We woke up to a beautiful day and got ready “to go caving”. That meant taking headlights and plenty back up lights, wearing a mask (from our previous experience there could be a lot of bat guano) and clothes that could get dirty. We firstly tried to climb up to a high point in the hills to get a view, but found the rocks incredible jagged and rough and we turned back. Before going into the cave we said goodbye our fellow campers who were heading south. It was strange to descend steeply down into the cave by means of a fancy stainless staircase. It must have been quite a challenge on our previous visit because it is very steep to get down to the cave floor. As one enters the cave, one becomes aware of a vast dark space. Our little headlights battled to illuminate the vast space, but we could make out majestic flowstone formations and huge stalactites and stalagmites. It really was a wonderworld and one can imagine how this would create a sense of awe to the San. To them this was a sacred space. Paul made sure that he made a line with a stick on the cave floor for just in case we lost our way. Previously we let out fishing line to make sure that we would find the exit again. We eagerly tried to take pictures and at times used all the lights we had at our disposal. Although we did manage to capture a bit of the beauty and grandeur of the formations, it simply could never do justice to what we saw. We slowly proceeded and there seemed to be an obvious route. There were many side passages, but most were very narrow or shallow. Stephen did try a side route but found a lot of guano and decided to turn back. The bat population was much less than on our previous visit and the guano was also not really a problem on the route we were following. We spent about an hour exploring and photographing and then suddenly realized that there was light ahead. And sure enough, just as the two couples had told us, we had walked a circular route and had reached the entrance again. This was a bit of a surprise. We must have penetrated much deeper into the cave system previously and we could not remember finding a way out without going back on our track via the fishing line. It was good to be back in the world of light again, but we were still overawed by the majestic formations. Back at the other entrance, we first enjoyed some coffee and then entered the cave. This time there was no staircase and we had to be really careful not to tumble down. This side of the system seemed to be much more impressive than what we remembered. We knew that there is a connection between the two sides and we had tried to find it previously without success, but this time we were just enjoying the wider spaces and the grandiose formations. It was very positive to see that the cave was still “alive” and that the stalactites and stalagmites were still growing. We did not spend too long exploring this side of the cave, because we still had a long way to go towards our next destination – the Tsodilo Hills. The track to the NxaiNxai San settlement was quite heavy going and took a while to complete. The settlement was substantial and there were a lot of properly built houses and administrative buildings. Paul and Petra were nearly talked into paying a fee by an “entrepreneur” for passing through the village, but Stephen and I just drove through. We were now on the new road and heading for the Aha Hills. It was a stony and bumpy, but beautiful road and we soon saw our first baobab. The hills are not very high, but the landscape is spectacular. Our GPS’s indicated a track turning off to a campsite and we decided to investigate. The track wound through the trees and we arrived at a magnificent campsite under huge Marula trees. The area below the trees was strewn with marulas and the elephants had obviously had a feast here. We had also read that there were two dolomite sinkholes nearby, but that they were difficult to find. This was a beautiful spot for our lunch and afterwards Stephen and I followed a track to see whether it would lead to the sinkholes. We turned back after a while without any success. We afterwards discovered that this site was called the Waxhu sinkhole campsite, and that co-ordinates indicated that the sinkhole was quite close but up the hill. We would have loved to camp here, but it was still too early. The gravel road heading north to Gcangwa was in good condition and we made good progress. The challenge was going to be to find the unmarked track we had seen on the satellite photograph that would take us north to Nxaunxau village. This track was not shown on any of our maps! I kept on trying things on both our GPS’s and suddenly and absolutely by fluke I put in the Tshukumutshu campsite marked on the Tracks 4 Africa map and the track appeared on our newer GPS! And sure enough, we found an obscure and very sandy and overgrown little track turning off in a northerly direction just outside Gcangwa. This had to be it. We decided to go for it. Initially the very sandy track passed a little settlement and as we left it behind, we suddenly saw a brown hyena hastily running off the track. It had been scavenging on a dead dog and the smell was horrendous. We quickly passed, but the foul smell hung around for quite a while. Soon we left all signs of human habitation behind and even the cattle tracks became less and less. The track was very sandy and overgrown and we could just detect faint vehicle tracks which must have been from a long time ago. We passed a wallowing mud hole which still had some water in it and there were very fresh elephant tracks. We would be following fresh elephant tracks along the whole route and the concern was that if we should encounter even one of these giants we could be in trouble. We would not be able to turn or reverse on the narrow sandy track!! So we just kept on hoping that this encounter was not going to happen! The Troopys at times had to just about “break” their way through the thick and very scratchy vegetation and we soon were talking about the “scratch alley”! Initially we cringed when we scraped through, but after a while we just kept going and wondered if we would ever be able to polish out the scratches. The track alternated between open tall grassland and low vegetation as we passed through the pan areas and thick shrubland and often wonderful tall trees. It was a beautiful track and even though it was heavy going at times, we could not help but marvel at the spectacular landscape we were passing through. The track ran for about 100km parallel to the Namibian border and on average was about 30 km away from it. To our amazement we did find some more of the concrete distance markers at 5km intervals. They had B 56W painted on them in yellow paint and the distance to Tsodilo could occasionally be made out!!! This track was actually an official road. Once again the elephants had played games with the blocks and none were in place! We now knew that this track had once upon a time actually been a proper route to the north. It was getting late and we realized that we could never reach Tsodilo. Just by chance a branch hit one of our empty yellow jerry cans on the roof and we jumped out to see what the damage was. Fortunately, the can had just been moved and nothing was amiss. While Stephen took the jerry can off to store inside the vehicle, I realized that we had stopped next to a very flat and very accessible area with a magnificent marula tree. This would be an ideal place for our necessary wild camp. It was a lovely site and we soon set up camp for the night and enjoyed our obligatory showers before the sun set. Some very old rusty tin cans showed that we were not the first to camp here. There was ample firewood and in no time we had a roaring fire going. It was a mild evening and we were all sitting around our campfire without jackets on. Mercifully no wild animals came to visit even though we had seen many tracks (even lion) along the way. There was a deep silence as we were sitting under the stars in this very wild part of Botswana. Khaudom was only about 30 km away to the west in Namibia and we knew how wild it was there!! As we got ready for bed, we suddenly felt the temperature dropping drastically, but we were soon tucked in and asleep. Our Marula campsite would prove to be one of our most memorable wild camps!

Geschreven door Leartravels