June 27, 2012
Gaborone or Gabs, as it’s
affectionately known as, is Botswana’s capitol city. It’s a good sized city. It’s definitely a city, though. Although the occasional herd of goats crosses
the city streets and there are some ridiculous roundabouts, it’s still just a
city. Some cities have a flavor and are delightful. Gabs is still in that up and coming stage and
it’s pretty much like any up and coming small city. But it does have all the recommendations of a
city, including malls. As Gavin and
Andrea put it, “There’re three malls. We
have to move.”
Really, I’m selling it
short. It is a nice city, but for this
country girl all cities are kind of the same.
Gabs is a full day by car away,
about eight hours if you’re doing well.
You pass through the other sort of landmark cities of Kang and
Jwaneng. Kang is distinguished by its
charming truck stop and Jwaneng by the thriving mine that feed it.
What really made the trip special
was staying at the other CCB camp in Mokolodi.
Mokolodi is an incredible game reserve just outside of Gabs. It’s absolutely gorgeous. It’s home to CCB, an education center of its
own, and a restaurant with food that’s genuinely good. (They had excellent calamari).
It’s also home to a pair of
spotted hyenas that almost tame. If you
sit quietly and don’t look at them, they’ll come right up to the fence and
sniff your fingers. And since they’re
captive hyena, they’re absolutely lovely.
They’re well-cared for and it shows.
I can’t wait to post their pictures.
Mokolodi also treated us to
sights of the ubiquitous kudu and impala. But more fun from my perspective was
seeing the go-away birds, zebra, and at last steenbok. Steenbok are a favorite cheetah food. Mokolodi also has monkeys. Vervets and baboons, which I wasn’t expecting
to see while I was here. Yet there they
were, every morning, jumping on tin roofs and swinging through trees.
Best of all though was the
reptile exhibit, although it might have been surpassed by the orphan vervet
monkey. But I’m getting ahead of myself.
The reptile exhibit is home to
spitting cobra, rock python, puff adder, a hawk, an owl, a crane, and three
vultures. But best of all, the most
delightful snake lady. She showed us
all the birds, talked to us about the snakes, antagonized a cobra so he’d show
us his hood (with a snake stick), picked up puff adders (also with a snake
stick), and let us hold one of the rock pythons. Caoilfhionn and I both got to cuddle the rock
python juvenile (still about a meter long).
Absolutely awesome.
Mokolodi also has an orphanage
for the various animals on the reserve.
At the orphanage were a whistling duck, a pair of birds that I didn’t
recognize, a barn owl, and three vervet monkeys. Two of them were older and had absolutely no
interest in people, but one was clearly orphaned quite young and loved
people. His name was Blue. If you offered him a finger he’d take it and
hold on gently. He was in love with
my watch, my zipper pull, the lace on my
sleeves, and Caoilfhionn’s hair. He was
the most darling creature. I have
hundreds of pictures of him because he was just so cute.
Anyway, it was a three day trip
all told, although we only spent one full day in Mokolodi. Another CCB staff drove us back on Wednesday
so that we could make the Ghanzi Show.
We had some excitement trying to drive in the dark with cattle, donkeys,
goats, kudu, and various other antelope thinking the road might be nice for a
nighttime stroll. But we came back safe
and sound.
Next Episode: Ghanzi Show
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