Maun and the Okavango Delta

We spent three days in Maun and the Okavango delta. When we arrived in Maun and got off the truck, the weather was amazing. Going from elephant sands it was a welcome change. We stopped for money, water and snacks. The shoprite was crazy with queues - the weekend at the end of the month is not the time to shop! After a half hour of trying our best to ward off queue jumpers, we finally got to the front. The scanner didn't work all that well, so the cashier had to hand type each of the barcodes. After that and our second trip to the ATM since we decided we needed more Pula we were off to the camp in Maun. The camp was Sitatunga - delta rain. We set up our tents and started a game of beach volleyball. No one was that amazing, so we just hit the ball around. We eventually ended up playing a semi official game, but with no referee it was slightly difficult to make calls on whether the ball was in or out! We played more cards and then had dinner - pasta, spicy chicken something, broccoli and cauliflower, and white sauce. Sarah and Natalie all bought a passion fruit cheese cake in town for dessert. I think we also started the fine for calling the truck anything other than the truck or shire. Mo is thus far the worst offender calling it 'bus' six times.

The next morning we boarded an open truck with our day bags to head to the delta. 

It was pretty chilly on the truck, so we were bundled up in long trousers an hoodies. When we arrived a team of polers was there to help us in to makoru ( again I'm sure I am spelling this wrong). A makoru is a dug out canoe. Now they are made of fibreglass, but they used to be tree trunks. There were two people to a makoru and one poler. Natalie and I sat in Baeti's makoru. They made our mattresses into seats and put our bags behind they so we could sit. The ride was about an hour long through heavy reeds. We saw zebra on the way. We were instructed by the captain to not make any sudden movement or we might end up in the water with the crocs. It didn't help that Natalie is deathly afraid of spiders and we were told that dragon flys, frogs, or spiders might try to catch a ride on the makoru. It only happened once and I tried to be quite about it and fling the spider out, but Natalie caught on. I let out a small "eek" when it landed on me which tipped her off. She asked "is everything alright???" I said "yep, fine!" But she said said... "Everything doesn't sound fine!" In the end, it was fine and we arrived at our island. 

We set up tents and most everyone had a makoru poling lesson. I decided to skip the lesson as I had no desire to get the one set of clothes I brought wet! The captain let us know some rules - no wandering, no sitting on the upturned makoru (or table) and if the spade and or toilet roll were gone, someone was... "In the toilet" and rule was one person at a time!

I got a bit of a pep talk which consisted of "squat" and had a go at the make shift toilet. I'm not a fan of the squatters potties, but surprisingly, the hole in the ground was much cleaner than most squatty potties. Bush toilet was Jamie approved. 

We had pasta salad and sandwiches for lunch and say around playing more card games. 

At 430 we all got back in to the makoru to go to another island for a nature walk. We looked at holes, poo, and animal tracks. Learned that hyenas have white poo because they eat leftovers like bones. After our quick nature walk, it was back in the makoru to our island.

We had steak, potato bake, and salad which we shared with the polers. After dinner, they sang and danced for us, with us joining in at the end. We also played two games. One was a Simon says type game where the captain (who was now the chief) was Simon and he would call out head, chest, or bum in another language. I made it pretty far, but got confused when he said four things at once and took myself out of the game. I was better at the next game where we all picked African animals and then you had to remember everyone's animal. The chief would call "WILD DOG" (that was me) and I would have to say "chief" and he would ask me in another language what animal I wanted. I would then say "ELEPHANT" (that was mo) and the chief would repeat "ELEPHANT" and she would answer "chief" and it started all over again. If you hesitated, said something too early or called am animal that had been eliminated, you would be eliminated. I made it nearly to the end, with lion, elephant, wild dog, and tsetsebe left, but whine I was asking how to say/spell tsetsebe the chief started with me and I was out! 

The next morning we got up and took a game walk on our island where we saw a hippo, kudu, zebra and several birds. We then packed up, had breakfast and the polers took us back. This time I put my buff over my face, laid in the makoru and had a nap. The reeds didn't bother me so much with the buff over my eyes!

Back on the open air truck we headed back to the camp, passing several children who really liked waving to us.

We set up camp again, some had showers and my team's chore for the day was cooking, so we set up the sandwich station for lunch. After lunch, lots of people went in to town, but stayed behind and had my shower and attempted to hand wash some dirty clothes. I think my clothes are still dirty!

Once everyone returned from town, we played some drinking games, learned some German from the German girls and then started on dinner. 

We had steamed veggies, pasta, beef stew, and stuffed squash with sweet corn and cheese. After dinner we played some more games and I headed to bed early, but most people headed for the bar. We had a lie in until 7am the next day! Amazing!