I’m just sat in Heathrow Terminal 5 waiting for a flight to Johannesburg and trying not to get too excited too early – it’s an eleven hour flight after all and then I’m not stopping there! Tomorrow lunchtime I’m catching a shorter flight to Maun in Botswana – the gateway to the Okavango Delta.  

After seeing the wildlife of Africa so often on TV I thought it was about time I saw it for real and the Okavango seems like a good place to start.  The trip is a bird-focussed holiday organised by Naturetrek but I’m hoping for plenty of mammals too – I’d be a very happy boy if I saw African hunting dogs!

I realised a while back that I’d missed Africa and its wildlife off my bucket list, so I’m making amends with this being my second long distance trip outside of Europe (the first being the Falklands and hopefully more to come).

For the first time in a while, I’m travelling laptopless, so there won’t be any updates while I’m out there. However, hopefully there’ll be plenty to blog about on my return!