As per Luke's blog, after another cold night and breakfast by the camp fire we met with Estelle who gave us extra diesel as we were not sure if we had enough going through the park which is supposed to be extremely sandy. She gave us some rather obscure directions which we hoped made sense as we went along. We were being taken hunting with the hunters from the village this morning. They were waiting with their bows, spears, pouch bags and long sticks with hooks on the end for reaching up in trees. They wanted to hunt further afield from the village so they went in the back of Estelle's truck and we followed behind. About 12km, after passing the local school, we stopped and headed off into the bush, Luke armed with his bow. We were out for about 4 hours. Not much luck with the hunting, which isn't surprising with 4 whities in tow. We did see a couple of deer. It was interesting nether the less. The hunters showed us which seeds from the trees, they used for eating and plants and roots that are used for medicinal purposes. They pointed out the porcupine, mice and springhare holes and tried to find honey in the holes in the trees with their long poles. We stopped once where they showed us how to make rope from the sisal plant which they then used as part of a snare trap for ground birds. They use resin from the trees as bait. Chris got to demonstrate how it works, snaring his finger. The next stop we learnt how to make fire with fire sticks which are part of Luke's quiver. Liam and I weren't as successful, but Luke was determined that was how we were going to start the fire that night. Another time, they dug up what looked like a very small dead plant, that actually had a massive root attached. They scrape the flesh of the root using a piece of wood. Once they have a handful they firstly wash their hands with it as it contains a lot of water within the root flesh. Using another handful, they squeeze the liquid out of it for water. It's very bitter tasting as Chris and Luke discovered.
At the end of our walk we showed the hunters some pictures of kangaroos on the ipad which they were completely fascinated by. They were equally interested in the photos of the Himba, zebras and other parts of Africa that they had never seen.
After saying goodbye to the hunters we continued down the track towards Khaudum national park one of the remotest places in Namibia. We had lunch in the middle of the track, as there was little likelihood of any other traffic. About 1/2 hour on we turned left on another track that took us into the park. This was marked by a large stone that elephants had used for rubbing against. There was lots of signs of elephants, they really are very destructive. After driving 1/2 hour we came to a huge waterhole with a tree house beside it for viewing the animals. There was a solo elephant and kudu, but we were a bit early in the evening. We decided to head on into camp. It was surprisingly busy as this is not on the normal tourist route. A Belgian family, a Swiss couple who had just spent a year in Australia and 2 cars of South Africans were there. We decided not to head back out to the waterhole but have an early dinner instead. Our mistake the Belgians told us there were about 100 elephants at the waterhole later! No fences at this camp, only warning signs of elephants, lions and hyenas to beware of. We tried the fire sticks but reverted to matches. Had damper for dinner, a bit over cooked and retired early for another cold night.
Location:Khaudum
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