Page 20 - Discover Botswana 2021

Above: Our 2019 transect through the Delta took a new route to our previous years, and it was fascinating to survey a different part of the Okavango system. Map copyright 2020 Google.
Right: Dr Steve Boyes carries the 360 camera which captured some amazing footage for a Virtual Reality series that was produced.
This footage is used to create awareness of these last wild places and the work that is being undertaken by various conservationists. (Image by Kostadin Luchansky)
River being completely dry. Luckily, we had already been researching a new transect route across the north-eastern delta, and there was still sufficient water in the Moanachira and Nqoga systems for this to be possible.
We wanted to find a way to cross the Okavango Delta using the channel systems north of Chief ’s Island, setting out from Seronga village. To find out how this could be done, we went to the Seronga Polers Trust to consult old friends, and new, on the best routes and guides for the Moanachira, Nqoga and Santantadibe channels all the way to Maun. Monnaaphuthego “Oja” and Tebogo “Rex” Mokopi, two Wayeyi elders, were elected as the experts for this mission. The Wayeyi are the ancient river tribe that has lived off the delta for centuries. Rex knew the route out of Seronga very well, having done it in recent years, and Oja knew the rest of the way to the other side of the delta, even though he last completed this route over 45 years ago, and is now in his late seventies! Both are true men of the wilderness, Okavango legends.
We allocated 18 days to complete the new route, but in the end it took us 29 days to cover an immensely difficult 303 kilometers across the fast diminishing water in the delta. It seemed that every hippo in the area was right there - we interacted with more than twice the number of hippos than in previous years, and at much closer quarters! Everything was more intense. We saw lion, wild dog, and rhino from the water, and were constantly surrounded by elephants, crocodiles, birds and
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