On Safari

So you ask, what does one do on Safari?  Well, first and foremost, "Safari" does not mean hunting,  or sightseeing.  In Swahili, it means"long journey," be it by land, sea, or air.  By the time we reached Deception Valley, we'd already been on a bit of a journey, mostly by air.  We were about to experience a completely different kind, and pace, in this next part of our journey.  First, we were up with the sun, to capture the animals when they were either just waking, or just going to sleep, depending on who we were talking about.  Second, instead of flying at 130 nautical miles per hour, we were driving at about a walking pace. 


From the air, the Kalahari looked pretty desolate, without much in the way of vegetation.  From the ground, it was a completely different story.  Our trip, which was in May and early June, was in late fall,  just after the summer rains, so the bush had not yet died off and was reasonably thick.  The variety of vegetation was also pretty diverse, with several kinds of grasses.  

Where's the lion?

The thick bush made it very difficult to see the animals, but the carnivores in particular were tough to spot, even when they were reasonably close to the road.  Without the guides and trackers we would have driven right by them without even realizing that they were there.  That adaptation thing that Darwin went on about was on full display here.  All of the animals really did blend in with their surroundings really effectively.

As I said in other posts, we were extremely fortunate (and probably also really lucky) as we saw both leopard and lion (including five cubs) during our stay at Deception Valley.  I've shown you pictures of the lion, before, but I am compelled  to show them again.  (I took 1,700 pictures, you are going to have to bear with me.)  This set of shots is new, so you shouldn't find yourself too terribly bored with them....I know that I haven't yet.   

The light in this part of the world is unbelievable. The early morning and late afternoon is bathed with a golden color that is pure magic.

Add lion cubs and it feels like you are in the middle of your own private movie.  These little rascals were 5 months old and full of spit and vinegar.  They were also a handful.  Poor Mom never got a break.  It seemed like they were constantly on her or at her in one way or another.

Even with all of that cuteness on display, it didn't take long to be reminded that these cubs are carnivores, with lot of pointy teeth and sharp claws.  If the cub's display of dental work wasn't reminder enough to keep your hands and feet inside the vehicle at all times, Mom's bigger teeth really made the case.

Keep your hands inside the vehicle

As I mentioned before, we also saw a leopard during our stay at Deception Valley.  We interrupted her hunt and, rightly, she was pretty cross with us about that.  As Jacu, the proprietor and guide told us, leopard are very patient hunters.  Chote (pronounced Cho-Tay) the Bushman guide/tracker sighted her as she was waiting for a Springbok.  The antelope saw (or maybe more rightly heard) us coming and bolted, leaving our leopard with no breakfast and a group of tourists in a truck following her through the bush for a while.   Jacu said that he feels a bit guilty about potentially causing any animal to go hungry, but then again, all of the animals at Deception Valley are free to roam on and off the 17,000 hectacre property at any time.  And, there is absolutely no hunting on the property, so he views the picture taking and the Land Rover pursuit as a form of rent. It's hard to say what the animals think about it.  The lion cubs seemed pretty non-plused by our presence.  The leopard on the other hand looked pretty torqued off, in that cat-like way in which you know you could pay for it later. It was probably good that she didn't know exactly where we were sleeping.

Even when you know she's there, she's hard to see.

The carnivores always get all of the attention, on the game drives.  They are always the thing that people ask to see first...and they are beautiful, but they are not the only thing to see.  The DeceptionValley property had a variety of antelope: Kudu, Springok, Wildebeest and Eland to name a few.  They also had Zebra and Giraffe (which we didn't see), Warthog and Porcupine.  Many of these animals came to the water hole just in front of the lodge for a drink, so after the morning drive, all we had to do was sit, drink our tea, and watch.

Kudu and Zebra

Kudu

There was also abundant bird life.  Not one of us came with any birdwatching skills, although that would change later in the trip.  But for now, we marveled at the home-building prowess of the Weaver Birds and the watchful eyes of the Vulture, who was waiting for the thermals to build before taking off from his high perch.   Apparently his huge wings create lots of lift, but they really can't help him to take off without some help.

 As I may have mentioned in my prior posts, the lodge was really comfortable, handling pretty much everything that we might want, including all meals, sun downer cocktails after the evening game drives and even our laundry.  We were definitely well cared for.  

All that said, we were treated with an unexpected and special experience late in the afternoon on the second day.  And, that, will need to wait for another post.  For now, I will leave you with more lions, just to keep you coming back!

This is the light I was talking about.  Amazing, isn't it?

Un-Deceived

Our Route to Deception Valley, more or less...

Our journey to the Southern Africa Bush began in earnest on the morning of May 20th.  Our route took us north west across the South African border, into Botswana and then across the Kalahari Desert.  You may be familiar with the residents of this part of the world from the movie The Gods Must be Crazy. The Bushmen used to be a nomadic people, which is no longer the case  due mostly to the fact that Botswana is one of the richest countries in the world.  It has diamonds...lots of them.  These riches enabled the government to provide the Bushmen with permanent homes, medical care, and education.

The Central Kalahari is a vast and amazing place.  The sand in this desert is ultra-fine, generating a dust that is unbelievable.  It gets in everything, making it a challenge to keep clothes, hair, cameras, anything really, clean.  The desert itself is scattered with thousands of pans, which create impressive, and dangerous mirages, as they are easily mistaken for lakes.  The lodge that we were ultimately headed for was near a large pan called Deception.  You can probably guess why it has its name.

Salt pan - Kalahari, Botswana

Gabarone approach, "None-Shall-Pass Area" to the right

Before we could land in Deception though, we needed to clear immigration and customs into Botswana, which we did at the Sir Seretse Khama International Airport, making sure to avoid the restricted areas, which I suspect might have been the President's residence.

Tarmac, Gabarone International Airport

Glenn and Carl gave us specific instructions, that whenever we landed in an airport with a fuel bowzer (the small aircraft equivalent of a gas station) we fuel up before doing ANYTHING else.  So, we headed for the bowzer and awaited instruction.

What a Bowzer!

Don't use slang when trying to pay in a foreign country!

The fueling man was very nice and helpful. Although, he was not used to our slang and nearly fell to his knees when, after putting $300 of fuel in our plane, Catherine asked him if she could give him "plastic" in payment. Realizing our mistake, we carefully explained that we meant to pay by credit card, kindly helped him to breathe a bit, and signed the slip.  After gaining back his breath he then instructed us where to go for immigration into Botswana (which required some paperwork to document bringing in an airplane) and where to go to pay the landing fees.  He pointed us toward the terminal building and said walk over there and into the building.  We had no escort, and apparently, we didn't need one.  It's hard to imagine that we would be allowed to meander across any airport tarmac in the western world like this, but we weren't in Kansas now, were we?   So, we made our way down the tarmac, past the jet, through immigration and customs, across the arrivals hall into the departure area, and through security (again setting off most of the security sensors....damn swiss army knife...with nothing but a blink from the security folks...YAY for being a private flight!).  Remarkably, once we explained  that our pilot was a woman, (and provided the appropriate proof by way of a license) we had absolutely no issues with managing all of this. We were, however, required to file a flight plan, something that Glenn failed to tell us during the de-briefing. This resulted in  a bit of a false start as we did we were taxi-ing down the runway without said plan when we received a request from the tower for our flight plan number.  Upon learning that we didn't have one she (most of the air traffic controllers in Africa turned out to be women...who knew?!) instructed us to turn around and get ourselves a formal plan, which we did.  I learned that all flight plans, no matter where in the world they are filed are done so on exactly the same time zone - Greenwich Mean Time, or Zulu time.  Catherine's watch is permanently set to that time, which occaissionally caused confusion about what time it really was. But after a while that didn't matter so much and we were always good for our flight plans and control tower reports, which really did and should take priority.

The benefit of this unplanned 45 minute dealy was that we learned how to say thank you in Swana - Ke Ala Boqa.  This alone was worth the backtracking.

The Gabarone airport experience was good learning, and preparation.  It turned out to be  fairly typical of most of our future airport experiences. On average, by the time we were done with fueling and the various paperwork requirements, we could count on spending about two hours from wheels down to wheels up in every airport we visited. I guess it was no different than being on a commercial flight, just a lot more fun, and no one had to sit in the middle seat!

Back underway, with only a minor delay, we headed north across the central Kalahari toward Deception Valley.

Gabarone Flight Operations - note the clock is on Zulu time.

After about 30 minutes of flying we finally realized how "out there" we were.  The pictures don't do the vast space justice.  There is quite literally nothing but bush, some livestock and ranches and a lot of dust for miles.  There was the occasional airstrip, but without apparent civilization anywhere nearby, making it not particularly appealing to consider landing.  That said, we were prepared with emergency food and water, so we would have been fine, should it come to that.

Where, exactly, does one go, once you land here????

Our GPS was also not the best.  The maps were not great and the cigarette lighter power source was not very reliable.  We had paper charts though and the GPS gave us lat/long, so we knew where we were, more or less, which we confirmed using physical landmarks.  Still, it did feel like a guessing game.  There really weren't that many landmarks to give us that warm happy feeling that we were on the right track.  That is, until we reached the Deception Pan, which looks a lot like a large airfield from the air, but from Glenn's instruction we knew that it was the last major landmark in the Kalahari before the lodge's actual airfield.

Deception Pan

 The folks at the lodge told us later that the pan actually has been confused for their airstrip.   Deception Valley Lodge is on the northern edge of the Central Kalahari Game Reserve and until recently they there were only able to communicate with  the outside world using a radio, which operated only once per day.  They were expecting a group of British tourists from Maun (a large town north of the lodge), where they  a charter plane.  Apparently the pilot either did not have a lot of experience with the Kalahari or he didn't have a lot of smarts.  Either way, he used his GPS in an incorrect manner, dialing in Deception.  The GPS, doing its job, guided him to the Deception Pan and he landed there, leaving his clients standing, in the middle of a game reserve.  The lodge proprietors were only about 15 minutes north by plane, and were waiting for their customers at their airstrip.  They watched the plane fly south, and then a few minutes later, back north, but it never landed.  And, without the means to communicate, there was nothing they could do to find out what happened and where their customers were. It wasn't until much later that they learned their clients spent the night in the bush.  Fortunately, a South African family found them and helped them camp over an uncomfortable and cold night.  The pilot realized his mistake the next day, and went back to retrieve a very unhappy lot.  At that point the Brits had about enough of Africa and flew straight home, never visiting the lodge.  That was a pity for them, as Deception Valley Lodge was one of my very favorite stops on the trip.

Fifteen minutes later, exactly on schedule we saw the lodge airstrip, which was marked so that there was no confusion.  Happily, all of the remote strips we landed in, used this convention.  No confusion, if you use your noggin!

Glenn instructed us not to land on this strip unless the lodge's car was visible and not to get out of the plane until cleared to do so by the guide.  This was lion country and he didn't want us in the food chain.

We followed that instruction, landed safely and Gerad, the proprietor, was there to greet us and helped us in securing the plane, which required tying it down, tent fashion, using ropes and tent stakes.

Once we got sorted and into the land rover, we realized that we were in a very special place.  Below is the view from the lodge common area, looking out onto the property.  Nope, definitely not Kansas!

From the deck at Deception Valley Lodge

How we began

I've shown you various pictures during the course of our trip, but wanted to give you a little bit more of a timeline on my big African adventure.  There were three of us:  Catherine (the pilot), Zabeta, and me. The trip was a two week flying safari around South Africa, including through Botswana, Zimbabwe, and Mozambique.

Zabeta

We started from the Benoni-Brakpan Airfield (FABB) near Johannesburg, South Africa on the morning of May 19th.  While the logistical planning for a trip like this might sound overwhelming, we had a lot of expert help.  The folks at Sky Africa made virtually all of the arrangements.  Janna  handled the on-ground activities and lodging.  She was a stickler for details and designed a trip that included everything we wanted to see.  Glenn was the flight ops person, who worked with Catherine on flight plans, and plane nuances.   Our plane, Dixie to us, but officially ZS DYX:  Zulu Sierra - the country designation - Delta Yankee Xray - the plane number,  is in her middle years and has some quirks.   Catherine spent most of Saturday, before I arrived, reviewing flight plans and maps and then a couple of hours on Sunday morning, after I arrived, clearing the flight checks with Glenn, which are insurance requirements.

Janna, organizer extraordinaire!

Glenn runs Catherine through her insurance flight checks.

Glenn and Carl

Carl is the owner and a font of information about flying and sites in South Africa.

We departed around 13:00 on the 19th, headed for Pilanesburg, a 45 minute flight.  This destination was selected by our fearless Janna so that we could clear customs out of South Africa the next morning. Brakpan doesn't have customs service and we needed that as we were bound for Botswana on Monday.  So, Pilanesburg was purely a stopover.  The flight was uneventful, if a little turbulent, due to the afternoon thermals.  For future flights we did everything that we could to get our travel completed before lunch, to take advantage of the calmer morning air.

Departing Brakpan

We stayed at the Sun City Cabanas, which was a casino resort.  If asked to imagine what accommodations in Africa might look like, this was the first thing leaping to mind.  It did give us a good bed, and decent meals, so we weren't complaining.

Arriving Pilanesburg

I started to make it a habit to take pictures of the various runways we encountered.  They ran the gauntlet from large international strips to smooth places in the dusty desert.  Our first two were pretty typical for small regional airports.  That was about to change.




On the morning of the 20th we were ready to head to the bush.  We were ready, having done our flight planning over sun downers the night before.  Catherine explained our route and noted that she'd need some help with navigation, particularly since we were going to be landing at Gaborone, the capital of Botswana.  There are a couple of restricted area that we would have to avoid.  The penalty for entering is pretty steep, and might entail a flight escort and/or a loss of Catherine's license.  So, we quickly learned how to identify those areas on the map.

Flight Planning

Clearing South African Customs

Before departure, we had to clear South Africa customs and immigration at the Pilanesburg International airport.  This is a small regional airport, servicing very few commercial flights.  That morning we were the only ones in the airport, aside from the airport security and customs/immigration staff.  So there were three of us and about 10 staff.  It was mildly overwhelming.  We went through the usual drill of scanning all of our luggage, which included pocket knives, 5 bottles of wine and 2 bottles of gin, amongst other things.  The machinery went off and the staff told us to just carry on.  We followed that instruction.   There was a little bit of paperwork to properly document the plane and us (the passengers and crew) but all went smoothly and the people were exceptionally kind and helpful while we learned the ropes.  The customs folks inspected our luggage and the plane, and after determining that we had no contraband, they told us that we were officially not in South Africa any more and wished us a safe journey.

Sun City from the air

So, we headed north, over the resort and toward the African Bush.  Our adventure was about to start in earnest!.  We had a good feeling.  The day started well, with a stunning sunrise and we were flying in cloudless skies!

Sun City Sunrise

Sundowners

The physical beauty of Africa is not limited to its wonderful wildlife.  We made it a goal to see as many sunrises and sunsets as possible.  It won't be a surprise to anyone who knows me that I didn't do a very good job of documenting sunrises.  (I did enjoy many though!)

Tian, our proprietor in Nxamaseri told us that he didn't believe a camera could actually capture the beauty of an African sunset.  I agree.  They are amazing, magical, fleeting.  And, while you know it won't be the same, it's really hard not to try to capture that magic through the camera to savor later.  It's not the same as being there, but I'm still glad that I tried to bring that juju home with me.  I think that I had some moderate success, and better yet, for me, looking at these pictures does transport me back to those places.  So, I had to share.  Below are sunsets from most of the places that we stayed.
Enjoy!

Deception Valley in the Kalahari

Nxamaseri in the Okavango Delta

Chobe Game Reserve in Northern Botswana - from the land

Chobe Game Reserve in Northern Botswana - from the water

Kyle Game Reserve in Masvingo Zimbabwe, near the Great Zimbabwe Ruins

Askari Game Reserve, South Africa

While not specifically a sunset, it was late afternoon.  The beach at Vilanculos, Mozambique.

The Big Five

When I left for Africa I knew that there were some animals that everyone had on their list of "must sees," or "The Big Five"....I didn't.  I wanted to experience the place for its natural beauty and while I did really REALLY want to see elephants, I didn't really have any other animals on my list that I'd feel disappointed if I didn't see.

Along the way people kept asking us if we'd seen the Big Five and all three of us shrugged and said something to the effect that we'd seen lots of animals.....because, honestly, we weren't quite sure what they were and while we felt a little ignorant that we didn't know, we were having fun and it didn't matter that much to us if we ticked off a list of animals.  If pressed, we decided that we were pretty sure the lion was on the list and maybe the elephant, but we also thought the giraffe must also be represented, because, it IS tall after all.  (We were wrong....)

It wasn't until halfway through the trip, when we were approached by a street vendor selling wooden animal carvings (of the Big Five), that we figured out what they actually were.  And, by then (to our surprise) we'd seen all of them with the exception of the rhino, which came later.

So, on my bucket list trip, I filled up someone else's bucket list card, which was nice.

For your education and enjoyment, here are the Big Five in alphabetical order: