Maun, Botswana.

Victoria Falls turned out to be a pretty impressive place, I figure its a bit like Whistler in that when you are there you feel like you'll probably be back again at some point in your life. The falls themselves were somewhat mismanaged but no real surprise there. As it's the tail end of the rainy season right now the falls where in full flow, consequently you could only see a little of them as the spray thrown back up from the sheer amount of water dropping 200m meant that you where looking through a constant rain cloud.



You can walk along on the opposite side of the falls where there is a sheer cliff down into the canyon and you can sneak peaks when the wind blows the rain out of the way. Within a few steps on the opposite side I was soaked through my rain jacket to the bone, there is a small suspension bridge that crossed one side of the canyon and had a small river flowing over it from the volume of rain. While crossing it I tried to look over the edge but couldnt see anything, the rain was coming up from below into your eyes, it came from in front of you when you walked and it dropped from above when you looked up.



After taking a walk around we headed up to the top and sat a 100m up the river in the sun to dry out, people where letting their kids play in the edge of the river less than 50m from the actual falls and the river at this point was borderline white water. I'm fairly sure a bit of natural selection as happened at that point once or twice. I also got myself weighed at the bungy bridge and im weighing in at 76.5 kg's now, I was 89 kgs when I arrived. Not sure what that is in stone but im fairly sure losing 12.5kgs will make climbing mountains a whole lot easier.

We crossed into Botswana the next day after an easy 80kms, Botswana has been a welcome relief, it has 1.7 million population in space the size of france, it makes for some incredible riding and for the first time for a while where you can be out on the road without being shouted or jeered at, one of the things that has been really wearing on me has been the constant barrage of noise form the poeple as you pass, it fun to begin with, but it is non stop and most of the time its dumb things that are shouted at you. The Elehant highway is the section we are on and the road has been relentlessly straight, predominantly flat, brutally cold first thing in the morning then hot as the day goes on. Most of al though it has been quiet. The trucks and cars that pass you every 20 minutes or so leave plenty of room and almost all give you a wave while resisting the urge to sit on the horn like the rest of the nation, in short the riding has been very pleasant and gives you alot of time to think.

I have ended up riding a great deal of these roads alone, mostly to get some space and to enjoy the tranquility, I havent even had my ipod on prefering to settle down to a nice rythm and cruise. Almost everyday has been around 160kms and not to hard on you all in however 160kms is still a fair bit of time on the bike however you look at it. Yet again i've found myself having conversations with things that pass by, birds - insects that try and play chicken with you, lizards and at one point I had a long chat with a bull Elephant that was at one of the watering holes we rode past. In all honesty he scared the crap out of me, I was totally in my own little world when out of the corner of my eye I saw a huge great grey thing moving fast on my right. After jumping enough to almost fall off the bike I realised that I had had the same effect on him and had startled him enough for him to have jumped up out of the mud he was rolling in and he was running away from me. He crossed to the other side of the small watering hole at the edge of the bushes and turned to face me ears out and alert. I composed myself and checked my shorts then we stood a distance away from one another and had a chat. Conversation went something like this:

Me : 'seriously dude, why are you scared of me, I should be the one hidin in the bush?'
Elephant: (silence with flap of ears)
Me: 'c'mon I mean what really do you think a guy in lycra can do to you?'
Elephant: (silence with trunk moving toward me to take another smell, ears at full length with him seeming to grow another 5 feet every breath.)
Me: 'c'mon come back to the water and take a drink, carry on with your bath, whatever, don't be shy.'
Elephant: long growly type noise loud enough to feel through your feet
Me: 'ok, try and scare me, your the big man here.'
Elephant: wrap trunk around near bush and pull it in half without budging the rest of body
Me: 'sure take it out on the bush, he scare you too?'
Elephant walk's toward the water with pace making me think he is going to come at me
Me - climbing on bike and checking im in a good gear to move quick if I need to.
Elephant: looking happy that I was about to run stops at waters edge and sticks trunk in looking smug that again I had to check my shorts.
Me 'cool well if your gonna play that game im gonna do the tourist thing and take pics of you, that cool?'
Elephant: spray water around still looking happy with himself.



We are down to 17 riding days left now, its a weird sensation - so much to look forward to, but also I know after a trip like this you are always left feeling a bit low when its done. Bear Back will be kicking off a day after I get home with Seb, Jamie, Pete, Nat and Tristan flying in on the same day and the the first guests Colin and Ian arriving a day later...good times, no idea what the snow is looking like, hope its hot there right now and that shit is melting fast.

Heading out on a plane over the Okavango Delta in about 30 mins, life sucks huh.

m