In the morning we are woken by a rustling overhead, birds we thought at first, until we look good from our tent. There are monkeys in the trees above our tent.
We have breakfast quickly, deflate the rear tires to 2 bar and leave the camp.
When we just stop after the challenging sand track to reflate the tires close in Etsha 13 a wedding is taking place. We immediately get audience while pumping the tires, dozens of kids want to be in front to see what I’m doing.
When we then also get a ball out of our car and inflate it the party is complete. Sonja plays a ball game with the kids, that’s a lot of fun.
The drive to Tsodilo is without trouble, only a stretch of asphalt road to the north and then a good flattened dirt road coming to the east. We arrive at one o’clock at the gate to the campsite and park. That appears to be closed with no sign of life in the neighborhood. If we ask a woman who sits waiting under a tree (on the bus?) She says that theywill be having lunch, just wait patiently.
And indeed, a little after half past one the first people appear from the huts across the road, a woman with an official-looking jacket also approches. We follow her and indeed, she allows us to park and we tell her we will camp overnight.
Down the female hill several guides are waiting, we can set up our tent, but the main guide advises us to first do the walk along the rock paintings.
Our guide, a young woman aged about 25-30, accompanies us from the parking lot around the mountain. In the beginning a sandy track which later transformed into a stoney path and by the end of the trip, about 2.5 hours, a steep rocky riverbed without water.
The rock paintings are lovely, nicely detailed but mostly incredibly numerous. We really see dozens of petroglyphs made by the San tribe of about 3,000 years ago.
It is a wonderful journey, and especially after the steep final stretch we are quite tired. When we return to the parking lot it turns out all colleagues of our guide got away, so I suggest to bring her back to the gate. She tells us that there is also a campsite close to the gate.
We install ourselves near the toilet block and are later joined by a Dutch couple who share in our campfire at night. We exchange travel experiences together and enjoy the beautiful starry sky behind the male Tsodilo rock.
