8615KM, 5 COUNTRIES IN 25 DAYS, (RR COMPLETE!)

[hennielowe]

Day 6:

We arrived today in Swakopmunt on the Namibian coast a bit up north. After 348km of poor roads ridden at a 80km/h average speed "flying" over gravel, sand and dirt, and having the bike to wobble at the rear and more worrying sometimes the front wheel too.

Globally, my wrist is better despite a sharp pain during the day but the voltaren and an improvised strap worked.

All of this puts the Paris-Dakar in perspective...

On the animal side, nothing ! Well one ostrich. It was too hot, up to 37degrees and we were too concentrated on the riding. The scenery was extraordinary. We crossed the namib desert, the largest in the world according to Abri.

We ditched the idea to see the red dune as we had a long degraded road ahead of us and wanted to leave early. Nevertheless, we saw dune "4", the highest in the world, still according to Abri.

We met plenty of people who were admiring our trip as there were few if no other bikers, only 4x4 on the roads. Some people ask us weird question, the weirdest was at the Tropic of Capricorn board an English lady asked if I was a Belgian celebrity to have such organization around. Others ask who are our sponsors.

We passed Walvis Bay where Abri's gps tried to find a restaurant or should I say where Abri tried to find a restaurant on the gps. We quickly had to forget about it. From there on we joined a tar road but it was sometimes completely covert in sand. Indeed, the wind blow sometimes up to more than 150km/h and we heard stories about cars being blown upside down.

As we arrived on the coast, the temperature dropped down to 17 degrees. The sky has been bright blue all day.

We had a drink on the beach in Swakopsmunt at a beach bar, 10m away from the sea. Hennie drove his Harley on the beach, 3m in front of the bar. This gives nice picks with the sunset.

Tonight we set up the tents in a camp on the border of the city. During the last kms we saw kite surfers, dune surfing and a lot of quad bikes in the dunes. Tonight we go to the restaurant.

Tomorrow is another day. We intend to quad bike in the dunes. The bikers might rest their wrists. Having to hold the handlebar with the vibrations is a pain. The roads look sometimes like ski slopes after being scraped with the chains traces in the ground.

We are going to eat, eland steak for me, Einstein for the others. The next 2 days should be quieter in terms of riding.

 

[hennielowe]

Day 7:

Today is a rest day. Pharmacy to get a strap for the bikers. With the voltaren it doesn't worsen.

I finally decided to go for 1h of quad biking in the dunes with Abri. It was extremely nice as we used the dunes as half pipes. The biggest one was 100m high facing the ocean.

After that I went to ride a couple of km in town and along the coast seeing the Sunday fishermen with their huge fishing rods. I visited the lighthouse and the salt fabric. This while the others updated the picks and the website.

The published picks are not especially the best ones but those easy to be published.

Tomorrow dirt roads but only for 178km. We have done more than 2200km so far.

We found the fishing boats returning from the sea and got  afresh snoek that hennie prepared for us that night!!

 

[nreyneke]

Lekker...  Moerse lekker....  :thumleft:

 

[letsgofishing]

I'm not laughing at you Fabian, but this is very funny
"We are going to eat, eland steak for me, Einstein for the others. "  :imaposer:

 

[hennielowe]

Day 8:

THIS WAS A BIG DAY

After a fresh night (18degrees) and an excellent improvised diner (snoek we bought on the street from returning fishermen). We left quite late as we had few km to do and needed the tents to dry up from condensation.

We left for 50km of tarmac. We stopped on the beach first to see a village that looked deserted. Then we stooped to see a wreck on the beach and where Hennie managed to put his Harley onto. I got stuck in the sand. Our tyres were still inflated for tar, my tyre is thinner and the bike is heavier. (Almost 300kg when filled up).

There were sellers of stones that we first thought could be thief’s.

Then, after a stop to drink and take some info about the rest of the trip in Henties Bay. We deflated the tyres for the dirt road. Henties Bay is a fishermen village where they found few diamonds in the past. The biggest marlin in photo was 260kg).

Only error of the day, to have forgotten to put sun cream resulting in a face and especially nose sunburn.

After 50km without seeing another vehicle we stopped in the middle of the desert to have a sandwich lunch on the car cap.

We then left in the middle of nowhere and a couple of km later there were, really in the middle of nowhere, stands made of wood and boxes. Women were selling stones. It's a tribe, the Herrera’s, speaking a bizarre language making tongue noises in between syllables. We clearly saw they were really poor so we gave them a lot of food and a lot of sweets to the kids. We gave beer to the man and I put a kid on my bike.

I've got mixed feelings. We did the max to help them and make them happy. They probably received more in one day then in years, yet the more we gave, the more they asked for. On the other hand, we had to split the food as they don't share. I was expecting a community to share but they kept for themselves what they received. I was also expecting them to show more gratitude but Hennie told me this is normal for this part of Africa. In any case, they will be happy tomorrow and at the end of the day, we were those born on the right side of the barrier. We talked about it tonight again around the fire. Hennie cleverly made sure the kids opened the sweets in front of us so they wouldn't be sold by adults.

We than headed to spitzkoppe. In the middle of the flat desert, we saw, in the middle of nowhere a series of concentrated mountains. It's spitzkoppe ! We arrived in the middle of the mountains. The roads are nice to ride, there made of dirt and sand giving opportunities for nice slides.

The panorama is extraordinary, absolutely fabulous ! It looks like an apache reserve. It is a natural reserve. We took a lot of picks of the bikes with blue skies. The sunset was magnificent.

We set up the camp under the sunset protected by 50m rocks, the car and the bikes. Indeed we protect ourselves against hyenas and leopards. Nevertheless, the chances are small as we packed up all the food. The most dangerous here are snakes, scorpions and all the ramparts. So boots and clothes are in the tent. We always have to check before putting on anything.

Tonight the stars are fantastic and I saw some shooting stars. We made a fire like usual except this time we are in the middle of nowhere. There is no water, nor toilets, well the spade is our best friend at this stage. It's the desert. The first village must be miles away.

For diner, they prepared chicken potjie with veggies, potatoes and onions and bread on the fire too. Yummy ! Hennie had promised me a surprise, something I'd never expect in the desert. I thought about swimming and other things are some places are called rock pool etc but understood it when the ice cream was brought out of the fridge. He had witnessed all the ice-cream I ate so far.

On another note I forgot to mention that in Luderitz we saw a whale breaking the surface in the far. And for Hennie, the most epic moment between Sesriem and Swakopsmunt was, after 300km of gravel and a sharp wrist soreness I said "I won't mind to see some tar again, fuck the adventure".

Tomorrow we leave for Windhoek, the capital before heading for Botswana. We should go towards less civilized places.

 

[letsgofishing]

Looks like you guys are having an awesome time!
Some great pics there  :thumleft:
Thanks for keeping us updated.

 

[RobCrouch]

Great RR... Love the Harley! :thumleft:

 

[hennielowe]

I'm not laughing at you Fabian, but this is very funny
"We are going to eat, eland steak for me, Einstein for the others. "  :imaposer:

I left it yust as he wrote it, he is french writing in english so its very funny!!

 

[hennielowe]

Day 9.

We left Spitzkoppe afer a very good meal in the middle of the desert underneath the stars watching for all dangerous crawling animals and listening to Nickelback. This place was just stunning but I understand there is more to come.

We left for 60km of dirt road with a few sand patches. When we arrived at the tar road, Hennie and I inflated the tyres again in some shade while Abri for more semi precious stones shopping.

While we inflated the tyres more and more kids came slowly towards the bikes to see what was happening. We hadn't any sweets left but they seemed happy kids.

The tar road lead us to Windhoek in the middle of more bush landscapes. Now this road seemed pretty boring compared to previous rides, uet we had to focus on overtaking trucks and cars and other cars overtaking us. It was in a way more dangerous than riding some dirt roads. This road is the main road in Namibia linking the capital to Swakopmunt, the main harbour. The temperature on my bike computer showed an average of 27 degrees.

Today was nice but less exiting than others. We arrived at 2.30pm in Windhoek and arrived in the lodge. Now it might seem meaningless to most of u but we have a bed and a hot shower. And it is refreshing to shower, jump in shorts and go and explore the city, which we did with a friend of Hennie before heading to Joe's bierhaus. Note that for the first day in many I don't have sand everywhere including my ears

Everyone in a bit of a strange mood today, not particularly bad, but strange. Probably because we are really in the the adventure now and because today seemed like a transition day between Namibia's first chapter and Botswana.

I stayed there for dinner with Hennie as Abri needed to sort out some business stuff and I guess he needed a bit of time out. We had Kudu steak and dom pedro for desert, which is a drink made of kulula (south african liquoe comparable in a way to baileys). Abri joined us later and fetched us. The mood and athmosphere is again at its highest.

Tomorrow we are off for 538km to Ganzhi and will enter Botswsna. We hope we will not be to long at the border. We have not much idea of what to expect there but we are looking forward to it. The two others seemed puzzled about taking a plane at sunset or sunrise to fly over the Okavango, as they prefered to spend money on taking out a boat to go and check the animals from closer. I told them I'd offer the flight for the three of us as I really want to experience both. So now we are up for a canoe ride and a flight in the Okanvango delta.

We are waking up at 5am tomorrow and hopefully I can sent more info.

 

[hennielowe]

Day 10

We woke up at 5am. By the time we packed up and filled in the tanks, it was 7am when we left the city. We headed East towards Botswana. It's a tar road but surrounded by bush fields. We saw male and female Kudu's including a massive bull. In the morning we drove at 120km/h but had to be very careful as the road was surrounded by high grass in which were a lot of Warthogs (facocheres), I saw 7 of them less than 10m away. They're amazing animals. We also had a chacal crossing the road in front of the bikes.

We also saw some more usual donkeys and plenty of cows as we are in Cattle country. We stopped at 9am after 180km in Gobabis for breakfast.

After that we kept on riding but it was too hot for the game to be out. We crossed the border with Bostwana.

That was no hassle except that Hennie's driving license went missing. In Botswana, it was pretty much the same landscapes. The aim of the game here being to go quickly from one place to the other to do what you want to do like safaris etc. It was still too hot to spot game. Nevertheless, compared to Namibia, there are no or few fences along the roads. We had to watch for more animal crossing, eventhough at this time of the day it was more about cows, donkeys, goats and wild horses.

Most of the petrol stations had no petrol so we stopped at one in a village off the road. A cow with massive horns decided to give me a nasty look so I had to make a sharp turn. At the station that looked like everything but a petrol station, the guys had rarely if not never seen a motorbike. One of them went balistic shouting "boura boura" and imitating a biker in front of my bike. At this stage there was too much exitement to be safe and we decided to quickly dash on the road again. We had to fill the Harley and back up vehicle tanks from our spare tanks that we carry in the vehicle.

After a last push of a straight 100km and a sore bum, we arrived in Ghanzi to fill up with petrol. This is were I had my first marriage request from the girl processing my card. We arrived at our camp site after a fence to keep the game inside and 3km of dirt and sand which I think I can manage well now.

As we came in, the farmer put his riffle on his shoulder and we all know what it means. Hennie cleverly got him to take us for a ride. So I jumped from my bike onto the game drive vehicle.He didn't shoot anything as we didn't have the opportunity. Nevertheless, we saw plenty of kudus, elands, impalas, steenboks, springboks and a wildebees (gnou). We also could admire vulture (vautour). And well, we saw two turtles doing a mating dance.
Chris, the farmer is an english man, a lovely man who has lived mostly in Zambia. He wears the typical farmer's hat and shorts, and has a greying beard. He drove us through to see it all on his farm: the game, the veggie garden, a dead eland bull shot by poachers etc. We were all on the vehicle with driver stopping whenever we'd request to.
We took stunning pictures of the animals. We actually Abri and Hennie did as Hennie is enjoying my Nikkon more and more and might even be converted. There are also cheetas (guepards) and lepards (leopards) around.

We then set up the camp and are careful with mosquitos are we now are in the malaria zone. So tomorrow we can't forget to take our malarone tablets again. We discovered the fridge in the vehicle goes on and off and hence is not keepong the temperature lower than 10degrees. Tonight we decided not to cook and go to the restaurant of the lodge. This serves two purposes, one we give a bit more of our money away to that gentleman, two it gives me one more day without washing the dishes from Spitkoppe (2days ago) I did promise to wash

Game is on the menu tonight and tomorrow we'll wake up at 5.30am to leave for a kill and another game drive as Chris needs some Kudu or Wildebees to supply his restaurant.

I organized a game tonight where eachone of us had to guess the 2 others highlights and low points of the day. Here they are:
Hennie's highlight of the day: seeing vultures in the wild
Hennie's low of the day: fridge problem / missing driving license
Abri's highlight of the day: the sight of the wildebees
Abri's low of the day: fridge problem
My highlight of the day: seeing the game on the road, especially the warthogs reminding me of the Lion king.
My low of the day: waking up at 5am to only get going at 7am. Amazingly I didn't think of the bank neverending problems.

Chris is now at the bar telling all his stories about cheetas, lepards and lions...

Exiting day ahead tomorrow starting with a game drive and then a 327km ride to Maun where we will stay for 2 nights and explore the Okavango delta.

 

[cable tie]

Lekker report! :thumleft: I camped at that same place in Swakkop 2008, they have nice showers! Man I think it is impossible to take a bad photo in Nam, that place is magical!

PS: That Harley looks flipping awesome!

 

[hennielowe]

Day 11:

This morning, I woke up at 5.30am very exited about the game drive, jumped I a shower and we all stood at 6am by the car, ready to go ! Not as impatient as the dogs though who were already in the car waiting.

On the way we saw 4 springboks fighting with each other or should I say challenging themselves. It was amazing to see them horn in horn. They cared more about the challenge than about us. Amazing picks again.

Then we saw a male kudu that Chris shot. He was wounded so he tracked him down with the boy while I had to sit in the drivers seat to keep the  dogs, shaking of excitement quiet. After a second shot we understood there would be kudu on the menu in the coming days. The bull was lying down.

Then we packed, drank coffee and left. After a 180km, we stopped for a biltong breakfast not only because we were hungry but also because Hennie fell drowsy on the bike. He reckons it's due to the malaria tablets so we'll have one more in the morning tomorrow and see otherwise we'll switch to the evening otherwise it might be dangerous riding.
During breakfast we saw a donkey car with people on the road.

After another few km, we crossed a vet border at Kukke to check on the foot and mouth disease. They just asked what meat we had with us and we carried on passed a gravel site were workers were busy preparing tar to tar the roads. All road in Botswana are pretty much the same and you can't see much as the country is flatter than a pancake. That is why we do have quick rides these days, between 100 and 120km/h. The only danger are the animals along the road. It might seem a bit boring but with the bee-gees in the helmet and an improvised dance on the bike it makes it worth it.

But we have a system for this. Indeed this is a human adventure too, and to quote Hennie, this is a "help your buddy trip", not a "fuck you ! buddy trip". We have radio in the helmet and can talk to each other by pressing a button on the left hand side by the gear clutch. One bike after the other was at the front. So we warn each other and said I don't now how many times "donkeys on the right", "horses in the middle of the road", "goats on the right", "car coming". It fell like a pilot giving explanations to the cabin. We trained for that as well and joked all the way. We didn't see Baboons in Botswana as we did in Namibia but there are clouds of white butterflies. Absolutely stunning. Obviously there are a few less since we drove through them. In Botswana, you also don't have as many beggars as in Namibia. People here are very proud.

We saw a rural village made of huts and we can only imagine the way these people live, as we would figure out how our newly settled ancestor were, wooden fences along the hut and cattle around. We cruised along as we will see more and better later.

The heat was difficult to handle. It's not as humid yet as we expected, even though we saw our first very white clouds in this trip, but with temp up to 38.5 degrees in the shade, it is difficult to handle. Abri is fine with the air-conditioning in the car, Hennie put his riding jacket in the water to cool himself down, a natural air-conditioning.

On another note, in Botswana, they don't accept Namibian dollars or USD (except for the latest if big amounts or very touristy places) and they rip you off on the exchange rate. They charge 20 to 25% !!!

Then we arrived in Maun. As we drove in, we were greeted by hundreds of school kids in uniform coming back from school. They were waving at us on both sides of the road. It was just amazing, I stood up on the bike and fell like I was arriving after a long trip into a crowd waiting for me.

Our booking didn't seem to get through the first camp and they didn't make much effort to give us a space with electricity so thank goodness we went for plan B and Abri went to check out on "old bridge backpackers". We decided to go for it and it's very nice. We are along the river, have pool and a bar along the river.

I called the bank but today is a bank holiday in Belgium so I will call tomorrow again. They are a pain but I will not give up on these...

I went with Abri to buy food while Hennie set up the camp. We booked the canoe day on the delta for tomorrow and the flight over the delta on the next day. We will fly for an hour over the delta with a Sezna 206 taking off at 7am for the sunrise.
Hennie took a fishing rod but I quickly realized he was more into chatting about fishing experiences with other fishermen than into fishing itself .

Nevertheless, we saw a fucking (excuse my language but there is no other word) sunset. I've seen a couple in Africa but that one my goodness. It had all the range of colours from yellow to dark red. You'll see the picks and think it's all fotoshopped.

We then went to the pool for a dip. We are now sitting by the fire with Hennie while Abri is face booking even though we tried to cut his electronic umbilical cord. We had a deep yet nice discussion by the fire while listening to music with the frogs in the background. We eating very food steak tonight and as usual: what's not eaten tonight will be for breakfast tomorrow".

Tomorrow Abri and I wake up at 7am as we leave for the delta at 8am to hopefully see elephants, giraffes, crocodiles, Kudus and smaller species. Hennie will fix the fridge, getting stickers for the car as we discovered we needed them for Zimbabwe, was the vehicles and sort out the picks which should be updated tomorrow night on the website.

Now a note about the reason of these mails. It's obviously to share our experience, to remember our exiting days as we see so many different things but it might also be an inspiration for a picture book that should be published about bike touring in Southern Africa.

Time to go to bed soon, good thing am knackered every night as I sleep with a snoring stereo

Hennie's highlight of the day: this morning game drive
Hennie's low of the day: fridge problem / drowsiness in the morning
Abri's highlight of the day: the sunset tonight
Abri's low of the day: the monotone road
My highlight of the day: the kids along the road greeting us
My low of the day: gravel on tar in a turn towards an rest parking as I arrived quickly and was surprised by it.

 

[hennielowe]

Day 12:

I forgot to say that yesterday I finally washed the dishes forom 3 days ago... well to be honnest I didn't do it but it cost me a tip of 9 Botswana pulas (1euro). Again tonight, I delegated to one of the guys working here for 10 pulas.

We had to open the tents and only leave the mosquito nets open last night, and it was still too hot.

We woke up at 6am, while planning an 7am wake up but this is late for us now and I must say the spider on my left arm gave me enough energy to stand up quickly. Hennie stayed a bit longer in bed and tried to sort out different things, not the most pleasant: stickers for Zimbabwe check, publishing the new pics on the website check, check for a nice place we heard of for tomorrow night (where there should be elephants and which is 90km up North to our original destination), washing the bikes and the car (although for the later hennie used the same trick as I used for the dishes). The fridge has officially given up, the compressor is out of use, so we regularly fill it with ice now.

Abri and I left on the day trip on the Okavango delta. We left in a flat speedboat for an hour to reach a village at the delta. We were then taken by a guide on a "Makulu" (sort of wooden canoe - pirogue). Abri was sitting behind me and behind him the guide was standing pushing the Makulu forward with a 3m long wooden stick against the bottom. The water was transparent. I cannot tell you how many birds we saw and all their color, today is very much a photograph day. We have nice pics of fish eagles and all sort of African cormorans etc. The makulu is 3m long and fits a man sitting but it's very low to the water, the edge is probably 7-8cm above the water. So it was difficult to hold some balance which made us a bit anxious about the cameras.

It was hot, very hot, with no shade and no movement possible, it took us 2h30 upstream to get to an island. We went through sort of clear water channels (we could see the fishes) in the middle of high grass and millions of water lyllies (nenuphares). Fortunately, it was too hot for the crocs and hippos to be active.

On the island, after a quick lunch, we walked for 10 minutes and saw baboons and neared 5 elephants by less than 100m. We came back and were offered a swim but we weren't so brave. We had time for a nap and time to appreciate the stupidity of a posh english mother and son that was on the other makulu.
As we came back onto the makulu to leave we saw 2 elephants from around 50m crossing the water. We then left for a 2h trip in the sun back to the village. These people have a special handshake in three phasrs. They shake hands as we do, cross hands and finallu shake hands again. It took me a couple of times to adapt. We took some pics in the village and headed home with the speedboat.

I then left on the bike to buy drinks for the coming days including Amarula... Love the Amarula on ice ! On the way back I froze when I saw a speedcheck and all the shit that this can lead us into. But they didn't arrest me eventhough there is no doubt they had all the reasons for it.

I was chuffed to receive pics of my godson from my sister/brother in law, who looks like a little boy and not like a baby anymore.

Then I translated all the first reports I wrote in French into English so Hennie car use them for the website or the book. That took a long time and I fell a bit anti social, yet wanted to get it done asap so I didn't need to worry. In the meantime we ordered pizzas as the thunderstorm seemed to come our way. But it didn't and hopefully all will be clear tomorrow for our sightseeing flight. We ate them around the fire as we had to leave the bar/restaurant area, that's how bad the music was. Abri was socializing with his laptop and Hennie spoke with an fellow English biker from cape town around the fire. That chap has been on his Africa Twin bike for 5month and went up to the Equator. Tonight he sleeps on the same camp spot as we do. Sharing stories and states of roads is always interesting as he comes from where we are going.

Generally it was good to have some day where each one of us did what he needed to or fell like doing but I'm looking forward to a day where we share a full adventure again. After the flight we'll head up North.

 

[LRFan]

Excellent report, great pic's and I love that Harley!

 

[hennielowe]

Excellent report, great pic's and I love that Harley!

thans :ricky: his name is fugly

 

[corcorlia]

Great stuff!  :thumleft:
There's some really great photo's!!!  Well done!  :thumleft:

 

[letsgofishing]

Once again, great stuff Fabian  :thumleft:

 

[Heimer]

Excellent report, great pic's and I love that Harley!

thans :ricky: his name is fugly

Great report hennie / fabian.

I am sure you are very proud of the what the harley could do. I had some doubts. I was proved wrong.

 

[nreyneke]

F*k nou word die kiekies darem bedonnerd...

Well done guys!!!!

 

[hennielowe]

Day 13:

This morning I woke up at 5am. It was cloudy which I thought wasn't good for the scenic flight. It got worse after my shower when I woke Hennie and Abri up under the rain. Nevertheless, when we arrived at the small Maun airport, the pilot said we choose a good day. Taking off in a Sezna 206, a 6 seater which we booked for ourselves only,  under the rain. We flew in between the thunderstorm patches. We were flying between 500 and 600 feet and were very lucky to see herds of elephants, hippos, girafes, buffalos. We also saw crocs, and 3 rhinos which is apparently extremely rare. We then landed after one hour in the rain again with challenging crosswinds. Hennie and I loved the flying and the sharp round turns above the animal.
It was just fantastic. If you come to Botswana, make sure you don't miss on that !!

The we had miced pies for breakfast prepared by the others while I started packing and washed the dishes the usual way, we had to finish packing in the rain.

We took of up North after filling up the tanks. After a 100km, we were stopped at a vet post to get our shoes in, I guess, a desinfecting liquid. The we had to go through a small artificial pond to do the same with the tyres and off we went.
After that there were a few cow carcasses along the road, god knows why. We still had to watch out for donkeys, cows, goats and horses along the road or crossing it.

We then went through a national park and bumped into a herd of close to 60 zebras. There was elephant dung on the road and tree pushed down which meant they weren't far away. On the gps, there was not much apart some indication now and again of a "baobab tree". The tar road conditions deteriorated.

We then saw on the side of the road a cow or donkey carcasse with 30 vultures eating on it. When we stopped they all left about 20m away. So we were hiding behing the car for 25minutes waiting for them to come back one by one, from the bravest to the cowards. We had then the occasion to take very nice pictures.

The road was nice though, we didn't have any rain, sometimes had sun but drove between thundertorms, one on the left, one one the right. We saw rural villages, huts in fences along the road, a girl pushing a bycicle wheel in Zogara as you see some kids doing it in tv programmes.

After a refill in Nata, we went 60km more up north and were told that this was the roads of the elephants, we saw a lot of traces of them but none in real. We all had the same feeling exitement to see one, yet apprehension as there are real risks. Fortunately, the road was tar and quite broad.

Then we turned left in a sand path for 1.5km. Goodness me, I'm so happy we didn't cross one of them. I wasn't focusing that much on the path but more on what could have come from between the trees. We arrived at the lodge. We knew this was an elephant place but were expecting a lodge with a fence where we could watch them. Well that is not how it works. You are in the middle of the park and wild elephants walk freely around. We didn't have to debate for long or vote, we decided to take a family chalet instead of pitching the tents. We then had a relaxed evening, eating a very tender beef filet we bought in the cattle country in Namibia. We watched rugby (SA vs Wales and the springboks won at the very end of the game) in the bar where there is a satelite tv, an open hut next to the swimming pool that was completely destroyed last week by the elephants. While watching the game, someone said we had visitors, so we all put our heads outside of the bar. Obviously, in the bar its very bright so when we headed just outside, our eyes took a while to adapt to the darkness and we could only realize that there were 2 bull elephants literally 2m away from us watching us, with their ears wide open. Maybe they also wanted to know the score of the game What a good decision not to pitch the tents. There is dung everywhere, broken trees and I saw a dung beetle in the kitchen.

We were not brave enough to walk the 100m back to our chalet in the dark and had a lift back as the other two guys in the bar, who gave us explanations on the roads towards the vic falls, knew the place and had their 4x4 parked next to the bar.

Tomorrow, we'll wake up early to try to see more and head towards the vis falls, Zimbabwe and maybe Zambia.

Highlight of everyone, all of the above and certainly the flight. No lows today.

Abrie washing the dishes as Fabian opted out!!