Ntwetwe Pan (1)

This enormous, fascinating area, the twin in many ways of its easterly neighbour, Sowa Pan, has been receiving more and more attention from independent visitors, for it is a gloriously free and open part of the country, and almost completely unspoilt.



The region is full of places of interest and I encourage you to explore it.

Innumerable ways lead to the area, and it would be impractical to try and list them all - apart from the fact that this would spoil the fun for intrepid explorers !

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Makgadikgadi Pans, the Boteti River (7)

At a point about 36 km north of the turnoff to Khumaga, the Boteti River cuts its way through the Gidikwe Sand Ridge.

There is fascinating scenery to enjoy here.



When the river is full, there are beautiful lagoons around this area, and massive cliffs of calcrete plunge vertically for more than 35 m into the river.
Near the spot, there are plenty of viewpoints and shady trees for a picnic.

You can usually find your way up or down the river on the north bank sufficiently far for reasonable privacy.
The area is little known, off the road and offers magical camping spots.

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Makgadikgadi Pans, the Boteti River (6)

The Makgadikgadi section of the Makgadikgadi - Nxai Pan National Park is now separated from tribal land by a electrified game fence that criss-crosses the Boteti, giving both cattle owners and wildlife access to its waters (when there is any).

You cannot, any more, drive up the east bank of the river.



At Khumaga (although they no longer encourage casual visitors and you have to book) you'll find Leroo-la-Tau Safari Lodge.
Located on the north bank of the river, at the bend, it offers both the advantages of a riverine environment - complete with perennial pools stocked with hippo and crocodile, giant trees, dense vegetation, superb birding -and, to the east, the rolling grasslands of Makgadikgadi.

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Makgadikgadi Pans, the Boteti River (5)

After passing Rakops on your way north, take the opportunity to turn east anywhere for a kilometre or two and explore the banks of the Boteti.

Wet or dry, it is an extraordinary place.

Drive over a few hundred metres of short grass to the edge of the tree line.



A fringe of giant but dead Acacia erioloba (drought-dead due to a falling water table as the Boteti dried) brings you to the edge of the riverine forest.
It is followed by more trees and shrubs and then the river itself; park and walk this last short bit.
Whether it is wet or dry (it was a full river in 2010, but fell short of Rakops by some 15 km), it is a remarkable sight.




More remarkable still is that on the brief trip from the tar to the river bank, you cross first the old calcrete road, and then, just before the river you will cross a very narrow but deeply entrenched track.
Maybe this is the remains of the original, historical track along the Boteti, a track used by Livingstone and all those who followed him.

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Makgadikgadi Pans, the Boteti River (4)

The course of the Boteti is traced out with a dark green ribbon of riverine trees while, in the distance, the waters of the old lake still seem to shimmer and dance in the heat.

It is incredible to think how changeable land forms really are and how insignificant a human life span is against the immensity of geological time.



Even if you do not explore the road to the CKGR, cast your eyes west as you drive towards Maun after the Department of Wildlife and National Parks turn off.

You will look out over a billiard -table-level plain that stretches to an elongated smudge of green on the horizon.

The smudge is the Gidikwe Ridge, the old shoreline: it helps you imagine the vastness of the former lake.

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Makgadikgadi Pans, the Boteti River (3)

Three kilometres north of Rakops, on the west side, is the signposted turn-off leading 45 km to the Central Kalahari Game Reserve (CKGR) boundary and, beyond that, 8,8 km to Matswere Camp and permit office.

The CKGR access road is usually in very poor conditions.
If you were to take this track and drive 13 dusty and uncomfortable kilometres westwards, you would arrive at the top of an age old sand ridge.
This is an ancient shoreline, an offshore barrier beach of the old palaeo - lake.



The Gidiwke Ridge marks the lake's western margin when it was at its greatest extent.
Ascend to its summit and look back.
If you do this in the afternoon, so that the sun is behind you, a stunning view unfolds.
Even from this relatively low elevation, the whole of the old lake bed lies before you.

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Makgadikgadi Pans, the Boteti River (2)

On his two journeys to Lake Ngami, the 19th century missionary-explorer David Livingstone came this way with William Cotton Oswell.
They found the sand so heavy and the trees so thick that they abandoned most of their wagons and went on only lightly equipped.
It is perhaps as well to realise, while one drives through the country west of Makgadikgadi, that, for the whole way on your right (north or east) lies the Boteti River.



It's not always easy to recognize it as a river, but even in relatively recent times - early in the 20th century and certainly in the 19th - it flowed regularly here, and the southern end, between Xhumo and Mopipi, was a wetland full of birds and aquatic creatures.
It's hard to believe that now !



It is nearly 30 years since the Boteti has reached Mopipi, which has done only three times since 1963.
In fact, the large, dry pan (Mopipi) you see immediately to the south of the village was modified so that water could be pumped in from the Boteti, turning it into a huge reservoir.
From there, it was pumped the 50-add kilometres to Orapa Diamond Mine.

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