Change In Plans

Greetings from Etosha National Park in Northern Namibia.

“Etosha” is the Otjivambo word for “a large white expanse.” For years, India has referred euphemistically to big bellies (including mine) as Etoshas. This is more polite than “beer gut.”

The Etosha Park is roughly the size of Massachusetts, and is normally very dry. It is usually a great place to view game, because you can sit by a water hole, and the animal kingdom comes to you.

It rained hard here for the several days prior to our arrival. Everything that is normally sparse, brown, and dry is dense, verdant, and lush. Dense vegetation and dispersed availability of water make it difficult to see a lot of animals - except for giraffe, whose heads still stick out above the low vegetation.

We spent our morning game drive appreciating birds, dodging big puddles, and smelling the incongruous smell of dense vegetation in the desert. We also saw a cool-looking Namaqua chameleon.

NAMAQUA CHAMELEON WALKING VERY SLOWLY

The center of the park is the Etosha Pan, which is a dried salt-lake bed covering about 5,000 square kilometers (about 2,000 square miles - slightly larger than Rhode Island). Even with the rains, Etosha Pan continues to be “a large white expanse,” too salty for anything to grow.

From a slight elevation (about a meter), it was hot, dry salt pan for as far as the eye could see. A few brackish ponds have formed after the recent rains. 

On the horizon, shimmering in the heat waves, we could barely make out hundreds of birds, standing immobile in the pan. Weird. It was difficult to tell whether the birds were storks or flamingoes, they were just too far away.   The pan flooded most recently in 1970, but given how much rain has fallen already, this could be the year.

To be honest, I think all of us (even India) are a little game-drive weary. We have seen so many animals, in so many different types of terrain, and had so many awesome rangers. The last few weeks have increased my enthusiasm for safaris and game lodges and conservation a lot.

That said, we are probably ready to move on to a new activity. For the first time ever, the kids are very restless on the game drives.  Even Zola has run out of hypothetical questions for our perplexed guides to answer (”If a hundred black-backed jackals fought ten cheetahs and five giraffe, who would win?”. If a klipspringer raced a mountain zebra were being chased by a hyaena up that hillside, which one would get eaten?”).

I will definitely be happy to have Internet access again, to add maps and pictures to the blog, and to type on a keyboard instead of my BlackBerry.

We will enjoy another night at the absurdly comfortable Little Ongava Lodge, and then start the long drive down to Windhoek tomorrow.

PostScript- I stand corrected. In India’s words, “I am NOT weary of game drives. I just want a wilder experience. Next time, no fancy lodges, no hobbyist game drives. We are going hard core: mobile wilderness camps, deep in the bush. I will never get tired of this! Never! ”

In the timeless words of happy marriages the world over: “Yes, dear.”