A slow boat to Caprivi

Namibia is known for many things, but lush riverine forests and watery environments are not among them. These habitats, found in the Caprivi Strip, host growing populations of wildlife and are the site of novel safaris for adventurous travellers. Follow Genevieve Swart as she rides the waters of this wet wonderland.  A fish eagle’s cry haunts the air as the sun rises over the floodplain. I am alone on deck, hugging a cup of coffee and watching a herd of elephants swim across the river, little ones waving tiny trunks above water. All around is wilderness and dusty pink sky – Africa at its most surreal and serene. No, I’m not wearing rose-coloured glasses. I’m in the Caprivi Strip. And my mode of transport? A houseboat. Yes, really. My cabin has wall-to-wall sliding windows overlooking the water, and last night I fell asleep to the sound of hippos grunting. If they had been any closer, we would have been sharing a pillow. The Ichobezi Mukwae is one of two houseboats that sail from Ichingo River Lodge on Impalila Island, at the confluence of the Chobe and the Zambezi (hence, Ichobezi). The houseboats cruise about 25 to 30 kilometres along these two great rivers and their connecting channels, past great snorting herds of buffalo, puku delicately tripping down to drink and crocodiles lying in wait. Guests take it all in from the comfort of a deckchair or the main deck’s plunge pool. About 450km long and 100km wide, the Caprivi Strip is the finger of northeast Namibia that pokes past Angola and Botswana towards Zambia and Zimbabwe. We are in the southeastern corner, with Botswana on one river bank, Namibia on the other. “The big attraction of the area is the wildlife – viewing it on the Chobe River is becoming internationally renowned,” says Ralph Oxenham, owner of Ichingo Lodge and its two houseboats. “It’s spectacular from May/June right through to the end of November.” Cruising for wildlife in a houseboat is slow travel at its finest. And when cabin fever strikes, we zip off in small tender boats on excursions into Botswana’s Chobe National Park, famous for its elephants. With more tuskers than you could poke a stick at (and we drift almost close enough to do so), it takes something special – like young bulls hosing each other down in water play – for newly blasé wildlife watchers to lift a camera. “There are very few things in the wildlife viewing world that you can be sure of, but elephants you can guarantee,” Ralph says of Chobe. “The national park has 45,000 of them, which is the biggest concentration anywhere in the world. You see them come down to bath and play – it’s a fantastic experience.” The region receives a fraction of the tourists seen in the Serengeti or South Africa’s Kruger Park and, with the focus turned to conservation, the Caprivi’s wildlife population is recovering from unregulated hunting and poaching during the decades of conflict. Visitors may see buffalo, hippo, crocodiles, tsessebe, sable, lechwe, hyena, lion and leopard, as well as rare animals such as the sitatunga, Chobe bushbuck and wild dog. Ralph and his wife, Dawn, started their Caprivi venture on land with Ichingo River Lodge. They launched the first houseboat, Ichobezi Moli, in 2005 and sailing past big game proved so popular they floated a second boat in July 2007. The houseboats are part of a luxury tourism boom in the region. For decades, the strip was a hotbed of guerrilla activity and out of bounds for tourists. Various African liberation movements and rebel groups used it as a corridor between countries and it was of strategic military importance during the 30-year Angolan civil war. The area’s administrative capital, Katima Mulilo (which means ‘put out the fire’), was an apartheid-era base for the South African army to direct operations against the South West Africa People’s Organisation (SWAPO), freedom fighters who now form Namibia’s ruling party. Impalila Island was also a South African Defence Force base and the tent-peg steps soldiers hammered into a 2000-year-old baobab used as a watch tower are still there. This is the same tree tourists now climb for views of four nations: Namibia, Zimbabwe, Botswana and Zambia. Up until 2002 people drove in convoy here for fear of attacks – only in the past five or six years has the area started opening up to tourism. With word spreading of great wildlife viewing, birding and fishing, as well as of its lavish new lodges, it won’t be long before more adventurous souls start to choose the Caprivi for their next safari. Most guests while I’m here are anglers – the area has some of the best tiger fishing on the Zambezi. Far too many tourists come to Africa expecting to see tigers of the Bengal variety, which has long been a source of amusement for locals. At least here visitors won’t go away entirely disappointed: there are tigers in the rivers. And the black-and-silver striped predator can be as ferocious as its namesake. Although its teeth are admittedly smaller, they have been known to take a careless fisherman’s finger. By chance, I hook one on my second afternoon on the Kasai Channel. No one is more scared than I am, trolling more for atmosphere than reward, to have an actual fish on the end of the line. This is despite having an expert tiger fisherman, Subia guide Robert, on hand and a fellow fisherwoman shouting encouragement, in between fits of laughter. Having grown up on Impalila Island, Robert has been catching tigers since a child and once reeled in a monster so big it fed all of his family, and some of the neighbours too. My fish leaps and dives and fights until my aching arms can’t take any more. Robert lands it and lets the 2kg tiddler go – anything less than five kilos and a serious fisherman won’t consider keeping it. Fanatics troll for days or go fly fishing on the rapids – I meet a British brain surgeon who has used tiger fishing to bribe his teenage son into spending time with him. It works: they disappear together for hours and come back beaming but empty handed, telling variations of ‘the one that got away’, including “my wife won’t let me bring home any more stuffed fish”. The Caprivi Strip was the result of a game of colony swapping in 1890 – Germany exchanged the spice island of Zanzibar with England for a slice of British Bechuanaland. The strip was named after the chancellor of the time, Count Leo von Caprivi, and the plan was to establish a trade route along the Zambezi to its mouth in Mozambique. But Germany’s route to the Indian Ocean was still blocked by something very British (in name anyway): the mighty Victoria Falls. To subscribe or buy back issues, click here  Namibia stayed modestly out of international news after that, appearing only as South West Africa, the German protectorate South Africa annexed during World War I and ruled, in defiance of the UN, for most of the 20th century. Independence in 1990 was relatively low key, overshadowed by the worldwide fanfare that accompanied Nelson Mandela’s release from jail and the first democratic elections in its southern neighbour. The most attention Namibia has received internationally was probably in 2006 when Hollywood actress Angelina Jolie had her baby here, with father Brad Pitt in attendance. And the image every celebrity magazine used to illustrate the land was the standard postcard shot, the red dunes at Sossusvlei, because the place was a desert, right? Mostly. That’s another reason the Caprivi is special – it’s the only part of Namibia where water is plentiful and the wilderness is lush and green. Largely undeveloped, the strip has few fences and the main road – the B8, also optimistically known as the Golden Highway or the Trans-Caprivi Highway – is a simple tar strip from Rundu to Katima Mulilo, with signs warning that elephants have right of way. This is as sophisticated as the infrastructure gets. There are three reserves – from the west, Bwabwata, Mudumu and Mamili national parks – but the best game viewing is in the far east, where the Chobe River forms the border between Namibia and Botswana’s famous Chobe National Park. New lodges are aimed firmly at the luxury market. The trend is to build grand ‘green’ lodges, with eco-friendly buildings blending into riverine forest and decor that evokes colonial splendour, with 21st-century comforts, such as refrigerators for the gin and tonic. Expect thatched-roof bungalows with indoor and outdoor showers, and sumptuous tented rooms, structures that deserve the adjective ‘tented’ only in so far as canvas is an element in building materials. Think four-poster-style beds draped in mosquito netting, wooden decks built around tree trunks and convivial evenings around a fire. Travelling from the west, the first luxurious port of call is Divava Okavango Lodge and Spa. Set on the banks of the Okavango River, wildlife game drives are offered to nearby Mahango Game Reserve, part of the 5000-square-kilometre Bwabwata Park. Diverse habitats, ranging from bushveld to papyrus swamps, make it a great birding spot, and there are cruises past hippos and crocs to Popa Falls. From there the river flows south to Botswana, where it disperses into the Okavango Delta. Bwabwata is a rugged park, making 4WDs essential. Sightings include everything from buffalo to wild dog. It can also be accessed from the east via the acclaimed Susuwe Island Lodge, where thatched suites, each with their own plunge pool, are set on an island in the Kwando River. Next stop is Lianshulu Lodge, in a private concession in Mudumu National Park. Here safaris may be in 4WDs, on foot or in small boats; sunset river cruises are popular. Mudumu is a former hunting concession, as is nearby Mamili National Park, which is famous for its birds, but hard to access. More than 400 bird species, including rarities such as the Angola swallow, are seen in the Caprivi. Mamili is a vast swamp criss-crossed by waterways, like a mini-Okavango Delta, and in rainy season it floods putting many areas out of reach. The park has only basic campsites. African skimmers, wattled cranes, black coucals and the elusive Souza’s shrike may be seen. Finally, Impalila Island – Namibia’s easternmost point. Here, Ichingo River Lodge has nine secluded tented rooms, with windows made of mosquito netting (no glass required in this humidity) and balconies overlooking river rapids. Most people find the cascades’ sound soothing at night, except one couple fresh from their sound-proofed room in Frankfurt who complained that the river was “too noisy”. Ichingo trains and employs 40 of the 600 or so Impalila islanders, who otherwise survive on subsistence farming, as do most of Caprivi’s population, which sits just under 100,000. There are two main tribal groups: Fwe in the west and Subia in the east. I visit a Subia village on Impalila Island where boys roll tyres through the dust, little girls help their mothers carry water to the cooking pot and chickens roam beneath a giant baobab. My fishing coach Robert is one of the islanders trained at Ichingo – he tells me tourism is a handy career for young Caprivians, allowing them to work locally as cooks, boatmen or guides, instead of heading south to the bright lights of the capital, Windhoek, to find a job. Lovely though the land lodges are, safari by houseboat is extraordinary. When I visit, the Ichobezis are the only overnighters in the area, which means that, come sunset, all the day trippers motor home and we are left sipping sauvignon blanc alone in the wilderness. “It’s very much part of nature,” Ralph says. “You’re right under the stars, you see the sun come up, the floodplain all around you, the animals come down to drink – you really are part of Africa. You can’t duplicate it on land.” He’s right. You can’t.

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