Running from a buffalo while bush camping at the Okavango Delta – Explore Southern Africa – Day 04

Initially, I was quite excited (and a bit scared) about the fourth day of the tour: we were going bush camping at the Okavango Delta! Unfortunately, the day started terribly.

A bad start

As you remember from previous days, I was sharing tent and seats in the bus with Sh. Well, turns out Sh could not sleep past 3am because she napped for five hours the previous day in the truck. Because of that, she decided to start repacking all her things at that time. That included screening the tent with her torch. And of course, opening and closing half the zippers in Botswana. She woke me up more times than I most likely remember even though I was sleeping with earplugs. At the same time, she woke up people in two other tents nearby.

At some point, about an hour and a half before we actually had to wake up I just asked her to please stop making noise. And I agree, it may have sound dry and direct, but she stole two hours of sleep from me and I am mean when woken up without necessity. Thankfully, by that time she had finished packing and repacking everything. Including her sleeping bag. And so she left the tent.

Completely awake, I ended up giving up and heading for the shower. We were facing three days and two nights of bush camping at the Okavango Delta. If you don’t know what that means: Camping in the middle of nowhere. Without access to water to either drink or shower. And the best part of them all: without any barriers between the animals and you. Because of that, I decided to have my shower that morning to try and start that experience as clean as I could.

Breakfast and pick up to start bush camping at the Okavango Delta

After spending another hour just reading by the fire and enjoying the chill morning, people started to emerge from their tents. Some of them ready for a shower. Others just about to finish packing and heading for breakfast. Then Sh came and apologize saying that she works nights and so she wakes up very early. Also, because she had slept five hours the day before on the truck, she was just not very tired. I told her that I understood but that if we were going to be sharing a tent, she had to try and be quieter. At this point, she just got very offended and said that she would see if we could change tent partners. To be honest, I got lost at this point, but I could not really care.

Since I was awake earlier than the sun, I helped Ir preparing breakfast. And we had a feast yet again. Scrambled eggs (fried eggs for me), bacon, beans, toast, Nutella, jams, fruit… anything and everything you could imagine. Then, while I was eating, I finally got to enjoy some WiFi. I uploaded a couple of pics to Instagram and contacted my family. And I also informed them that I was going to be unreachable for the following three days.

Before leaving

Breakfast was supposed to start at 7 but since I was up at 5, by 6.30 I was done. Unfortunately, many more people were awake earlier than expected and the people who actually woke up to have breakfast at 7 felt as if they were late. And many of them were not very happy about this. In any case, by 7am all tents were down and we were having breakfast. Then I asked G how often would mokoros (boats), turn upside down in the Okavango Delta. This question had half of the group cringing, until he told us that is not common. Yes, it can happen, but it is not common. Also, G added, I could not go bush camping at the Okavango Delta without a camera. And so, I decided to bring it camera along.

G and E, our guide and driver, told us to leave most of our luggage in the white elephant. G would join us bush camping in the Okavango Delta, while E would stay behind with the truck and our belongings. The truck also had a safe to leave anything we thought valuable, as we should only carry on us a small backpack with a change of clothes, the camera and the bottles of water that we purchased the previous day. I ended up carrying to small 20L backpacks, one with snacks, another with a jacket and a change of clothes. Separately, I took my camera, in hand to capture any animal we may have seen on our way to the Delta. And the two 5L water bottles.

An interesting trip to the Okavango Delta

At 7.30 two very big open vehicle trucks with a trailer showed up in our camp. We loaded everything. Looking by the end of it as a gipsy family moving countries. And then by 8, we left. In summary, about 45min of the trip was on road, the rmaining, about an additional hour and a half, was on very white and super fine sand. There was sand in the air, covering the truck, covering ourselves… Everywhere.

In addition, the road (and I am generous saying that that was a road) was framed by white spiky trees that often invaded the road. Consequently, we would be repeatedly slapped by their branches while trying to cluster together in the center of the truck to avoid getting hurt.

When we finally made it to our destination, we were all covered as much as possible in scarfs and chemises to try and minimize the amount of fine sand we were breathing in. The sight was quite interesting if you ask me.

First time we saw water in Africa (with a dual meaning)

Covered in white dust and after regretting not bringing a sports bra to the safari (it was a bumpy road), we finally started to get out of the open vehicle. And right there, one of my bottles felt off the truck and broke. I asked one of the guys there to please turn it upside down to save as much water as possible, but I ended up losing a good half of it. Trying to savage the mess, I filled in my two reusable water bottles, filled the other bottle to the top and split the remaining with other people in the group. While everybody else assured me that if I needed more water, they would give me some. Such a nice group of people if you ask me!

Then, I had the chance to really take in the landscape and the Okavango. In summary, it was just beautiful. Water everywhere and, for the first time, also greenery. Birds were chirping here and there and the mokoros were laying there just to take us in. It looked like it was going to be a good day.

Mokoro trip to our private island for bush camping at the Okavango Delta

After landing and getting introduced to all the polers that would take us to our camp site, we paired up and chose a random mokoro. I decided to ask A (the American sleepy girl from day 1), if she wanted to join me and off we went. We ended up in a mokoro with Baleh (probably not the right spelling), one of the most senior polers. And we left.

It was beautiful to see them all pushing us through the Delta. However, few minutes after leaving the riverside, Baleh brought us back so that we would close the entourage. When we asked why, he explained that for safety reasons, they had a senior poler in the front, one in the back and one in the center. And… then we relaxed.

The whole trip took a bit over a couple of hours. During this time Baleh told us about the animals and plants in the Delta as well as a little bit about himself. Soon after starting the trip we saw a local fisherman, followed by our very first hippo. The feeling of being in a very small boat meters away from some of the most dangerous animals on Earth… it is quite something.

A small pit stop

Halfway through the trip Baleh stopped next to a small lagoon along with the rest of our group. There, we could see a small group of hippos, popping up now and then from underneath the water. And behind them there were also a few elephants. While we were waiting for the rest of the people to board again on their mokoros and sail, Baleh also got a massive elephant poop and showed us the fibers inside. He explained that when the grass is not well digested, and present in big fibers, it is because the “producer” elephant is older than 15 years. According to him, their molars get worse as they age and because of that they chew less, producing more fibrous poop.

Back in the mokoro and ready for bush camping at the Okavango Delta

After we made it back to the mokoro, A asked Baleh which was the animal that he liked the least in the Delta. He told us that the animal he respects the most was the hippo, but that he preferred not to tell us bad stories about them until we made it back from the trip. Instead, he showed us quite some water lilies and explained the difference between the day water lilies and the night ones. And after such nice things, he proceeded to name all the different poisonous water snakes he knew lived in the Delta. Yay.

Two and half hours under an impressive sun and sweating like pigs, we arrived to our small island. We had lots of shadow and a relatively big area to set the tents. When I arrived, Sh was already starting to mount the tent by herself, but had not decided where. So I went and put it under a tree that we saw. Once the tent was up, the cute couple of brits, D and C, told us that it was their spot. Since our tent was up, they agreed on leaving the place to us. Thank you for that guys. To date, I am still sorry that I ended up kind of stealing your place.

How to go to the toilet bush camping

While we were busy mounting our tents and setting the chairs by the fire, the polers were preparing the bathroom. When I realized what bush camping really meant, I was sure I was going to end up squatting for three days straight. I was pleasantly proved wrong.

Our polers dig a hole on the floor. Then, they put a chair on top of it where, instead of a sit, there was a toilet seat. On top of it all, there was a square tent around it for privacy. It was awesome!

Safety bush camping at the Okavango Delta

Once we were all set, the polers proceeded to give us some safety rules to move around camp. First, during the day, we were not allowed to move outside of camp alone. Second, after sunset, we had to ask any of the polers to take us anywhere we wished to go. Under no circumstances we could go outside of the campsite without them.

With these instructions, we ate some hotdogs that Ir had prepared in the meantime. There were numerous toppings and, though simple, we had as usual a very nice lunch.

Our private pool while bush camping at the Okavango Delta

After taking good care of our lunch, we had a few hours to kill. While some people decided to stay by the fire chatting, some of us went to a small pool next to our campsite. Baleh was the poler on charge of taking us there and he promised that there would be no hippos around. I was not a hundred per cent sure of the whole situation but I decided to assess it all myself.

We made it to the “pool” in less than five minutes. But it was so extremely hot that as soon as we got there, we all went straight into the water. It was a natural pond of sand and just a few patches of grass here and there. Also, because the deepest part of it may have been less than a meter, we knew that there were no hippos with us. However, in the pond next to ours there was a small group of what we thought was three hippos.

Side note: we discovered later that there were many more. From up close.
After soaking for over an hour, we decided to make it back to the tents feeling a bit better after getting rid of all the dust and sweat from our trip to the campsite.

Sunset walk 

Once we were all back into our clothes, we chat by the fire for about an hour. Then, we were taken again to the small pond where, with the mokoros, we crossed to the other side. We were then asked to split into groups of six however we saw fit. I ended up in a group with A (American girl), K and C, the two Irish ladies, as well as R and I, the Scottish and Brit couple of friends. Then another one of the polers just came by and introduced himself as our guide for the evening: Momeht. Again, sorry for the spelling. Along with Momeht, we also had a second poler who’s name I cannot remember that was going to be closing our walking expedition.

Because Momeht was also a senior poler, our group was again the last one leaving. Although in this case, we were all departing in different directions. Right before leaving, he also explained us the basic safety rules that we needed to follow: always walk on a straight line. Never stop in front of a hole when you can’t see the end of it (leopards love sleeping in these holes). And above it all, always stay far away from the animals. You need to respect them. As a general advice, he told us, 50 meters for all animals except for water buffalos, where this distance should be a minimum of 100m.

Hands-on class: how to survive a water buffalo

After the short introduction, we started walking. Not even five minutes later, our guide stops on his heels and very seriously tells us to go back. A water buffalo has spotted us and is looking at us funny. We just turn and walk at a slow pace when Momeht starts rushing us to go faster. Turns out the wind was against us, the buffalo had scented us and decided to start chasing us. Half hysterically laughing, we followed our second guide. Following her footsteps, we climb a termite hill when we see the buffalo. Right there, still moving towards us.

At that point, we were still half joking, half seriously worried about the situation. Momeht then decided that we would cross over to another area so that we could get behind the buffalo without him actually seeing us. This would lead us to have the wind in our favor so that the buffalo could not scent us. And so, quite fast, we followed Momeht to cross over to the other side of some trees. Which was across from our camp. Where we had seen a couple of hippos in the water before.

Definetely not two hippos

While we were kind of running with the buffalo in our backs, we crossed over to the other field to find a group of about eight hippos staring at us surprised from about 10 meters away. Our second guide, as surprised as we were, was faster on her feet than us and started telling us to f*ing run. Period. Laughs were non-existent at the moment, and we run across the field to finally go back to the “buffalo area”. And during that time, somehow crazy R got a picture of the hippos! Momeht climbed a second termite hill and there, we saw the buffalo looking at as from afar. He knew we were the same ones he scented, but besides looking at us funny, he stopped the chase.

Team Buffalo

The, our previous situation sunk in. And how lucky we had been. We started joking about how Momeht was our savior. How he just kept us alive. Then the joking about offering A as a sacrifice if the water buffalo came back started. And We could not stop laughing, and even Momeht found us crazy while he joined us cracking up about the hippos and the buffalo. And in the middle of all of this, we decided to name our group team buffalo.
Additionally, we unanimously agreed to stick to Momeht in any future trip while bush camping at the Okavango Delta.

The remaining afternoon tour

The tour lasted for another two other hours. During that time, we saw a big group of giraffes, behind a quite big pond full of hippos. Then, we saw another two buffalos from afar and joked again about sacrificing A to them. Later, Momeht told us about how to difference between the poop of male and female giraffes, the male one having sharper edges because male giraffes have stronger jaws. And turns out giraffes are also antelopes. Who knew that?

After that, we saw a few (other) antelopes and zebras. Along with an area that should have been flooded but that instead, it had burnt days before and was as dry as it gets.

Finally, he also gave us some more information about the importance of three specific animals in the maintenance of the Delta. These animals were elephants, termites and hippos. The first ones, by eating seeds from plants and then leaving them in other areas while they defecate. Then, smaller animals eat the seeds that accumulate on the feces and then take them to even further areas. It is the natural way of plants to find new habitats to colonize. Termites, on the other hand, create solid land for these plants to actually grow. All across Botswana, there are these, some huge, some smaller, craters that are the termite hills. And the Okavango delta was packed with them. Finally, the hippos are important for the Delta because they are basically bulldozers. They will go from bay to bay opening canals and allowing the water to keep on flowing while “cleaning” any blockage.

Sunset at the Okavango Delta

When we started heading back to the camp, we decided to stop on a small termite hill to take in the views. Then slowly, the other groups joined us and told us about what they had seen and done. And we proceeded to explain our near to death expression. Yes, we may have been a tad dramatic, but we had some fun. Interestingly, while all groups had been told to be quiet to see more animals, Team Buffalo was heard all over the valley.

On our way back, we also saw that all the giraffes were moving towards one direction and I asked if this was their normal behavior. Momeht told us then that these animals often go to islands where people sleep to be safer from bigger predators through the night. I found that fact quite interesting, at least we humans are of some use.

Dinner and how to go to the bathroom at night

We arrived to camp and dinner was waiting for us. Fantastic as usual, Ir was the best cook ever. We had some fun around the fire while sharing our near-death experience and listening about what the other people had witnessed.

Then, before going to sleep, they told us about the necessary precautions in case we had to go to the bathroom during the night. First, if we had to pee, go by the tent. In case you needed to go number two, then you had to screen the bushes with your torch looking for eyes. If the eyes were green, proceed with caution, it would be, most likely a rabbit or an antelope. In the case the eyes reflected were red, we had to retreat very slowly to our tents and wake up our tent buddy or one of our polers. Because if that was the case, we had a lion on camp. No need to say that I went to bed dehydrated all nights to make sure I did not have to visit the bathroom.

Star photo shooting while bush camping at the Okavango Delta

After that cautionary tale, we stayed by the fire for a while. Considering that I have never been as far away from civilization as I was back then, I decided that I wanted to go see the stars. And soon most people in the group decided to join too. When we were about to go outside the camp, even if it was only two meters away from the polers, G told us to stop. We could not go out without one of the polers. Hippos are very active at night and they were meters away from us. Agreeing, one of the polers joined us and we all stared in awe at the stars. It was possible to see the full Milky Way. Along with more stars that I have seen in my entire life.

Once we went back into the camp, I decided to play with my camera to find the best settings to shoot that sky. I had read some guides about it before leaving and I had some idea about how to get it. However, in order to get proper shoots, the best thing was to just test it. R and I played with our cameras for a while and got some nice shots.

Soon after that, I was heading back to the tent to sleep. I was awake very early and it had been a very long day.
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