by “Over there, two lions doing what lions do best. Sleeping” said our guide, pointing out that a lion is stretched out under a Kalahari apple tree. Eyes closed, legs sprawled, tail flicking from side to side. Next to her, the cubs were cuffing each other to Grabbing my camera, the words “absolutely amazing” came to mind until, a few yards away, I saw a baby giraffe, also stretched out on its side, but with two other lions gnawing horribly at its ribs. .
It was typical of the particular frisson you get during November in the Botswana bush. It’s the season that many herbivores produce their young, and meat eaters know it. It’s a great opportunity to see the baby animals at their best – as long as you understand that a fair number of them will be on the wrong end of a slaughter.
Samhain is also one of the quietest times of the year for tourism. Our summer is winter in subtropical Africa and is the busiest for safaris. It’s the dry season, when animals tend to congregate around shrinking waterholes and are therefore easier to spot, and it coincides with peak family holidays. In September and October, spring is in the air, and the temperature and humidity are rising as the unpredictable rainy season arrives. And so November is usually the time when the safari camps take a breather as they enjoy a quieter time before Christmas.
However, spring in Botswana is also a magical time when the bush transitions from the parched, dusty months of winter to the lush fertility of summer, flowing green as the leaves of the mopane trees begin to drop and the tree a great flame of bright color with it. a splash of red on the landscape. Exotic flowers, crimson fireball lilies, white bauhinia, aromatic wild honeysuckle, bright purple jacaranda and delicate yellow frangipani, bloom around the camps – and the jeep tracks perfumed with the sharp scent of wild sage.
And it’s not just about the flowers and animals. As it is spring, the birds are also at their most active. I saw many summer migrants, including the carmine bees, with their brilliant colors and distinctive long tail feathers, as well as resident weaver birds perfecting their exquisite nests on the branches of the acacia trees.
Egyptian geese, great white pelicans, blue-helmeted guinea fowls and the funny long-necked African ray bird were flitting at the water’s edge, and occasionally I caught an emerald flash of a Burchell’s tern or the bright blue of a wood kingfisher in flight. . . My forays into the bush echoed with the shrill calls of blackbirds and the “glug-glug” of coppertail cuckoos – and the night wasn’t very restful either, a cacophony of courting cicadas and mating bullfrogs echoing throughout the reed beds. swampy.
Even the bush floor was full of activity. As well as witnessing the drama of the large animals, some of my most interesting moments were spent watching dung beetles squeeze their huge fake balls into shape, before rolling them through the tiny red velvet mitts, and past sleepy leopard tortoises emerging from hibernation. , in an attempt to impress a potential person.
My plan was to explore this fertile and fecund season in the Okavango Delta region of northwestern Botswana from some of the more remote bases, namely Selinda Camp, Duba Plains Camp and the newly opened Sitatunga Private Island, all eco-comfortable stylish camps – a part of Great. Conservation of the plains – which are spread across some of the richest habitats for elephant, lion, hippo, leopard and cape buffalo.
Each camp offered different types of drives and excursions, but all had a common sense of drama and suspense. From the hyena, lurking in its hole waiting for an unsuspecting antelope calf to be separated from its mother, to the unblinking eye of a crocodile that is located like a hollow in the shallows looking for prey. And from jackals patiently waiting their turn to feast on a rotting carcass to eagles flying low in search of unsuspecting rodents. Most impressively, we saw a leopard that had become almost completely camouflaged as it quietly blended into the tall grasses.
But my most memorable encounter was by far the vultures, which began to gather near our jeep and as close as they wanted to the lioness and her cubs. They were watching the lions stuffing the baby giraffe as quietly, motionless and intensely as we were, but with lunch rather than photography on their minds.
How to explore Botswana
According to Jeep
Remote and beautiful, the Selinda Spillway is a water channel that connects the northern Okavango Delta with the wildlife-rich Linyanti and Chobe rivers. Within minutes of driving from Selinda Camp, we saw family pods of hippos wading in the shallows and bull elephants, mothers and calves as young as two or three weeks paddling along the water’s edge.
In the scrubby grassland, impala antelopes grazed alongside their long-legged, bambi-eyed offspring, and the horned sessebe, among the fastest animals in the bush, stayed close to their gangly, sand-colored young. Troops of baboons and vervet monkeys passed through the scrubby plain with children clutched tightly to their chests and warthog piglets cavorted around their bristly and tusked mothers, although far from the traditional beauties themselves, they certainly produced some of the the cutest and most attractive offspring I have seen, with their snubby snouts and flapped-back ears.
With a helicopter
A 10-minute air ride in a small four-person helicopter from Duba Plains was a great way to get a feel for the vastness of the region, a sense of space that you can’t fully grasp on land. And, from above, it also becomes clear why the area is described as a panhandle as the Okavango river channels into the region from the highlands far out Angola before branching out in long tendrils, which flood in the shape of a pan over the land . .
The lush green landscape was criss-crossed with hippopotamus trails, shimmering like snail trails, and we passed low over elephants as they plodded along their well-trodden paths, past white termite mounds so large they could be seen from the air. One of the most amazing moments was diving over a herd of Cape buffalo, close enough to make out their big, dark and terrifying curved horns.
On foot
A 40-minute boat ride along the Okavango from Sitatunga, its banks fringed with papyrus and reeds, brought us to a disembarkation point on a small island, where we followed our guide quietly and in single file past sausage trees, feverberry groves and logs of elephant palm.
Pointing out the centuries-old baobab trees, and clusters of milkweed, where African monarch butterflies fluttered, our guide showed us how to recognize hippo and antelope tracks in the sand and explained how elephant dung contained berries which would be rich collections for the baboons and them. hyena dung, tinged white from scavenged bones, created calcium-rich food for turtles. Trials by the puff jewelers were tracked in the dust and showed us holes in the river bank where there were water monitoring lizards.
Fundamentals
Cazenove+loyd (020 7384 2332; cazloyd.com) offers tailor-made travel to Botswana, with six-night stays at Selinda Camp, Duba Plains Camp and Sitatunga Private Island (two nights in each camp) from £9,860 all-inclusive, with private transfers, based on two shares. A two-night add-on at Mpala Jena Camp in Zimbabwe (for Victoria Falls) starts at £2,200. British Airways (ba.com) can fly from London to Johannesburg or Cape Town from £714 return.
