KHUTSE
It's just after sunrise at the Molose waterhole. It's March but the mornings are already crisp – the veld smells fresh and alive. There's a jackal calling in the distance and northern black korhaans are squabbling over their little patches of territory. Then, from our vantage point in our Fortuner, my wife Venessa and I see four or five big shadows emerging from the bush. Elephants! But hang on a minute, elephants in the Kalahari?
Venessa and I first visited Khutse together in the early 1990s. Back then we were only dating. I'd grown up camping but she'd never experienced it. My dad loved fishing so we went camping regularly. I wasn't so great at the fishing part, but I simply loved being out in nature. I had decided that Khutse would be Venessa's introduction to the overlanding world. She'd either love it or hate it… We had all the basics: an old Mitsubishi Pajero with a dual battery and fridge, a rooftop tent, a porta-loo (one of Venessa's prerequisites) and enough water, wood and food.
Khutse is “only” a 570 km drive from Joburg and a great introduction to the isolation of the much larger Central Kalahari Game Reserve (CKGR). (Khutse shares a fenceless border with its neighbouring mega-park.) I underestimated how long it would take to drive those 570 km and we arrived fairly late. We drove from Gauteng and covered the entire distance in one day – not one of my best ideas. You should
