From Namibia to Botswana
Crossing borders
It was the twelfth day of our trip; we had spent two enchanting days at Shametu River Lodge; now it was time to move on. Our next big destination was the Moremi Game Reserve.
The next lap of driving was a little more than 400 kilometres to the city of Maun in Botswana. We drove through the Mahango Game Park, and took a short detour to take a look at an ancient baobab tree. We stopped for a short while took a few pictures and then we crossed the border.
The officer at the Botswana immigration who stamped our passports knew all about Singapore because, he told us, the software platform that they were using had been set up by a Singapore IT company. The world had indeed become quite small.
The road that was
The condition of the road changed once we entered Botswana. We had been forewarned that we would encounter potholes on the road but we did not expect them to be so big and so numerous. Sometimes they would extend across the width of the road and there was no way we could steer away from them. It turned out to be a very bumpy ride indeed. On top of that, we got stopped by the police because they said we were speeding. IB was driving, so they took down his particulars and issued us a fine. They said we should give to our car rental company who would make the payment and charge it to us. We did not dispute the allegation; we did not know what the repercussions could be; from that point onwards, we kept well within the speed limits.
The potholes on the road, as well as the police encounter, had slowed us down. It was well past 6pm and dark when we reached Maun. And then, our GPS decided to lead us astray. It took us to a block of single storey residential houses instead of our Cresta Maun hotel. Luckily, we managed to reach a patient listener when we called up the hotel. She gave us detailed instructions and we were at the hotel parking before 7:30pm.
Uncertainity over onward journey
The hotel was a sprawling one and we had to walk along winding corridors and carry our luggage up flights of stairs to reach our room. Our room had wifi connection, we felt we had come back to modernity.
But the excitement was not over yet. The airlines, with whom we were scheduled to fly to the Okavango Delta the next morning, were supposed to have informed the hotel of the exact flight time. It seemed no information had reached the hotel. The very kind lady at the reception tried to call the airlines’ office but they had closed for the day. I too tried calling the agent through whom I had actually made the booking but got no results. Realising that there was nothing more we could do that night, we made plans to wake up early and be ready to leave by eight in the morning.
Catching the flight
But things did not happen according to plan. IB was thrilled to be back in in touch with the world and stayed up late. As a result he woke up late; and then spent some more time hunched over his laptop. So when the reception called us to say that they had managed to contact the airlines and our flight was in an hour’s time, we were far from ready to leave.
It was a mad rush then. The hotel helped by carrying out our luggage and being superfast with our bill, but we still left without breakfast. It was half an hour to flight time when we reached the airport; I ran up to report our arrival to the airlines counter while IB went to return our rental car. One should thank life for small mercies, our flight, being a chartered one, did not need the usual protocols of checking-in and boarding; we were escorted to our plane by the pilot himself.
While talking to the airlines officials we realised that they had indeed called the hotel to inform about flight timings , but were told that there was no such booking at the hotel. It puzzled us about why the hotel would do so, until we realised that the hotel was booked in IB’s name while the flight was in mine – so this whole fiasco was actually our creation!
Journeying to nowhere
There were three of us in the six-seater plane, excluding the pilot. The third person was returning to his job at Moremi Crossing, the camp that we were going to, after a period of leave. He told us that they worked at a stretch for a few weeks and then got leave for about two weeks. There were no concepts of week days and weekend. I wondered how it would be to work in a system like that.
The plane was a really small one and every little gust of wind seemed to shake it up.Luckily it was not flying very high, so did not feel all that scary. As the plane steadied in its flight, we looked down to see herds of zebras and giraffes and even elephants during the course of our almost half an hour flight. And then the plane coasted down to a miniature dusty runway.
At Moremi Crossing
As we got off the plane, we were met by a welcoming party who bundled us into a open topped vehicle for the short drive to the camp. On reaching, we were further welcomed with lots of smiles, a drink and a song in the local language. We were led to the main deck which housed the dining area and a lounge. We were shown around the camp by the staff and accompanied to our tent, where they left us for washing up, telling us that we should be back at the main deck in about half an hour for lunch.
Food was simple wholesome fare with bread, meat, vegetables and some fruits. That became the pattern for the meals the next three days. We loitered a bit in the deck after the meal was over looking out at the narrow strip of Okavango river running in front and the scrublands beyond, before going back to our tent.
Back at the tent, I sat watching the landscape while IB took a nap. A hippo stood grazing on the river bank right in front of our tent, I could not believe my eyes! A few antelopes and a group of warthogs also came along and, in the distance, along the other bank of the river I could see a group of elephants squirting dust over themselves and raising a cloud.
Warthogs near our tent 
Friendly antelope
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