En Route Travelling around Botswana

Accommodation

Kalahari Arms Hotel – The town’s best-known landmark has had a facelift. Comfortable and convenient, it’s the best place to stay. Camping and self-catering facilities are also offered.

Tautona Lodge – A game farm just outside town.

D’Kar Hostel and Campsite – Has very basic amenities.

The Shakawe

Anyone arriving from northern Namibia and the Caprivi Strip will enter Botswana at Shakawe, the most northerly settlement on the western side of the country. From this small yet burgeoning riverside village you’ll get your first glimpse of the Okavango River.

If you’re in a hurry you can head straight for Maun, almost four hours from here, but if you’re on a more leisurely schedule, set aside a good few days to explore the Panhandle and Tsodilo Hills. Campers and those with a tight budget will find Drotsky’s Cabins a short distance south of Shakawe and right on the banks of the Okavango, a great base.

They offer full or half-day trips on the river. Another 30 kilometres further south, you’ll find the tranquillity of Nxamaseri Lodge (your accommodation must be booked and no campers are allowed. Ideal if you want a more exclusive stay away from the bustle of the main road and the busier sections of river.

Both places offer fantastic fishing, and Nxamaseri Lodge is one of the very best birding destinations in the Okavango Delta. Botswana’s most memorable rural experiences are to be had on this route.

Make it part of your journey and stop off anywhere between Shakawe and the oddly-named Etsha 6 to bargain for baskets or just observe village life – the people will welcome you warmly. Fuel is available at Shakawe, Etsha 6 and Gumare. 

Tsodilo Hills

These three hills form one of Africa’s premier Bushman rock art sites and are highly recommended as a stop-off, but make sure you allow a day or two to explore the area. Tsodilo Hills consist of a quartzite outcrop just 40 kilometres west of the main road, standing like a beacon in the otherwise flat surrounding Kalahari sandveld.

Archaeological evidence discovered amongst the remains of villages here, including pottery, stone tools and simple jewellery, indicates that various groups used the hills as a trading post, stop-over point and place of abode from as olong ago as 100 000 years.

The hills are known to the local !Kung people as the Male, Female and Child, and contain over 4 000 individual paintings, at almost 400 sites, including images of humans, wild and domestic animals, and various geometric patterns and shapes. While some of the paintings may go back a few thousand years, the majority are more recent – dating to the early part of the last millennium. The most modern paintings, of white geometric shapes, are just a few centuries old.

Presently, the only people living beneath the shadows of the three hills are a small extended family of Kung and a group of Hambukushu, who see Tsodilo as a sacred site, as they believe their people were lowered onto earth by the gods at this site.

Besides its cultural heritage, Tsodilo also has immense natural beauty, with the trees, birds and incredible vistas all creating a very special atmosphere.
Tsodilo is now a national monument and Botswana’s first World Heritage Site.

A small museum complex has been built, and there is also a bush airstrip as well as various designated campsites here. You can also base yourself at one of two lodges in the area (Nxamaseri and Drotsky’s Cabins).

Fishing and birding from boats are the major activities in the Panhandle region.

The Van der Post Panel on the Female Hill is the most striking of the rock art sites at Tsodilo Hills.

With its feather-like branches, the wild date palm (Phoenix reclinata) dominates the islands along the main river and channels of the Panhandle.

The Tsodilo Hills are known to the local !Kung people as the Male, Female (seen here) and Child, and contain over 4 000 individual paintings at almost 400 different sites.

The Kasane–Nata Route

Kasane itself is not a particularly impressive place, but what falls within the immediate vicinity is. The town acts as the ‘Gateway to the Chobe National Park’, and as a crossroad for anyone heading to the Victoria Falls from Botswana. As a result it far exceeds Maun as a leading tourist town.

Spread out along the banks of the Chobe River, Kasane has a number of hotels, guesthouses and campsites that accommodate all the visitors to the national park. The town has a decent gallery, The African Easel Art Gallery, for you to enjoy during those midday hours outside of game-driving time, as well as a few roadside craft stalls between the town and the Kazangula ferry.

If you are on your way to Livingstone in Zambia by road, you will have to cross the Chobe River on this ferry. If you are going on the ferry, don’t be put off by the queues of trucks: just drive straight to the front. (The possibility of building a bridge across the Chobe River at this site has been mooted, but there are no definite plans as yet).