From the Boteti River to Makgadigadi Pans in Botswana
Discover more from Your Own Road Overland – Expedition Conservation
From the Boteti River to Makgadigadi Pans in Botswana
We said goodbye to Central Kalahari and drove towards new horizons – and the beautiful, endless-looking salt pans of Botswana.
From the Central Kalahari to Boteti River, Makgadigadi and Nxai Pans National Parks.
The great zebra migration, Baines Baobabs, and the endless salt pans. There were so many new things to explore and experience!
In this chapter, we tell you about our time in the Makgadidagi and then, in a separate post, about the Nxai Pans. Just trying to keep the length of these posts a bit more bearable. ;)
And both of these places definitely deserve their own chapters here. Both of them were amazing – and different.
But for now, dive on to Boteti River and Makgadigadi Pans!
Restocking in Maun
From the CKGR, we had to stop by Maun to stock up on groceries, have a few days’ downtime at a familiar campsite, and try to fix a big crack that came to our windscreen a while ago in Ghanzi.
We opted to go to Sitatunga campsite, about 16km out of Maun, for its tranquility and nice amenities. They had also upgraded the campsite since our last visit in 2019, and now they also have campsites with private ablutions (shower and toilet). We took one of those and had a relaxing few “ DNA days” (DNA = Do Nothing At All).
After shopping for groceries, we tried to arrange the windscreen repair – but without luck. PG Glass in Maun was the place to go, but they did not have the type of glass we would’ve wanted. However, they confirmed that the crack was only one-sided, so it was still safe to drive with it and change it later.
We then decided to change the windscreen somewhere else where we’d have more options (and we still needed to wait for the “green light confirmation” from our insurance company).
Wild camping in the beautiful Boteti River
We then drove to the Boteti River. This area has many options for wild camp with elephants and other creatures possibly wandering around. Some camping safaris frequently use this area, too.
On the other side of the river is already the Makgadigadi National Park, and there is no fence (anymore) all the way along the river shore.
There are a few small villages, though, but on our way, we encountered only a few odd people, usually villagers on horseback on the narrow dirt track.
We mostly use the iOverlander app to scout for nice spots, but its tips for wild camp spots may often be outdated and non-existent.
This was the case now, too, and most of those marked spots had been left behind a new fence line. But it was a blessing in disguise, as we found a superb place to park Honey Badger the Defender right along the almost dry Boteti Riverbed! 😍
We were far from villages and saw no people. It was a perfect and tranquil spot to enjoy the sunset and a peaceful night. Take a look at it in the video below!
Wouldn’t you love to be there, too?!
The beautiful views at our wild camp along the Boteti River in Botswana. Makgadigadi is on the other side.
Unfortunately, we saw no elephants or other game, only occasional cows wandering around. Heard some hyenas in the night, however. In the morning, a local herder rode by on his donkey and waved to us when riding by.
After a well-slept night, we started to drive towards Makgadigadi.
To Makgadigadi National Park
We planned to drive straight through the Makgadigadi and not spend a night inside the park. Instead, we wanted to maximize our time on the Nxai Pan’s side.
We thought that spending one whole day driving the dirt tracks of Makgadigadi would be enough this time. And it turned out to be a good plan this time.
We drove to Khumaga gate, which was easy to reach as the river was dry then, and there was no need to use the ferry. We saw two game-drive vehicles at the gate and accidentally heard a few people speaking Finnish!
It turned out that the whole group was Finnish people and their guide, who were on a Botswana safari tour. :D We chatted with them for a little while (some of the guests “sneaked” a few photos of our car, too. ;) It was a fun coincidence. We don’t often run into other Finnish people on our African travels.
Off to Makgadigadi Pans and its lovely dirt tracks
It was still morning, around 10 a.m., when we went through the gate and started doing our game drives around the park.
Soon we saw big dazzles of zebras and many elephants along the river!
Driving in the river bed was such fun, watching all the elephants, zebras, and other game. From the top of the river bank, the views were absolutely gorgeous, too! The rangers recommended concentrating on the river shore, as that was where most of the animals were – because there was still some water.
Below are a few scenes we took on the Makgadigadi drive. At least the remnants of the great zebra migration seemed still there. So many zebras were grazing in the riverbed!
Check out the video below!
Zebras and elephants in the riverbed in Makgadigadi National Park in March 2023. What a bliss of a view!
Picking the right track back up to the riverbank from the riverbed was trickier than we thought, and we ended up backtracking a bit. Some of the banks were very steep with deep sand.
But in the end, we found a good track, which got us to see more of the great river views and many giraffes on our way back to the main road.
On the last stretch, the track turned to pretty deep sand when getting closer to the Phuduhudu gate. So, we had to engage the diff-lock and low-range gears.
But that was not a problem; we actually like to drive in deep sand. It’s one of those more fun 4x4 driving scenarios. Our Defender is also a real ace in the deep sand. It just cruises through. :D
Straight off to Nxai Pans
So, it was nice and extremely scenic driving to the Phuduhudu Gate through the Makgadigadi and then off to Nxai Pans.
Little before 3 p.m., we arrived at the Nxai Gate. We still had a nice time to reach Baines Baobabs, as the roads were supposed to be in good condition. And the pans dry enough to drive on.
We didn’t have any pre-bookings, but at the Nxai Gate, we were lucky again, and we secured one night at Baines Baobabs (campsite 1 – which turned out to be the best campsite, in our opinion!) and two nights in South Camp. Happy days! :)
Then, off we drove into the Nxai Pans!
But we’ll tell you about Nxai Pans in its own chapter – it deserves that. It's an absolutely amazing place!
So make sure you hit that “Subscribe” button below! Don’t miss it! Or, if you already are a free subscriber, please consider upgrading your subscription. There are a lot of extra perks!
… This post - again - turned out to be at the length limit here in Substack. 🤣 But well, at least you’ll receive enough content. ;)
Also, starting to think about putting all the extra story content in a bonus section for paid subscribers. We’ll be implementing that in the future, too.
AND - A WHOLE PAGE OF COOL BONUS CONTENT is already coming soon for paid subscribers only! So keep your eyes open! 😃 🙌
But meanwhile,
Stay Wild & Go Adventure,
The Recommendations Corner
Here, we recommend things we use ourselves or have some experience with, so we know they’re good! Mainly overland, camping, and outdoor products that make your life easier on the road.
And sometimes great readings, too. Like this time, a book that is maybe one of the best and most inspiring (and exciting, too!) books about living and working in the wild African Bush:
The Cry of the Kalahari by Mark & Delia Owens 🦁
