The red indicator light on the dash flashed on at about 7:30am, in the Njuca Hill section of Makgadikgadi. We have not seen anyone in two days. We know what the light means. It’s the battery again. A connection becomes overheated and eventually melts the wiring. Fixing it requires time and experience which we have in abundance. This isn’t the first time the light has come on.
However, it is the first time we have come to a halt and gotten out of the vehicle in the wild Makgadikgadi Pans Game Reserve. Until now we have felt like we could camp safely; even the shower contraptions are close enough to use after dark. So here on this single-track road to nowhere, we find ourselves gingerly exiting the 
truck after we coasted to a slow stop and left the engine running. Now, do you know how hard it is to NOT shut the engine down? It is so automatic; we had to keep reminding ourselves that if we shut down, we won’t get started again. That would be bad. When will someone else come along? Who knows? So keep the engine running and let’s have a look-see.
I popped the hood and while Jim checked out the cables, I quickly looked around. Huh. What the …. is that in the road behind us? I did not see that a minute ago. Distances are so deceiving, it looks like Bat-eared foxes. I alert Jim – what do you think? While the binoculars just aren’t getting a sharp enough image, I shoot a photo of whatever it is, and I blow it up for a better view.
Oh, dear me. Or words very much to that affect. Those are lion. Three lion. No, six lion. And they are starring right at us. Shit. They are too far to charge us before we can escape into the truck, but still. Jesus. Jim already knows he can’t fix the truck here, so we after a quick discussion we opt to jump in and coast backwards to get a better look at the lion. Is that stupid? considering if the engine dies we will not be able to get out of the truck? We take a chance. It was worth it.
The tar roads in Kruger National Park allow for just about any kind of vehicle to game drive, something we haven’t seen before. The park maintains the many dirt tracks, something else we haven’t seen in many parks. The camping experience is quite different, people come into the park with their travel trailers towing a small car which they use to explore the roads, somewhat like in the US. This took some getting used to. Special campsites in the Kruger are highly coveted and reservations are booked a year in advance. We haven’t gotten used to that yet.
Rules abound for visitors. Don’t get out of your car except in a designated site. Preferably fenced. No jogging – they had to make a rule for that?? Only block the lane where the animal is, leave the other lane open – now there’s a rule made to be broken in those “Yellowstone 
moments”, as we call them. No speeding, but even at 20k an hour, far under the speed limit, if you hit a lizard or a tortoise it is curtains for the creature. When I see a pile of bones by the roadside I used to think a lion killed something there, but now I realize it is more likely a vehicle. Some scavenger made a meal of the unlucky creature I hope.
One directive is consistently broken by everyone at sightings. Do not put any part of your body out of the vehicle at a sighting. Not your arm or your head and certainly not your torso. This is known as “breaking the plane.” As a rule animals see vehicles as something solid. Studies have been done using dummies to dem
onstrate what happens when a limb sticks out of the flat plane of a car. Lions attack and they are quick about it. Leopards claw what is sticking out of a window. But humans aren’t dummies, right? That’s questionable.
We witnessed an episode of breaking the plane on our way to the Orpen Gate. We’d stopped to admire a very pregnant lioness. She was relaxed, laying on som
e sand near the road. Other vehicles were observing. Then suddenly her body tensed. Her head went up and her vision narrowed and her jaw elongated. She was staring at the road – what could she be so fixated on? Along came a SansPark pick-up truck with four guys sta
nding up in the bed, their heads well over the cab. That lioness stared and stared as they drove past, eyeing them like they were meat at the butchery. The four guys broke the plane. Likely a good thing she was so heavy, there could have been chaos (plus some crazy YouTube videos). And then on we went, inside the Beagle where it is safe. At least from lion.
And when it’s time for leaving Mozambique . . . you will feel sad. Mozam-beach, as we took to calling it, will be difficult to top. The people, the scenery, the warm welcome we received from Pemba to Maputo – Moz is wonderful. When you visit, be sure to say hi to Mateo on the beach at Goody’s Villa, he has the biggest, freshest crayfish. At Pandani Beach, Michael and Joseph are the guys to see for oysters, mussels, white snapper and rock cod. And should you find yourself in Cuomo, the only hotel in town has a desk clerk who, while he knows as much English as I know Portuguese, can hook you up with a room and he’ll go out of his way to find you something good to eat, even though it is well past dinner time. Most surprising, and unlike most everywhere else along the Indian Ocean coast, the water is both safe to drink and delicious. Have a long cold glass, you will love it.
Still, another park is calling us. At the southeastern side of Zimbabwe is Gonarezhou National Park, part of the Great Limpopo Transfrontier Park. The Frankfurt Zoological Society has been managing and updating Gonarezhou since early 2000. Their practice of keeping the park accessible but uncrowded makes visiting a delight. Four of the six nights here we were all alone in an environment kept as natural as possible. Most impressive was the staff, everyone knew about their area, knew which campsite has the best view and which one the elephants like the best. Gonarezhou means Place of the Elephant. There are more elephant here than there are impala. If you’ve been to Africa, you must know what the means – and you might think I’m making it up. How can there be more of anything than there are impala? But it’s true. As well, elephants here are somewhat less explosive than in Gorongosa, lucky for us.
Which leads me to explain the cover photo of this post. Jim caught me on camera, beating a hasty exit from the long-drop at our primitive camp – I’d walked to the toilet, admiring how sturdy it was (that should have been my first clue) and I rounded the corner thinking, is that a wall? No, you idiot, it’s an elephant! and I was about to bump into its ass end. Oh dear. . . or words to that effect. I ducked inside the outhouse and he turned on a dime to face me. Was he going to charge? Not that it’d be that much of a charge, I was six inches and a piece of wood away from him. But I didn’t feel threatened and as it turned out he was more interested in the fruit of the Nylala tree over the outhouse; he stood on his hind legs reaching up for the lowest branches as shown in the upper right of this photo.
Elephants, bush buck, monkeys, kudu, baboons and of course the elegant impala came and went through all of our camps; birding was crazy good along the Runde river and out in the mopane, only a kilometer from camp on a hot afternoon we came upon three lion – one of them starred us down for a bit. Only later did I realize my window was completely down while this powerful cat was giving me a good look-over. That is why we keep the engine running. And why we come to wild places like Gonarezhou.
There is a transit road through North Luangwa and it is how most people see this park. And like most people, we too drive the transit road headed for Kapishya Hot Springs high in the hills west of the park. First a soak in the sandy-bottom natural springs then a visit with the owners. Mark Harvey claims to remember me from nine years ago – hmmm – but the more we chat, the more remarkable his memory is. He has seen a lot in three decades in Zambia. Maybe he does remember us. He and his wife Mell, and Michal, the camp liaison, are so enthusiastic about North Luangwa we decide to see more of it from their Buffalo Camp operation. It is a four-hour drive and well worth it, Buffalo Camp is as wild as Zambia gets.
6:15 am. Is that a lion? I ask myself, half aloud, taking my first sip of coffee. Why yes it is; nine lions in fact. Right there on the sandy bank. I have an ear to ear grin, it is a splendid sighting. Michal goes total primate – “Lions! We’ve got lions!!” he is squealing at the staff. Everyone is heading for the best vantage point. I top off my coffee first then follow them – priorities, you know. There are seven beautiful females and two six month old cubs and they don’t hang around long but that’s ok. It is time for a three hour bush walk, in the opposite direction as if these nine girls are the only lion around. 
All told we see three different groups of lionesses (and two tiny baby cubs) along with clouds of bright green Lillian Lovebirds, mongoose (white-tailed, banded and slender) civet cat and the graceful Genet cats both large and small. The usual suspects, the buffalo, impala, zebra and wildebeest abound, and there are elephant. This lioness had a run in with a porcupine – she looked better the next time we saw her.
Charlie and Peanut are the resident elephants at Buffalo. Mark talks to them like we talk to our dogs – and like our dogs, Charlie and Peanut “get” what Mark says. We did not witness this, but it has been documented. Science would likely dismiss such a connection as anecdotal but I totally believe it. Elephants are brilliant creatures. At 1am Charlie pays a visit to our chalet. We thought perhaps he wanted a shower as it sounded as if he was going to crush the thatch walls around the ablution. He was on his hind legs reaching into the winter thorn tree for the fruit with his trunk – how awesome is that? I stand on the toilet and watch. Mark can talk to Charlie about wrecking the thatch fences later, Charlie really made a mess.
Making friends fast is a fact of life on this road. We really like Michal, an engaging young man from Poland and after lunch the three of us begin a conversation about music and such – he plays guitar and is interested in hearing some of my brother’s music. Before we can get that far, a four-door Land Cruiser pulls into camp. A “big man” and three armed guards disembark and they are here for Michal. Who brings three armed men all the way to Buffalo Camp just to talk to a slight young man? The “big” man (using the term for an African man who is full of himself) is angry and the guards are serious. Michal tries to slow down the confrontation but the big man is having none of it. “Get in the car, you are wasting our time” he says. 
He is the head ranger for NL Park, his superior is out of reach so now he is in charge and he wants everyone to know it. We cannot interfere. Michal has solo-traveled enough to to take care of himself. He is shoved into the Toyota in-between two armed men (he might try to escape, right?) and headed for a miserably long drive to Mpika and the ZamPark office. We don’t know if we will ever see him again.
Is anybody coming? I ask Jim as I drive onto the highway out of our first campsite in Namibia. Not in the last two days, he says – ha! Welcome to Namibia!
After spending the obligatory two nights in the Kalaghadi Transfrontier Park we are in a new country. We would have spend many more nights in Kalaghadi Park but it is no longer an undiscovered arid transfrontier park. There is no room for us here, the campgrounds and chalets are packed.
Which is funny as you can drive for half a day and only see one vehicle. It takes us 10 hours to cover the 110 kilometers from Two Rivers to Kalaghari Tented Camp, bumping along the track, seeing all sorts of creatures. Two of those 10 hours are spent parked at the 13th borehole. There’s a bit of shade and a good view. I download some photos, read my John Reader book, and Jim takes a nap. You cannot get out of your car. A wildebeest comes by for a drink. 
Birds come and go. I’m not nearly as frantic as in the past to identify every bird I see. We’ve got two years; we will probably see another one of those. How relaxing this is.
We know how lucky we were to have spent over three weeks in KTP in 2013 with Adrian and Rentia – the four of us traveled the length and breadth of it, from Rooiputs to Mata Mata, to Swart Pan and Mabuashahube, an experience not likely to be repeated. It is a fabulous green park this time of year and as a parting gift we have our morning coffee with a male lion lounging in front of us.
Mata Mata is a hot and sleepy border crossing. The South Africans take our firewood – even though it is Namibian hardwood. Go figure. The Namibian border guard is ok with stamping our carnet, but only after I point it out to him. The carnet insures that we will bring the Beagle back to South Africa instead of selling it in some other country. A substantial deposit was put down for the carnet and I’m not risking losing that because a border guard was too lazy to do the stamp. Sometimes you gotta insist. I’m sure there will be more adventures at border crossings.
Recent Comments