ETOSHA NATIONAL PARK, NAMIBIA: Okaukuejo Waterhole, Guest Post by Sara Kras

Okaukuejo Waterhole, Etosha National Park, Namibia

My friend and fellow children’s book writer Sara Kras spent much of the past year living in Namibia. Here she shares a recent visit to Etosha National Park. Sara loves to travel and has contributed numerous articles to The Intrepid Tourist. Sara's most recent book, Baby Boomer Reboot, is a fascinating account of the challenges she faced going back to college in her fifties.  

 
Etosha National Park lies in northern Namibia. This large park is 8600 square miles and is surrounded by a fence.  To ensure the animals within its borders have water, many manmade waterholes have been constructed throughout the park. The most famous one is Okaukuejo. One of the park entrances is there, along with a large camp comprised of villas and cottages. There is even a large dirt parking lot where visitors can pitch their own tents and camp.

Entrance to Okaukuejo waterhole, with its characteristic stone tower.

High-end international travelers rarely stay on site at Okaukuejo because of the condition of the buildings. The main advantage of staying on site is to be at the waterhole after sunset, when there can be lots of activity.  If you stay outside the park, you must leave by sunset. We stayed in one of the most expensive rooms (about $180 including dinner and breakfast) called a Premier Waterhole Villa.  Our room #33 had a direct view of the waterhole. We could sit on the balcony or even in our bed and watch the animals come and go any time of day or night.  But, for this wonderful feature we had to put up with very noisy and leaky air conditioners, stained curtains, and an upstairs toilet with no toilet seat.  This was definitely not a luxury situation and most western travelers would find it intolerable. But it did have strong hot water pressure in the shower and the bed was comfortable--two of my main criteria since I am not a camper.

What did I get for putting up with this discomfort?  If you’re into African animals as I am, you get a lot.

After sunset, floodlights illuminate the waterhole. This is the best time and place to see the endangered black rhino.

On Day 1, we saw a large herd of zebra, many giraffe, springbok and gemsbok.  After the sun went down, a male lion began roaring and huffing. This continued most the night, though he never made an appearance at the waterhole. However, twenty black rhinos showed up, staggering their appearance to keep us all entertained, and two lionesses trotted down to the waterhole for their nightly drink.

During the night there was an intense thunder and lightning storm. Buckets of rain poured from the sky, much to our dismay, as rain disperses the animals because they can find abundant water elsewhere.

The waterhole was pretty quiet on Day 2. I felt sorry for the visitors that came to Okaukuejo for just one night (never a good idea). There were lots of long, sad faces sitting around the waterhole willing animals to appear. They never did except for three giraffes and three black rhinos.

Elephant herd

Because of the heat, a lot of water evaporated from the rain, so animals began making their trek back to the waterhole on Day 3 in the afternoon. There was a group of about one hundred wildebeest, along with zebra, gemsbok, and springbok. Several herds of elephants showed up, totaling about thirty. Many babies were part of the group. Later in the evening, five different black rhino made their lumbering appearance.

A visit to Okaukuejo is one of the most unusual safaris my husband and I have experienced. The reason is that the animals come to you. There’s no need to drive anywhere to search for them. In addition, there’s lots of opportunity to see the critically endangered black rhino. The best months to go to Okaukuejo are June through October when the park is the driest.