So this trip so far has been all Botswana. I started off in the Kalahari, went to Nxai Pan and the via Maun continued to Khwai in the Okavango Delta. Again via Maun I continued my way down to a place I’ve never been before.
Almost a year ago we came from Matopos National Park via Khama Rhino Reserve and went to Gaborone. I needed to get the radiator of my car fixed and afterwards we drove to the Kgalagadi. That wasn’t the best experience for us though and you can read here why not. But anyway, in Gaborone I got to know Joel, who’s also a photographer with a big heart for the bush, but not always enough time to get there. And so this time we decided to do a trip together to a rather wild area and for that we needed a tracker. Joel brought a friend of him, Gerald and on the way we picked up the tracker. That resulted in my car being packed up quite seriously…
Zutshwa is a former hunting area right before the Mabuasehuse Game Reserve (Kgalagadi). At this point there is zero toleration when it comes to hunting (and of course poaching) in Botswana. It’s a very strict policy and when it comes to poaching they even have a policy to kill.
Anyway, because of a formal hunting history the animals tend to be quite skittish. So not only did the tracker come in handy, it was also hard to take pictures of bigger mammals since they are clearly not that at ease with people being around if you compare it to some other regions in Botswana. Snakes however we found plenty!
It was our (or at least my) first time with a tracker. We don’t have a fancy trackers’ seat in front of the car and having him on the passenger seat would make no sense, so we were creative and did it this way:
Camp life however is everywhere the same: from setting up the tents…
… to cooking, having dinner and doing the dishes and have a nap every once in a while…
My ultimate goal was to find an aardvark. I didn’t succeed although I came really close. We saw lots of fresh signs and evidence of aardvark activity. Luckily difficult goals are reusable… 😉
We did however found a big group of vultures on a recent kill with a jackal trying his best to scare off the vultures by biting one of them. He wasn’t very successful in the end in eating on his own so he simply took a piece with him and went home…
We also saw lots of springbok and I played a bit around with some panning shots.
The weather was still quite shaky, so we also had some rain an thunder here and there. But all together, it was a lovely little trip!