Botswana-Chobe

Kasane is a small town in north east Botswana, west of the Zambian border and south of the Namibian. The Chobe River flows into Zambesi but passes Kasane and Chobe National Park. Our lodge was on the Chobe River, called the Garden Lodge.

Plenty of water... this is a bar, but unfortunately closed for the moment

We arrived quite early and could fit in the sunset cruise on the Chobe River. It was a small boat and we could see the other guests looking a little bit sceptical when all five kids climbed on board. The cruise was fantastic, we saw a lot of game, especially elephants taking a bath in the river. Other things plentyful were iguanas, crocs, different bucks, hippos and birds. We also had a scary moment when the captain of the boat wanted to get really close to a group of hippos. All of a sudden a very angry hippo bull broke the surface and gave us the evil eye, just two meters in front of the boat! Luckily we could back away before we became hippo-chow...

That's close enough folks!

Actually, Elle was really happy.

You got really close to the elephants.

I'm watching you!

A bath can be pleasant

There's Gin & Tonic in the bottle, for the malaria of course!

A water monitor is doing his evening toilet

The river was full of water and nature was all green and lush. Unfortunately our camera's batteries died and we don't have a pictures from the marvellous sunset, seen from the river. We had to settle for just enjoying it.

The next day we started out fairly early for a drive through Chobe. We were told it took almost the whole day, so we asked the lodge to supply us with lunch packs. The drive started out with us driving on really sandy tracks and stopping was not an option! Luckily we didn't meet anyone else and we soon got on solid ground.

Waterbuck

There was plenty of game to be seen but the cats were all gone to the southern part of the parks to our misfortune. Although, we got the spotting of a life time, mating elephants! There were a bunch of elephants next to tracks and we tried to drive past them quickly since they can be feisty. All of a sudden we saw the act and just had to stop and shoot a few pictures. Well, we also had to answer some tricky questions from the kids and Elle now believes the elephant male has a fifth leg. Please don't tell her otherwise!

Explanation not needed...

Do you see both of the giraffes?

A classic, the dung beetle

Lunch was also interesting... we went to a camping site within the park and the entrance to it was a nice gate. We couldn't see any fencing though... The informative park ranger told us not to worry, but to keep an eye open for the buffalos that were in the vicinity.

The game drive took the whole day and after cleaning up at the lodge we were treated with a nice dinner while watching the local hippo grazing just a few meters from our table.

Family of nine?