Throughout the night there was thunder and lightning with some rain. It was neat to see the lightning from our beds in the tent. There were hippos splashing in the river and making noise throughout the camp. We got up at 6:30. Bill sat on the deck smoking his cigar and watching the sun come up. We had to pack up to leave and then at 8 we went to breakfast. I had coffee and a cup of Rooibos tea [bush tea], an omelet with cheese and salsa, some sautéed mushrooms, and toast with marula jelly. There was a hippo in the water watching us eat breakfast.
I got photos of our servers, Rosemary, Juliet, and Lydia, and Lettie the camp hostess, Ollie our ranger, and Umgandi the other ranger. Everyone at all of the camps were so delightful, pleasant, helpful, and hospitable.
As we were driving away, a tourist’s car was stuck in the water in the road. Many of the roads had quite a bit of water in them, but our vehicles were equipped to handle them. The car was being pulled out by one of the camp’s trucks. There are 2 other camps on either side of Xakanaxa.
We took off at 9:45. We could see yellow sandy hippo paths in many of the ponds below. Our two planes flew next to each other so we could get photographs of each other.
At 10:45 we landed at Kasane airport near Chobe National Park. There were beautiful Jacaranda trees outside the airport all in bloom. A van took us to Chobe Safari Lodge where we boarded a large boat contracted from Bushtracks. At 11:15 we took off for our cruise down the Chobe River. I hadn’t expected much from this cruise, but I was astounded at the animals we saw from the boat. There were elephants, open-billed storks, puku (another kind of antelope), jacana (a beautiful wading bird), cape buffalo, great white egret, Nile crocodiles including a female on the bank guarding her nest, blacksmith lapwing, kudu, hippo, warthogs, waterbuck.
Three elephants swam across the river playing as they came. Five hippos bobbed in the water which was hysterical to watch – we could see 3 hippo, one would go under and two would come up, etc. Then we came to a huge group of hippo. There must have been 30 of them all grouped together near the shore. We anchored near them and had a wonderful buffet lunch: sorghum (made into a starchy poi-looking dish), carrot soup, mashed potatoes, green beans/carrots, macaroni and cheese, saffron rice, oxtail stew, fish, several wonderful salads, feta cheese, olives, several pates, fruit salad with a yummy cream sauce, cream puffs, muffin cupcakes. We ate and ate as we watched the wildlife.
There was another large herd of at least 30 hippo on land near us. And a huge herd of cape buffalo lying down in the grass so they looked like huge boulders. We finally saw a herd of red lechwe (another kind of antelope) with several males butting horns. A dignified fish eagle was looking down on it all. We finally returned to the dock at 2:30. We used the restrooms at the hotel where the sinks had beautiful bird paintings in the sinks. Back to the airport for a short flight to Victoria Falls. The pilots took us over the falls twice so both sides of the planes could see the falls from above.
There were no problems with immigration or customs. In fact we totally breezed through them. I wonder if it is because we were on a ‘recognized’ tour? We got on a bus and drove about 20 minutes through Livingstone to the hotel. Livingstone is a decent sized town, reminding me of towns in Mexico or the Philippines. There were three cell phone towers that were decorated as a huge palm tree, a Norfolk pine, and some other bush. Those were rather neat.
Upon arrival at the Royal Livingstone, we were met by a costumed greeter who escorted us through the lobby to the huge grounds beside the Zambezi River. We could see the mist from the falls which made a beautiful backdrop. We were given hot towels, and a wonderful tasting iced tea. Just at that moment, two zebras came racing from nowhere at breakneck speed. They stopped just beyond us, turned around and raced back from whence they had come. It was pretty impressive. The hotel is part of a nature preserve, so zebras, vervet monkeys, impala, and giraffe roam the grounds. We were given our instructions not to leave any doors or windows open or the monkeys would wreck havoc in our rooms.
Our room was nice but not nearly as luxurious as our camp facilities had been. When we got to our room, Felix, our butler, came and explained all the amenities including the mosquito repellent vaporizer that was plugged into an outlet. We all settled in and then headed back to the lobby area. As we came out of our room, a giraffe was across the walkway grazing. We walked down to the river and sat in a swing watching the ‘smoke that thunders’. Bill smoked his cigar, and we listened to hippos in the river. Then we checked our email in the internet room which had six computers. Jerome and Giselle were there as was Linda. We went to the indoor bar to check out cigars. That was a shock. The cheapest was $85 and went up to $180. No new cigars for Bill. We sat by the pool where I had a bad amarula. It was getting dark, and a couple of zebra were grazing in front of us. A little impala came by, and the zebras had a hissy fit and chased him away. We got a golf cart ride back to our room and ordered room service – club sandwich, burger, and a veggie pasta salad. We were in bed by 10:30.
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