Our Trusty Steed
Well here it is: our transportation and accommodation for 26 days. A Mercedes Benz Sprinter base with a camper / caravan 'box' bolted on top. Unfortunately the fine German engineering stopped at the hood ornament, with the box cobbled together by a number of manufacturers. This has definitely been an area of compromise for us, as one of the only practical means of transporting and accommodating 6 people. The Spirit 5Lux model that we rented will sleep 5 in a pinch and, er, 6 in a charliehorse ... We considered several alternatives for a few weeks before leaving for Africa, including the idealized, photogenic Land Rover Defender 110 with two roof-top tents and a towed trailer with a third tent on top; but our space would have been much tighter, and the daily setup and tear-down would have been impractical. We've seen many couples and families of 3 and 4 travelling in the Defender 110, Toyota LandCruiser, and Toyota HiLux setups, which look ideal for these numbers; with pop-up, roof-top tents that are ready to use within minutes of arrival if necessary – all with a more pleasing ‘safari’ look.
I'm being a bit unfair though; our 3.1 litre turbo diesel engine has been very reliable over the 6000+ kilometres we've driven it. The air conditioning has worked when it’s been needed; although tight, the sleeping has been reasonable; and the inside space has allowed for the comfort and distraction of the kids over longer stretches - with on-the-move access to a fridge, and areas for the kids to lie down, move about, and have their ‘space’. The only set-back was a tire slashed beyond repair by a rock (see 'Solitaire' in a previous blog), but easily replaced.
Although gravel and dirt (washboarded in places), the roads have all been easily passable in our vehicle, and we haven't once wished we had a 4x4. That was until we arrived in Kasane, Botswana, which is at the northeastern corner of the Chobe Park, and large parts of this park are known to be passable by 4x4 only (deeply rutted sand), with high clearance required. Most of Chobe Park requires a guide however, so we've taken a boat tour up the (swollen) Chobe River, a guided driving tour into the park, and an over-night, fly-in, guided tour into the Okavango Delta.
Communication
If you don't know or don't care about the differences between WiFi and 3G then the following won't be of interest to you, but we’ve travelled with a few iPhones, a notebook computer, and an unlocked GSM cell phone – all of which thrive on a daily diet of telecommunications of course! With the cell phone, we’ve been able to purchase a new SIM card and some pre-paid airtime (or equivalent volume of internet data) in each of the countries we’ve visited. After activating the SIM card and provisioning the card for data usage, we’ve made calls with the phone or, alternatively, put the active SIM card into a MiFi 2352 wireless modem router. This MiFi device is pretty convenient: it’s the size of a pack of cards, battery (or USB) powered, and distributes a WiFi signal to its surroundings, allowing up to five other devices to connect via WiFi to a shared 3G or GPRS signal for data transmission. This has allowed us to blog, Skype (in a pinch), research activities, camp sites, and accommodation, and even navigate ‘on the fly’, while driving with our own little internet ‘cloud’ within the vehicle. Beyond the convenience of being able to connect with the notebook and iPhones while underway and in camp, the data costs have been much lower also. For example, throughout Namibia we were buying pre-paid ‘minutes’ which allowed us to get internet data at a rate of $NAM 2.00/MB (about $CAD 0.27/MB). This of course compares quite favourably to Roger’s offer of $CAD 30.00/MB for data roaming!
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