Up with those taking a scenic flight. Hot shower was just warm. Sat around the fire trying to warm up, made tea and coffee, and breakfasted when the truck (and flyers) returned, the flight having been cancelled till anything from 10am on. Hurled bits of wood at the monkeys to try and keep them at bay while we ate.
Spent the cold morning filling in time, chatting in the bar, drinking orange juice, filling the truck water tank using jerry cans. News reached us via phone that Gary and Linda’s chartered flight had been cancelled and they were refusing to pay extra to take a standard flight. Gary pleading poor - as is his wont. They threatened to camp there until another cheap flight arranged, the tactic getting them discounted tickets. The Lodge owner was furious because she’d never been offered one.
Drove into town, where I twice perused the beautiful "Africa Adorned" coffee table book of bejewelled tribal portraits, the second time with Myrta while eight moneyed Americans took over the shop, hauling souvenirs off the shelves. (My sister bought me this wonderful book for Christmas on my return to Australia, and I still have it.) Kel caught up with an old Exodus driver and Joburg travel office fellow and got some info about the Makgadikgadi Pans route.
As we left town we saw many Herero women - and some men in waistcoat and jackets trousers and hats like players in a period film. We followed a long straight sandy road through the sunny afternoon with very little to see.
We came to a foot in mouth disease barrier where an overly zealous veterinarian confiscated Stanley (the long-dead long-horned skull that had adorned the front of our truck for months)! Four days from Joburg and we had to leave him leaning forlornly against a sign - well photographed. We continued through flat grassland with a few shrubs and palm trees, ostriches the only wildlife we saw.
Turned off the main road onto a track to the Makgadikgadi (salt) Pans, the country flat into the distance. Camped beside some palm trees and watched the setting sun the billowing clouds on the horizon pink and mauve, in strands, smudges and fluffy masses that silhouetted the trees. After dark, sheet and fork lightening spectacularly illuminated those same clouds. But Halley’s Comet was a non-event again.
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