Makgadikgadi Pans: Day 4

Thursday, 19 August 2010 00:00 Last Updated on Monday, 23 August 2010 16:39 Written by Billy van Graan

Distance Walked: 35km

In the morning I walked through massive grass fields as the bush disappeared and turned into the Ntwetwe pan. I met some villagers on horses and we chatted for a while. All the people in Botswana are really friendly. They asked me why I was walking around and if someone was paying me to do it. I told them it was only for fun and no one was paying me. They were clearly confused with this but I was asked the same question yesterday by the guy that had to open a gate for me in the vet fence. He was also confused that no one was paying me. The two villagers on horses told confirmed that I would see no dangerous animals on the pan and I can relax. I knew I could trust them because they lived on the other side of Ntwetwe pan closer to the national park.

Once on Ntwetwe pan I was happy to find that the pan surface was very smooth and hard and I made some good distance. Then the pan gradually became wetter and stickier until I saw this massive black shade in front of me. I know that the pan there was going to be very wet but I didn’t want to change my course because I was far from the side of the pan and if I turned to the center of the pan it might be a long distance before the pan became dry again and heading toward the side of the pan meant that I would have to go very close to the side before it became any drier. I was making such good progress and was annoyed with the situation that I decided to just walk straight through this sticky business and that nothing was going to make me change my route.

I quickly changed my mind after about 50 meters into the dark grey muck when I was almost ankle deep in clay and slush. I was breathing very hard and knew that there was no way of walking straight any more. I was going to have to change my route. It took me a long some time just to turn my trailer around and get back onto normal ground again. I decided on walking back to the edge of the pan then head north again.  When it was almost time to set up camp I smelt something stank of dead fish. Then in front of me appeared a lake. I was on the edge of a lake and if I carried on straight I might have ended up walking straight into it. I set up camp on the edge of the lake and watched the sun set which was very beautiful.

Makgadikgadi Pans: Day 3

Wednesday, 18 August 2010 00:00 Last Updated on Monday, 23 August 2010 15:54 Written by Billy van Graan

Distance Walked: 42km

When I left this morning I was still not sure which route I should take. I decided to try the track for a couple of kilometers and see if it would be a wise choice. There was a section where the track and the pans would meet up 5km from Khubu Island and I would then be able to get back on the pan if the track was not hard enough.

In the end it turned out the track was just fine to walk on with the trailer I just needed to tie everything on the trailer down properly because the trailer was bouncing around over rocks. I made good time and the trailer felt a bit lighter because I have eaten most of the canned food and have gotten rid of at least 15 liters of water since starting off. Some people coming from Khubu stopped and talked to me and wanted to know what I was doing walking around with a trailer. Some European tourist even wanted to take photos of me. This was fine since it gave me a chance to talk to their guides who knew the area well enough to also tell me not to worry about animals.

By 11am I have done over 20km and found a tree to wait for the worst of the heat to pass. My big toes on both have developed big blisters because the shoes I am using are not really meant walking such long distances in. I can’t wear my hiking boots because I have some problem with my Achilles and the hiking boots press against my Achilles which makes it pain. By 3pm I could wait no more and packed my things and started off again. It was still very hot and I sweated like a pig. Twice during this stretch big bulls huffed and puffed at me and once I was chased by a dog. I walked hard and by the time I had to make camp just before sunset I have done another 20km.

Makgadikgadi Pans: Day 2

Tuesday, 17 August 2010 00:00 Last Updated on Monday, 23 August 2010 15:46 Written by Billy van Graan

Distance Walked: 20km

Set my alarm to wake up at 5am so I could start my walk for the day by 6am but when I woke the wind was howling and it was very cold. I knew I had to get up because I wanted to try and get out of this wet and muddy business I found myself in and if I could make the daily 20km all in the morning I would have a tree to sit under at Khubu Island during lunch time, but I just couldn’t get myself to move so I just lay there for another half a hour before getting out of my sleeping bag.

I quickly made breakfast and tea then packed all my things. When I picked up the groundsheet a saw a small white mouse was sleeping under it. The mouse quickly ran and jumped onto the groundsheet again and disappeared into the folds. It is a massive groundsheet so I didn’t want to unfold it completely to look for the mouse so I just shook it very well.

The first 10km of the day was again a struggle in the wet and salty clay and took a lot of energy to get through, but after that the pan surface gradually improved and got harder and dryer. I could see Khubu on the horizon to I had something to aim for and I put my head down and walked as hard as I could.  In the last 10km I saw hundreds of eggs. These are flamingo eggs and at one stage I could count over 50 big eggs without moving.
I only managed to get to the island at 11:35 and by that time I was baking in the sun. I headed straight for the first big tree and took only the food bag and water with me and left my trailer at the edge of the island.  As I grabbed the food bag I saw that the mouse from earlier the morning was still in between my things. Shame the little guy was hitching a ride and was now 20km away from home.

Only at 3:30pm did I dare go back into the sun to look for a nice spot somewhere around the island to camp. On the one side of the island there is a campsite but I didn’t want to camp between all the other tourists and get asked about the trailer all the time. When people see the trailer they want to know what the hell I’m up to and I just wanted to be left alone. One of the locals that help to run the campsite came past me later that evening on his bicycle when I was busy eating and I called him to stop. I wanted to get some information from him about the route I was planning to follow and about these dangerous wild animals I was stressing about.

According to him I could take a track that connects the two pans rather that walk straight north on the Sua pan then directly west through the bush onto Ntwetwe pan. In my initial planning I wanted to use this track but all the pictures that I could find that had this track on looked to me as if the sand would be too soft which makes pulling the trailer very difficult. He said the track is only soft in very few sections and would recommend I take it. He also said that I should not worry about wild animals unless I go very close to the Makgadikgadi Nature Reserve which is on the west edge of the Ntwetwe Pan.  The section of bush where I will walk tomorrow is all used for cattle farming and there would be no dangerous wild animals. Yipee.

Khubu Island is a magical place. There are some of the biggest Baobab trees I’ve ever seen in my live and you can climb on some huge rocks to get a great view of the pans. I would definitely go back there again in the future.

View south (where I came from) from Khubu Island - Click to Enlarge

Makgadikgadi Pans: Day 1

Monday, 16 August 2010 00:00 Last Updated on Monday, 23 August 2010 15:46 Written by Billy van Graan

Distance Walked: 20km

Woke up early to get to the pans which where a 160km away from the campsite in Francis Town. Luckily Lance woke up without any issues because getting him out of bed can sometimes be a real problem. The starting point was at near a village called Mosu on the south side of the Sua Pan.  The Makgadikgadi Pans consists of 2 big pans the one east side is called Sua and the one on the north is Ntwetwe. For me to be able to say I crossed the Makgadikgadi Pans I needed to cross both.

So just after Mosu village we turned off onto a track that led to near the south side of the Sua pan. We drove as far on this track as we thought the card could go before getting stuck and then started to setup the trailer and all the kit. Lance joined me to the start of the pan to take some photos and a video of me starting off. I eventually got going at around 8:20am.

Start walking on the south side of Sua Pan - Click to Enlarge

The first 10km was no problem at all. The pan surface was hard and although the weight of all my water, food and other kit was between 75-80kg it was relatively easy to pull. Once the heat got to bad at around 11:00am I stopped and made a little shelter with a groundsheet I bought so I could stay out of the sun until it cooled down enough for me to carry on. When I constructed my little shelter there was no wind at all so I didn’t do much effort to tie down the ground sheet. While I was lying down a sudden burst of wind blew the groundsheet of and I had to run after it. At just after 3:00pm I thought I would start walking again.

It wasn’t long before I encountered the first wetter sections of the Sua pan. With such incredible heat during the day you would think that the pan would be completely dry but the truth was that it wasn’t.  The wetter the pan surface became the harder it became to pull the trailer. The surface was now wet clay that stuck to everything and the tires of the trailer was completely covered and slick. The bottom of my shoes also had clay stuck to it in a thick layer and I could not grip properly. This made pulling the heavy trailer quite hard work and I had to stop every 400-600m to catch my breath and drink water.

I planned to do at least 20km the first day and then another 20km the second to get me to Khubu Island, a famous spot on the edge of the Sua pan, so I struggled on for the last couple of kilometers until I reached a total of 20km for the day. By the time I stopped the pan surface was a soaking mess of clay covered by a layer of salt. At least I was so far onto the pan that I hardly saw any footprints of animals around which meant I would sleep without worrying too much.

One of my big concerns for this walk was dangerous wild animals. And although I asked people that has been to the region about dangerous animals on the pans and was informed that I didn’t need to worry I still had a lot of people (people that have obviously never been to the area) asking me about lions and telling me to be very careful. So it was something that was always on my mind. O and seeing a massive footprint of some kind of predator about 4km into the walk didn’t help put my mind at ease.