OK, Neil’s got all of his photos from the trip culled and imported into Lightroom and he’s finished processing the first day’s worth so I can now get into providing you some excellent images from the trip. One thing I’m gonna do differently this time…yes, I’m going to do the field guide sort of shots for identification of a species or whatever Burt I’m going to try and include interesting or interestingly processed shots as well.

Before that…a quick update on life here in SW FL. Connie had her follow up with the surgeon and she’s doing well…her swelling is almost gone and while the incision is still red and not looking all that great it’s a lot better than it was originally. She has mostly regained her former shape but the right side is going to not look the same as the left one after the surgery and that’s just the way it is. She’s graduated to wearing her underwire bras that provide more support as the bruising and soreness has diminished. Her pathology report is excellent…all of the cancer cells are gone and she’s going to undergo some localized radiation treatment to make sure. The oncologist wants her to take hormone replacement for 5 years…but there is a black box warning about doing that with retina issues so she’s going to most likely decline to do that. Her radiation doctor agrees and she’s just not comfortable taking the hormones given the side effects and her only one working eye situation as well as a detached retina from 2019…while it’s her decision Neil agrees with her that if it was him he wouldn’t take the hormones either.

She’s off to Mastersingers rehearsal tonight…so is happy about that as she’s getting back to doing what she likes to do. We are looking at some more concerts this year as well as a potential trip to see the leaves in Appalachia as they turn in the fall as well and we’ll stop by and see the kids in Richmond for diner as part of that. 

The weather is starting to cool off just a bit…I’m sure we’ll still have some hot and humid days but we’re getting close to when the weather is what we call comfortable and can open the windows for fresh air most of the time. It’s still raining most days…but Florida summers are like that. 

So…overall we’re doing well and getting back to what passes for normal for us. She’ll still need a mammogram every six months (vice once a year) for at least 2 or 3 years but that’s just fine with her.

So…let’s get on to discussions about his trip to Botswana last month. I’ll report on it on a day by day basis along with both photos and some observations about the trip. Suffice it to say he had an excellent time overall.

He left on July 29, Connie dropped him off at the local airport and he was smart enough to get business class both ways…otherwise it’s simply impossible to sleep if you’re back in the economy section. It costs more of course…but well worth it in our opinion. Flights were all Delta but some of them were operated by KLM as their partner. He had a 2 hour first class flight up to Atlanta…after all you have to go through Atlanta to get to Hell as we all know…and then a 2.5 hour layover there before boarding his business class KLM flight to Johannesburg, South Africa…all 16 hours of it. They departed at 2230 and there’s a six hour time difference along with the 16 hour flight. While he really appreciates the excellent service in business class…serving a full meal at 2300 followed by breakfast 5 hours later and then another meal 5 hours after that plus a snack before landing is just too much food. His dinner was short ribs and mashed potatoes and he ate part of that along with a cocktail and some wine but then it was past midnight so he crashed and skipped the next meal. Luckily KLM has lay flat seats in business…which while not really comfortable compared to a real bed are far better than sitting up crammed in the back. He put on an eye patch and blanket and fastened his seat belt over the blanket so they wouldn’t’ wake him up and slept pretty well. And 16 hours later they arrived in Johannesburg at about 2200 at night. He picked up his luggage, cleared customs, and headed to his overnight hotel…the International Hotel which was basically 50 yards from the terminal exit. He checked in and basically went right to bed before his next flight the following day. 

After breakfast in the hotel, he got a late checkout as his plane didn’t leave until early afternoon and headed back to the airport for the 2 hour flight to Kasane Botswana. The city is located right on the Chobe River which is the border between Botswana and Namibia and since it was Botswana there was the whole leaving South Africa entering Botswana immigration thing but overall that was pretty easy. On arrival in Kasane the tour company…Pangolin Safari Company…picked him and 4 of his fellow clients up at the airport, the 5th one (Luanne) had flown into Zimbabwe for a visit to Victoria Falls which is just a 2-3 hour car ride from Kasane. They all met at the hotel, had a quick checkin there, a brief meeting with Steve and Rose Perry the workshop leases and then went off on the first game drive.

Slight aside here…the workshop was divided into 3 parts. Three days in Kasane staying at the Pangolin Lodge with game drives actually being boat drives on the Chobe River. Then a mid day flight to the Kanana bush camp in the Okavango Delta area about 200 miles southwest of Kasane where game drives were actually in vehicles. Then the flight back to Kasane and a boat ride to officially enter Namibia as the houseboat is registered in that country followed by another boat ride to the houseboat where they spent the last 3 days. Again…boat rides on the Chobe River but they headed upstream 15 miles or so and visited some of the channels and tributaries of the Chobe River on the Namibia side of the border.. I’ll talk in more detail about those as we get there in the reports on the trip.

Some general geography to orient you. South Africa is at the southern end of the continent and Johannesburg is over to the eastern end. Botswana is the next country north of South Africa and Kasane is at the northern border of Botswana about 350 miles from Johannesburg. Namibia is mostly west of Botswana but there’s a thin section of that country that extends eastward just north of Botswana and then at the eastern end of that thin section there’s a common border area with both of those countries and Zimbabwe. The Chobe River forms the boundary with Botswana on the south side of the thin eastward section of Namibia. The first and third sections of the trip were along the Chobe. The middle section was in the Okavango Delta area which is about 100 miles southwest of Kasane, you can see the delta swampy area as the green area in the map below. The camp they were at was on the island (named Chief Island) in the center of that green area. Kasane isn’t marked on the map but it’s just west of Livingstone which is visible and it is located right where the two red lines cross just west of Livingstone. The Okavango is the area just northwest of main in green and Chief Island is the yellow area in the middle of that green. The second map below is about 400 miles across both north-south and east-west. Of note…the Kalahari Desert on the left as it extends from Botswana into South Africa is the area where the recently completed season of Alone was filmed in South Africa. Victoria Falls is actually located near Livingstone and the river there (the Zambezi) forms the border between Zimbabwe and Zambia. Neil wishes he had known it was that close or he would have visited Victoria Falls with Luanne ahead of the workshop as well.

Also of note…remember that all of this south of the equator thus the seasons are reversed and it was pretty much the middle of winter there. In both Kasane/Chobe and Okavango…highs were in the high 70s to low 80s and lows were in the 40s. So…they all bundled up in the morning and shed layers as the day went on. Neil chose wisely with his wardrobe…a long sleeve wicking undershirt with a long sleeve safari shirt over that and a windbreaker over that. Add in gloves and watch cap for the mornings (and evenings as they sped back home after dark) and he remained pretty comfortable. On the boats Pangolin provided warm windproof cloaks that they mostly just tossed over their laps…and in the Okavango the camp provided hot water bottles and blankets in the trucks for the morning drives. They were all glad to have gloves and hats though.

Large map of southern Africa.

Zoomed in map with the areas they visited more visible.

All I can say is that it’s a long flight from Atlanta to South Africa and he was glad to have an overnight to recover from that before the trip actually started. I addition…the accommodations and food were simply outstanding overall…but then Pangolin is a higher end safari company and as expected you get what you pay for.

The Chobe River runs from a couple hundred yards wide to about a half mile wide and depth ranges from just a foot or two to probably 20-30 feet in the middle in some places. All of the boat rides were on a 25 or so foot long boat with 8 seats fore to aft…each seat had a nice gimbal to hold your long lens and plenty of space for the second camera on the deck. Seats swiveled so you could see both sides and get shots easily. Steve and Rose took the front and aft seats to provide directions to the boat driver and offer suggestions and the six clients took the other seats…clients rotated forward every boat ride so nobody got stuck with being in the back all the time time. There was plenty of water, tea, and snacks on the boat so nobody got hungry.

Food…well, they fed them 4 times per day. Rising about 0500 they had breakfast then headed off right after dawn for the morning boat or truck ride, returning about 1100. Then brunch which was really more like lunch and an hour or three to rest, download images, charge batteries and whatnot. Then about 1500 it was afternoon tea…the country was colonized by the British after all followed by the afternoon boat or vehicle drive another 3-4 hours arriving back just after dark. Dinner at 1900 or so every night preceded by cocktail hour of course and then some really excellent food followed by more image downloads and battery charging before bed. Rinse and repeat for the next 10 days…but on day 3 and 7 there was a flight to and from the bush camp in the Okavango.

Ok, with that as a basic description of how the trip happened let’s get to some photos.

Gathering around the Pangolin Lodge lobby as we all met up for the first time. The two ladies in the middle are Luanne who was on the trip to Tanzania with Neil last year and Lin with her walker. Lin is almost 80 and that walker has been to all 7 continents with her. She gets around pretty well but uses it to help keep up. On the right in the white shirt is Steve who is actually from Fort Myers. 

A shot 180 degrees from the one above down the first floor of the Lodge. The rooms are all up on the balcony walkway on the left and Neil and Steve were roommates the whole trip, their room was down the far end. He basically turned around after the iPhone shot above and took this one.

Headed out…the first critter was a Nile Water Monitor…this one is about 2 feet long and they are maybe 3-4 feet long at adult size. Very similar to the iguanas we have here in FL.

White Crowned Lapwing…a shore type bird about 15 inches tall…they have a couple of hanging pieces below the bill.

Bull Greater Kudu…a herd animal larger than an elk but a bit smaller than a moose. The horns reach the full 2 turns after about 3 years of age. Neil ate a bunch of these on the trip…they are red meat similar to venison or elk and very lean so mostly served with sauce of some sort. He wasn’t able to figure out if they’re farmed or just hunted for food. They probably saw 300 of them over the trip typically in herds of a dozen or two at most with an alpha bull, his harem and the youngsters that hadn’t been driven off yet.

Impala.

Pied Kingfisher perched then heading down to the river to snatch a fish. These are larger than the Belted Kingfishers we have in the US by about a factor of 2…and they move really, really fast.

About this time in the drive…our driver got a report from another Pangolin boat about a leopard upstream a bit. So…we put our cameras down and the driver floored it to get to that area before he left. The leopard was originally eating on a guinea fowl that it had caught but then a group of impala came down to drink so it tried sneaking up on them for a real meal…but the chase failed as they took off as soon as she charged them and the leopard gave up the chase pretty quickly. These were taken from maybe 20 yards offshore in the boat.

Headed back to the grouse after the chase failed.

And back under the trees enjoying the remains of her guinea fowl.

At this point…all 6 of the clients declared that no matter what happened the next 10 days the trip was a success. As it turned out they had more leopards later on though.

Nearby there was a Fish Eagle…very similar in both size and coloring to the Bald Eagle we have here in the US.

By the time the leopard and eagle were done it was getting pretty dark so they headed back to the dock…it was 40 minutes or so back and they got back to the Pangolin Lodge well after dark for dinner.

A couple other shots from earlier before sunset and the leopard.

Gray Heron…very similar to the Great Blue Heron we have in the US but not quite identical.

And a family of elephants having a drink at the edge of the river.

While waiting on dinner Neil grabbed this shot of a carved native outside of the dining room…they apparently believe in anatomically correct carvings in Botswana. This carving is wood and is about 4-5 feet tall…and pretty well done.

Cocktail hour and dinner ensued shortly afterward and they all went to bed pretty early as nobody had really recovered from the time change and long flights yet.

So…an excellent first day and already a successful trip…because leopard of course. They’re far less common than lions are in the area so getting one early on was a prime opportunity they took advantage of.

Interesting things found on the net.

Cyas.