Saturday 17 September - Rundu to Okavango Delta

CHALK AND CHEESE

This morning we crossed into Botswana at the Muhembo border crossing and drove towards Sepupa where we were to board our motorboat to take us to our houseboat for our two night stay. Even during the drive to our lunch stop the differences between Botswana and Namibia stood out for me, starting with the attitude of immigration staff – the Namibian side were all business while the Botswana officials were very cheerful and appeared to love their jobs and visitors to their country. We passed Botswana villages but here the huts are round and each hut usually had its own fencing, rather than a fence around the entire village. A few villages even had satellite dishes!

Botswana villages

Botswana has a population of approximately 2 million, similar to Namibia, but also has nearly that many donkeys. They’re everywhere, even standing on the roads and not particularly anxious to move out of the way.

After a picnic lunch of sandwiches and juice, we loaded our overnight bags onto an open motorboat for the journey to a houseboat on the Okavango Delta, our home for the next two nights. Like everywhere on this tour, travel times were grossly under-estimated – the hour transfer took well over two hours along the main channel, lined mainly with papyrus and reeds, broken occasionally by landing areas with trees and a small sandy stretch. One such stretch even had a large crocodile sunning itself in the afternoon light.

Landing stage for transfer to houseboat

Typical scenery in the channel

The majority of cabins on the houseboat were on the upper floor, two single beds per shoebox with one small triangular shelf over one bed, mosquito netting for each bed and facilities down the corridor. At night the corridor was lit by a small oil lamp at each end on the floor. The captain and his assistant cooked dinner tonight and we also sat around a large table eating, talking and swatting mossies.

Home for the next two nights

Sunset from the houseboat deck