boggy track.

Sometimes, in the middle of the bog, the track just runs out. That’s when you really just hope you’re still heading the right way – there’s certainly no one around to come and pull you out at this time of year and there’s no sign of traffic having passed recently.

Once in a while you get the ‘perfect-storm’ of conditions: deep boggy ground, high grass and little clue as to what’s ahead. The picture below is a log bridge on the was to Nanzhilla – you can just make out the vertical poles that show the width of the bridge and roughly where it is. Without getting out and walking over the pretty rotten 3-inch diameter logs first you’d be nuts to drive on and trust it though.

I walked across, mobbed by Tsetse flies. I was reasonably confident it would take us (why would it be there otherwise) but with the high grass growing through it, I couldn’t tell how deep the ground was under it.

Plenty of creaking, but we got across slowly and, a few kilometres later made it to Nanzhilla Lodge and campsite that Brad & Ruth previously ran for 5 years.

It took us nearly 3 hours to cover the 80-odd km inside the park. Pretty stressful most of the way. If it had been in the UK / Europe I wouldn’t have been gripping the seat so hard with my backside. In Africa, a huge, remote park, no one else around, unknown roads and conditions ahead, rough conditions behind – it made it the 3 hours pretty tense.

To cap it all, Nanzhilla Lodge was closed and the manager David was away for a couple of weeks. Fortunately a couple of the staff Brad had known previously were still there, doing some off-season maintenance.

Steady (next to Helene) and his pals made us a fire.

We gave the guys a bag of ‘suckers’ (lollipops) Ruth had asked us to deliver and they could hardly wipe the grins off their faces.

After that, we settled in to fresh burgers we had made and a glass of wine overlooking the plain.

View from The Penthouse that evening.

Quite a trip to get there from Livingstone, but worth it to arrive.

Another major bonus (as it has been throughout Namibia, Botswana and Zambia) a beautiful night sky with no ground-light.

The Milky Way looks stunning, and stretches from horizon to horizon. Beside it (only seen in parts of the Southern Hemisphere) are the Magellanic Clouds – galaxies that orbit our own a mind-boggling distance away (the two clusters just left of centre in this picture).

The following morning the view of the Earth from The Penthouse was equally beautiful.

So glad we made the trip.

So like a rainbow in the grass as the sun rose.

So easy to understand why Brad & Ruth loved the place.

What Time Is It In Zambia?

Posted on March 31, 2014 by Scott CableMarch 31, 2014

Whilst the car was at Foley’s Africa with Nick Selby we got the chance to spend some time doing nothing at all at Maramba River Lodge in Livingstone.

It’s been a great place to chill for a few days.

We got a chance to meet Slinky, the lodge’s pet squirrel.

Who got eaten by the lodge’s pet cat the following day.

Brad & Ruth (the Lodge managers) have been extraordinarily helpful: arranging a great deal for us to stay in one of the Safari Tents while we’re without the roof-tent;…

Very comfortable, and a rare treat after many months in the roof-tent.

They printed & marked up maps showing us where to go and who to contact when we get there; gave us one of their radiator nets to protect the engine bay from grass seed & the risk of fire when driving through long grass; donated a few square meters of shade-net that Helene used to make window screens so that we’re not eaten by Tsetse Flies when the windows are open.

There’s no aircon on the Landy and in this heat it would be painful to have to drive with the windows shut.

Brad also drove me into Livingstone to try and organise COMESA Insurance for the car (a sort of bulk-buy arrangement for 3rd-Party cover where you can pay once rather than at each of the borders of the COMESA Member Countries ie mainly Eastern Africa).

His pal runs a brokers in town but unfortunately they couldn’t help. It transpires COMESA can only be bought from the broker who insures you for the country you are in, at the time you first insure the car.

The broker I bought from at the border didn’t sell it and said they had an office in Livingstone who would be able to do it for me. That turned out to be rubbish. The Livingstone office was a one-room dump manned by a woman who had never heard of COMESA. I tried a few other brokers in town but, although they were all very helpful, they could only sell me COMESA if I bought another Zambian policy. Not worth duplicating the cost so we’ll try again as we go into Malawi.

Top Tip: don’t buy insurance on entering Zambia unless the same broker sells COMESA. If they do, buy it there and then.

We had the chance to have dinner with Brad and Ruth a number of times while waiting for the car.

Brad asking “What time is it in Zambia” was a cue for the bar to be forcibly opened if necessary and someone to get him a Brandy & Coke p.d.q.

It’s funny how small a world it can be. Brad is Zambian but his family farmed in Zimbabwe for many years. Their farm was ‘liberated‘ forcibly from them by Mr Mugabe years ago. For the last 12 years or so his father and the rest of his family have lived in the UK.

More precisely in Hawthorne Way, Shepperton.

More precisely still, about 30 metres from where I lived for 18 years before leaving home – where my brothers and sister still live.

Amazing coincidence.

After 4 days the car was back from it’s spa-treatment at Foley’s. Nick’s team had done a good job in an area where spares are notoriously difficult to find.
The missing washer-bottle has been replaced.
New wheel bearings fitted.
Roofrack lifted and solar panel relocated from under it to on top of it (hopefully that will cure the poor battery life of the leisure battery system).
2nd spare wheel relocated from the roofrack to the bonnet (not sure I’m too keen on that as it obstructs view of front of car when in a tight spot and will almost certainly shake the bonnet to death on these poor roads).
Reversing light switch replaced.
Twisted speedometer brackets replaced (shaken to death in Namibia).
New brake pads (had to use some of my own spares as couldn’t get others in time).
Passenger seat fixed.
Oils changed in axels, gearbox, transfer box etc. This was where the delay had originated!

There was a lot of metal in the transfer box (fortunately I have a magnetic plug that collected it). After a few rapid emails to our personal International Rescue advisors Frank & Liz in Cyprus, it was agreed the transfer box had to come out to see if the gears where ruined.

It transpired that there are 2 bolts holding the transfer box one side and 3 on the other. Of the two bolts, both were causing problems. The top one had stripped it’s thread and was ‘hanging by a thread‘. The bottom one should have been the shorter of the two but was wrongly fitted with the longer bolt from the top (probably in Bulgaria when the gearbox drive shaft had to be replaced). This had then worn away against the end-face of the gears. Fortunately no gear teeth were damaged. It was discovered though that the flange on the gearbox had been broken off so the lower bolt was actually fitted to nothing (probably also in Bulgaria). It’s still fitted to nothing, as we couldn’t find a spare housing. Hopefully the one re-tapped top bolt at the top will hold it until we can get home.

On a happy note, Charlie’s Xmas present arrived in the UK. We had sent it by 5-day airfreight via Nampost in Swakopmund on 26th November. By 20th December they admitted they had lost it. Today it arrived. Xmas all over again.

Anyway, it was good to have the car back and we were ready to hit the road north. Brad & Ruth had previously managed Nanzhilla Plains Lodge in Kafue National Park for 5 years and convinced us that, although at this time of year the roads would be difficult, it was a beautiful place and we just had to go.

Top Tip: Get Zambian Kwacha from ATM’s. There are only ATM’s in about 6-8 towns, so get loads. The exchange rate from your own bank is almost certainly 10-20% better than given locally for US$ or Sterling / Euros in Zambia.

The route to Kafue Park from Livingstone was tiring and rough, although there have been news reports that it is to be improved.

Two hours on good tar, 120km to Kolomo (last chance for fuel: 9.20 Kwacha ie $2 per litre). Then just over 2 hours on rough dirt tracks 85km to Dundumwezi, the southern gate of the park. Finally 3 hours to do 80km inside the park to Nanzhilla Plains Lodge – the first camping available.

On the way we had dropped a bag of goodies off to Safely, the Park Gate Manager at Dundumwezi from his nephew Henry, Brad & Ruth’s chef. Safely told us the Plains Road was not passable due to the rains and we had to use the Cordon Road. “You should get through.” he said cheerfully “Watch out for the Cotton Soil, bogs and ruts“.

Oh good. My favourite.

“By the way” he added “don’t panic if you see some guys in the long grass with guns – it’s probably just one of my anti-poaching patrols.”

We set off along the Cordon Road a little nervously, with about 4 hours till dark, hoping the tracks would have started to dry after the recent rains.

Mosi oa Tunya – The Smoke That Thunders

Posted on March 27, 2014 by Scott CableMarch 27, 2014

In Livingstone, Zambia (80km from the Botswana border) we went to Fawlty Towers Backpackers and had a late, fairly good breakfast (20Kwacha / $5 each). Unfortunately they’ve gone ‘upmarket’ and don’t do camping any more.

Livingstone Backpackers was also pleasant, but the only camping they have for roof-tents is in the car park.

Fortunately they recommended we try Maramba River Lodge, 5km outside town and halfway to Victoria Falls (but not advertised as having camping in any of the books / Tracks 4 Africa, etc).

We definately lucked-out stumbling across Maramba. And were made very welcome by managers Brad & Ruth Keast.

A great place on the Maramba River, a slow-moving tributary of the Zambezi, with a shady, quiet campsite and the opportunity to use the pool, restaurant, bar, wifi, etc. Camping 100kwacha ($20) per night.

Plenty of big crocs, baboons and hippos around the camp. Also elephants in the dry season.

Mind you, I also spotted one of the rarest sights (either before or since we arrived in Africa). Helene cooking.

French Toast with ham & cheese. Very pleased with herself (and very tasty dear).

Although Maramba was very quiet (no more than a couple of other people there each night at this time of year) we also met some interesting people.

Rita and Evet (or ‘this one’ as she calls him) who come down each day from the casino they run in town and have a couple of Mosi beers as they chill out.

Also, Barrie & Sue (a pharmacist from Guernsey) who were travelling in their self-built camper truck. This year they were on a bit of a ‘pilgrimage’ to Livingstone Hospital where they both worked around 40 years ago, and haven’t been back since.

They’ve had their overland camper for 18 years and store it in Namibia – coming over from Guernsey every year to tour some of Southern Africa.

It was originally a Land Rover Forward Control but, after years of mechanical problems (and rolling it) they eventually had the original ‘camper’ section extended and fitted onto a Toyota truck.

Much more reliable. Very quirky.

Alexandra and Geert are Danish and travelling up from Cape Town back to Nairobi where she works for as a TV journalist for the UN (United Nations High Commission for Refugees).

Alexandra deals specifically with Somalia at the moment but previously worked for 5 years in Afghanistan – which she thought was tremendous. They left with their GS & Tenere loaded with 2nd-hand replacement tyres Brad found from his workshop – left behind by Charlie Boorman who visits Maramba every year on one of his bike trips.

Our car was scheduled for another ‘Spa Treatment‘ (as Philippa Hewitt puts it) at Foley’s Africa workshop (run by Nick Selby) in Livingstone. We decided to have a couple of ‘sharpeners’ at The Royal Livingstone Hotel on the lip of The Falls before dropping it off.

Very grand (it ought to be at $1,300 per night). The staff dress in white shirts & long socks, jade shorts & Colonial Pith (safari) helmets. Very dapper.

I think we lowered the tone just enough.

What a setting. The spray from the falls rises up to 400m and swirls around the lip like cigarette smoke in a breeze when the water level is so high at this time of year.

In the dry season, you can walk out to the lip of the falls and paddle in a couple of rock-pools on the edge.

At this time of year, any boats that go out there have to take great care due to the volume and speed of the water.

After paying our bit to keep The Royal Livingstone staff in fancy uniforms ie $12 for a weak Pimms ($12!!) we went down to The Falls to see the other side of the lip that the boat was cruising against.

Incredible power and volume (both sound and quantity) of water.

There’s a walk up to the lip that you can take where you don’t get wet at all. We’d heard that there can be a lot of spray around on the walk that faces the falls, but went that way anyway.

At first the spray is refreshing in the heat and like standing in a light shower of rain. It’s constant, but not consistent – swirling, and covering you in waves. Helene found it a bit bracing…

We walked out and crossed Knife Edge Bridge (far left of this pic)…

…where the spray hits the bottom of the falls (108 metres below) so hard it is actually forced back up and you’re struck by spray from above and below simultaneously.

There was so much spray my shoes filled with water within 30 seconds of stepping onto the bridge. i’ve fallen out of boats and not been that wet!

At this location it’s almost impossible to take a picture through the spray as the water plummets down only 50m from where you stand.

Once across the bridge taking photos is almost pot-luck.

You have to snap as fast as possible or risk the camera being ruined.

However, there are dramatic sights available in almost every direction at this time of year

Heading back to the car via the top loop, more views are available…

…until you look out towards the Livingstone Bridge at the Zambian border with Zimbabwe. There are bunji jumpers leaping head-first off the centre, but as the sun sets the bridge itself is dramatic enough for me.

We were so wet that staff we passed and people who had walked up the ‘dry’ side just laughed at us on the way back.

The chap at the ticket office had let us in for free in the afternoon (normally $10 each) because we were planning to come back after sunset to see The Falls by moonlight ($13). As it turned out, we were so soaked we had to change in the car park / craft market and didn’t feel like waiting 3 hours for another drenching.

I’m glad we didn’t. We would have missed the terrific sunset that we saw from a picnic spot on the river as we drove back to Maramba.

From a picnic spot beside the river, looking back, the spray from The Falls looked like candy-floss.

Looking upriver towards Maramba River Lodge, the sunset was even more dramatic.

Hard to believe those colours are natural. View from The Penthouse…

Not the ‘biggest’ waterfall in the world since in the ‘dry’ season the water volume drops to 4-10% of what it is just now – so the annual average puts it in the top-3.

However: 1,700m wide; 108m high; 1088 cubic metres of water per second, (ie 38,400 cubic feet / second); 2x the height of Niagara Falls; 2x the width of Horseshoe Falls.

Mosi-oa-Tunya.
Outstanding.

Zambia Border

Posted on March 20, 2014 by Scott CableMarch 20, 2014

Our last night in Botswana was at Chobe Safari Lodge. The camp there has good shade, friendly staff and is next to the wide Chobe river.

Uneventful, other than the normal Warthogs running through the undergrowth and a Baboon who stole the bag of flour I was making bread with while my back was turned at the campfire only a couple of feet away.

He left a trail as he ran off but I didn’t intend to follow him up a tree.

I’d bought a cast iron pot in S Africa, having resisted for ages because I thought they were a bit gimmicky and too heavy.

I wish I’d bought one years ago. They really are excellent for slow-cooked stews, bread, soups, frying, etc. By putting coals on the lid it almost becomes a small (inefficient) oven.

Everyone uses wood to Braai (BBQ) throughout Southern Africa. There must be a market for the Fuel Briquettes Helene has been implementing with Amaha we Uganda in Kasese, but Africans love to burn a whole bag (or 2) of wood when camping, so firewood is sold everywhere.

Helene made some ‘adjustments‘ to my IDP, which had expired, and we left mid morning for Kazungula on the Botswana / Zambia border.

I filled up with fuel at Kasane (P9.88 / litre ie 988 ‘Raindrops’ / $1) as I’d heard it was more expensive in Zambia (about 40% more as it turned out).

The border is almost triangular at the Zambezi River. You can cross between Botswana, Zambia and Zimbabwe within a radius of just 4-5km.

A 2km line of trucks lead up to the Botswana Customs point to exit. We drove to the front – where all was calm and friendly.

The trucks are not being delayed by Customs but by the small, deisel-powered, single-truck capacity ferry that is needed to cross the Zambezi to the Zambian border post (also called Kazungula).

We arrived at Botswana Immigration at 11.20am, got our visas checked, passports stamped and the Carnet exit-stamped.

By 11.35 we had driven through Botswana Customs and were waiting for the ferry.

Friendly, calm and simple.

That’s when the touts / guides / fixers / money-changers surrounded us. No hassle really, just persistant.

We weren’t sure whether or not we needed assistance on the Zambian side or should just muddle through. But, in the end we decided to use Elvin (who looked the most respectable) and agreed a fee of ZAR50 (South African Rand) – about $6.

I was sceptical that his fee wouldn’t escalate, but we gave it a shot.

There was just room for ourselves and one 2-trailer truck on the ferry, but that still meant there was a queue as the truck driver argued with the ticket clerk about the $ exchange rate. He makes this trip every week: the rate doesn’t change; the argument doesn’t change; and the fact that he always pays up doesn’t change.

The ticket can be paid for in Pula (272), Kwacha (150, Zambian currency) or US$ (30). The figures are fixed. The exchange rate is terrible and Pula is the cheapest way to do it.

The ticket is bought on the ‘boat’. Forms are filled in with car registration etc.

After that, the ticket is inspected by the Police guard (who stood next to me while I bought it), then by the assistant clerk (who stood next to the car – 2 metres away from the ticket booth and watched me buy it).

Finally a 4th clerk (who couldn’t read my vehicle registration on the ticket) asked me to confirm my registration number. He didn’t understand my English and refused to look at the number plate at the front on the vehicle (which he was leaning on the whole time). Oh well, it keeps the unemployment figures down I guess.

Getting off the ferry on the Zambian side, things are more chaotic.

The car was immediately mobbed: guys and teenagers wanting to change money; guard the car; sell kerbside insurance; be our ‘fixer‘; sell us diamonds; wash the car; get fuel for us; etc.

‘Our’ fixer Elvin kept most of them at bay and guided us through the different government offices.

Top Tip: Take US$ and local currency. Certain fees must be paid in US$.

Ferry Ticket: $30
Immigration Visas: $100 ($50 each – single entry). Fairly quick. Must be US$
Customs Office: Carnet stamped (free)
Road Toll (Tax): $20 (long queues). Must be US$
Car Insurance: 390 Kwacha (approx $78). Long queues.
Carbon Tax: 150 Kwacha (approx $30). Based on engine size.
Police Port Fee: 40 Kwacha (approx $8)

Total cost: Approx US$266 (if all paid in US$)

Top Tip: There are no ATMs at the border. We bought Kwacha for the non-US$ fees before entering Zambia as the rate is >20% better. Total cost if using Kwacha where possible would be reduced to approx US$220.

It was a bit disconcerting when Elvin disappeared a couple of times with our Carnet and Vehicle Registration papers for the Insurance and Carbon Tax (while I queued for the Road Toll) but it saved us about an hour.

Timing:
10 minutes Botswana side (friendly & organised)
10 minutes on ferry
1hr 40 minutes Zambian side (friendly but long queues and much pushier)
Total: exactly 2 hours – pretty good.

We could have done it ourselves but Elvin saved us a lot of running around and queueing – especially in that heat.

Elvin’s fee stayed at $7. I gave him $10.

Top Tip: Get receipts for everything. Don’t hand over cash for anything the fixer pays for until you get them and dont pay his fee till you get ALL your documents in your hand.

When we got back to the car, ‘reflective’ stickers had been put on the front and rear (compulsory in Zambia and a great excuse for police fines at roadblocks if you don’t have them).

The guys who put them on demanded $30. I told them to take them off (they’d just used coloured sticky tape) and eventually paid them 20Pula ($1.50) to get lost.

We later saw that all the local cars also seem to just use coloured sticky tape – so maybe that will work.

Over a dozen clamouring teenagers all claimed they’d acted as security and watched the car for us. After 10 minutes of fairly pushy arguing I eventually paid one of them $1 and we left them to argue amongst themselves who had ‘earned’ it.

As we left the border, the line of trucks on the Zambian side waiting for the small ferry was over 5km long.

I had spoken to one of the drivers about the length of the wait. He said it was okay at this quiet time. No more than 4-5 days. At peak times it can be up to 2 weeks. There are no facilities for the them (showers etc) and they spend their time cooking at the roadside, boozing and selling their diesel to pay for hookers.

We drove 70km to Livingstone (mostly poor, potholed tar road) and had chicken pittas & wings at a small cafe (pretty good, 38 Kwacha / $5). While we were in the cafe a street-kid with a bucket cleaned our car. I didn’t ask him too, but it certainly needed it as it was still covered in the Chobe mud from when we had been stuck.

I asked a local couple in the cafe what I should pay him. They thought 5Kwacha ($1) was sufficient. He asked for $20 because he said he was starving. I gave him $2, a handful of Pula I had left from Botswana, a couple of apples and a bag of raisins.

Now to find somewhere to camp.

Chobe – Arse About Face

Posted on March 17, 2014 by Scott CableMarch 18, 2014

We met Gilles from Belgium over a glass of wine and then had coffee with him the next morning before he set out for Mozambique.

He has just spent 5 months coming down the west coast of Africa from Europe. There have been very few who have got through in the last year or so and and he recommends not to bother.

Some of the people he’s met have been friendly and he particularly liked Morocco, Ghana and Namibia. But his views on everywhere else seem to echo those of others we’ve met – constant hassle; aggressive / corrupt police & borders; nightmare (expensive) bureaucracy for visas; very few attractions (or even places to have a shower) that are either open or in any state of repair to make them worth the detour. In his opinion, only worth doing it to be able to brag about how macho you are – not fun at all.

He’s now looking forward to the east coast route and should be travelling up a few weeks ahead of us. Hopefully we’ll get the chance to meet up again.

For our last few days in Botswana we headed into Chobe Riverfront.

This essentially follows the border with northern Namibia (which is in the centre of the Zambezi river). The other side is The Caprivi Strip.

On the Zambezi itself, there are many boat trips and a few floating hotels.

Bizarely, after a border dispute about one of the islands in the river, there is also a Botswana flag, on a huge pole, on an island in mid-stream.

But either side of the main stream is a huge marshland area which is quite difficult to travel through at the moment due to the amount of rain.

All the guide books and the official websites say that advance bookings are essential and that no entry permit payments or camping permits will be issued at the park gates. We rolled up on the off chance anyway and managed to arrange entry and camping at Ihaha camp on the spot. Maybe it wouldn’t have been so easy in the high season.

450 Pula per night camping ($45) and P250 ($25) per day to get in with the vehicle.

There are a number of inland sandy tracks that radiate like a spider’s web throughout the park, most of which are in reasonable condition.

Even some of the marshland fringes are pretty easy to get around.

But in some of the fringe areas the tracks just disappear into the boggy marsh.

We spent the morning on the fringes and inland, just cruising around, enjoying the scenery.

There wasn’t much game around due to the plentiful supply of water throughout the region. However, as we rounded one bend we were literally stopped in our tracks.

We watched her for a while, until it started to rain. As she headed off into the bush we noticed that she’d been in a pretty bad scrap at some time and had lost her left eye – it can’t be easy for a predator that can’t see properly.

We followed her slowly through the bush for a while, then lost her in the heavy rain.

Ten minutes later we thought we’d spotted her sheltering from the downpour.

It turned out to be another female – both eyes intact.

We followed her for about 20 minutes and were surprised when she met with another lioness and 2 cubs.

Then, two more cubs arrived…

…then another 2. Eight lions in total. It turned out they had 3 cubs each (pretty unusual) although the cubs were so lively and playful we couldn’t get a single shot with them all in.

We sat and watched the cubs playing for a while…

…until mum got board and took them off into the bush.

I decided we should take the marshy track west towards camp.

Helene wasn’t quite so sure that it was a good idea.

We did ok for the first kilometre or so: wet, boggy and muddy, but ok. “Don’t worry,” I said, “If it gets much worse we can always turn back“.

Unfortunately, about 400 metres into one of the wetter bits (400 metres after we should have turned back) we got stuck.

Up to the doors in stinking, black, boggy mud.

Now what do we do?

There’s nothing to winch on (and we don’t have a winch); we’re 1.5km from the nearest dry track that anyone may possibly come along; there are 8 lions somewhere between us and the track (do we get out, wade back to the track and try and leave a ‘HELP’ sign pointing the way we came) and we’ve already seen crocs in the swamp.

Neither of us fancied any of those options. There was no way we could go forward – the front was buried. Fortunately, after about 20 minutes of rocking the car back and forwards in low gears we found some grip in reverse and (somehow) I managed to reverse us back along the random, twisting troughs we made coming in.

That got the heart racing a little more than I would have liked.

No more bogs by choice for a while – we stuck to the sandy, riverside tracks as we drove through the bush to Ihaha camp.

On the way we passed a ‘Private’ sign for Chobe Game Lodge. In need of a break, we went in anyway, looking for a strong coffee. They couldn’t have been more welcoming. What a beautiful place.

Like a museum / gallery.

Rooms are $900-$2,000 per person per night. The potential cost of the coffee was almost worrying me as much as being stuck in the marsh.

Not a problem though. Two (pretty good) coffees, $3. Phew!

The rest of the day was relatively uneventful. Plenty more to see though.

Huge herds of Springbok (Helene wants to call this picture ‘Arse About Face’)…

…Baboons (some with a face only a mother could love)…

…Buffalo…

…and the occasional hyena…

This guy, looks like a smallish, unthreatening dog – until you see how big he is next to the car…

We finally got to the Ihaha camping area around 5pm. A long day, but a beautiful area to drive and a great location to set up camp.

View from The Penthouse at sunset…

…and at sunrise…

The rest of our time at Ihaha was spent as lazily as possible, watching a series of fishermen working hard…

…miles and miles from their villages in the marshlands…

…as we sat and chilled in solitude.

Zambezi Bound – Monkey Business

Posted on March 14, 2014 by Scott CableMarch 14, 2014

Disappointed not to be able to go into Moremi with the car, we headed 230km east from Maun, along the Makgadikgadi / Naxi Pan road.

The potholes are a menace. One woman recently got into the newspapers taking a bath in one as a protest.

However, there are approximately 140,000 elephant in Botswana and only about 50% of them are in parks / nature reserves.

The rest often seem to graze at the side of the roads (and wander across them) as if they owned the place.

Chances are anything could just wander out.

Top Tip: Keep your speed down, your eyes peeled and never drive at night.

That night, as another heavy sky threatened us, we stayed at a lovely, remote lodge called Elephant Sands, about 50km north of Nata.

A nice, simple bar no more than 10 metres from a waterhole. They can get hundreds of elephants there in the dry season.

Another great sunset.

They also have a fixed menu dinner, (not cheap, $12 each) which was pretty good, but the highlight for me was the home-made bread. The best I’ve tasted since coming into Africa.

Camping 85 Pula per person (8,500 ‘raindrops’ / $8). Good value. A peaceful campsite, with simple showers etc.

Even the firewood round here is attractive.

None of the camp is fenced and we sat that evening with a glass of wine as an elephant wandered round the shower block 15 metres away.

The next morning, a cracking view from ‘The Penthouse‘ at sunrise.

We had coffee at the bar and watched the elephants wander amongst the chalets.

We headed north towards Kasane, a small town at the ‘pointy’ eastern end of the Caprivi strip where the borders of Botswana, Namibia, Zambia and Zimbabwe meet.

The Old Hunter’s Road (I think that’s a euphemism for Poacher’s) runs north, right along the Zimbabwe border. It’s pretty remote. The few villages we passed are just collections of very simple dwellings.

When it rains out here, even a leaky old Land Rover provides at least some shelter.

The effects of the rain and flash floods can leave some weird sights on the large, flat plains.

We stayed one night at Senyati Camp – another lovely, remote, unfenced private camp around a natural spring that attracts elephant, buffalo, giraffe, etc.

Expensive: P340 (£24 / $38) per night, but that gets you a private shelter / shower block…

…plus elephant…

…and up to 100 buffalo wandering though the camp as you cook round the campfire.

A little unnerving. Perhaps even more so than the elephants.

We were headed for Chobe Riverfront at Kasane and the next day moved on 40km up the road to the Botswana / Zambia border on the Zambezi River.

Chobe Safari Lodge is large, fancy and fairly expensive (£200-£1,000 / $330 – $1,600 per night).

But the camping is very good value (P150 / £10 / $16) per night – and you get to use all the Lodge facilities.

Mind you, this is still pretty much the middle of nowhere and the campsite is swarming with Baboons & Vervet monkeys.

They raid the bins…

…drink from the washing-up sinks…

…or just prowl around looking for trouble…

The males with the blue balls are in charge. The bluer the balls, the further up the hierarchy the monkey is.

The youngsters who haven’t learnt the bin-raiding trick yet, just sit around cultivating their ‘I’m helpless, please feed me’ face.

Other visitors in camp include the Striped Mongooses (Mongeese / Mongii?)

…who flatten themselves and try to play-dead if you get too close…

…and the Warthogs who race around chasing each other. These 4 woke us at 5.30am one morning crunching the remaining logs from last night’s fire just to get the meat fat off the coals!

They ate the lot.

82,000 raindrops – Okavango & Moremi

Posted on March 11, 2014 by Scott CableMarch 13, 2014

The Botswana currency is the Pula (meaning ‘rain‘) and it’s divided into 100 Thebe (meaning ‘raindrops‘).

Cool huh?

Appropriate too as we’ve had plenty of rain since arriving.

The bar at ‘The Old Bridge’ is a busy mix of back-packers, campers, tour guides and bush-pilots. With a ‘bar-at-the-end-of-the-world‘ feel, it’s difficult to tell whether the residents are propping up the bar, or the other way around.

By no means the worst place to sit and watch the storms in the frequent power cuts.

After a relaxing 24 hours we got a surprise visit from Simon & Lore – a Belgian couple we’ve been in touch with since we both originally tried to get into Egypt. They eventually shipped from Jordan to Sudan and avoided it altogether.

By coincidence they were camped the other end of town and had heard we were at The Old Bridge.

We’ve been following Simon & Lore’s Facebook posts etc as we plan to go north on a similar route to theirs coming south.

It was good to finally meet up with them.

They’re travelling in a 4×4 VW Camper that Simon converted to a regular home-from-home. Unfortunately they’ve had starter motor problems and although they had planned to leave the next day, that plan came to an abrupt end.

I took Simon into Maun and we spent the morning trawling spares shops & mechanics until we found a chap who said he ought to be able to fix the solenoid by the end of the day.

Helene & I had wanted to visit Moremi National Park but the recent heavy rains had made that impractical. The best way to see it would either be on a mokoro boat trip or from the air.

With time on our hands, the four of us decided to take a scenic flight across the Okavango. The 5-seater Cessna is a fixed price regardless of the number of passengers but for four of us it was a not-unreasonable P825 ($90) or 82,500 ‘raindrops’ each.

The 1470km long Okavango River rises in central Angola and flows south-east through Namibia’s Caprivi Strip, where it meets the northern Kalahari.

Annually it spreads over 18 billion cubic meters of water across the 16,000 sq-km Okavango Delta of swamps, marshes, reed beds and papyrus-choked lagoons that include Moremi National Park.

It is stunning.

Top Tip: at some point see at least part of Africa from the air.

I doubt any photo I could take would do it justice – but I’ll try.

It can be so wet that getting around or game spotting from a ground vehicle would not be practical. From 500ft (170m) though you get a totally different perspective.

The landscape is vast. It’s hard to imagine that there are actually almost 100,000 people that live there: hand-to-mouth, fishing and hunting.

There are some remote lodges in the heart of the delta, but they’re real hot-shot stuff. You can only fly in and they cost from $400- $1,700 per person per night.

Too rich for my blood. We’ll settle for a fly-by rather than a fly-in.

To date we’ve only seen Africa from ground level. From 500ft though the colours appear much more pronounced and the landscape can be almost abstract.

It’s hard to imagine what it must look like in the dry season, when there’s only 50% of the water around.

The southeast / southwest of the Delta is a maze of rivers, tributaries, pools and swampy wetland animal trails.

The north-eastern part of the park / delta is drier, but equally beautiful. As we’ve seen so often in Africa, the skys are broad and dramatic.

In a small plane dramatic skys mean turbulence. Guaranteed to heighten the tension a little.

As we headed back towards the airport the sky darkened considerably.

Eventually we hit a squall that produced a huge rainbow across us and a handful of lightening strikes either side of us as we came in to land.

No pictures of that – too dark, too bumpy and we all had other things on our minds.

We raced back to the campsite as Lore had left the VW sunroof open. I took Simon back to town to pick up his starter-motor and we finally got back around 8pm.

Lore had made dinner in their camper but, since all of our stuff was with me in our car, I couldn’t be bothered preparing anything that late and we ate in the bar.

The next morning, the VW was running sweetly. Over breakfast Simon & Lore gave us some excellent tips on places to go further north (& some to avoid) before they headed out.

I spent the rest of the day looking like I knew what I was doing around the car – checking bolts, oil levels, filters etc.

There was something bothering me about the look of the engine bay though. I couldn’t put my finger on what it was – it almost looked too tidy, not as cluttered as usual.

It finally clicked.
The big space top right of the picture should have contained a huge windscreen washer tank and pump.
It couldn’t have fallen out – I guess Whitey forgot to re-fit it when he removed the turbo etc.
Whitey’s repair job to the injectors / filters was very welcome: but over the week or two since, seems to be costing us more and more.
Oh well, something else on the list for Foley’s to do when we get to Zambia.

Good news though: that night we got a rare chance to Skype Charlie. She and Luke have now set the date for their wedding next March.

Makgadikgadi – No-go.

Posted on March 8, 2014 by Scott CableMarch 8, 2014

Still more rain.

We met up with Ben, a German chap who’s been across India, Nepal, Tibet and into China on his trusty old KTM.

He came in via Libya (somehow got a ‘Business Visa’ and crossed into western Egypt and has travelled down from Northern Africa for the last 4 months.

We picked up some good tips from him about some of the countries further north and talked about whether or not it was safe to head out into the Makgadikgadi – the general consensus was no.

Good call. Ben left the next morning – he’d had enough when he woke up and found his shoes floating past his tent.

We hung around for the next 24 hours at Planet Baobab, dodging the spiders…

…and the snakes. We’d seen very few snakes (two or three) over the previous months but then in the space of six hours (despite a bad back) Helene made me jump out of my chair when she spotted a Boomslang come out from under it…

…another one that climbed up into the roof while we were having dinner, and then a Puff-adder that wandered past the foot of the tent ladder just before we went to bed.

Ok. I’ve had enough spiders…

…snakes and giant moths…

…for now. Time to move on.

Much as we liked Planet Baobab, let’s just pay the bill and go (assuming the Credit Card isn’t declined again).

It was.

“Never mind, I’ve got another one hidden in the car, and if that fails, I’ve got some US$ stashed.”

That was the plan anyway.

Over the next hour we discovered that the Visa Card was declined because we don’t have any money (despite me shouting at the bank on a hugely expensive phone call, it seems that that’s my problem not theirs).

The spare credit cards were no good – because they were wrapped up in a waterproof bag – with a pint of water in it.

The US Dollars were sodden.

As were the spare passports – which are ruined. My picture makes me look more like Mr Blobby than when I sat for it!

We finally managed to transfer some money electronically, pay the bill and hit the road.

In another storm.

Along a road littered with potholes you could bath in, that bisects the Makgadikgadi Desert and Naxi Pan.

Things were looking up though. Arriving at Maun (250km west, on the fringe of the Okovango Delta), we found some rubber hose that I could use to repair the diesel-fountain under the bonnet and, when we arrived at The Old Bridge Backpackers there was a lovely sunset…

…and a friendly (cheap) bar.

Camping 160 Pula per night (about $15). Beer P20 ($2) a pint. Gin & Tonic P22 ($2.2).

That’ll do for a day or two of R&R.