It's a wild old world

This rain had turned things a little upside down, instead of the warm days and cold nights we'd been expecting we were getting cold days and warm(er) nights - much better for sleeping in the tent though!

We set off south the next day, following the Okavango river to enter Botswana. An amazingly efficient border post, we were in and out in fifteen minutes, definitely a record for this trip. There was only one room on each side that dealt with all the formalities. Maybe they should suggest this amazing system to some of the countries further north? The Angola - Namibia border was the first time we'd seen computers at a border post since Morocco, they did have a couple of old typewriters at the Gabon exit post however.

So, Botswana. A more African Africa than Namibia was. There was actually a bit of a North South divide in Namibia. There is a fence with control posts to get through separating the huge cattle ranches in the south with the subsistence farms in the north to prevent the spread of disease. Once we'd got north of this fence in Namibia we lost a lot of the western world. Back to mud and timber huts with thatched roofs, people herding livestock down the sides of the road and a bit more of an African feel to the country. This carried on into Botswana, I've never seen so much livestock on a road as the one heading south from the border.

First stop, Tsodilo hills. These are an ancient sacred site with rock paintings, and pretty much the only four hills in Botswana, about 350m high. It must be one of the worlds flattest countries. 85% of the country is dominated by the flat expanse of the Kalahari Desert. It took us thirty minutes or so to travel along the 40km track from the main road. We found Alistair and Bosse sitting at the end of it eating their lunch, the guys we'd met in the Polo in Namibia. They'd got this far in 1.5 hours, but had decided they could not make the last 3km to the hills and would have to turn round again.

We went for a walk that afternoon with James, our guide, to visit the paintings and learn about the hills. The San people believed these hills were the point of creation so they were of great importance. Paintings dated from about 3000 years ago and were mainly of wildlife, most amusingly I thought, there was one painting of a penguin. People must have travelled up from Southern Namibia where penguins exist.

We crossed paths with the Botswanan military on our walk, being the only hills in Botswana it's where they come to do their training. Usually the African military are to be avoided, but all these guys seemed very friendly, one of them stopping to take a photo of us.

The next plan was to visit the Okavango Delta. Most rivers disappear into a lake, the sea, or another river. The Okavango is a river with a difference, flowing into the Kalahari Desert and disappearing into the sand and the air. In the process it creates the worlds largest inland delta bringing water and nutrients to millions of people and animals in this arid country.

We decided to take what looked to be the most interesting route down through the delta - down the east side cutting through the Moremi reserve. This involved heading north again back towards the Namibian border to get the ferry across the river. While waiting for the ferry I asked a couple of people how much it cost receiving blank looks. We drove onto the ferry anyway, and I asked the guy behind us, a local guy, how much it cost. "It's free, a service for the people". The thought of an African government actually trying to provide a free service for its population hadn't even crossed my mind! Onto the road the other side, we headed down to Seronga, to Mbiroba camp to arrange a boat trip into the delta the following day.

We set off with Tom, our "poler" (the person who powers the boat using a pole). He'd been doing this for eleven years and was an impeccable guide, naming plants, animals and even birds from their calls. The boats used are called Mokoros, basically a flat bottomed canoe. We were sitting very low to the water, gliding along silently through the reeds of the delta. Very peaceful. The thought that the area was crawling with hippos, crocodiles and elephants kept us on the lookout.

We arrived at an island where we would do a walk, I assumed this would just be a little potter round a small island. "Now this is where your game walk begins" Tom said. I saw the immediate horror on Hannah's face in realising what we were about to do, walking and animals do not mix well in her books! He then went on with a safety briefing, kind of like the ones you get in an aeroplane but without the fancy arm waving - what to do it charged by a buffalo (lie down), how to avoid getting charged by elephants (make sure you're down wind of them) and other dangers. We set off, within a few metres we stopped to analyse two piles of dung. One was elephant, the other hippo, the two most dangerous animals on the planet. The difference being that hippos only eat grass where as elephants dung contains sticks and twigs. We carried on with the walk, spotting baboons, warthog and impala, but none of the African classics. A couple of hours later back at the boat, and Hannah amazed that we had survived we set off again to find a spot for lunch and then slid back home through the reeds.

We carried on along our road following day, with the road steadily deteriorating. We eventually came to water flowing across the road and three huge pools stretching 100 metres or so. After a quick examination, we successfully drove through these pools, only to reach the next village where we were informed by one of the locals that the road beyond was impassable. Due to the exceptional rains earlier in the year there was an abnormal amount of water in the delta at the moment. We turned round heading back towards the ferry to find a huge queue of cars - it seemed that the ferry had broken down. Now we couldn't get off either end of the road! Never having much luck with ferries on this continent we sat and waited, watching an otter, then wondering why the locals seemed determined to hit it with rocks. Fortunately it escaped safely. After a couple of hours we got across the river, bush camping that night before heading on to Maun the following day.

This proved to be a much more successful route south, although the discovery at one of the many veterinary control points that we were trying to carry sausages around the country without a permit led to a spontaneous picnic, whipping out the stove and cooking up sausage butties, much to the amusement of passing drivers.

Maun is a funny little town, it just seems to be crawling with overland vehicles restocking for their next mission. We went to a campsite recommended in the Lonely Planet as a quiet campsite, I think the book was a little out of date as it was now the place where all the young and trendies of Maun hang out for the weekend. They were enjoying the unusual amount of water in the delta, waterskiing, fishing and just pottering around on boats, as well as attempting to drink the campsite bar dry.

We did the thing to be done in Maun the following morning, refueling and refooding. We decided against the track up to Kasane as it went through a couple of marsh areas, and with the abnormal water levels didn't want to risk having to turn round again. We decided to head on towards the Makgadikgadi pans instead. We reached Gweta, the area all looked quite flooded, it appeared they'd had a lot of rain recently. We started heading south on gravel, that turned to sand, that turned to mud. With the road getting worse and the sun setting we decided to pull off the track and camp for the night. Testing the ground it was dryish sand so we drove off, as soon as we were off the track the car went through the sand and into the hidden mud below grinding to a halt. We tried brute force to get out but that didn't work so we started the now familiar process of digging, jacking and sand ladders. We also noticed the rear left tyre rapidly deflating, not ideal. Everything in place and the sun now set we tried getting out again, moving the car a couple of metres back towards the track but stopping just short of firm ground. We decided to just put up the tent and sort it in the morning. Jacking up the rear right wheel to stick a sand ladder underneath to prevent it sinking more in the night and level the car for sleeping, we heard the dreaded tssssssss - the jack had torn the tyre valve, so now both rear tyres were flat - time to ignore it for now, and eat and sleep instead!

The following morning we reassessed the situation, the car wasn't too badly stuck. A little more digging and jacking to be done. We managed to get some air into both the rear tyres to prevent them from being damaged further and reversed out. We fixed the puncture and headed back towards Gweta giving up on the pans idea - if this area was anything to go by they'd be flooded anyway. We left the fixing of the valve to the professionals in Gweta, removing the tyre from the rim was something I'd only do if I absolutely had to, far too much work!

We'd later find out this was the first time it had rained in Botswana in June for 88 years. Maybe we should offer our services to other drought stricken parts of the world?

Leaving the tyre repair shop in Gweta, we headed towards Nata. Barely 15 minutes had gone by before once again we heard a now familiar sound, tssssss thud thud thud - yet another puncture! This was our first self-repaired puncture from Ghana that we didn't trust 100% that had failed, so we switched tyres again and got on our way.

Wildlife in Botswana has been amazing, in most of Africa it's mainly in the parks, but in Botswana we'd seen all sorts just at the side of the road including giraffe and elephants. Driving north towards Kasane we were lucky enough to spot two lions in the road. As we approached they walked off, although we could still see them just a few metres from us, watching us watching them. When we moved the car to try to get a better look at them they'd move to try to get a better look at us. After five minutes or so of staring at each other they decided we were no longer interesting and disappeared off into the forest.

We stopped at Pandamatenga that night. The following morning I happened to notice that Stanley's front right suspension spring had snapped. Fortunately the break was near the top and the way it had collapsed and lodged itself it place meant we'd lost a few centimetres of clearance but other than that it was working fine. Seeing as it was only an hour to Kasane we decided to carry on and see what they said when we got there.

We arrived at Kasane and went straight to Chobe Motors. They got on the case of trying to track down new springs for us, eventually telling us to return the following day for a quote. The next day, after another hour or so waiting they eventually managed to get hold of parts and prices from South Africa. We'd have to wait till the following Friday before they'd receive them for fitting, eight days away. Glad the car was still in a useable state we started to make ourselves at home in Kasane. Fortunately there are a few things to do in the area. It's the main entrance to the Chobe National Park for a start.

We'd spent our first couple of nights camping in Kubu Lodge. On our second morning while clearing up the tent, a bit of a clatter indicated the arrival of campsite raiders. A vervet monkey was sitting with the remnants of our loaf of bread in its hands, and another with a banana skin it had stolen from the dashboard. The games now began. I was trying to clear away breakfast to keep the monkeys at bay. As soon as I'd chase a monkey from the table another would sneak round behind me and be hanging from the tailgate with its hand in the kitchen or climbing in the door of the car. Amusing for the first 10 seconds or so!

After a day of chores we opted for a change of scenery and went to stay in Chobe Safari Lodge, a stunning hotel and not a bad campsite either right on the river. Our pitch was on the edge of the park, the park fence was only a couple of metres from the car! The warnings in the hotel about elephants wandering the premises at night suggested the fence wasn't very effective. The site was not too surprisingly overrun with animals, warthogs wandering between the tents, more vervet monkeys, monitor lizards, and amusingly we had a troop of fifty or so banded mongooses (collective noun for mongooses anyone?) charging down the path next to us. That combined with the warnings about elephants, hippos and crocodiles roaming around makes it feel like quite a wild campsite!

The next morning we went into Chobe National Park, it's a huge park that runs along the banks of the Chobe River. Chobe is known for its massive herds of elephants, apparently the highest concentration in the world, and they were certainly in evidence. Hundreds and hundreds of them along the waterfront. It's a beautiful park, all very natural and unspoilt. All the roads are still just dirt tracks, and other than that it's fairly untouched by human hands. There was a wide variety of life, mainly impala, with other classics such as giraffe, zebra and fish eagles. We also had a few unexpected, such as several species of mongoose, a honey badger and lots of hippos out of the water during the day.

We were camping in the park that night, as the sun was setting we started heading to the site. Lots of life in the road and we soon reached our first serious road block, a huge bull elephant just standing in the road. We stopped the engine about thirty metres from the elephant and waited. He started walking towards us. It's said that with elephant you will always get a warning that they're getting upset before they do anything serious, such as ear flapping, trumpeting or a mock charge, so we figured we'd just wait and see what happened. Appearing totally relaxed, just eating and throwing dust over himself, stopping occasionally to have a look at us he kept approaching, and approaching. He eventually walked past us almost touching the side of the car. All we could see were his hips through the window. After a couple more four legged road blocks we eventually reached our camp. A beautiful site, right on the river and exceptionally basic, just a toilet block. However, Hannah believed it was lacking something fundamental for the middle of a national park - a fence. We arrived at our site with the vervet monkeys waiting for us and a couple of elephants a little further down the bank. As we set up camp we could hear shouts of "Oi, get out" as a troop of baboons made its way from pitch to pitch stealing what they could. Fortunately (for us) the occupants of the site next to us had their tent up and weren't back yet, so this kept the baboons busy trying to work out how to get into the tent (I did occasionally do the right thing and chase them off). We tucked into some delicious fillet steak, £4.10 per kilo, we love beef prices in Botswana! We slept that night with a good racket outside from all the animals wandering around, having no clue what was making most of the noises we heard.

The next morning was very quiet in the park, we decided all the animals must have had a heavy Saturday night as there was hardly anything around. We left the park on the western side of the riverfront section and tried to track down somewhere to camp but there were no camp sites in the area so we headed back to Kasane on the transit road to relax while waiting for car parts.

Those of you who have been following us closely may have noticed that we're slightly off course, there is a reason for this. Due to the weakness of the pound we decided we'd have to cut the trip short and are therefore skipping out Kenya and Tanzania. The new route plan is to cut across from Namibia, through Botswana, Zambia and Malawi to Mozambique, then head south through Swaziland, South Africa and Lesotho to eventually ship from a port in South Africa.

Don't forget to drive on the left

We rushed for the Angolan border hoping to get as far as possible on our first day. We'd gathered as much information as we could about the Angolan roads on our way down through Africa. We'd planned our route to include as much tarmac as possible, by crossing at Luvo, head for Luanda via M'Penza-Congo and then carry on south down the coast before heading inland again at Benguela, down to Lubango then following the main road to the Santa Clara border.

We crossed the border, a little slow but no real problems eventually breaking free at 3pm. Relieved it was dry, it was a relatively smooth dirt track. We'd been warned it was like soap when wet. There were, however, storm clouds brewing in the distance. This was due to be our last evening in the wet season, and after about 45 minutes of driving it decided to see us out in style with a huge storm flooding the road. The surface became slippery as promised and we were sliding all over the place. We eventually reached M'Penza-Congo. The sun was setting so we thought we'd try to find a place to stay. The only hotel in town was full, so we left the town eventually finding a quarry just outside to bush camp. A quarry doesn't sound like the nicest place to sleep, but you're advised not to venture off the roads in Angola as there is still a high risk of landmines from the recent civil war. Quarries therefore provide one of the few options for bush camping, being well cleared.

The following morning, setting off at 6am, the wet season decided to throw its last punch with drizzle and fog, not ideal, but the road started off as a beautiful smooth dirt road winding through the hills of Northern Angola. Probably really lovely scenery but we couldn't see anything. As we raced towards the coast the fog lifted and the road deteriorated. Anyone who's driven on the wide variety of roads across Africa will know that the best ones are the beautiful tarmac, well maintained dirt roads aren't too far behind. A bad dirt road is a bit of a pain, throwing you and the car around, but bad tarmac in just brutal. Sharp edges and aggressive deep potholes violently jolting the car slowing everyone down to a crawl (not that there was anyone else). Most of Angola's roads were tarmacked before the civil war, but haven't been maintained for 30 years or so. Patches where the tarmac was totally destroyed weren't too bad, but other bits were terrible. The terrible tarmac changed to a pretty terrible sand road along the coast as we started heading south. By now vegetation was drying out, grass was turning yellow and the sky was turning the beautiful deep blue that the lack of moisture in the air allows. We were back in the dry season!

Shortly before Luanda the road turned back to tarmac, smooth and new, winding its way down the coast with stunning scenery, palm trees and blue seas racing past as we headed south. It was 4pm, we decided to try and shoot round the city to get to the southern side ready for an early start the next morning. The road we wanted to take round the city seemed to no longer exist, we turned back to try a second option. Tarmac quickly turned to sandy diversions round roadworks, and progress was slow, especially with heavy lorries crawling along. There were roadworks all round Luanda - they're hosting the African Cup of Nations next year, so there's frantic infrastructure improvement taking place (although I'm not sure how anyone is actually going to manage to get an Angolan visa to watch it). After several hours of battling we were on our road south out of the city. A policeman suddenly ran in front of the car blowing his whistle telling me to stop. Seeing as our Portuguese is really quite limited, all we could understand was that we had to pay a fine of US$50, with no idea why. "Nao compreendo" (I don't understand) repeated over and over again for 10 minutes or so seemed to do the job, and he eventually gave up and returned my driving licence. It was now dark, and with no sign of anywhere to set up camp. The first hotel we tried was full. The second might have a room soon for US$200. Slightly beyond our budget, so we tried the old overlander trick of asking if we could sleep in their car park in return for eating in their restaurant. After a bit of a discussion they agreed, so we put on our finest clothes, which really are pretty disgusting and sat down in their lovely beach front restaurant for a meal.

That night in the car was unbearably hot. Struggling to sleep we decided to set off at 4am, stopping after a while for porridge and tea at the side of the road. The road was good, again with fantastic scenery down the coast and beautiful Angolan villages. We realised we could possibly make it to Windhoek for the 23rd to meet Hannah's brother, so we pushed on all day. The good road carried on most of the way, eventually running out, turning into diversions winding through the forest round all the road building works that were going on. We searched for somewhere to camp, eventually pulling off up a forest track shortly before sunset. We were treated to amazing stars and our first cold night for several months (with the exception of Mount Cameroon).

We got up before dawn to make a push for the border, and were unexpectedly treated to some more good road. Disappointingly, it then turned into some of the worst road we'd had in Angola with badly potholed tarmac and dirt track with huge craters several metres wide. Shortly before the border we filled up everything we could with diesel at 25p/l, the cheapest we'd have on the trip.

After 34 hours of driving, with 2000km covered in 3.5 days we reached the Namibian border at about 3:30pm. We were helped out by a young man sorting out all the formalities on the Angolan side. I went to hand him US$5 for his assistance, quite generous I though for half an hour of work. He rejected it, saying "Just US$100 will do, that's all", I had to double check I'd heard correctly, yes, one hundred United States dollars was what he thought his help was worth. "How stupid do you think I am?" I believe was my response. "Ok, only $50 is ok". I got in the car to drive off and he suddenly decided the $5 was ok after all, having rejected the first offer he got nothing. It was nice being able to argue in English though!

The border itself was trouble free, and we were suddenly in a world where we could speak English and drive on the left (though changing sides of the road does make for a slightly confusing land border...!). We set off to find a camp site, yes, a dedicated camp site, our first since Morocco! This campsite even had some bog standard tourists in it, the first we'd seen for several months since Ghana. Pulling out woolly hats and ski jackets we braced ourselves for a Namibian winter evening, it was cold!

After our recent early starts we were up early the next morning - although as it turned out, somewhat earlier than we'd realised. We'd put our watches forward an hour on entering Namibia, blissfully unaware that the country has daylight saving time. We were quite happy in our world an hour away from everyone else's for a day or two until we realised - although it did explain the strange looks from the security guard when we got up at 4:30am - we thought it was early at 5:30am! Got a nice sunrise photo though.

Onwards to Windhoek, tarmac all the way and not a pothole in sight. We saw roadworks a couple of times where repairs were being made to the slightest imperfection in the road surface. The roads weren't designed to keep the driver awake however, with only a couple of corners every hour or so. We arrived at Thomas and Corinne's hotel to be met by an amazingly unfriendly woman, telling us that they were out around town. We headed off to Chameleon Backpackers. It was the most classy backpackers I've ever seen, the room we took was stunning and immaculate, staff exceptionally helpful and all reasonably priced as far as Windhoek goes (although still the most expensive place we've stayed since leaving Europe).

We returned to see if the others were back at the hotel, but it was just the exceptionally unfriendly woman still. We weren't allowed through the gate so decided to sit outside and wait. She advised us after a while that the area was very dangerous with serious crime problems and we shouldn't wait there. We knew the others would be back in 10 minutes or so and asked if we could wait inside for that time. "No, no visitors", ok so where should we wait. "I don't know, but not here, it's not safe". There were no bars or cafes around we could pop into so we decided to brave the street for another 10 minutes. The others eventually turned up, and after some pleading by them we were allowed through the gate for a few minutes while they sorted their stuff. We received warnings from several people about crime in Windhoek after we arrived, I'd imagined it to be a quiet and safe city, so this was really quite unnerving. We headed off to Joe's Beer House that night for a safari on a plate, a meal of of kudu, ostrich, crocodile, oryx, springbok and zebra. We were back in a land of good meat!

We'd been referring to Namibia as the promised land for quite a while by now, since leaving Ghana really. There would be good food, tourist facilities, hot running water, good supermarkets, we'd be back in the dry season, speaking English, good roads, driving on the left and fresh baguettes and croissants growing on trees (we can dream can't we?). Whenever someone was complaining about anything there would be a voice that would say "Namibia", as if everything would be perfect there. So far, apart from the bread trees it was pretty much holding true. We set off south fairly early the next morning after a trip round Shoprite, the big South African supermarket chain (Hannah and I really enjoyed it!). A camp site near the Taushab river in the Naukluft mountains was the destination. After a little while we took a right turn onto Namibian gravel, a new experience for Thomas and Corinne and it wasn't long before they were cursing the guide book for saying everything was perfectly doable in a two wheel drive vehicle and hiring a Toyota Yaris. It may be doable, but at half the speed and twice the discomfort. The lack of high clearance and travel on the suspension made for a slow journey.

We arrived at the campsite reception with its pool, bar and shop to be told that our pitch was 8.5km down the road, so off we went to find it. Clearly signed, well laid out and in the middle of nowhere with just 4 large pitches, all of them well separated by a bit of woodland to give some privacy. All that was polished off with clean, well maintained toilets and showers with hot running water. This was like no campsite we'd ever stayed at before, kind of like bush camping in luxury.

A couple of days walking was the plan, starting with the Olive trail. Lovely walk up through the mountains, descending along a dry river bed, a few tricky bits including hanging onto chains to traverse a near vertical wall - not sure what UK health and safety would have to say about that!

On to Sesriem the next day, climbing Elim Dune in the evening for sunset, a spectacular walk with stereotypical Namibian scenery all around including springboks bouncing in the distance. That night we had our first close encounters with Jackals wandering the campsite looking for food.

According to the Lonely Planet everyone wants to see Sossusvlei at sunrise, so we decided we probably should too. It was about an hours drive from the campsite so a 4:30am alarm was the order of the day going through the gates at 5:30am to join all the other cars to get there. The partly cloudy skies gave us a spectacular sunrise, but obscuring the sun after that meant we didn't get the flaming red dunes that we were supposed to, this combined with the unfortunate fact that we went to the wrong place meant we didn't get the experience we were meant to. Honestly, how often are there cloudy days in Sossusvlei in the dry season?!

Swakopmund was the next port of call. We had a very surreal drive on route into Walvis Bay. The sun was setting straight ahead, the thick blowing sand and the silhouetted cranes in the distance created a very eerie world. We did our chores in Swakopmund, including getting the hole in our exhaust sorted - they didn't have the right part, but nothing a grinder and a bit of welding wouldn't fix. A few other bits and bobs combined with some delicious sea food and we were on our way again.

We took the scenic route to Etosha via the Skeleton Coast national park. An exceptionally long days driving through a spectacularly barren landscape, visiting a few shipwrecks on route and Hannah and I managed to squeeze in another puncture. We barely saw another person all day, struggling even to find anyone to let us into the National Park at the gate. As the sun was setting the booked accommodation was no longer an option so we found a camp site, but the Yaris couldn't make the access road, despite what all the locals in the campsite were telling us. We all piled into Stanley leaving the Yaris at the side of the road.

We spent the next few days at the Etosha National Park. Our first Southern African park, and what a change from the ones down the west coast; not only was there actually wildlife, but also sufficient organisation to enable us to see it! As soon as we were through the gate there were zebra, springbok and giraffe at the sides of the road. The first evening we spent over three hours by the floodlit waterhole at the camp, there were twelve rhino at one stage, both black and white, elephants, giraffe, hyena, they were all making a show. On our final day in the park we went searching for a lion, sitting by a waterhole we'd heard they were known to visit. After an hour or so we were a little surprised to see a different big cat, a leopard creeping through the grass. Known for being incredibly shy, mainly nocturnal and rarely seen this was quite a surprise! Sadly, we still had to retire at the end of the day without our lion.

We left Etosha and went our separate ways leaving the other two to head south back to Windhoek for their flight, and to discover what pain Europcar would inflict on them for the state of the Yaris, while we went North East towards the Caprivi Strip. We spent the next few days moving very slowly, just driving an hour or so each day after our frantic whistle-stop tour of Namibia. We spent a day relaxing at Treesleeper community camp, named after the native people from the area. They're known for going hunting, then after making a kill they'd climb a tree with the kill and wait there to avoid the attentions of other predators, such a lion that might be interested. We paid to go on a "Bushwalk" to learn about the old hunter-gatherer lifestyle they used to lead, learning fascinating facts about hunting, medicine and making fire. This lifestyle has now been pretty much outlawed in the name of conservation.

We eventually reached the Okavango river, this whole area had been subject to serious flooding earlier in the year and was still recovering, our first campsite showing us how high the water had been. Went met Alistair and Bosse here, a couple of guys who'd rented a VW Polo in South Africa and were doing a small African tour in it. A little slow on some roads apparently but it was holding out ok.

Our next Okavango campsite, Samvura Camp, was a curious affair, we arrived to be greeted by three barking dogs and an exceptionally friendly lady. "Do you want to see a cape clawless otter?" she asked. Is it by the river? Stuffed? I thought. She wandered down to the house, "Come on Otty, come here". An otter wandered out of the house and came to say hello, a beautiful animal. Its mother had been caught in a snare and it was the only survivor from three pups. Attempts not to humanise it had failed, it was still effectively wild however. She said it would disappear into the river for up to six days at a time, but would always return eventually. Amusingly it would mark its territory by going to the toilet at the various entrances to the house. We were chatting at the bar when a large male goat trotted through and stood between Hannah and me. "Here's trouble", said the owner. He was going to be staff Christmas dinner five years earlier but they decided he was too small to kill. She gave us a stick to whack him with if he got annoying, he had a habit of butting people. We wandered down to have a look at the river, followed by dogs and a goat. "This is the worst campsite ever!" said Hannah, her dislike for animals overriding everything else that existed. We retreated to our camping spot, unfortunately joined by a horse for a while who decided to raid our table for food, but that was the last of our animals for the evening. A lovely peaceful campsite, lots of character and plenty of domesticated wildlife for those that like animals. We were a little surprised to have a bit of thunder and a few spots of rain that night, this was the dry season!

We carried on along the river heading for Ngepi camp, raved about in the guide book as the best backpackers in Namibia and the owner of the previous camp saying it was very nice we had high expectations. We arrived, there was no one else there, the staff were not particularly friendly and it was expensive. Still, we were here now. We went to look at our camping pitch, small, and we weren't allowed to drive on the pitch, so with a roof tent that would mean we had to camp on the road. We decided it wasn't for us and went to a place marked on the GPS instead, just a few kilometres down the river, Mahangu Lodge. Surprisingly it was packed, the first busy accommodation we'd stayed at in Africa! We were shown around - again the whole site had been underwater for two months in the floods, only drying out again in March. Amazingly it was all back up and running more or less normally, German run of course! We finally managed to spots our first hippos, the animal that had been eluding us the whole way through Africa. As the evening wore on various pods of hippos grunted away as they drifted past the camp. Again, we were surprised when a storm hit that evening, amazing sounds created from the thunder rolling across the plains. Even more amazing when it struck just metres from our tent!