… but just a little this time.
We heard sketchy reports of the water conditions heading into
Moremi Game Reserve, but decided to head out from Maun and try to make it to
Third Bridge, which had been our next destination after Nxai Pan. The road to
the park gate was fine, as the rain had (finally) stopped by the time we left
Maun. We camped the first night at South Gate campsite. It’s mostly a layover
spot. The highlight here was definitely having a giraffe walk by as I was
making dinner. (We saw our first giraffes of the trip on the way in here. I had been getting worried we wouldn’t
see any!)
We took the drier route to Third Bridge, as the usual route was
closed due to deep water. We had no issues getting to Xakanaxa, another
campsite/gate along the way. We stopped here to use the facilities, but
couldn’t get in as there was a large elephant in the way. Between Xakanaxa and
Third Bridge, we crossed a lot of small water, and one bigger one that covered
the windshield – and us and much of the interior of the truck – with mud.
Fortunately that one was caught on video. Third Bridge itself was under water
and we came across a truck stuck in the middle and a small army of others
waiting. They finally got out, added some extra logs to the bridge, and off we
all went.
We didn’t see a lot of wildlife here, and when we did the skies
were often grey so we’ve hardly taken any photos. We did have a family of
elephants walk through camp one morning, which was beautiful to watch. We also
saw some hippos grazing out of the water. After weighing options, we decided
the best thing would be to head for Namibia and hopefully drier times.
The usual road back the park gate was open, so we took it. Things
were very wet, though we managed to avoid getting stuck. We did not avoid a
flat tire. That meant B had to spend close to an hour in the noon sun changing
the tire while I pretended to be a meerkat, keeping sentry duty to make sure he
didn’t get eaten. When we got out of the park, we realized that all the water
had loosened the front end of the truck, so we had to get that fixed back in
Maun. He’s still pretending to find it stressful, but B is totally loving this
driving. 
No comments:
Post a Comment