It’s a long day ahead of us. We are staring at about 420 kms of driving today. We left the community camp in the morning itself. The destination is Harnas Rest Camp in Namibia which is also a game farm and a wildlife research foundation. Except for the camps in Botswana we didn’t have any reservations in the camps in other countries. In Botswana, esp in the NP’s its compulsory to have advance reservations. But since its off season, I was sure that we don’t have to bother about any reservations in Namibia. The only problem with Harnas is that is about 100 km north of the Trans Kalahari highway. So if we don’t find any place to camp there then the only options left are to go for normal rooms, which will be expensive or to drive back all the way to the highway and look for other options. Both are not good. In addition the rates mentioned in the travel guides looked more than double the normal rates in Namibia. Since it is a game farm I expected that the rates include some kind of game drive. So I decided to call them in advance when we are on the road about campsite availability.
On the way we couldn’t reach the camp office in any of the telephone numbers mentioned in the travel guides. So we had no other option other than driving directly to them. We reached there around 4pm. The camp settings were a bit different from what we knew of other game farms. The rest camp is situated in a very large fenced area with the games in “semi captivity”. The whole extra money they charge for the camping/lodging obviously goes for maintaining that huge property. They also claim to conduct some wild life research. Unless I see some credible publications from the researches, I will be sceptical of those claims. But they do say that they take care of abandoned pets and do rescue and rehabilitation of the animals for more than 30 years, which is always a good thing. I hope they are really doing that for the exorbitant rates they charges.
To our disappointment the game drives were not included in the rents. And I didn’t even feel like taking pictures of animals behind fences. Especially after coming across them roaming around freely in the national parks. Actually it is quite depressing to see them behind fences. I saw the first cheetah of our trip there. Beautiful cat, and my most favourite one, but felt sad to see it behind barbed fences. Wish I could talk with it. In the evening we could see some antelopes (impalas and wildebeests) around our camp. Also we came across a new animal, a springhare, which looks almost like a rabbits with small ears, but hops around like a kangaroo. It also had a long black tipped tail. I had never seen/heard about this animal before. That was a nice surprise!
It’s the last night of our Kalahari adventure in the tent. The rest of the days are going to be in more or less civilized surroundings. I felt sad. I loved this life with all its rustiness, surprises and freedom. But then I am also aware that this is not real, in the end it is just holidays. When I was lying down in the tent I told the Lady that I am going to miss her. She didn’t say anything, obviously, the answer clear! Sometimes silence is the answer!
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