Luxury safaris in Botswana set up camps amid the animals
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OKAVANGO DELTA, Botswana -- It was a scene straight out of a Hemingway novel. Gin and tonic in one hand and slathered with mosquito repellent, I sat on the deck of my tent in this remote outpost in the bush, watching as a blood-red African sky began fading to darkness.
Etched against the sky, like cardboard cutouts on a piece of construction paper, a mother hippo frolicked with her babies. Every so often, she would heave her enormous girth out of the water, and a cascade of spray would arc from her mouth in the direction of the babies. Then they would silently submerge until nothing was left but three pairs of shining orbs staring back at me.
So goes cocktail hour in the bush.
Slightly larger than Texas, Botswana is just north of South Africa. Although it has the world's second-highest rate of HIV/AIDS, it also enjoys a reputation as one of the Africa's most prosperous and stable nations, thanks to a long-held and uninterrupted civilian leadership and a burgeoning tourism industry. With much of the land given over to national parks, Botswana offers an excellent chance for spotting the continent's big five game animals: lion, leopard, elephant, rhinoceros and Cape buffalo.
Intrepid travelers hoping to photograph them can do so in grand style thanks to the Orient-Express Safaris, whose trio of luxury game lodges provide access to the unsullied Africa of the imagination.
Eagle Island Camp at Xaxaba in the Delta is one of these "bush oases." From the air, the water of the delta looks like a shimmering silver dollar cupped in the brown hand of the bush. Technically a swamp, the Okavango is a life-sustaining source of pure water that begins in the highlands of Angola and snakes its way to the Kalahari Desert on a course so convoluted that it encompasses several diverse ecosystems along the way. At Xaxaba ("island of the tall trees"), it emerges as one of the continent's largest watering holes.
Hippos snort and fish, eagles screech, crocodiles slither off the banks and into the water, and species ranging from comical but dangerous warthogs to majestic lions inhabit the small islands that dot the swamp. Guests can do their game viewing on foot (for impala and red -lechwe deer), in an open-air SUV (the best mode of transportation for encountering lions and buffalo) or by mokoro, slender dugout canoes that are piloted around thick masses of water hyacinths for hippo viewing.
I tried all three and decided I liked vehicular travel the best. The reason seemed obvious, to me at least. It felt the safest. Because the viewing is done in national parks, no firearms are permitted, and our safari guide was armed with nothing more lethal than a large stick. Great for the lions; maybe not so great for us should the big cats not feel like being bothered that particular day.
Which brings us to the game viewing by mokoro. In Africa, it is hippos, not lions, that are responsible for most attacks on humans. Hippos, being very territorial, jealously guard their turf, making it an absolute necessity for the mokoro pilot to be able to maneuver his canoe deftly around the bloats of hippos. Organizers say game viewing of all types is done under the safest -conditions possible for humans and animals, and guides are trained from youth to ensure that these conditions are met.
Physically, the Okavango is a study in contrasts: a ribbon of green lacing a sepia landscape. Think Everglades before airboats and developers upset the area's delicate ecological balance, or Georgia's Okefenokee in its most remote reaches.
The Eagle Island Camp is the most unusual, but the other safari camps offer their own windows into life in the bush. Arriving at Khwai River Lodge on the outskirts of Moremi Wildlife Reserve, I was immediately caught up in the spirit of safari. Tall tales accompany tall drinks served in the open-air bar overlooking the Khwai River flood plain, and the lodge's viewing platform provides a front-row seat for the drama that is life in the African bush.
Khwai conforms most to the stereotype of a safari camp perpetuated by Tarzan films, although on a lavish scale that would surely have pleased Jane. Lodging is in thatched bungalows with a view of the riverbed where elephants, hippos, waterbuck and hyenas congregate at twilight for their evening refreshment.
After dinner, camp staff, armed with flashlights, escort guests to their tents, with an admonition to stay put. Any inclination to -disobey is squelched as nocturnal life in the bush gets into full swing. The roar of a lion, seemingly right outside my tent, heralds the trumpeting of an elephant. Suddenly, the flap of fabric, sturdy as it is, appears a fragile divider between man and beast.
Sunrise brings its own set of challenges. Tea and coffee service at 6 a.m. -- the camp's version of a wake-up call -- was delayed one morning when the tea-bearer was chased by a marauding Cape buffalo and forced to dive under a hut for cover. He arrived not long after, dignity and body parts intact, and announced with a beaming smile that breakfast would be served in half an hour.
Breakfast also was the focus of that morning's game drive. Our guide stopped the SUV just shy of a pack of wild dogs freshly polishing off their kill. Following in their wake was a scavenging hyena, with the bloody remains of his breakfast still visible on his mouth. The pack of dogs and the hyena, hunger satisfied, sashayed in front of the vehicle in a sort of canine conga line, oblivious to our clicking cameras.
The third site, Savute Elephant Camp, represents a stark contrast to the two other camps. Savute, in Chobe National Park in the rugged, semi-arid wilderness of northern Botswana, in contrast to the more lush wetlands of the south, teems with wildlife as diverse as the graceful giraffe (which has seven vertebrae, the same number as humans) and the less-than-graceful warthog (no count available on the number of warts.)
But, as the name implies, at Savute, one animal reigns supreme: the earth's largest land creature in all its dusty magnificence. One evening, our group noshed on wine and cheese laid out in white tablecloth splendor on the back of the SUV, alternately watching that spectacular African sunset and the herd of elephants enjoying their own happy hour in the muddy recesses of a water hole.
As I said, cocktail hour in the bush is definitely something to be experienced.
Orient-Express Safaris
Rates at Khwai River Lodge and Savute Elephant Camp range from $525 in low season (Jan. 1 to April 30) to $720 in shoulder season (May 1 to June 30) to $965 in high season (July 1 to Oct. 31.) Rates are per night, based on double occupancy, and include luxury air-conditioned tents with twin beds and en suite facilities; all meals, including afternoon tea; non-alcoholic beverages as well as beer and wine; laundry services; all game-viewing activities; emergency medical evacuation insurance; national park fees, and 10 percent Botswana VAT.
Rates at Eagle Island range from $800 in low season to $995 in shoulder season to $1,240 in high season, and include all the above as well as one helicopter flight.
For reservations, call 1-800-524-2420 or go to www.orient-express-safaris.com.
Note: Before visiting sub-Saharan Africa, check with your physician about what, if any, inoculations might be required.
First Published June 7, 2008 12:00 am
