One of the main reasons I signed up for the expedition was for the tracking. To track in Africa and to watch and hopefully join in the tracking with the Bushmen would be an ultimate dream.
The first stop at Hobatere was a great introduction to the environment and landscape. The wildlife wasn't obvious and it wasn't too easy getting used to the open expanse of the Mopani bushvelt or the light coloured reflective ground and the bright sky despite zoning-in. I would say that going from the UK woods to the Africa bushvelt was like stepping out from a dark cinema onto the pavement on a bright summer's day. It took a while to get used to it and eventually spot the excellently camouflaged animals.
Tracking was another matter. Although not as easy as it would be in the Bushmanland, it was certainly not too difficult. Stani set up a couple of man-tracking exercises to get us into the swing of tracking in Africa and after a couple of false starts, we got into the swing of it. I enjoyed learning a new system of speculative tracking. The substrate was a fine stony-sand (see Mountain Zebra print above) and when there was tall grasses in the area. The grasses gave the direction of the quarry away by flagging. We eventually identified Kudu tracks near the camp and of course the abundant Mountain zebra.
Stani found some recent elephant tracks which we studied and eventually we were able to go down to the water-hole we had been watching to study the tracks and scat in the area. Interestingly we found a lion kill zebra in the latter stages of dried up decomposition in the shade of a mopani tree.
There were trails everywhere. It was impossible not to follow one and once you had identified the size and shape (and fall) of the scat, you could reasonably determine which of the antelopes had left it. Giraffe tracks were followed up to steep sided Kopje's where water might have collected in the cracks of the rocks and there was evidence of elephant on the same Kopjes. Tree and larger bushes were pushed over and stayed at acute angles where the eli's tried to get moisture from the tree roots.
Another day at Holbatere would have been ideal in order to study these fantastic tracks and trails in more detail and perhaps spot the lions which were surely not far away.
As we traversed along the Etosha pan, we tried to identify what there was as we lent out to view the prints from inside the Land Cruiser. The above shows a rhino and a giraffe print side-by-side...
... and we saw this lion print (confirmed by our local driver/guide). This was one of a series of tracks, which unfortunately, did not reveal it's owner.
At Bushmanland the substrate was fine sand. It was so good for tracking that you could see the imprinted maker's name of everyone's boots. We watched beetles and millipedes wander across the sand and immediately tried to store the track information in our heads.
Of course the ultimate came when the Bushmen took us out tracking. Not only did we have a good substrate to work with but it also rained for half an hour before we went out. Perfect conditions. After a few minutes looking at scat, the Bushmen picked up an active track. Not taking anything away from them but it did stand out in the conditions and even I could tell it was incredibly recent.
It was thrilling to see the bushmen un-shoulder their bows and string up an arrow. I noticed one of them had a short spear with him. I was following them closely and listened to the whispered and translated explanations. We were following a Duiker (pron. dyker) a small antelope very similar in size and shape to a Muntjac (although I didn't know this at the time).
For a while we followed the tracks until they suddenly ran out. The bushmen looked at each other and then started their clicking chatter. They seemed to be carrying out some sort of lost spoor procedure and retraced their steps slightly. I was entranced by their hand movements as it appeared as though they were mimicking the springing motion of the duiker with their hand. Then they had it. They walked forward quite a way and resumed their tracking. I couldn't see the tracks at all and wondered how the hell that they had found the track again.
They must have read my thoughts because they came back and gestured that the duiker had leapt a huge distance after hiding in a bush. Apparently (and I know this only from later research) the duiker hides or freezes when it thinks its in danger and, at the last minute, springs out of hiding only to dive into another bush, hence it's name duiker or diver.
So therefore it was intimate knowledge of the quarry that had found the tracks and not some mystical or shamanistic vision. We measured the leap and it came to approximately 7 meters. That's some long jump and it would have confused the best tracker had they not known the traits of the animal.
The bushmen patiently let me lead the tracking. I considered this an absolute honour even though they played a trick on me (see this post). The rest of my tracking (for about half a kilometre) could have been smoother (it was was a little stop start as I looked at the tracks near my feet and not far enough ahead) but I was reasonably accurate and quite quick in places. I was nervous but I was enjoying every minute.
After a while the bushmen stopped for what I thought was a rest. I know I needed one! They brought out the hand drill and made an ember. Instead of making a cup of tea, which was a bit of a shame, they studied the smoke and determined that the wind was swirling everywhere therefore our scent was also blowing about. They told us that the duiker had taken us in a complete circle to try and get downwind of us. They decided that it had won the day and it would live to tell the tale. Unbelievably we had been out for two hours and had covered about 3.5 kms.
Studying the GPS track later we saw that indeed we had gone in a large figure of eight which showed the way the duiker had out-smarted us. The last sign and tracks we looked at was the duiker kneeling down and I imagined the small antelope looking through the bush in our direction at the noise we were making, and slowly rising to sneak away as we rested.
It's difficult to describe how fantastic it was to be tracking with the bushmen. Perhaps it's like painting with Picasso or having a kick about with Pele. Certainly an experience I won't forget in a hurry.
Final Namibia post - Bush Survival.
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