The Okavango Delta is the end of the 1430 km Okavango River that starts in central Angola and flows through Namibia into northern Botswana. There, it dumps 18.5 billion cubic meters annually into the landscape where it is evaporated or soaked into the Kalahari. Before reaching the Kalahari, the delta forms 16,000 square kilometers of lagoons.

We took a 3 day mekoro trip through the lagoons, camping on an island. Pictured here are empty mekoros, awaiting our arrival. These were loaded with our gear and a Poler pushed us, with a pole, along various channels to the island on which we camped with, to name a few, elephants, wildebeest, lions, zebras and coutless birds.

Once loaded, our mokoro sat about 2 inches above the water. Our Poler, Bea, pushed us safely along the channels to our various destinations.

While on the island, we did 2 walking safaris. During these, we saw zebras, wildebeest, tsessebe (sort of like a hartebeest, but lighter in color), and lots of elephants.

We also saw the skeletal remains of an elephant that died about a year ago. We were told that other elephants often return to the remains and would attack anyone found in the vicinity of the remains.

We took a flight over the Okavango Delta. What you can't see from the air is that the Delta is submerged in about a meter of water with reeds growing out of it.

During our flight, we saw herds of elephants and wildebeest, hippos and giraffes.

Botswana has a high birth rate and one of the world's highest HIV infection rates. Many of the headstones that we saw were for people in their 30s and 40s!!