Day 13 - Mahango national park

Accommodation : Ngepi Camp site

Starting our day early with a breakfast on the camp site deck overlooking the river. Goggles in hand we could admire the morning routine of all the birds, starlings, weavers, bee eaters..

Time to go and discover Bwabwata national park. And what a highlight! A very small park just few kms away from Ngepi, with one main road crossing to Botswana and a loop to look at the animals by the river. The best part was the numerous off road routes leading straight into the river beds and sand banks, giving us many opportunities to simply park to observe. And with so much to see! The real wildlife as Lion King depicted it. All around the water, hundred of species and thousands of animals living together. All types of deers, elephants, hippos, monkeys, giraffes, ostriches, buffalos, crocs and more types of birds we could ever think of. We just sat there trying to take it all in.
What a surprise and a gift!

Back at the camp for a light lunch, cold beer and little swim in the river cage! (Created to enable us to swim in the croc and hippo infested waters !)
And time to get cooking!
Tonight's menu, Lars' 4h oxtail and red wine potjie and Leo's homemade vetkoeks, a south African bread.
Chopping and mixing and searing and kneading. Everything was ready for the next few hours of simmering and rising.
One last check up to smell the incredible aromas coming out and stirring the pot.
"You should leave the potjie alone" they say.
So we did and took a sunset stroll through the camp.
Coming back for the apéro and a few games of Yahtzee, listening to the bubbling stew in the background in it's 3rd hour of cooking.
As we opened to check it we found a completely black burnt gooh on the bottom. Not what the recipe looked like.
But luckily we still had the bread !
As Leo put the dough balls on the grill, we quickly realized that was not going to make dinner either. The dough having now turned into compact flour.
From our original juicy oxtail Potjie and fresh vetkoeks, we were now looking at carbonized meat and brick bread.

The gnocchi and caned Bolognese thankfully managed to turn around Leo's hangry melt down and Lars's afrikaaner's disappointment.

What a day!!Read more