Camping in Africa!

What an adventure! René and I went camping this weekend in Africa!? That is something I never thought I would do! We left Oshakati on Saturday morning (after acquiring a tent, a lantern, a tarp and batteries for our "torch"). We drove about 2 and a half hours to "Hippo Pools Campsite" which was near Ruacana Falls and right on the Kunene River. The campsite is actually run by the local community rather than a private enterprise. There was a Himba woman making a basket who "checked us in." Google "Himba" because they are a really unique and traditional people. Because of what we read in the guide books and the name of the campsite, we thought we would see crocodiles and hippos. The only Crocs we saw were the shoes left behind by our neighbors! But there were some telling signs of crocodile presence and the Namibian customs agent told us a tale about a German guy who waded into the water while his wife took pictures of him and he was taken by a crocodile. We seriously sat by the river for hours scouring the area for crocs! And we heard distinct hippo sounds at night, but I was way too scared to find out what kind of animal was making the noise! Let's just call it a hippo. The birding was amazing and René made a friend, a little red bird, who he never failed to photograph when he turned up! (He proceeded to fill our memory card with pictures of this particular bird.) Anyway, it was a huge success, despite the fact that it was a million degrees in our tent as we tried to fall asleep. At least it didn't rain as hard as it has been- we had only sprinkles. There were several other campers at the campsite, one group was a huge family reunion of some sort with music and goat roasting on the braai pit (just like a grill) and volleyball. Our neighbors were Afrikaners who had a motor boat and went out for a boat ride in the river (scary, considering their boating skills, which were poor). We also met some young guys from near Ruacana who wanted to take pictures with us. René is convinced they plan to crop him out of the photos, haha.