Overland Travel With KMcGee

For the past 5 nights and 6 days I have been in the Central Kalahari Game Reserve (CKGR) >100 km from the nearest road and settlement. Driving into the CKGR was a bit surreal, as I was driving steadily for 3 hours on a sand track through Kalahari thornveld – you remember, that thorny, scrubby, woodland vegetation comprised of grassland mixed with a variety of mostly acacia trees and shrubs on deep sandy soil – getting farther and farther from “civilization” with each mile. Here a couple of shots to give you a visual of the drive into the Reserve:

It’s interesting that no matter how confident you are in your self-reliance to get yourself out of most any problem situation, it’s impossible not to ponder in the back of the mind – even just a little bit – how it would really suck to have a vehicle breakdown this far from everything. And with each passing mile, you can’t help but ponder it a little bit more. Of course, you know that eventually someone would come by for the rescue, but it could be quite a while and the waiting and wondering would be torture. However, my Green Dragon is a self-contained house on wheels and I can live out of that vehicle for many days, weeks perhaps, if necessary. Knowing this provides a peace of mind that is very reassuring.

Of course, it is a certainty that on the main roads into and throughout the CKGR eventually you will cross paths with others; thus, rescue in the case of a vehicle breakdown is virtually guaranteed within a day or two at most. However, once you get off the beaten track on some of the less used roads, I’m not sure a rescue would be coming anytime soon. Check out this series of photos of a 3 hour loop drive I did that got progressively less and less road-like, and eventually there was no evidence of any recent vehicle use. Of course, the Green Dragon was made for this kind of overland travel, so no worries – into the wild I go!

I want to comment on the gestalt of this place before going any further. In the entire 6 days of being in the Reserve I saw a total of perhaps 6-8 other vehicles. Actually, for the first 4 days I saw only 1 other vehicle each day, but on day 5 at a water hole I saw I think 6 vehicles, but 3 or 4 of them were the same ones I had already seen days before. The point being that there aren’t many people out here in the central Kalahari.That, combined with the expansive, seemingly never-ending landscape, and star-lit skies spanning 180 degrees from one horizon to the other combine to create the ultimate feeling of solitude. Not loneliness or remoteness, but solitude – that feeling of being truly alone in nature. For me, there is simply nothing like this feeling of being completely disconnected from the rest of the world. No phones, no social media, no TV, no shopping, no people; no nothing, just me and the natural world. Sublime! Although I suspect this kind of desert solitude would not be comforting for some people, I also think that it would do most people a lot of good to disconnect in this manner every so often.

My first public campsite in the CKGR is in Deception Valley adjacent to Deception Pan at the public campsite called Kori. This isn’t really a campgound in the typical sense as there are just 4 sites and they are separated by hundreds of meters, so each site is essentially its own camp. My site consists of patch of bare ground with an Umbrella Acacia tree for shade and rudimentary ablutions, including a “drop” toilet in which the stuff that comes out of you “drops” into a pit (we would call this a “pit” toilet) and a “bucket” shower in which you fill a 5 liter plastic jug with water, raise it up overhead and pour it on yourself – but you have to sacrifice some of your own precious water for this purpose – NOT LIKELY! Oh, there is a fire ring as well. So, if you like a hot shower, flush toilet and picnic table at your campsite, this ain’t the place for you! You may be wondering how I can stay reasonably clean without a shower after several days; well, you take a cloth or sponge and wet it down with just a little bit of that precious water and wipe yourself clean – good as new! Here a few shots of the site and facilities:

At the Kori campsite, my evening serenade for about 2 hours beginning almost exact at sunset was not the usual cast of characters, but this critter. Can you guess what it is? If you can, you win the title of “Master of the Kalahari” and my admiration:

Is it bird, mammal, reptile, amphibian or perhaps an insect? Shall I tell you or shall I make you wait until the next post to ponder and perhaps lose sleep over? First clue: it is a reptile! Second clue: it lives in an underground burrow and comes out of its hole at dusk to serenade the world – actually to advertise its territory and attract a mate – but I prefer to think it is serenading me. OK, you give up, so I will tell you. It is a Barking Gecko. Yes, that’s right, a gecko. I was surrounded by hundreds – I’m not exagerating, truly – of these scaly creatures calling from every direction and distance – a cacophony of gecko “barks”. Since I will never get a decent picture of these guys, here’s what they look like from a borrowed internet picture:

Another exciting incident at my Kori campsite occurred on my last morning. I woke to the roar of a male lion to the east of me, probably on the Pan a couple hundred meters away – but it is exceedingly difficult to judge distances with the roar of a lion – so the estimate should be plus or minus a couple hundred meters! I am in an unfenced campsite by myself with nobody else around for many miles, but no worries, we have a mutual understanding – I don’t hurt them and they don’t eat me! All is good, so I get out of the Green Dragon to fix some breakfast and break camp, but still in the dark as I want to get going by first light to look for those twilight species. Still hearing the lion roaring to the east of me – good, got a tab on that one – when I hear another lion roaring to the west of me, probably a couple hundred meters away, plus or minus a couple hundred meters. Yikes, I am positioned between two roaring lions and it’s still dark so I can’t see very far. Are these territorial lions and I am in the middle on the boundary between the two? Or perhaps they are brothers and jointly oversee a pride – that happens quite frequently. Either way, I’m not sure how I feel about being between these lions without knowing where they are exactly, or where the lionesses are if they have a pride. So, with a little uneasiness and extra alertness I finished eating and broke camp. Felt a little more relaxed once I was in the Green Dragon on my way. You can’t buy experiences like this – well, actually you can.

I stayed at the Kori campsite for 3 nights and then moved ~30 km north to another public campsite adjacent to Sunday Pan for my last 2 nights. Pretty much the same kind of setup as Kori – patch of bare ground, shade trees, fire ring, and rudimentary ablutions. However, this site was much sweeter than my last. Not only was the site delightful, having some great shade trees, the site was situated on a “hill” overlooking Sunday Pan, and I was only a few hundred meters from the water hole where I spent considerable time. Here’s a picture of site:

Here is a very long composite video – sorry, but it’s 6 days worth of stuff – that I made of some of my observations in the GKGR, including a description of the landscape and some of the wildlife observations that I was able to capture adequately on video. Note, this 40-minute long video contains two long segments on lions that amount to about 26 minutes:

CKGR composite video (40 minutes)

This next section is primarily for my birder friends; in particular, those that have been to Africa before, but the rest of you may enjoy seeing the pictures of these birds as well. Lounge-chair birding from the campsite can be fairly productive. Here are some of the birds I saw literally from my lounge chair. – I kid you not! I only have usuabe pictures for a few of the species, but I included a few pictures borrowed from the internet for a few of the more colorful species to show the variety of beautiful birds visiting my campsite. Note, at the end there will be a quiz:

Here’s the rest of the birds seen, but without pictures:

• kalahari scrub robin
• red-billed quelea
• bronze mannikin
• cape glossy starling
• fork-tailed drongo
• acadia pied barbet
• black-chested prania
• long-billed crombec
• western barn owl
• tawny eagle
• bateleur
• pririt batis

Not bad hey, for just lying back in my lounge chair in camp? Now, here is the quiz. Which of the species above do you think is calling and singing in this not-so-great audio recording?

Did you guess the crimson-breasted shrike? Is so, you would be wrong. How about one of the cute little manakins? Wrong again! Here’s a clue to help you out. The species in the recording made the nests in this photo:

That gave it away. It was the white-browed sparrow-weaver. These guys are abudant and ubiquitous in this landscape as judged by all the nesting colony trees I saw on my wildlife drives, and they were very busy around both of my campsites.

This section is for Skylar – I hope you are watching! I made a video just for you that asks you lots of questions about the animals I saw while I was on safari for the past several days. Watch this with mommy or daddy, or both, and see if you can become a junior wildlife ranger by getting most of the questions right. Good luck, and let me know how you do.

Sklar video (10 minutes)

This last section is just some miscellaneous photos of the landscape and wildlife that I happened to like and thought I would share for those of you that like to look at pictures:

For those of you that are following my travel posts closely, I am giving you a vacation from me and my travel blog for the next 6 days. I am heading into the very remote Central Kalahari Game Reserve (CKGR) for the next 5 nights and 6 days and this is going to be dark sky country, and I mean really dark sky country as there will be zero, and I mean zero, light polution and of course no cellular service. So, no I haven’t forgotten you and no I haven’t been eaten by a lion or trampled by an elephant – I hope – I am just out in the middle of the desert.

I’m sure that I am going to have a lot to say and show you when I come out of the CKGR so I am going give you the overview of the CKGR in this post. I have wanted to visit the CKGR ever since reading “Cry of the Kalahari” by Mark and Delia Owens, published in 1992. The Kalahari desert is the second largest desert in Africa, after the Sahara, and occupies almost all of Botswana and parts of Namibia and South Africa. The GKGR, established in 1961 is absolutely huge (20,368 sq. mi.), and covers a large portion of south-central Botswana. I believe it is the 2^nd largest reserve in the world and by far the most remote reserve in southern Africa, and it is home to rhino, black-maned lion and desert-adapted elephants among other striking desert-adapted species.

The land is mostly flat, and gently undulating covered with large open grasslands and semi-arid shrub savannah and scrub covering sand dunes, and scattered areas of acacia and Terminalia trees. The Kalahari is essentially a huge basin of sand as much as 200 feet deep in most areas, hence all the sparse precipitation percolates into the sandy substrate, leaving no surface waters, excepted in isolated pans. Despite the sandy soils, much of the surface is covered with desert-adapted vegetation – so don’t think Sahara sand dunes, except in the far western portion of the Kalahari in Namibia where the precipitation rate is much lower. Many of the river valleys are fossilized with salt pans, including Deception Valley where I will be camping for the next 5 nights. These fossil riverbeds mark the positions of rivers which once drained into ancient Lake Makgadikgadi (more on this at my next destination). Pans and shallow depressions periodically containing water are widespread in the CKGR. These pans often appear “white” due to the salts that accumulate over time on the surface. If the water cannot drain into the ground fast enough, which happens in deserts where the evaporation rate exceeds the precipitation rate, it remains on the surface until it evaporates, leaving behind minerals precipitated from the salt ions dissolved in the water. Over thousands of years, the minerals (usually salts) accumulate on the surface. These minerals reflect the sun’s rays (through radiation) and often appear as white areas. Note, during the wet season these pans typically contain water and are important feeding areas for lots of birds and other wildlife.

In addition, the Kalahari is home to the San people (or “Bushman”), an ancient hunter-gatherer society that have transcended the ages with their excellent hunting skills and ability to adapt to the harsh environmental challenges presented by this enormous desert. The San, have inhabited the lands for thousands of years since they roamed the area as nomadic hunters. Unfortunately, the San have suffered the fate of so many indigenous peoples around the world. Since the mid-1990s the Botswana government has tried to relocate the San from the CKGR, claiming they were a drain on financial resources despite revenues from tourism. In 1997, three quarters of the entire San population were relocated from the Reserve, and in October 2005 the government had resumed the forced relocation into resettlement camps outside of the park leaving only about 250 permanent occupiers. In 2006, a Botswana court proclaimed the eviction illegal and affirmed the Bushmen’s right to return to living in the Reserve. However, as of 2015 most Bushmen are blocked from access to their traditional lands in the Reserve. A nationwide ban on hunting made it illegal for the Bushmen to practice their traditional hunter-gatherer lifestyle, despite allowing private game ranches to provide hunting opportunities for tourists. Is the displacement of the San driven by economic interests of the private and government-owned corporations? Coincidentally, in 2014, a diamond mine called Ghaghoo operated by Gem Diamonds opened in the southeast portion of the reserve. The company estimated that the mine could yield $4.9 billion worth of diamonds. So, the ancestral rights of the native San people to live as they choose, or diamonds? Sound familiar?

OK, that’s a little background on the central Kalahari and the CKGR so that you can ponder the desert expanse that I will be in for the next 6 days. It should be wild! See you in a week!

First, some business to take care of. Nancy brought to my attention that when I reply to your submitted blog comments you are not getting a notification. Consequently, most of you probably don’t realize that I replied to almost every comment entered, but you would have to go back to the post that you commented on and expand on the comments to see the comments and my replies. This sucks, because most of you probably don’t want to have to go back to the post to see if I replied and what I said. You probably all thought I was just blowing you off, which is NOT the case. I absolutely love getting the comments and replying! I am going to look into a solution for getting a notification when I reply but I am not optimistic. Sorry, I guess my website is just not that sophisticated – or perhaps it is me that is not!

Now for important stuff. For those of you that are following my travels and travails closely, you know that I am in Maun, Botswana, pursing the “Case of the Frontend Alignment Gone Awry”. With 3 alignment shops in Cape Town and now 2 more shops (including a big Toyota Dealer that works a lot on Land Cruisers) in Maun behind me, the mystery of the frontend alignment continues, and to make matters worse, a “jingle” or “rattle” in the back wheel somewhere has been troubling me in the background since the beginning of the journey. Now, I have exhausted all reasonable efforts to resolve this case, right? Well, just about when I was ready to give up, I remembered that I was in Botswana, and you know who is here, don’t you? The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency! So, I sought out the No. 1 Lady Detective, Precious Ramotswe, and put her on the case. In case you don’t believe me, here is a photo of her hot on the case pondering what or who could be sabotaging the Green Dragon:

And, of course, it didn’t take Precious long to solve part of the mystery, as this photo shows:

I am certain with a few more hours, or at most another day, Precious will have solved the case, as she is, after all, the No. 1 detective in Botswana.

OK, for those of you that don’t know what the hell I am talking about, The No. 1 Ladies Dective Agency is a really popular mystery series (22 novels and turned into a TV series) written by Alexander McCall Smith between 1998 and 2022, and Precious is the main character. The lady in the photo is, of course, not Precious, but rather Ona, who is the business manager/admin person for the speciality shop I was in and she reminded me of Precious from the series – really, the spitting image. By the way, Ona knew the book series and loved that she was going to represent Precious in my blog.

The front end alignment is unresolved and will remain as such at least for the duration of this trip, because 20-30 experts have all looked it, poked and stabbed at it, tried this and that, and all failed to find anything wrong that could be causing the problem. But all, to a one, said the vehicle was otherwise in great shape and the perfect vehicle for my journey – so that’s good, right? We did find and fix the “rattle”, which turned out to be a bracket that had fallen off leaving two bolt to rattle around against the suspension. And guess who found the problem, not the mechanics and “experts”, but little old me. Chaulk one up for my team!

Since this is a get to know the locals post, sort of, that some have asked for, I want to tell you about another local that I met and talked to for quite some time. He is a 63 year old man from Maun, married with 5 childen ranging in age from 30 something to 16, and he has a 40 acre farm outside Maun in which he grows potatoes and maize on 20 cleared acres. All of his kids except the youngest one are grown and don’t live at home anymore. NONE of the kids want to be farmers or even help on the farm, so he does ALL the work himself – and he really isn’t the strongest or fittest looking individual to be honest. He desparately wants to expand his farming operation but lacks the labor and financial resources to do so. The country has more or less closed off imports of most produce in an effort to encourage the Batswana people to produce what they need in country. They claim to have funds available to help farmers get going but they require 50% matching funds. This man cannot come up with that kind of money, and even if he did, he might not be able to find any younger person willing to work on the farm. He says that he is the typical case of the rest of the Batswana. Consequently, the produce is not being produced and the import ban or extreme tariffs are in still in place and there are now major shortages of produce. In one example, he said that the local KFC (that’s the really popular fast food joint in Botswana) couldn’t even serve “chips” with their main dishes because of the lack of potatoes (which are grown locally). He says it is a dire situation and he worries for the future. Anyways, I thought you might enjoy this story. I’m only sorry that I forgot to get his photograph.

To finish this post I a want to let you know that I am living the life of luxury tonight. I’m staying at the Old Bridge Backpackers Lodge and Campsite. I am still camping, and have that to myself, but I am writing this post while eating a PIZZA and watching a hippo pool below me that has a hug crocodile on the bank and a big hippo swimming around, snorting, grunting and doing all the crazy things hippos do in pools. Unfortunately, my camera battery died (again) and thus I can’t show pictures of the pool and critters, but I can show you a litle slice of my pool-side accommodations:

I’m off to bed. Cheers all!

First, I have to correct a major mistake in my last post and composite video. You know that prize footage at the end of the very long video in which the “white rhino” came down to drink at the water hole, well, as my brother Mark pointed out, it was actually a “black rhino”. I think I was only expecting to see a white rhino so I just described it as such, even though my description of a white rhino (square muzzle, large shoulder hump, and pointyish ears) clearly wasn’t true for this animal. Now that I relook at the video it is clear that it was a black rhino. Chaulk it up to over excitment!

Second, I took a detour from my planned itinerary and drove all the up to Maun today to take the Green Dragon to yet another shop to try and resolve the frontend alignment issue that continues to plague me. Note, the vehicle is fine and in great working condition other than the alignment, and I am reassured by all the professionals (4 shops now and a 5th tomorrow) that I can drive the vehicle as is and it will get me where I want to go like few other vehicles could. I will let you know if and when this gets resolved, but regardless, I am in Maun for the next 2 days before heading to the Central Kalahari.

In case you were wondering about the landscape in the southern half of Botswana through which I have been travelling. Recall that Khama Rhino Sanctuary sits on the eastern edge of the Kalahari Desert, as does Maun. SO, between there and here it is pretty much a completely flat landscape with thornveld vegetation – a very boring landscape to drive through at 90 km/hour since it is so monotonous, but it can be a different story when driving slow on dirt roads while looking for wildlife. The biggest challenge of driving through this part of the country, other than falling asleep at the wheel (thank goodness for audible books and podcasts), is dodging cows, donkeys and goats on or crossing the road at frequent intervals.

Since I have nothing else to report, how about I simply go for some more anectodotal wildlife observations from the past couple of days.

“I feel pretty, oh, so pretty, I fee pretty and witty and bright!”

“I wish you would stop calling me Zazu, I never even saw that movie”

“I’m not having a bad hair day, this is just the way I look!”

“Life was actually “life” when there weren’t automobiles and roads”

“If I stay really still, I don’t think he will see me”

“Is that me that stinks?”

“We’re your friends, we’re your friends, to the bitter end (the bitter end)!”

My first stop in Botswana is the Khama Rhino Sanctuary, located near the town of Paje (near Serowe) on the southeastern edge of the great Kalahari Desert – more on this desert when I get to the Central Kalahari. The sanctuary (33 sq. mi), established in 1992 by the residents of Serowe, is a community-based wildlife project to assist in saving the vanishing rhinoceros, restore the historic wildlife populations and provide economic benefits to the local Botswana community through tourism and the sustainable use of natural resources. The sanctuary provides prime habitat for both white and black rhinos. The long-term goal of the Sanctuary is to let the rhinos safely breed within its borders and re-introduce them into their natural wild habitats. To date, the sanctuary has relocated more than 20 rhinos to different places within the country from a founder population of four animals, and the sanctuary currently has a population of more than 30 white (square-lipped) rhinos as well as the beginning of a small black (hooked-lipped) rhinos.

My campsite in Khama Rhino Sanctuary is called Mokongwa camp and it is my kind of setting. Each site (I think there are 13) are isolated by quite some distance from each other – I can’t see and can barely hear the other sites as they are probably 50 yards apart. Moreover, my site at least is situated under the spreading canopy of a mokongwa tree – which is the namesake of the campground. I love it!

As far as species of the day, how can I not make the white (square-lipped) rhino the chosen one. It is, I believe, the second largest land animal in Africa behind the elephant. The “white” rhino is not really white at all, but usually grey, and often takes on the color of the local dust and mud in which it frequently wallows. More distinctive is the somewhat squared-off muzzle that is adapted for grazzing on mostly grasses. This is in contrast to the so-called “black” rhino, which is also not black in color but dark grey (granted, often darker than the white rhino) and also generally takes on the color of the local dust and mud, that has a hooked-lipped or pointed upper lip that is well adapted to browsing on woody vegetation. Consequently, the white rhino, which is the larger of the two species, is more of a grassland savannah species whereas the black rhino is more of a woodland savannah species, but the two species do overlap in distribution so both can be found together in some places. Here is a borrowed internet picture of the white rhino:

You are probably aware of this, but just in case you are not, it is worth repeating. Both rhino species have had their populations and distributions drastically reduced over the past decades due to poaching for their horns, which are prized in the Far East (yes, I am talking about China) for their supposed medicinal properties – mainly as an aphrodesiac under the belief that it increases male virility and libido, for which there is absolutely no scientific basis – and to a lesser extent for dagger handles for the tribesman of the Arabic peninsular (mainly Yemen and Oman). The poaching problem continues to be the biggest threat to the species’ survival. The “horns” by the way, are not made of bone but rather of matted, hair-like filaments that are attached to the skin and not the skull.

The landscape in the sanctuary is dominated by two distinct environments: the “pans”, which are the centerpiece of the sanctuary, and the “thornveld”. I discuss the pans in the composite video so I won’t repeat that description here. The thornveld comprises most of the acreage of the sanctuary and is pretty much what it soundsl like: scrubby, thorny bushes and small trees, including an amazing diversity of species. However, this is the kind of vegetation you really don’t want to have to walk through, unless you are wearing rip-stop clothing. Here are a couple of shots of what it looks like:

I will finish with another composite video, since this seems to be a nice way to let you get a more realistic feel of what I am observing. However, I have to forewarn you, this one is super long because I have a lot to share from today’s observations and I had a very special visitor that warranted extra long footage. So, in case you get anxious or bored and stop watching before the end, be aware that the prize observation is at the very end – so skip to the last 5 minutes if you want to just watch the prize.

Khama rhino sanctuary composite video (17 minutes)

Until next time, cheers!

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!

As I leave behind South Africa, in the spirit of this “travel blog” I am going to take advantage of this “not too exciting” all day drive to share some random observations from behind the wheel in South Africa.

While driving long distances, especially when you are alone, you have a lot of time to ponder both the big picture stuff, like the meaning of life, but also lots of silly things that don’t really matter that much other than the fact that they occupy the inquisitive mind while driving. I want to share some of these ponderings with you just for fun, since anyone contemplating a long-distance road journey or anyone that has completed one already will have had similar ponderings. There is no particular order to these random ponderings – just random thoughts of a lone driver.

#1. Flashing lights. Driving in Africa as a foreinger can be frustrating at times for lots of reasons, but one of the reasons that has, quite frankly, stumped me is my inability to interpret the flashing light signals given by other vehicles. Take this example, what does it mean when the truck in front of you puts on their turn signal but without any turns up ahead? Are they signaling that you can pass them, or that they plan to turn or pass someone ahead, or that it is unsafe to try and pass them at that time? I have seen situations when all of these options have seemed to apply. So I remain befuddled and therefore generally don’t do anything when they are flashing at me lest I make the wrong decision and piss off a big rigger. Or how about this one. A car comes up behind you and makes it clear they want to pass. At some point you find the space to pull slightly into the breakdown lane and they come zooming passed you and double flash their rear lights. Are they saying “thank you” or “F U Ahole for not moving over sooner”? Hard to say. There are other confusing flash signals but you get the point – driving in a foreign country without know the road protocols ca be frustrating.

#2. Highway buffer maintenance. The highways, both the national and regional roads, all have pretty big buffers on the sides that are in most places just grass strips. It baffles me a little to see road crews of dozens of men with hand-held weedeaters cutting the tall grass instead of using a tractor mower. And this is happening on all the roads at regular intervals. Is this because they can’t afford a tractor mower? Or perhaps because the ground is too uneven for a tractor mower? Or is it because it makes for a great government work program? This I ponder when I pass them by.

#3. Police traffic stations. I almost never see police cars on the roads looking for traffic violators. Instead, at regular intervals there are traffic police on the side with hand-held radar guns ready to stop anyone going even a few kilometers over the speed limit. And usually these stations are “manned” by 2-4 “officers”. Is this because they don’t have sophisticated radar devices in their police automobiles and therefore must use hand-held devices? Or is this because their police vehicles are too crappy and slow to actually catch a vehicle speeding, so they hope you will simply stop if they wave you down? Or is this yet another government work program to employ lots and lots of traffic police? This I ponder when I pass them by.

You might ask whether I have been stopped yet. Well, generally I am safe from these traffic stops because the Green Dragon generally can’t go the speed limit anywhere – trully. The highways generally have a speed limit of 120 km/hour and I can’t go much over 90 km/hour in my “tank”. However, I will admit that in the Park I did get stopped once for going 60 km/h in a 50 km/h zone. Interestingly though, and typical in Africa I hear, the very nice female officer BS’d a bit and then decided that instead of giving me a ticket she would ask me to exchange a $50 USD for the equivalent local Rand currency. She had received this $50 at some point, probably a pay-off from another speeding tourist, and didn’t have an easy means of exchanging it for currency she can actually use in most places. So what did I do, of course I gave her like 1,000 Rand and she gave me the $50 USD – deal done and I’m on my way.

#4. Fences. These South Africans really do like their fences. As I am driving along through this country I am continually amazed at how many areas are fenced off, and often with imposing fences and reinforced gates. Are these to keep stuff in or keep stuff out? This I ponder. In some cases, like the game farms it seems obvious that they want to keep the “game” in, but they probably also want to keep the would-be poachers out. In other cases, it is just not clear why they have such impossing fences and reinforced gates. Is it simply the fear of theft or vandalism? Is it private property mentality gone to the extreme – no one come on my land. Anyone who has built fencing knows how costly it is in terms of labor and money to build and maintain a fence line, so there must be a very good reason, but it is not obvious to me.

#5. Roadside fruit and vegetable stands. Now this is something that really boggles me. In the agricultural areas, such as the wine country of the Cape Provinces in the south or the citrus country of the Limpopo Province in the north, you see lots and lots of roadside fruit stands, with each vendor selling pretty much exactly the same stuff, and with stands that look almost identical. Moreover, there are dozens of them spread out every 100 yards or so. Now, if you want to stop and purchase some fruit, in part because it looks delicious and in part because you want to support the local economy, which stand do you stop at? Do you stop at the first one you come to because that’s when you first see the opportunity? But doesn’t that person have an unfair advantage over the others – no telling how they managed to snag that site. Perhaps you wait and stop at the second or third stand out of sympathy for their position in the line of stands? But which one? Or perhaps you wait until the last stand because they probably never get any business and you want to make sure they get some support too? But how do you know if in fact it is the last stand since you can’t see around the corner? And what if others are thinking the same thing and are also choosing to support the last stand, so then what about the stand just before the last, certainly they get almost no business? This is a real dilemma and something that perplexes me each time I consider stopping. So, in most cases, before I can decide which stand to stop at I am now passed the stands and choose to leave the whole mess behind, and no one benefits – I get no fruit and they get no money!

#6. Soccer pitches. Most of you know of my life-long passion for soccer (or “football” as the larger world calls it), so it should be no surprise that I am always on the lookout for soccer fields and people playing soccer – I never know when I might want to stop and join the game! Anyways, I have come across quite a few soccer pitches during my South Africa travels, but my favorite is this one:

OK, see you in Botswana!

My last stop in South Africa is the UNESCO World Heritage Site Mapungubwe National Park, located in the far northeastern corner of the country near the towns of Alldays and Musina and situated at the confluence of the mighty Limpopo and Shashe Rivers (although the larger Shashe River appears dry at this time), as shown here:

Mapungubwe NP abuts Botswana and Zimbabwe, and forms part of the Greater Mapungubwe Transfrontier Conservation Area. Note, a Transfronteir Park is one in which one or more bordering countries have abutting Parks that cooperate at some level to manage the much larger area as one effective conservation area, under the rationale that bigger is better for wildlife that see no borders.

Mapungubwe (110 sq. mi.), established in 1995, protects the historical site of Mapungubwe Hill, which was the capital of the ancient Kingdom of Mapungubwe, the oldest known kingdom in southern Africa (900-1300 AD), as well as the wildlife and riverine forests along the Limpopo River. Mapungubwe Hill was the site of a prosperous community dating back to the Iron Age. Archaeologists also uncovered the famous golden rhino figurine from the site. Here is a shot of the famous Hill:

Mapungubwe is also renowned for its scenic landscape, with sandstone formations, woodlands, riverine forest and baobab trees (more on these special trees later). Despite its World Heritage status, Mapungubwe is threatened by the development of an open-cast coal mine in the Park’s buffer zone – argh! Here are a few shots of the scenic rock formations, acacia scrublands and mopane woodlands in the uplands:

The most striking trees in this community are fever trees, ana trees, leadwoods, fig trees and as many as 24 different species of acacias. Some of the trees along the Limpopo River have grown to massive sizes as you can see in these photos of the “gallery” forest along the river:

In addition to these gallery forest trees, there are some very large baobabs in the park as well, with one specimen having a circumference of 31m. Here are a couple of shots of this magnificant tree:

The baobab is perhaps my favorite tree in all of Africa, and for lots of reasons. First, it is a succulent, which means that during the rainy season it absorbs and stores water in its vast trunk (up to 1,200 gallons), enabling it to produce a nutrient-dense fruit in the dry season when all around is dry and arid. This is how it became known as “The Tree of Life”. The fruit, which is inside hard pods that hang upside down from the tree, is edible, and baobab seed powder is used in foods because of its nutrients, possible health benefits, and as a natural preservative. It is a good source of vitamin C, potassium, carbohydrates, and phosphorus. Baobabs are widely distributed throughout Africa and are long-lived – with individuals recorded to be over 2,000 years old and reaching enormous sizes – with older trees reaching 35-45 feet in diameter – enough to fit a small house! Baobabs offer places of shelter and are a key food source for many animals. Elephants, in particular, eat the soft, moisture-laden tissue in the stem and can often leave trees looking like have a petticoat.

Baobabs are also steeped in legend and superstition, and have inspired myriad myths and stories. Some of the stories lead to its common description as “The Upside-Down Tree”, because when it’s bare of leaves, its spreading, twisted branches look like roots spreading out into the air as if the tree had been planted upside down. The silhouette of a baobab in the setting sun is the quintessential African scene – and one that I never tire of. Unfortunately, in recent years, many of the largest, oldest trees have died, possibly due to climate change.

My public campsite in Mapungubwe NP is Mazhou, situated in the western section of the Park on the southern bank of the Limpopo River. It has about 8 sites and they are fairly close together, so I hear all my neighbors – argh! On the positive side, there are some great shade trees with huge spreading crowns. Unfortunately I did not manage to snag one of these sites, but as you can see in the photo below, my site isn’t terrible either. On the negative side, you can’t see or gain any access to the river. I guess the flooding of the river makes it impossible to put a campground any closer to the river bank, and the same goes with the game drive roads – they are set back a little from the river so you only see the water on a few ocassions.

Some of you have asked about the people I have met along the way. Well, the people I have met in this campground are pretty typical of those I have met in the other public campgrounds. So far, all white South Africans and all over 60 and mostly retired. In this campground I spent a bit of time talking to the self-proclaimed “Duke and Dutchess” of Pretoria (the major city outside of Jo-Berg) who, like all the others I have met, love to camp and see the wildlife. The Duke is suppose to email me pictures of the “bush babies” he took sitting in his camp chair. We have both the tiny southern lesser galago (bush baby) and the much larger thick-tailed greater galago – both primates – hanging out in the trees inside the campsite. I manged to see only the latter, so the Duke is emailing me a picture of the former, which I will share when I get it. Otherwise, there is no much to report – just normal people who love to camp. I did meet a few white South Africans that didn’t have a lot of kind things to say about the country under black rule or the “blacks” themselves, but I don’t want to give them any more attention.

One last thing that hopefully you will find fun and perhaps a little surprising, and that is how much wildlife in these less developed campgrounds can be seen right from the campsite. Note, this is not always the case all the time, but the video below is not that unusual. I filmed the composite video below entirely from my lounge chair over a period of an hour or so during the mid-afternoon. Who needs TV when you have this to watch?

Mahzou campsite composite video (6 minutes)

I think it’s time for another mystery sound. Listen to this one:

Any guesses? As I wouldn’t expect anyone to guess the species, can you place it in a group of animals? Hint, I heard this (and saw it with my torch) just after dark at my last Kruger campsite. Here is another hint for Skylar and parents if they are listening. It’s one of Gander and Skylar’s favorite animals to immitate, even though this particular species doesn’t sound much like Grander’s immitation. It is the African barred owlet, a cute little owl that can really belt out a call. Here is a picture from the internet:

How about a few anectdotal wildlife observations from today:

“Mom, do I really have to leave the herd next year?”

“Hey Joe, this one’s empty, try the next site.”

“What you wanna do, I don’t know, what you wanna do?”

And last but not least, let’s finish with a species of the day. There are so many cool species to choose from. I’m going to go with the Malachite kingfisher which I saw on the Letaba River in Kruger National Park. When you see this bird in the wild you think, “I can’t believe birds can be this beautiful”. The irridescent colors in the feathers of this bird simply overwhelm the visual senses. And the large, bright red bill creates a striking contrast with the blues of the body. It is, of course, a “kingfisher” and like most, but not all, kingfishers, it forages on small fish by diving from a perch or from a hovering position over the water, so you always find this species on water bodies – usually rivers. Unlike North America, Africa has many different kingfishers and they are all brilliantly colored, so it is one of my favorite group of birds to see here in Africa.

OK, off to Botswana. See you on the othe side.

As I indicated in my last post, I left Kruger National Park with a sad face because I had so many exciting wildlife observations. However, the journey must go on! Before reflecting on Kruger a bit, let me first describe the landscape today.

The landscape between Kruger and Blouberg Nature Reserve is varied both in topography and land use. The land varies from plains with rolling hills to rugged mountains so it kept my attention all day. Unfortunately I didn’t get any pictures of the mountains I was passing through as I was trying to get to my destination in time to facetime with Nancy – which I failed to do, not because I was late (although I was a little late) but because, once again, the cell service doesn’t exist here. I would guess that in terms of land use the land is 50% huge game farms (which we talked about before), which I didn’t take any pictures of because they look just like the Park except that they have big 8-foot tall fences around them and imposing entrance gates. I am guessing another 20% is cattle ranches (but of the woodland scrub, not grassland type), which I also didn’t take any pictures of because so far as I could tell they look just like the game farms but without the huge 8-foot tall fence. However, it is difficult to discern whether these are all in fact cattle farms because the vegetation is so thick that I rarely seew any cattle. I did see some though which makes me conclude they are probably cattle ranches.

Another 20% or so is extensive citrus orchards (mostly oranges, but also some other delicous fruits). I stopped at one of the roadside stands to purchase some fruit and got talked into a box of avacados and a box of a fruit the vendor described as “shadow”. Each box had about 6-8 pieces and the total was roughly $4 USD – not bad! Here’s a picture of the fruit stand (the “shadow” fruit are the large yellow fruit in the second bin) and the nice young man who sold me the fruit, and whose mother drove up in a flash once I was purchasing some fruit and then intervened with some interesting facts about the growing of the “shadow” fruit. I think the young man was a little embarassed that his mother intervened in the sale.

Another 10% or so of the land was monoculture timberland that was actively being logged for what I don’t know – pulp, dimensional lumber, biofuel? Here’s a shot of what some of that landscape looked like.

Another 10% or so was either residential development or town centers and the final 10% was, I believe, protected land in regional Parks and Reserves, all of which was in the rugged mountainous country.

Oh ya, did I mention that the roads in this Province are generally in good shape – almost no potholes! And I was astonished to see road crews resurfacing sections of roads with bad potholes – a more effective long-term strategy campared to the signage strategy that we saw in the Cape and Freestate Provinces. However, although I aplaud the commitment to maintaining and improving the road infrastructure in this Province, I must stay I was disappointed to see that they were only putting a single 1-inch layer of pavement down and calling it good – a cost-effective short-term strategy that will cost them more in the long term, but hey, that will be the problem of the next administration. Here’s proof of the actual road work:

After a long days drive I came to my destination, the Blouberg Nature Reserve. What a gem of place! There are game drive roads throughout the reserve and an absolutely stellar campground, which I am in right now and that I have to myself. I literally have this Reserve to myself – amazing! There are only a half dozen or so sites in the campground and they are all huge and private and nestled under some beautiful shade trees, most of which are called Nyala trees (which is the big tree shading the Green Dragon in the photo below). There are all kinds of animals around my site making all kinds of noises – I love it! The baboons and vervet monkeys are making their presence well known, which puts me in total alert mode for fear of my campsite being raided. I have to remember to not leave anything out unattended and keep the vehicle doors closed – or else!

OK, now for some afterthoughts on Kruger National Park for those wanna be southern Africa safari adventurers. If someone were to ask me to describe what I think of Kruger, here is what I would say. If you want an exceptionally accessible Park in sub-Saharan Africa that has all the classic megafauna (well, most), Kruger is a great option. You can fly into Jo-Berg (the easiest place to fly to from the States) and drive to the Park in several hours. If you want to see the classic African wildlife and yet sleep in comfort in a soft bed, with a hot shower, and possibly have a hot meal at a restaurant, and NOT get tossed around and have your bones rattled in the back of a safari vehicle on rough, corregated roads, THEN Kruger is the Park for you. The campgrounds in the Park are like nothing you have experienced in the States – all amenities, and I mean ALL, are available. And while you do have to drive let’s say, on average, an hour for every 5-10 minutes of actual wildlife observation, the wildlife you do see will be spectacular, as hopefully some of my photos and videos demonstrated. In addition, the landscape is quite varied and asthetically pleasing, and by that I mean there are some pretty interesting and varied landforms (e.g., plains, “koppies”, mountains, large rivers, etc.) and some different vegetation types (e.g., grasslands, marula woodlands, mopane woodlands, etc.) that keep things interesting and entertaining between wildlife observations. Overall, however, Kruger is a rather “tame” Park, and by that I mean you never, ever, ever get the feel that you are truly in the wilds of Africa. It all seems like its just the nearby neighborhood Park in which you can go for a drive on the weekends to see some pretty cool wildlife. But hey, I wouldn’t mind having this Park in my neighborhood.

Since I have been remiss in my posting of mystery sounds, here is one for you experienced African safari-goers (you know who you are). Hint: this is an animal you here regularly in camp:

Any guesses? Took me quite a while to first identify this bird as I kept hearing it but couldn’t see it. Now, I am alert for it and see and hear it a lot, including in all my campsites so far. It is the grey go-away bird. They say its call sounds like they are saying “go away”, but I don’t hear that. Here is what this bird looks like (borrowed from the internet):

OK, I am off to my last Park in South Africa. See you there!

NOTE, I am going to try something different with the videos today, in part because they are long ones (you will see why). I understand that downloading them on your device is taking a long time, at least for some of you, and this is probably due to my website host, Hostinger. SO, based on Nathan’s suggestion, I am going to try providing you a Youtube link to each video instead of embedding them in this blog. That means you will leave the blog and go to Youtube to see the video, but then you will have to return to the blog to continue – it won’t happen automatically. Try not to get distracted on Youtube as there will be many other videos on the channel and you could easily lose the continuity of the blog post. Let me know how this works.

First, before getting to the exciting highlights section, let me describe my journey north from my last campsite at Setara to my new campsite at Letaba (which I won’t say anything about because it was just another Kruger campground, small city just like Satara). As I mentioned last time, as I moved north through Kruger the environment changes a bit and the landscape becomes increasingly dominated by mopane woolands, which is dominated by the mopane tree that I discussed last time. Here are a few shots of the mopane woodland, noting that in most places the mopane trees are sort of stunted in growth so they appear more scrub-like than full trees, but in some places they take on greater stature, and they will get larger as I continue north:

Not too exciting I know, but hey, that’s mopane woodland – at least the stunted version. I also encountered a couple of large river valleys with flowing water – they must be something to see during the rainy season when they are at flood stage:

There are also quite a few of these rocky hills (or “koppies” as they are called) that stick up out of the plains in isolation that provide some really nice relief to the landscape – and they look like they should have all kinds of cool animals on them:

OK, now I want to share a few Kruger highlight experiences. There’s lots more to share in terms of animals sites and sounds, but they will have to wait.

#1. African savannah (a.k.a. “bush”) elephant. My first highlight is none other than the magnificant African elephant. But before getting to the video, let’s talk a little about why elephants are so important and why they are probably my favorite animal here to observe in the wild. The African savannah elephants is what we call a “keystone” species; that is, a species that has a greatly disproportionate influence on the ecosystem given its abundance or biomass. In this case, although elephants are big, well actually they are huge, they don’t amount to that much biomass relative to many other organisms that make up for their diminutive size by their shear numbers. However, elephants have a massive impact on the ecosytem in terms of structure and function, and through their activities they affect the habitat of numerous other organisms. Indeed, many organisms practically owe their existence to elephants.

Let me give just a couple examples to illustrate what I am talking about (but there are many more examples that we could draw from).

Example 1. Elephants physically alter the environment in many ways. For example, elephants dig holes in the ground with their feet – sometimes aided by their tusks. They do this for a variety of reasons, one of which is to get at minerals to include in their diet. By creating these holes, water will collect in them and the elephants will return to drink and take mud baths – which they do to protect their skin from the sun. Their repeated visits will gradually enlarge the holes and they can become seasonal or even permenant water holes, which then provide water and habitat for a whole host of other organisms. In some parts of Africa, the actions of elephants to create water holes is the only means of creating this critical habitat. In these areas, without elephants, in the long run, many water hole/wetland dependent organisms would disappear. Here is a series of photos I took today to show the idea of the progression in the development of a water hole by elephants:

Example #2. Elephants eat a lot! By a lot, I mean that an average adult can eat 300-400 pounds of plant material every day. That’s a lot of organic matter going in, but what comes out? Well, they only digest roughly 50 percent of what goes in, so do the math. A lot comes out the back end every day. This dung is the perfect compost to support the growth of the very plants they just ate. Also, the dung is filled with undigested plant seeds that are now deposited in the perfect setting to grow, and some plants even need to pass through the elephant digestive system to germinate. In addition, there is an entire community of insects that live in elephant dung. Some, like the dung beetle simply gather up a bit of the dung and roll it away to a private location where it can lay its eggs so that their larvae have a feast waiting for them. All sorts of critters feed on the insects attracted to the dung. Do you remember Zazu from the Lion King. Well, he was a Hornbill, and I watched many hornbills (southern yellow-billed and red-billed hornbills) pecking insects out of elephant dung balls today on my drive. Here is an elphant dung ball; now multiply this by a very large number and that is what each elephant is leaving behind each day:

There is so much we could talk about, but it would take a book to discuss all the cool things about elephants and tell the complete story of their diminishing numbers and range throughout Africa. Suffice it to say that historically they were everywhere throughout sub-Saharan Africa and truly a dominant presence in most ecosytems. Today they are almost entirely restricted to the scattered Parks and Reserves, which represent a small fraction of their historic range and represent disconnected “island” populations to boot.

Instead, let’s talk about some very exciting encounters with elephants I had over the past few day in Kruger. In the composite video below I selected just a few of my favorite highlights. Note the following as you watch the video: 1) when you are driving around on these Park roads you have to keep at least one eye on the road ahead because you never know who is going to be waiting for you when you round the bend blocking the road, and by the way, what do you do when you have two elephant butts sticking out of the bushes into the road? 2) watch how the young elephant uses its foot and trunk to scrap the road surface to gather up some needed minerals for its diet; 3) watch for the ears flared and head shake that indicates that they are a little disturbed at your presence, and just letting you know who is the boss! 4) watch how the matriarchal herd (i.e., the matriarch and her young of various ages and their offspring, along with probably her sisters and their young) watches out for the young ones and keeps them protected at all times, and just how fun-loving and playful the young ones are; 5) watch how they go to town on the bark of this tree they had pushed over before I got there – see how they use their tusks and trunk together to tear off the bark and eat it (by thye way, what is this big bull elephant, the one that is really intent on eating the bark, doing with this herd, as they are usually off by themselves or hanging out with other bulls away from the matriarchal units); and finally, 6) how cool is it to watch the young elephant nursing 10 feet in front of me – which is a really good sign that they were not too bothered by me, especially since they approached me and not the reverse. Enjoy!

Elephant composite video (11 minutes)

#2. Southern Giraffe. My second highlight is also one of my favorite animals to watch because of their unique and awkward physical appearance, which can make for some interesting maneuvers – as you shall see. This species is the epitomy of evolution by natural selection. What a crazy body form! Only evolution could create such a creature, who is perfectly adapted to browse on all the yummy vegetation that is out of reach to all those other “lowly” herbivores. As such, with its outstretch neck, the giraffe has access to an essentially untapped food resource. Of course, it comes at the expense of some pretty big tradeoffs. It makes it a bit awkward to run at high speeds, so the best they can do is lollop along. And they do so with the very unique gate of the front and rear legs both moving at the same time, alternating with the two legs on the other side – unlike most 4-legged creatures in which the front right and rear left come forward together followed by the front left and rear right. So they look really wierd when running

Now, we an all agree that the neck of the giraffe is exceptionally long. So how many cervical (neck) vertebrate do you think they have? Hint: we humans have 7. So, it must be like 20 or 30, right? Actually, no, they also have only 7 cervical vertebrate – they are just super elongated ones. This means they can’t articulate their neck as much as you think they might like to. And with regards to the neck, one of the fun things you will see in the video is these 2 young bulls “necking” – no that doesn’t mean they are having sexual relations – it is how they battle. These two young bulls are just trying out their combat skills, sort of practicing if you will, before they have to really use their necking skills to compete for the pleasure of mating with receptive females.

Another tradeoff of being so tall is that it makes it very difficult to get your head down to the water hole to get a drink. So, they have to splay their frong legs apart so as to lower their body just enough to get their head down to the water. This makes for a very awkward posture, and one they are not keen to make often as they are vulnerable to lion predation at this time. In the video, note the tentativeness at getting low for the drink. But alas, it has to be done!

Lastly, while the southern giraffe once enjoyed a nearly ubiquitous distribution throughout sud-Saharan Africa, they too have had their distribution drastically reduced by humans. Fortunately, this species of giraffe still has pretty substantial numbers in southern Africa, albeit restricted mostly to the Parks and Reserves. OK, enjoy this video of a few of my favorit giraffe moments in Kruger:

Giraffe composite video (4 minutes)

#3. Wild dogs. Let’s finish with one of my best experiences in Kruger. On my second to last day in the Park I came across this pack of wild dogs in the road. I had this drive entirely to myself as I hadn’t seen another vehicle all morning – hoorah! I won’t say too much here because I had the good sense of doing a little narration in the video itself and I covered some of the key points of interest. Suffice it to say that this observational experience was exceptional on many levels. First, because it was with wild dogs, which are one of Africa’s coolest predators, and second, because I spent perhaps 1 hour with these dogs all by myself, something that is rare in the Parks when sighting a predator species like this. In case you were wondering, this is why I am in Africa!

Wild dog composite video (8 minutes)

I hope you enjoyed some of these Kruger highlights. There’s lots more to share with you on some other pretty cool species and observations, including some more mystery sounts, but I think I will leave those for later as this post is already rediculously long. So long Kruger – Cheers!