I made sure to be up before sunrise, because I wanted to catch the early morning sunlight falling on the tree from the east. It was once again a magic time of the day and the old baobab glowed in the morning light. We slowly packed up, almost reluctant to leave. We got a fright when there was a noise in the right front wheel, but it proved to be the freewheel hub that had not disengaged properly and it went away after engaging and disengaging it again.

The road to Tsumkwe, the “outpost” town in Namibia’s Bushmanland is now a made gravel road and in reasonable condition, unlike our first visit when it was thick sand. The old sign to the Bushman settlement that used to offer cultural tours was still there, but there was no sign to a campsite anymore. I wondered just how hard Covid and the absence of tourists had hit these communities. There used to be quite a cute little campsite and cultural tours were being offered from several settlements in this area. NGO’s had assisted in setting up these facilities, but it must have all fallen apart. The San simply cannot maintain their traditional lifestyle and need money to survive. Their social life had degraded and alcoholism has become a big problem. This all started in the seventies when the Bush War raged on the border with Angola and the army moved into the north of what was then South West Africa. Many of the men, who were excellent hunters, were drafted into the army for their tracking skills and the centuries old hunter and gatherer lifestyle fell apart. The women now became the head of the households in the absence of men and the adult males were introduced to alcohol. The women do not hunt and they could not live from gathering veld food alone. So the young women had to go to the towns to find work in households or on farms and many landed up trapped in city life and were totally unprepared for this. This all had a catastrophic effect on the lifestyle of the San. This was why a Dutch researcher was sent to the region to study this cultural demise. I had the privilege to be chosen to accompany her as a second year Anthropology student.

The little shop and fuel station in Tsumkwe had not changed at all. There was diesel available (it has been known to run out!), but this time we did not need any. Paul tried to use their compressor to inflate his deflated tyres, but the setup was not operational (as it was previously when we tried). We did not even try this time! The shop had the most basic of supplies and mostly tins. There was some white bread on the rack, but it was rather stale. The place really has a frontier kind of feel! It is amazing to think there was only a mission station and various San settlements with grass huts and people still dressed traditionally when I came there in 1971. On a later Ethnos trip I once again visited Tsumkwe, but by then things had started to change. We enjoyed the little group of cats that were lazing in the sun behind the shop, while we were waiting for Paul trying to get his tyres pumped. I was keen to go the Tsumkwe Country Lodge to see if it was still going. We had camped there twice before. The gate was closed, but it looked very well cared for. We opened the gate and drove to the campsite. There was some building happening and soon the manager arrived. He explained that the previous owner had probably gone bankrupt in Covid times and that the new owners were fixing up the place. They were building individual bathrooms in the campsite and all the rooms had received a revamp. This was good news. We had coffee in the campsite and filled up with water. We had also established that the pans were accessible, although there was still a lot of water standing. On our last visit we could not go there at all. The water levels then were too high and had even inundated parts of Tsumkwe itself. Shallow pans are dotted over the vast flat landscape and the area is a bird watchers haven. This unknown part of Namibia is also known as the Pannetjiesveld. Thousands of birds congregate on these pans when they fill up after the summer rains and the main NyaeNyae Pan can turn pink with flamingos thriving on the saline water. On the edge of the pans magnificent baobabs stand out like huge giants in the flat landscape and there is still a lot of wildlife (elephants, wild dogs, hyena, several antelope species and even lion) to be seen. Many San settlements exist in this wild world and they are trying to cling to some form of traditional life. The area was declared as a Cultural and Natural Conservation area in 1998 and the San are the custodians.

We initially were a bit unsure about our route, because it seemed to take much longer to get to the water than previously, but after a long and bumpy ride the vast pan, which was filled with water, came into sight. In the distance we could make out thousands of Greater Flamingos and closer to us Red-knobbed Coots, Red-billed teal and several Lapwings that were peacefully feeding in the water. It was an amazing and unexpected view and Paul and Petra were very surprised. They had heard us talk about the pans and now they could see what we meant! We drove to the high point and one had a view of birds as far as the eye could see. It was very hot and we could not spend a lot of time up there without shade. It would have been a great place to camp if it was later in the day. I was sure that there was a way around the pans, but our time here was limited and we still wanted to do the Boabab Trail across the pan. Needing to find shade for lunch, we tried to get to an abandoned windmill but the track disappeared. We eventually found some trees and stopped in their shade for lunch and Stephen checked our axle. It had started to leak again. We had to get to the other side of the vast pan and the GPS showed a shortcut. We knew from our previous experience that Tracks4Africa was very inaccurate in this area, but we decided to follow the “shortcut” track. It did head in the right direction, but it was very obscure. We landed up at a San settlement and it looked like a dead end, but an elderly San man very enthusiastically explained that the road did continue and directed us past the village. We eventually did find the main track again, but the Troopys suffered a lot more scratches. We were now on the Baobab Trail and soon we found our first tree giant. These ancient baobabs are huge and very photogenic. We took pictures from all angles and felt like dwarfs standing below them. Most had lost there leaves and were now “upside down” trees, but there were a few that still had their green summer leaves. This was rather strange. It was getting late and when we arrived at Gura Pan with its interesting hide, we decided that this would be a good place to camp. Stephen and I had a rather scary experience here when we came past late after attempting to find a Dorsland Trek Monument unsuccessfully. We were on our way to the Holboom campsite and encountered a group of huge elephant bulls here. They were on their way to the water and we had to get past the pan. It was getting dark and we literally had a race to get past them before they reached the water. I will never forget the dust and the ghostly movements of the fast moving elephants. We made it and managed to find that Holboom campsite that evening with the help of our GPS in the dark. We were on edge all night hoping that the elephants would not come past!

This time there was no sign of elephants at Gura Pan, but we camped close to the hide for just in case! We had our showers and found plenty of wood for our fire. It was a lovely place to overnight. There were lots of Coots and other waterbirds on the water, but no animals came to drink. The evening light over the pan was soft and magic and there was a wonderful atmosphere. Paul and Petra decided to make crumpets for supper and we used the fire for cooking. It was a lovely evening, but we were grateful for the fire to keep us warm. Was this going to be our last wild camp?

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