We high-tailed it out of Jo'burg the next day on a bus to Gaborone, the capital of Botswana. We said goodbye to predictable water, electricity, guaranteed toilet roll and clean streets, all indications of 'civilisation', however here, a contradictory word meaning industrialised and physically developed in South Africa, but, meaning that one can't walk around the city without a fear of muggings. The journey was 6 hours to Gaborone and the bus was nice by Western standards. We met an elderly couple from Botswana who were coming back from a seaside holiday in Cape Town - only a 30 hour trip by bus! We were only in Gaborone for one night but it was fairly memorable staying in a dubious hotel located at the bus station with a casino attached. The overly friendly casino manager, Natasha, who I later caught on to be a lesbian, treated me to several free drinks while teaching me 21. It was a great idea at the time but not so much in the morning waking up at 5am to catch a bus for the 11 hour trip to Maun. The first of many long gruelling bus journeys went by rapidly somehow and we discovered while driving through the whole of the country that Botswana's largest export after diamonds, is cattle. 40 million cattle and 2 million people. We were lucky to have a seat, as many people were packed into the aisle and some standing for as long as 11 hours.

Maun is located in the north of Botswana and is the gateway to the Okavango River Delta, the world's largest fresh water delta. We spent the next few days relaxing at our wonderfully serene river lodge, chatting with Afrikaaner's on fishing holidays and other travellers. I met a nice environmental science student who had been studying and living in Maun for four months and I'd met him on his last night at the lodge. There was a big party that resulted in shot after shot of springboks (popular peppermint liquor and amarula shots that resemble the South African rugby team colours). That was also the night of the closing Olympic Ceremony and I remember in a drunken haze feeling oh so patriotic and thinking how incredible London would be at that moment.

Although I was interested to see the Okavango Delta, I was looking forward to moving on to a proper town and meeting some backpackers. Many budget travellers miss Botswana completely because its so expensive and difficult to travel through without your own transport, however the local buses were a piece of cake in comparison to other parts of Africa, I've visited. We had our safari holiday visiting the delta by dugout canoe, flying over Moremi National Park in a tiny 4 seater plane and doing a 2 day safari to a park called Khwai, where elephants, hippos, zebras, buffalo, you name it, were literally walking around our tent. Aside from being amazing, it was terrifying! I'm well aware of thinking animals look cute and beautiful but they are at the end of the day unpredictable wild animals and my previous experience with one angry mother giraffe and a territorial ostrich has confirmed this.