CENTRAL
KALAHARI
SAFARI LODGES & CAMPS -
INFORMATION & IMAGES
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LODGE ATTRACTIONS
The
fossil valley was first brought to the world's attention
in 1985, by the book Cry of the Kalahari written
by Mark and Delia Owens, who lived on the pan for
seven years studying the brown hyena that live here.
The Kalahari is not a true desert though, but rather
an arid savanna wilderness - its broad largely featureless
plains are clad by sweet grasses and by patches
of camelthorn, blackthorn and other acacias. |
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These
great forbidding places also manage to sustain their wildlife
populations, a surprisingly rich diversity of animals - among
them springbok and gemsbok, blue wildebeest, eland, red hartebeest
- that are superbly adapeted to the bone-dry conditions. Many
of them extract water from such unlikely sources as the dew-covered
nighttime plants, from the deep roots of succulents or the moisture-laden
wild cucumber and tsamma melon. Others - carnivores such as lion,
leopard, hyena and wild dog - slake their thirst on the blood
of their prey. The Kalahari also has its indigenous human presence;
it is home to the last of the "traditional" Bushman communities,
descendants of the once-dominant semi-nomadic hunter-gatherer
inhabitants of the thirstlands. |
