one week to go!

Greetings from Botswana! First internet opportunity in weeks and over 200 e-mails to respond to. Sorry if I haven’t written back to your individual e-mails. In a weeks time I can actually pick up the phone to have a chat or, even better, stop by to say hi (if you’re in Greenville)!

We have had a great time in Botswana thus far. Fortunately, the rain that had been bucketing down has stopped and we have enjoyed dry weather and cool nights as winter approaches. We started our trip in Ghanzi where we had interactions with the local bushmen both on a “bush walk” (showing us plants/herbs they use for medicinal purposes and plants/berries that they eat) and an evening of dancing and singing by the fire. From here we headed up to Tsodillo hills to hike and see the bushmen paintings on the rock cliffs. Crossing the delta on the rustic ferry in high flood waters was a thrill for the students and we spent a couple of nights in Seronga (where Paul was almost eaten by the dogs last July…but we didn’t visit those dogs this time).

In Seronga, we stayed at a community run lodge (giving the students a few nights off the ground), went out in mokoro boats (the dug out canoes) had great sightings of elephants and hippos, and then off to a village walk to see their clinic, primary school, kgotla (tribal space where the chief gives “strokes” for punishment if people misbehave or steal goats!). The students were fascinated by that! We crossed back across the delta via speed boat and spent the night at Sepupa Swamp Stop (since there was a line of 22 cars in front of the safari vehicles when they went to cross back over the delta via the ferry!).

After a quick stop in Maun to restock food we headed off to Moremi where we were inundated with flood waters and unable to make it to our original destination. After being stuck in the mud twice (once requiring all the students to get out and push which most thought was pretty cool and the second time 3 of 4 vehicles getting stuck for 2 and ½ hours in the mud), we decided to stay at a different destination. All was well. Nice animal sightings – impala, zebra, giraffe and the best lion sighting I’ve had in 2 years. We saw a pride of 5 lions including a small cub who was baiting the others to play with him. It was quite fun and we watched them for a good long time until the male got cheeky and decided to bite a hole in the spare tire on the back of Paul’s vehicle. Then we decided it was time to go.

We’ve been back in Maun for 3 days. Lots of programming here including a tour of the new hospital (which only has 14 doctors on staff for a hospital with 280 beds!), a lecture from the District AIDS Coordinator, student trips to the internet and shopping and a fun cruise out to Paul and my house at the ostrich farm for a pizza party and star gazing with the telescope last night.

We head off tomorrow for the final week of travel. By this time next week, we’ll be back in the states…hard to believe.
See or talk to you all soon.
Kristy