Delta Airlines. Not that Delta. We arrived at the airport - a tiny building in the center of town - and climbed into a 4 seater plane. We flew 40 minutes over the delta - elephants and zebras were dots below. We could see the water's dried up highways and interstates and dusty back roads that have stopped flowing as the dry season’s sets in. It looks like the remains of a bustling city hub that was abandoned centuries ago. We were flying to the middle of nowhere. No roads, no cars. A small landing strip for our tiny plane came into view seconds before we landed. Oddballs Camp. We’re staying in a raise canvas tent with an open-air bathroom. And a bucket shower where gravity’s the water pressure. I love the bucket shower.
The delta is calm, quiet, slow. Actually it fools you for a second. Turns out, it's not quiet - there’s noise everywhere. Birds sing incessantly which is cute until it's nighttime and you're a bad sleeper. Mosquitoes buzz around your head, recoiling at the last minute as they smell the Deet coating your skin. Dried leaves fall off the trees with the wind and sound like rain. A pod of hippos snort and it sounds like they're right below your feet. So actually, it's decidedly not quiet at all.
Walking onto the deck I can already see the Delta unfold. Hippos splash and grunt by the banks of the river. Baboons and Impalas roam around together. Vervet monkeys climb a nearby tree. Double, triple decker termite mounds create the delta skyline. An African fish eagle screeches from the tall yellow grass.
Walking onto the deck I can already see the Delta unfold. Hippos splash and grunt by the banks of the river. Baboons and Impalas roam around together. Vervet monkeys climb a nearby tree. Double, triple decker termite mounds create the delta skyline. An African fish eagle screeches from the tall yellow grass.
I don't know why I thought the animals we'd see would for some reason be siphoned off by species - maybe because I don't know anything about animals. Elephants stage right, baboons off screen, warthogs center left etc. Turns out they're all just casually cohabiting. Every time I look up from the deck there is something new, something moving, something changing. And yet even amidst the commotion everything somehow feels so still.
Before we went on our safari I believed nature was chaos, which I think may, in part, be why I'm so scared of animals. I think I've always assumed that we can't understand why animals do what they do, go where they go, act as they do. I assumed there was no way to predict anything in the wild - including what animals we'd see on a given day on a safari. But there are clear rhythms and patterns and expectations in the wild. There is a bird that calls out when predators are nearby (note: it sounds a lot like a curmudgeony Woody Allen saying “whaaaaaaat” with a strong uptick). When you see buffalo on Tuesday evening, chances are you'll find lions on Wednesday morning, as they stalk the buffalo as prey. Elephants and hippos are most dangerous in the springtime when new flowers bloom giving them indigestion. Giraffes and zebras often congregate together, as the zebras use the giraffes’ height to alert them to nearby predators. The wild is calculated, predictable, logical.
I thought the objective of a safari was simple: to see animals. Which I think might still be the case for a driving safari. But as soon as we arrived at Oddballs it became clear that seeing animals would be a byproduct of our experience. Of course, a happy and expected byproduct but a secondary objective nonetheless. The true objective was to be fully immersed in nature. Walking on the dry land of the delta I felt intimate with my surroundings. I was living, for a brief moment, alongside the animals. Breathing, walking, moving together. The goal quickly shifted from wanting to see animals to simply wanting to inhabit the same space for a short while.
Before we went on our safari I believed nature was chaos, which I think may, in part, be why I'm so scared of animals. I think I've always assumed that we can't understand why animals do what they do, go where they go, act as they do. I assumed there was no way to predict anything in the wild - including what animals we'd see on a given day on a safari. But there are clear rhythms and patterns and expectations in the wild. There is a bird that calls out when predators are nearby (note: it sounds a lot like a curmudgeony Woody Allen saying “whaaaaaaat” with a strong uptick). When you see buffalo on Tuesday evening, chances are you'll find lions on Wednesday morning, as they stalk the buffalo as prey. Elephants and hippos are most dangerous in the springtime when new flowers bloom giving them indigestion. Giraffes and zebras often congregate together, as the zebras use the giraffes’ height to alert them to nearby predators. The wild is calculated, predictable, logical.
I thought the objective of a safari was simple: to see animals. Which I think might still be the case for a driving safari. But as soon as we arrived at Oddballs it became clear that seeing animals would be a byproduct of our experience. Of course, a happy and expected byproduct but a secondary objective nonetheless. The true objective was to be fully immersed in nature. Walking on the dry land of the delta I felt intimate with my surroundings. I was living, for a brief moment, alongside the animals. Breathing, walking, moving together. The goal quickly shifted from wanting to see animals to simply wanting to inhabit the same space for a short while.
On the walks, Fish was captivating to watch. Termite mounds were his lookout posts. A tall vantage point to see across the vast delta. Bird calls, feces and footprints were his walkie talkie and GPS (note: he did have a walkie talkie, he just never used it. Which I think is why we never saw lions when others did). He didn't speak too much, probably because his English was poor, but he moved gracefully and I enjoyed watching him. He had a baby face and I kept daydreaming about him as a child running around the delta - climbing the sausage trees in the mornings to drink the sweet water that pooled in the tree’s burgundy flowers. We followed him for miles, seeing impalas, warthogs, hippos, elephants, birds and baboons. We walked slowly and carefully. We saw a herd of buffalo in the distance and stumbled upon a wounded buffalo separated from his group and an accidental 40 meters in front of us. To be honest, I didn't prefer seeing the buffalo up close over walking even when we weren't seeing anything at all.
On our final walk we told Fish we wanted to see lions. Everyone else had seen them. The guides weren't scared of lions so of course now neither were we. They were scared of hippos and buffalo and elephants. But not lions. We didn't see a lion on that morning walk. But it was my favorite walk of the trip (at least until Fish realized the lions had migrated to the next island and we weren't going to see them, at which point I began decompensating only to be rescued by Tom methodically swatting mosquitoes from my neck for the full final hour of our journey). The walk was filled with an anxious energy. We could hear the lions roar in the distance as we walked towards them. During the day the lions hide in the tall grass. We weren’t walking a far and wide circuitous route around our target as we had been in the past - we were walking straight through the tall grasses. Fish was studying the signs. Steering us away from impalas and other happily grazing animals because it meant lions weren't there. Tracking footprints, listening to bird calls, looking for buffalo and hyenas as indicators of the pride’s whereabouts. We didn't see a lion. But I didn't need to. The anticipation alone was as exhilarating than the prize.
The pace of a walking safari is slow. Fish was always stepping so slowly. I wonder if driving safaris are more common because they suit our Western sensibilities - the pace is quick, the sightings are efficient. Guides spot an animal, drive close to it, tourists take pictures and move on to the next. Rinse and repeat.
The pace of a walking safari is slow. Fish was always stepping so slowly. I wonder if driving safaris are more common because they suit our Western sensibilities - the pace is quick, the sightings are efficient. Guides spot an animal, drive close to it, tourists take pictures and move on to the next. Rinse and repeat.
Perhaps another reason driving safaris are more appealing is because we feel protected. A car is protection. Guns are protection. But on our walking safari there was no car, no gun. Our only protection was Fish’s lived experience and knowledge - and I could feel it. He was always stopping and listening, looking around, quietly contemplating, drumming up all the information from thirty years of living with the delta as his playground. When an elephant is angry he will mock charge. He may do this up to three times. Don't run. If a hippo, rhino or buffalo charges you, run and do so in zigzags. Look a lion in the eye. Never look a leopard in the eye. When a hippo is angry, you're fucked.
These weren't just paltry pieces of advice to make our adrenaline rush. These were actually pretty regular encounters. The Wednesday before we arrived, Fish and two tourists were charged by an elephant. During our stay, another guide and a tourist were mock charged by a lion after accidentally running into a large pride. Kate and Richie had to abandon their mokoro because a pod of hippos were blocking the channel, only to be screamed at to get back into their mokoro because they accidentally de-canoed in front of a mother elephant and her baby. I could feel that Tom wanted one of these run-ins. And as scared as I was, I really did too. In the evening around the campfire these stories are your currency, everyone in a friendly competition for the tallest tale. Sadly, we sailed through our excursions with safety by our side and both blamed Fished for it.
These weren't just paltry pieces of advice to make our adrenaline rush. These were actually pretty regular encounters. The Wednesday before we arrived, Fish and two tourists were charged by an elephant. During our stay, another guide and a tourist were mock charged by a lion after accidentally running into a large pride. Kate and Richie had to abandon their mokoro because a pod of hippos were blocking the channel, only to be screamed at to get back into their mokoro because they accidentally de-canoed in front of a mother elephant and her baby. I could feel that Tom wanted one of these run-ins. And as scared as I was, I really did too. In the evening around the campfire these stories are your currency, everyone in a friendly competition for the tallest tale. Sadly, we sailed through our excursions with safety by our side and both blamed Fished for it.
