Chobe: The Real-Life Lion King (Minus The Lions)

After three days in the Delta of fending off spiders, swimming in grimy water, and basically rolling around in elephant dung, I was, needless to say, stoked for my first shower of the trip. Unfortunately, I had to be that dirty hippie on he bus ride from Maun to Kasane, where Chobe National Park is located. The drive to Chobe was filled with roadside animal sightings - cows, horses, and goats crossing the road every few kilometers; giraffes, ostriches, and gansboks (a type of antelope) chilling right next to the road; and, as we got closer and closer to Chobe, elephants. I saw so many elephants on the ride in to Chobe that I had almost become desensitized to them by the time we reached Chobe - almost.

We arrived in Kasane in time for a hurried lunch, before heading down to the water for our sunset cruise down the Chobe River. Our cruise took us only a few kilometers downstream into the park over the course of three hours, but I don't think I've ever seen as much wildlife in one sitting as I did on this ride. Let me tell you: getting plastered while floating down the Chobe River and watching animals as the sun set behidn me - it was truly sublime. Our pontoon boat (see, Carrie, I now know what a pontoon boat is) took us through the African "four corners" equivalent, where the borders for Botswana, Zambia, Zimbabwe, and Namibia meet. A bit cooler than the Arizona-Colorado-Utah-New Mexico dealie. We could literally watch Namibian elephants change nationalities to Botswanan elephants in the course of two minutes.

The cruise reminded me more of the Lion King than anything I’ve ever seen in my life, though there were no lions (I still can’t believe I have yet to see any lions here, we came close on our game drive in Chobe but couldn’t see them through the thistles of the bushes). I’ve never seen so many different types of wildlife chilling side by side, grazing on the grass, and not paying any mind to each other. On the same island, I saw hippos, buffalos, and elephants – three of the most dangerous animals in the world – all just kicking it right next to each other and doing their own thing. Pretty cool. We saw a bunch of other animals: kudus, impalas, a few fresh-water crocodiles, a water monitor, and a huge pack of baboons. One kid on our trip managed to get a picture of baboons having sex – one of the funniest pictures I’ve ever seen.

The highlight of the cruise had to be the ride back, when we spotted a pack of about 20 elephants on a ledge right next to the water. The sun was setting right behind them, and, through the camera lens, literally silhouetted the massive animals. One elephant in particular seemed to be posing for the camera – the dude who I caught in the picture below – and loved the attention of he people. Very different from the elephants in the Delta, who were afraid of humans. The sunset cruise spoiled me and will forever ruin how I look at safaris – I will never again see that much wildlife in one sitting (until I’m back at Chobe in two years doing the exact same sunset cruise, right mom and dad?).

We awoke early the next morning – try 5 am early – so we could be en route for our 6 am game drive. I had learned the hard way on my last safari in Hluhluwe-Imfolozi – it’s cold as hell in the morning in Africa. Even if you think you’re going to be warm since you’re in Africa, you are wrong. I was the only person who brought gloves and a hat – and I was the only person who wasn’t freezing my ass off. Literally seconds after going through the gate to the park, we encountered a pack of elephants. Chobe is famous for it’s elephants – home to 120,000 of them. In fact, it has so many that it’s become a problem since they knock over too many trees and eat too much of the vegetation. Definitely not a problem for me to see that many elephants though. Like the previous night, we saw an insane amount of wildlife: water buck, hundreds of impala, baboons, hippos, buffalos, a huge snake, kudus, giraffes, zebras, jackals, hyenas, and, most hilariously, a baby warthog and its mom sparring. As I mentioned above, we were right next to a pack of lions, but couldn’t see them through the thistles. Weak. The highlight of the game drive was, again, elephants at the end. We saw a pack of about 5 or 6 right next to the road – literally feet away from the edge of our vehicle – and one of the babies started posing for us. Doing it’s elephant thang, making them elephant noises, the whole shebang. Thankfully, it didn’t charge at us like the baby elephant did in Hluhluwe in July. Really cool to see an elephant so close that you could reach out and touch it.

I mentioned this above, but it’s worth noting again: the animals in Chobe seem unphased by humans. In fact, I think they like showing off for humans. They know that the humans in the park are not going to harm them, and our guide said that they don’t even see the game trucks as people, but as vehicles. The vehicles have never hurt them, so they’ll get up nice and close to them and pose. Very different from the animals in the Okavango Delta, where the majority of the humans they encounter are poachers there to kill them. This makes both places extraordinarily special: any wildlife sighting in the Delta is a treat, while Chobe is amazing because of the amount of animals you see and how close they are. It’s reputation as the best game park in all of Africa stands pat, as far as I’m concerned.