Botswana and More

 Day 10

My Foolish Fetish

Today was an all-day trip to Chobe National Park in Botswana. So here is my foolish fetish – I get to add another country to my list of countries that I have visited. More on this later. I will also note that Botswana seems to have its act together more than Zimbabwe – they have much nicer roads and at least they have their own currency.

[Side note: Zimbabwe currency collapsed in early 2009 and shortly thereafter, the entire country converted to US dollars as the most reliable currency. So useless was the Zimbabwean dollar that the exchange rate was

$1USD = $1,000,000,000,00ZWR! (that’s one billion)

The government then struck 12 zero’s off each denomination because of the absurdity of the bank notes, but the currency continued its total collapse. Before it was all over, the Zimbabwean government actually printed a 100,000,000,000,000 note!!!! (that’s 100 trillion)]

OK, back to the story of the day. The plan for the day was:

• Bus ride to Botswana
• River cruise on the Chobe River
• Lunch
• Jeep tour of Chobe National Park (The Park)
• Ride back to our hotel in Zimbabwe.

We left our Lodge at 7:35 for the bus ride to Botswana. The “highway” (and I use that term VERY loosely) appeared to be paved but was continuously bumpy. Our driver warned us as we got onto the highway, “Now you get a free massage.” The ride lasted almost an hour to the Botswana border. Then we had to go through several levels of immigration and customs to pass from Zimbabwe and Botswana, including Adam/Maria showing birth certificates for Elise and Connor. Once in Botswana, we had to take another shuttle bus to the Chobe Marina Hotel (what a beautiful setting!) where we would start our river cruise on the Chobe River.

The open-air lobby and restaurant of the Chobe Marina Hotel,

which looks directly on to the Chobe River.

Here is what we learned along the way. The Chobe Marina Hotel is near the juncture of the Chobe River and the mighty Zambezi River. The Chobe is a major tributary of the mighty Zambezi. This nexus is the ONLY place in the world where four countries come together. The Chobe divides Botswana from Namibia, and Zimbabwe and Zambia have the Zambezi and a shared border. Thus, at the center of the joining of the two rivers, the four countries meet – much like Four Corners in the US with Colorado, Utah, New Mexico and Arizona. Except in this case, you have to swim to that meeting point in crocodile infested waters. So, as far as we know, while many people stand on four corners in the US, no one has made it to the ‘four corners” of Botswana, Namibia, Zambia and Zimbabwe and survived. But … here is where the foolish fetish resurfaces! By cruising on the Chobe River where the centerline of the river is the border between Namibia and Botswana, we were actually in Namibia for part of our river cruise! THAT’S ANOTHER COUNTRY TO ADD TO THE LIST! And that makes five countries visited on this trip alone (adding in South Africa). Never in my wildest dreams – even as of yesterday – did I ever think I would be in Namibia.

OK, back to the story again! [But I bet you do learn some interesting things in this blog as well!] Once again we had a perfect weather day – clear, sunny, warm, but not too hot, a little breeze across the water. Perfect! The river cruise was a boat that carried about 40-50 people. To keep this short, suffice to say that we saw TONS of animals that weighed tons. Elephants, hippos, buffalo, crocodiles (yes, the very largest can get to 2000 pounds – now that is frightening). They were either along the shore sipping on the cool Chobe River water or plunged full bodied into the river. Now a large group of elephants is a herd; a large group of hippos is called a pod (if in the water) or a thunder (if on land); buffalo come in herds; and finally, a group of crocodiles is called a fantasy – because they don’t exist! Crocodiles have a reptilian brain and are solitary animals – even immediately after they are hatched, their mothers push them into the water to fend for themselves. Many other animals have group names that I cannot remember - like a group of giraffe is a forest - or something like that 😆.

Also, along the shore were hundreds of impala, baboons, monkeys, a few kudu (antelopes with really big, spiraled horns), warthogs and maybe a few other things I cannot remember. The sheer scale of the river basin, sprinkled with islands delineated by channels of the river, dotted with animals EVERYWHERE was a sight to behold. The expanse is too much to describe or even convey in a picture.

After we returned for lunch, which was a nice buffet situated right on the river and included kudu sausage (certainly not the quality of a good German brat!), we got on Jeeps (really, Jeeps) and went into the land portion of The Park. There we saw a lot more elephants ... giraffe in abundance ... lots of kudu, and some more elephants. [Did you note that the plural form of giraffe is giraffe – so that wasn’t a typo in the last sentence!] Did I mention that Chobe is famous for its 70,000 elephant population (as of 2020), and there is probably more than that. It’s hard to say since Chobe is not fenced in any way and animals move in and out of The Park, including the occasional lion wandering into the nearby towns. On our drive back to Zimbabwe, we saw three giraffe standing near the side of the road chomping on a very tall tree.

Anyway, we finished our ride through The Park and headed back to the border with Zimbabwe with all the attendant bureaucracy of immigration. After getting to our Lodge around 6:00PM (18:00), we relaxed then went to the local Brewing Company Restaurant for a simple dinner – no more three course meals! My pants don’t fit anymore!!! BTW – we got our usual taxi driver – Tobias – for the short trip to and from the hotel. He is a very delightful man. I sincerely wish him and his family the best as they scratch out a living in Victoria Falls Town, Zimbabwe. He deserves it.