Day 2 on my Okavango Delta Walking Safari at Oddballs’ Camp begins at 5:30 (wake up call/visit to tent) with a light snack/coffee before heading out at 7am to start the first of two walks today.  My breakfast of champions this early is a power bar that I brought with me. I’ve sealed my foods in two plastic bags as if bears were strolling through camp – no Yogi or Boo Boo here – wrong camping trip!

I climb into my mokoro with my guide and we wait for the others to push off – we are the last boat in the group.  Watching the sun rise is pretty spectacular from the water and rather than take photos (I’m still a bit sleepy as we had some unusual noises last night, sadly, not animal but humans snoring) I just sit back and enjoy the ride and the stillness of the early morning.

We land the mokoro and start our walk.  Similar to last night, the land is barren and dry waiting for the end of winter that will come in a few weeks.  The difference today as we move further inland is the smell, today I don’t need to see the poop, I can smell it!  I feel like I’ve walked into a zoo and while that initially made me happy thinking the animals were nearby, it was the opposite – they had just passed through.  So the dance to avoid the fresh poop begins – my guide found this funny – I, on the other hand, was attempting by hopping and jumping around (not so successfully) a few ballet moves to preserve my hiking shoes as they were the only shoes I had for the next ten days.  So while yesterday, we saw animals quickly, this morning not so much, but at least it is entertaining so far for one of us.  My guide wears my backpack so I can carry my camera and easily access what I need while we walk.

My guide then stops (the rule was that I had to always follow behind him) so I stop.  He points over to my right and at first I see nothing but trees but then my first elephant comes into view- no telephoto lens needed, the elephant is right there coming toward us on what appears to be a stroll – they don’t usually go out alone I am told.  I am now on a animal high and want to see more – the impala were nice, the baboon and warthog cool, but this is the big time – one of the big 5 (elephant, leopard, lion, cape buffalo and rhino).  This will be the only elephant I see on the walking safari stay in Botswana but it was fantastic!  Me here, elephant there and just walking past each other as if we both belong here. Not sure how to properly express it – I wasn’t on a ride, wasn’t in a truck, I was just walking around and our paths crossed that day.

The elephant passes us and we continue on wandering and not seeing another person from camp until we happen upon the termite mound.  Everyone is gathered there which was a surprise.  We are directed to look in the distance and with the naked eye, I see something but don’t know what it is – I needed to use my camera lens to see the shape of one buffalo!  The guide said that they haven’t seen buffalo in about six months. We all have binoculars/cameras trying to get the best view when we start to see dust in the distance as the one buffalo swells to about twenty!  Despite the open landscape and the dry conditions, the buffalo were behind some trees so it was tough to get a clear photo.  Either way, this morning excursion was exceeding expectations.

The buffalo disappeared as quickly as they showed up – we weren’t sure if a predator was near them or not so we all dispersed from the termite hill (thankfully they were dormant as their mating season would be in a few months but the hill was massive) and continued with our guides in different directions.

As we walked, baboons ran down a tree so we stopped -it was a big tree full of them so we waited until everyone was out – just another day of walking in Botswana.

We made our way back to the mokoro (about 1/2 hour trek) and glided back in the water to camp to enjoy a well deserved hearty breakfast and to compare notes, stories and photos with the rest of the group.

I’ve been at camp less than 24 hours and have experienced so much, its a bit hard to process, although I have taken some photos, I have spent much of the time imprinting the sights and sounds in my memory because this is truly a once in a lifetime opportunity for me.