This was to be a day of extensive air travel supplemented by a disproportionate amount of waiting time in air terminals; oh the joys of international travel!
We had a reasonably early start to the final day of February with our Virgin flight to Sydney leaving Hobart at 10:10. Having now joined up with our travelling friends Malcolm and Rae Wells, we had a seven hour wait in Sydney before our connecting flight through to Perth. Fortunately our luggage was checked right through to Johannesburg from Sydney which partially relieved the stress of being lumbered with bags during our Sydney sojourn.
The five hour flight to Perth departed Sydney on time at 19:00 and had us in Perth at around 21:00 Western Australian time. At mid-night we departed Perth on a fairly old Airbus A340-300 South African Airlines plane for the ten hour flight to Johannesburg. This night-time flight enabled us to gain a reasonable amount of partial slumber despite a bumpy period of travel above mid-Indian Ocean.
We arrived in Jo’burg at the O.R. Tambo International Airport at approximately 04:00 South African Time on March 1st and made our way through immigration and customs with minimal delay. We then prepared ourselves for a seven hour wait before boarding our regional flight to Kasane in north-eastern Botswana.
Whilst enjoying an early morning coffee (05:00) in an airport café we encountered Patrick, a young Adelaide film producer/presenter who’s involved in the production of a popular You-Tube African wildlife show called “Safari Live”.
Breakfast time at Johannesburg airport
After a further seven hour wait, we finally boarded a smallish plane (Embraer E190) for the two hour flight to Kasane in Botswana where upon arrival we were met by Moss from Pangolin Photo Safaris. She transported us to the new Pangolin facility in Kasane and we were immediately impressed with the architecture and elaborate décor. It was great to catch up with Guts and Charl who we’d met on our previous trip.
View over Chobe River, Botswana
Our plane, Kasane airport, Botswana
Having entered Botswana and carried out the appropriate immigration procedures at the airport, we were now required to go to an immigration office in Kasane to fill in forms to leave Botswana as we were about to cross the Chobe River and enter Namibia.
The Namibian immigration office was an obscure little shed hidden up a riverside track but we managed to get the appropriate stamps in our passports. We were pleased to be through with all the immigration and customs formalities of the last 36 hours. During this time, we’d had little quality sleep and had set foot in four different countries.
Namibia immigration
Our guide and boatman Fabian then took us on a two hour river orientation trip up the Chobe. The photographic boat is the one we’d used on our last trip here and is set up with the gimbals for camera mounting giving 3D flexibility for stabilised photography.
Fabian
Jak with camera
The river trip gave us a chance to see a number of bird species we’d not seen before with two species of bee-eaters that were new to us, namely the carmine and blue-cheeked.
Blue-cheeked bee-eater
Little bee-eater
Carmine bee-eaters
Malachite kingfisher
Pied kingfisher
Red bishop
African darter
Crocodiles, hippopotamuses, an elephant and a kudu were sighted but not pursued as we’ll have more time tomorrow to get serious with our photography of the wildlife.
Hippopotamus
Hippopotamus snorting
Buffalo
Squacco heron
Pygmy goose
Just on sunset we tied up astern of the Pangolin Voyager, the riverboat on which we’ll live as our base for the next five days. Tjaart and his staff welcomed us and after a brief chat we were shown to our cabins where showers and clean clothes were the order of the day. The riverboat has five cabins and can accommodate ten guests. At present there are just the four of us being looked after by a crew of four!
Pangolin Voyager
Melody the chef provided us with a very pleasant meal after which we headed for bed seeking sleep after a very protracted 36 hours of travel since leaving Hobart.