Chobe National Park, Kasane, Botswana

An amazing three days in Chobe National Park near Kasane, Botswana.  Here are some of the highlights.

There are a lot of pictures; it's easiest to click on the first picture, then use the right arrow to go through the pictures.

King of the jungle keeping an eye out as his pride feasts on a zebra nearby

Leopard evaluating how to catch one of the nearby baboons

Leopard deciding to take a siesta instead

Rare roan antelope

Friendly Chobe River local

The most dangerous local in the Chobe River

The Batswana (people of Botswana) simply refer to them as "the Giants"

Monitor lizard with an amazing blue tongue

Little Egret looking for fish

Lion feasting on an elephant while the vultures wait impatiently for their turn

A beautiful bird, known as the white crested helmetshrike

These birds eat mites off of not just impalas, but many other creatures in Chobi

Vultures actually blend into these types of trees very well

Elephants getting a drink and staying cool

Huge Marabou stork - four feet tall!

Guinea fowl which are running everywhere

Red-billed hornbill (Zazu from the Lion King)

Even if you knew what you were looking at, it'd be hard to see this without getting really close.

Just taking a nice river stroll along the beach

"Pleased to meat you, Mr. Lion."

Zebras look fake, even when they're right next to you

Baboon army advancing

It's Baboon Man!

Lovely sunset over the park

Hippos are amazing; they can hold their breath for six minutes underwater and close their nostrils while swimming

Kudu antelope

"It's my grass!" "No, it's mine!" Guys, there's a whole park's worth of grass out here.

A baby fanny pack

Look! A distraction!

Lilac-breasted roller

African Fish Eagle

Super cute, fuzzy jackal - Alex wants to bring one home

A small portion of a large cape buffalo herd kicking up dust

Baboon tree house party

Rare long-haired baboon sighting

Warthog staring us down

Endangered ground hornbill

A cape starling looks like a bluer raven with remarkable orange eyes.

Rare, shy, and endangered sable antelope

Even more rare sable unicorn

Irek found Keri again!

Slender mongoose

Hamerkop

"I'm not done eating yet!"

It's nap time 5 minutes after waking up... again

One of many impala herds that grazed everywhere

Ending our day with a little yoga
The handstand is called a 'double stag'

What's Africa Like?

     Today, I am going to tell you about the culture of Africa. In Botswana and South Africa (yes, it's a country), everybody is super nice. They all say hi to you when you pass by, and some want to start a conversation with you or get you to come back to talk again! It's nice to have friendly people around!

     They also have really cool handmade things to sell. They just set up their little shops on the side of the street, and you can look at all of them from your car! Everything in Africa is cool!

     From,
     TTC (Katie)

A long drive to Kasane, Botswana

We've had two long days of driving to get from Johannesburg, South Africa to Kasane, Botswana.  It wasn't the easiest drive:

• Jet-lagged from 20+ hours of flying and an eight hour time change.
  
• Driving on the left side of the road for the first time.  I'm mostly used to it now, although I still reach for the shifter with my right hand out of habit.  And I still instinctively want to pull off the road on the right side...
  
• Some really bad roads, especially for about 200 kilometers approaching Nata, Botswana from the south.  Dusty dirt road where it was under construction, and a falling apart road where it wasn't under construction.  I'd heard the road had a lot of potholes, but didn't realize that meant the sides of the road had eroded off, leaving less than two lanes with high-speed semis going both ways.

• We tried to avoid driving at night, but after delays at the car rental and border crossings (there are six different stops to get from South Africa to Botswana), we ended up driving in the dark for an hour.  There are always goats, donkeys, and cows grazing along the highway, and they are a lot more dangerous in the dark.  We had one particularly close call, where we could see all of the brown cows next to the highway, but not the black cow walking down our lane.  Here's what a black cow on the highway looks like in the dark:

The good news is that we've started to see some amazing sights including:

• Three groups of elephants.  The first elephant was walking across the highway ahead of us, and looked straight out of Jurassic Park.  Due to Botswana internet speeds, we'll have to load an elephant picture later...

• A monkey at the entrance to Botswana.  We didn't get a picture of the monkey, but here's the entrance to Botswana (between the fifth and sixth checkpoints):

• A bunch of warthogs, including these:

• And ended the day with a sunset over the Chobe River in Botswana.

Tomorrow, we start a safari in Chobe National Park for a few days.