The next morning we were up early and back on the road with our new group. There was 17 of us in the new group; this time a completely different mix of nations. Mostly Germans, some Italians, and of course a few Aussies.
It was a short drive that day. We dealt with border formalities and went back to the last campsite we visited in Botswana. The plan was to do another game drive and an over night in Chobe National Park. The exact same activities we’d done four days earlier. Kelsi and I opted to stay behind at the campsite and skip this excursion. We were tired, and both emotionally and physically exhausted. Plus Kate and Ash from our last group, who were continuing South to Johannesburg on a different tour, were doing the same thing. We figured it would be fun to hang out for one last afternoon.
Falafel stayed behind as well. She was also continuing all the way to Cape Town with us. So we had a pretty good group to hang out with at the pool for the day.
About an hour after our group had left we were so happy about our decision. The skies opened up and the rain came bucketing down. Apparently the game drive was windy, freezing, and left everyone soaking wet by the time they reached their bush camp.
Kelsi and I spent the night hanging out with Manda and our old driver Elouise and listened to them tell all their disaster stories about past tours. We sat under cover from the rain well into the evening, just laughing about all the crazy things tourists do in Africa.
The next morning our group was back and we were off to do another Chobe River cruise. It was pretty much the same as the last time. Cherry was our driver, we saw some hippos and elephants, and we sat around enjoying a cold beer with our new friends.
This time though, we didn’t have the boat to ourselves. About two other German tour groups joined us, leaving Kelsi, Gina and I to sit on the floor by the cooler.
Gina’s bags had finally been recovered and sent to the campsite, which was such a relief. She was still a little blue, but that would fix itself all in good time!
The second half of the boat cruise we saw very few animals. It began to rain again and the wind made it freezing cold.
When we arrived back at camp an hour later, we found Bush Baby flooded. All our stuff was soaked, sleeping mats, blankets, bags, everything. Good thing we decided to choose the most mangled looking tent! Unlike our last tour, this truck didn’t have ANY rain covers for the tents. We pulled our tent under shelter, hung our stuff up in the damp night, mopped out the floor of the tent, then climbed back in with the spare sleeping mats Manda provided. I hope it’s not going to be raining much on this half of the tour!