ActivityNorth-West District, Botswana
The Okavango Delta by Mokoro
Silent channels, water lilies and an elephant at eye level
Average rating 4.0 out of 5
4.01 reviewEasy
A mokoro trail is the slowest and most intimate way to see the Okavango Delta. Our editor, a former poler, explains what to expect.
Poling through the Delta
I grew up poling mekoro, the dugout canoes my grandfather carved from sausage and ebony trees. Today most are made of fibreglass to save the trees, but the craft is the same: a poler stands at the stern and pushes off the sandy bottom with a long pole of mogonono wood, and the boat slides through channels a metre wide.
From a mokoro your eyes are a few centimetres above the water. You see reed frogs the size of a thumbnail, malachite kingfishers, the pink of a day lily opening, and you hear everything: the hippo grunting two channels over, the splash of a red lechwe. Your poler reads the water constantly. Hippos and elephants have right of way, always.
The best mokoro trips are in the flood season, roughly May to September, when water from the Angolan highlands fills the Delta just as the Kalahari around it is driest.
The Delta from the water and the air
Before you go
- Wear neutral colours and a hat; there is no shade in a mokoro.
- Sit still. A mokoro is stable only when its passengers are.
- Bring binoculars and a zoom, not a tripod.
- Tip your poler directly at the end of your stay.
A mokoro has no engine and no hurry. That is the whole point.Kagiso Molefe
Okavango Delta
About this story
Kagiso MolefeAuthor
Wildside ExpeditionsPublisher
Reviews
Write a reviewAverage rating 4.0 out of 5
1 review- LHLeila Haddad4 out of 5 stars4 Sept
Excellent wildlife advice. The transfers between parks take longer than suggested.
Keep this story
