Welcome to Botswana

My 2^nd country on this overland trip is Botswana, and once again, it is worth sharing a few factoids about this country to put things in better context and to educate myself (and you, if interested) a little about this corner of the world. But before doing so, let me briefly report that crossing the border into Botswana was a 5-minute out, 5-minute in no-hastles ordeal. There was only one other vehicle leaving SA while I was there. Of course, I chose one of the most remote border posts in the country, with 50 km of corregated dirt/gravel road on each side of the boder, so almost no one uses this border crossing so far as I can tell. Here’s proof of my no-hastles crossing:

• As you can see in the map above, Botswana is a land-locked country bordering South Africa, Namibia and Zimbabwe, centered on the Tropic of Capricorn located between the latitudes 18-26 degrees south, which in terms of distance from the equator is the southern hemisphere equivalent to, say, the Bahamas and central Mexico in the northern hemisphere.
• Roughly the same size as Texas.
• Roughly 2.3 million people, compared to ~332 million in the U.S..
• 2 official languages: English and Setswana (Tswana).
• Government is a parliamentary republic similar to South Africa that I described previously.
• Currency is the Pula.
• Major exports include gems (diamonds, comprising 60% of exports!) and precious metals (gold, copper and nickel), and beef.
• Roughly 3% of the population identifies as belonging to indigenous groups, including the San (known in Botswana as the Basarwa), the Balala, and the Nama. It is estimated that there are only about 300 San bushman today that still live a traditional hunter-gatherer life.
• Like most African countries, Botswana suffered European colonization, but fortunately was never totally subjugated by the colonials like in South Africa. The British colonized the land of the Batswana people known as Bechuanaland in 1885 as a way of blocking possible alliance between the Dutch Boers in South Africa and the Germans to the north and west (Namibia). The British called the territory Bechuanaland Protectorate. So, Botswana has always been semi-autonomous and achieved full independence from the British in 1966.
• Botswana is Africa’s oldest continuous Democracy – way to go!
• Has the highest concentration of elephants in Africa!
• Has ~29% of its total land area devoted to national parks, reserves and wildlife management areas – what a fantastic accomplishment and legacy for future generations!