“We have finally come up with your ultimate challenge.” Philippe’s laconic French Swiss accented voice, which always held the undertone of an unbridled sense of humour, drifted over the phone. “This is not just a simple task like conquering Kilimanjaro or anticipating the exact timing of the wildebeest migration in Serengeti or finding Bushmen in…
The road was diabolical. Knee deep, slippery red mud had been churned into a thick doughy consistency by numerous United Nations trucks. It was all but impassable, as evidenced by the large number of vehicles that had slid off the surface and were marooned in the deep trenches created by a sharp drop off on…
Situated on the banks of the Thamalakane River, our barn was a curiously large edifice because its original purpose was to treat and store elephant hides. Its walls were made of chicken wire that had once seen a splash of cement – to reduce, but not quite eliminate, transparency – and this makeshift structure was…
We live in far north-eastern Botswana on a heavily wooded property that overlooks the Chobe / Zambezi River confluence. We have a constant parade of wild animals around our boundaries. Elephants, buffalo, hyaena, hippo and leopards are regulars as are bushbuck and an assortment of other herbivores and small predators. We have, rather scaringly also…
I bumped into my friend and fellow safari guide, Vic – a tall, gaunt, phlegmatic, and bearded man, in a campsite pub in Rundu, a small town on the Kavango river in northern Namibia. I was near the start of a three-week safari through Namibia with four English folk. A carefully planned and exciting itinerary…
Who washes their lettuce in dishwashing liquid? Orthodox Jews, I learnt to my surprise when I set up camp for a family from New York in Moremi Game Reserve in Botswana over the Sabath. Rabi Barry had booked to spend a Sabath in a mobile camp with a Jewish American family, so that they could,…