| In November of 95 I took a Flying Safari to the Okavango Delta
and Chobe National Park in Botswana. The idea is to fly to different 'camps'
for different game viewing activities. A friend recommend Mark Nolting and The Africa Adventure Company to arrange my
trip. Mark knows Africa and arranged a wonderful trip. (End of sales pitch). Click on any
image's title for a larger view. Also, check out my travel
photo gallery for more great Africa shots. The trip starts with a
flight from Johannesburg, South Africa to Maun Botswana. From here it's a short flight to
the first camp in the heart of the Okavango Delta. The Okavango River evaporates into the
Kalahari Desert and is the largest inland in delta in the world. This makes it an oasis
for animal life. |
| The first camp was Tchau Tented Lodge in Okavango National Park. To get to
camp we had to travel by boat up the river to reach the camp. I never saw so many animals
in one place. At one point we had to chase off some elephants to continue our journey up
the river. Mombo is a water camp where game viewing is by Mokoro (dugout canoe). We
(meaning my guide) would
poll through the channels and lagoons; If you are a bird lover this is the spot. |
View from a Mokoro |
Typical Scenery in The Okavango |
Also, we would take hikes looking for wildlife.
At one point, my guide Mike (probably not his real name) was tracking a pride of Lions. No
Fire arms are allowed in the park, so I spent my time gauging if I could outrun Mike .
Luckily, this time out we did not find any. (Though we did find an elephant who was not to
happy to see us.) |
| The next camp was Mombo Tented Lodge in Moremi National Park. Here game
viewing was by open Jeep. And did we get close! You name it we saw it. Moremi offers
elephants, buffalo, wild dogs (only about 3000 left in the wild and we saw quite a few),
cheetah, lions, zebra. Most of the pictures I took came from the Moremi Reserve. |
 Mombo
Tented Lodge |
 Wild Pups |
 Lots of these guys in Moremi |
The Main Lodge at Chobe Chilwero |
Another plane and another camp: Chobe Chilwero on the Chobe River. This
camp sits on a hill with a wonderful view of the river valley. Chobe is the heart of
Elephant country. I heard there are more than 10,000 elephants in the area. At anyone time
we might see herds running up to about 300 (they were hard to count). |
| Here, game viewing was focused on boat rides looking for elephants that
come to the river to bath and cool-off in the mid-day heat. We also took Jeep rides
through the park looking for game and many times we would cross paths of elephant herds
going to and from the river. |
 A view from the River |
