Being unable to buy supplies we were left with little option but to visit the restaurant. This was an inspired choice but left the girls once again without tasks to earn their keep. In a very sweet move, Gaby did a speech in front of the whole restaurant thanking us for rescuing them in Sprinbok and looking after them so well. It was well received by us as well as all the ransoms in the restaurant. Once again the end to a stunning day. We all want to visit Etosha again.

A slow start today with tents to pull down and van to pack up. Team Sargerofti were waiting for the girls outside the gates of Etosha. After fond farewells it is back into a much more roomy van.

LuLu is struggling today, we suspect her sinuses are also blocked like ours were after the dust in the park. We thought with a little less weight we would be flying. It might be a visit to the doctor this morning. We also need to get Stews tooth looked at but that might have to wait for Livingstone. Yesterday Stew was eating and lost half of one of his back molars. It isn't hurting but we don't want it flaring up in Malawi.

First stop Grootfontein, top up with supplies and give LuLu a much needed air filter clean. Back on the road and she is a different lady. It just shows that if you look after your woman and treat her right she will give you many years of love right back. We also just realized that LuLu is 39 years and 362 days old so we are thinking of a big celebration at Livingstone.

As we head toward the world renowned Caprivi strip we are passing lots of game farms. Lovely bushveld would make an excellent home for the Rhino. They take poaching very seriously here. Any incident results in full Namibian army response. We are getting lots of respect for the Imake a difference fundraising effort.

Just passed a farm with the name Taranaki. It is probably the same size but I wonder if there is any connection. This run up to Rundi is 260k of sameness. Just stopped for a leg stretch with quite a few put footers. Fantastic to see the replacement VW has caught us up after an epic 1800k drive yesterday. I think all cars are back in the rally.

Dotted along the road are small traditional villages with the traditional wooden Kraal. Looks a bit like Zululand but no rubbish nor painted block work.

We took the time to stop and chat to the locals. They loved the pens and the soccer ball. Think they might need paper as well. We were quickly surrounded and thought we should move on.

Approaching the Caprivi strip we took sundowners in the evening on the road, we are quite chilled inside LuLu so it wasn't a hardship. Bruce can't wait to get into camp so he can have a belated sundowner. The Caprivi strip connects Namibia to the great Zambezi. This narrow strip borders Botswana on one side and Angola on the other side. The little villages dominate the landscape and everywhere you look you see cows and goats. Many of these are not taken into kraals at night so driving can be very dangerous after dark. We came past locals walking in the road, cycling on the road with no lights and dark clothing as well as goats and cattle. Bruce and I were working very hard to spot anything in the fading light. The moon gave us a little relief.

We finally reached Ngepi camp after about two hours in the dark, what a surprise we had in front of us. This camp is stunning, it is on the banks of the Okovango river, there are lovely campsites along the banks of the river as well as restaurant decks and bars. You can hear the hippos in the water beside the campsite which seems a little dangerous but it seems they don't come into the camp when people are there. Lets see!

We are starting to get sorted with putting up the camp now but still haven't managed to get all the gear out as we couldn't get the van onto the site. We then cooked a fantastic Braai of vegetable parcels, chicken and baked potatoes in tinfoil.

Chill also delighted the camp with another appearance of the Bagpipe Whisperer.

Woken by the Fish Eagles calling and the Hippo's grunting you know your in Africa. Waking in a tent on the banks of the Okovango river, it just doesn't get much better. This camp is absolutely stunning. There are tree houses over the water, campsites along the banks, a central bar and kitchen with decks over the river for dinning or just chilling.

Guy and Amy went out on the makoro this morning where you paddle yourself up the river, where they learnt from their guide that there are 650 species of birds in the area here. They are so colourful and the bird noises are amazing.

I took the opportunity to visit a local village with Jacki from the sargerofti crew, our guide came from this village so we were able to ask whatever we wanted. We were shown how they make the houses using termite mounds and wood cot from the local trees. This village makes its money from cutting reeds and wood and selling it to locals or through the camp. They get N$10 for a bundle of wood and the camp sells it for N$12.50. A Namibian dollar has the same value as a rand so this is about NZ$1.50

It costs N$100 per term to send a child to school so many of the children can't afford to go. In the village we gave away some of the "imake a difference" pens to the kids. I asked one little girls if she had a pen already and she didn't. Boniface, our guide, told us that if a child doesn't have a pen then they must wait for one of the other kids to finish so they can borrow theirs but they need to be quick before the notes are removed from the board before the next lesson. Bring pens and soccer balls to Africa if you want to do something constructive for the locals.

The structure of the village is that girls and boys stay within the family compound. Once they get to be more independent the young men build a hut outside the compound and the young lady has a hut within the compound so the parents can keep their eye on her. If they want to get together they either need to organise this through the girls family or sneak out at night. If they have an accident then he must either marry the girl or take the child. If he wants no part of either then this would be a big problem.

This camp also has free wifi which us being thrashed as crews try to get their blogs up. This is not an official checkpoint but at least half of the crews seem to be here. We are taking the time to spend two nights here and are sharing the site with our friends from Team Maverick again. On the other side we have the Sole Sistas who are a fellow Project Rhino supporter. We had a good chance to chat and they might be interested to Adopt a Rhino under their Sole Sistas name.

The boys organized a fantastic lunch of borevors rolls with potato and onion. Maybe not the healthiest thing but it sure tasted good.

It was nice to have some down time in the afternoon. Traveling is fun but tiring and we probably spending more time in our car than most others. Bruce is doing a stirling job chauffeuring us around the continent.

We teamed up with the Creastfesters, sole sistas, tekkietubs and the legendary Team Maverick for the Booze cruise at 5.00 to view the animals in the park across the river and see the hippos and crocodiles in the river. We saw a good herd of Elephants coming down to drink, Kudu, Crocodiles, Buffalo, Little Egrets, Cattle Egrets, green backed heron, blacksmith lapwing, giant kingfisher, pied kingfisher, fish eagle, reed cormorants and spoon bills. The no swimming signs are for real! Ngepi camp does have a swimming pool in the river which has netting around it so you are safe from the crocs.

As we were coming back we were treated to another stunning sunset. The colours of an African sunset are quite unique. It seems every shade from yellow through gold, red and purple feature in the sky at the same time. As the sun went down we were treated to the largest moon since 1930. It was huge and again all the colours of the spectrum. The reflection on the Okovango river was an added bonus.

The Ngepi camp has to be seen to be believed, they have a very relaxed vibe and will make a plan about anything. Everything runs on an honesty system which was a new experience for many of the South Africans. You run a tab up and pay on exit.

Tonight the super moon is the biggest since 1930 and with the current poaching crisis in Africa we are very concerned for all the Rhino and Elephant that will loose their lives tonight. The full moon has become known as the poachers moon as it makes access to the parks so much easier. The Super Moon turns the night into a darkened twilight which provides plenty of light for the poachers to track these iconic animals.

Although we are on the Put Foot Rally, which does great work with school kids in Zambia, our cause is to raise awareness of the poaching crises decimating the number of Rhino. We are traveling under the www.imakeadifference.co.nz banner and our Kombi is becoming known as the Rhino car. Our mascot Bheji is a clay model Rhino and we have tried to photograph him in some of the iconic places we have visited.

It is with a heavy heart that I have to report that the poaching crises has claimed a victim close to our camp. Bheji has had half his horn removed in the night. We have no idea how this happened as he was locked away in our Kombi and it was on constant guard. At least he was not slaughtered or left drugged for extended periods ruining his internal organs, like so many of his species. None the less it will take many years to hone his horn to a point again and he may now suffer short horn syndrome.

It really brings it home to our camp that we need to wipe out the trafficking in endangered species and their body parts.

You may have noticed that we have a New Zealand domain extension for our website. Yes we are a NZ based fund, raising money for saving the Rhino. We see the plight facing the Rhino and Elephants as a global problem and want to use our business contacts (Our business is called Imake Ltd and we sell DIY equipment and supplies to make your own food and alcoholic drinks at home) to help raise funds and awareness for this heinous international crime. We have raised money from many of our international suppliers and customers from countries as far away from New Zealand as UK, Canada, USA, China, Taiwan, France, Australia and even South Africa. We also believe that the education about the poaching problem is as important as raising funds to try to make a difference in this war against poaching.

One thing I want to make very clear is that all funds raised are used for the projects listed on our website. No donated funds have been used for a joy ride around Africa. All costs for this trip including the cost of the Kombi, maintenance, fuel, signage and crew feeding and lubrication have been born by either us personally or Imake Ltd.

Our points of difference for our fund are that 100% of all donations go to the cause. All administration costs are born by Imake Ltd or are donated. We work with existing NGO's or similar but try to provide goods or services where we pay the suppliers of these directly. For instance when we paid for a reprint of enviro kids magazine we paid the printer, when we pay for helicopter reactions to poaching we pay the invoice from the helicopter owner, when we paid for the second tracker dog in Phinda we paid the breeder. All these payments are done through The Bagpipe Whisperer whose other life has him as a lawyer based in KZN. This gives us an added level of comfort. Chill also donates his own time and that of his staff to facilitate this.

Kia ora Bro, what a blow out last night! Our cuzzies Team Maverick saved us a choice spot to camp right by the entrance. This made loading and unloading so choice. We had barely got the tents up when the pre loading began. Everyone was happy to chillax and have a few quiet drinks before the madness began.

I would like to say that I am not saying what went on because what goes on tour stays on tour but the truth is we can't remember! Justin gave us a few shots of Jaeger then we all woke up feeling a bit crock.

No seriously it was a great time to get to meet a few more crews from he front of the pack that we hadn't seen since 7am on the first day. The drinks flowed and the food was Devine. A huge pot of poitjie and borewors on the Braai with Pap and corn mixed in. Even had a lovely salad. To take the chill off the air they had braziers everywhere around the out door seating. Namibia is one fine country. I think the only unfriendly person we have seen was the first border guard.

Some partied later than the others and I woke at one stage to hear Chill shooing off some young bucks trying to court our new French models. I think I heard him say "there is nothing for you here boy, you might as well go to your tent."

The first campers started leaving about 5.30, I wish they could have done this quietly! We awoke to find one poor soul dressed as a chicken, leg less by the front entrance fast asleep on a chair. The early morning rendition from the bagpipe whisperer couldn't wake him so his mates asked for the tazer! This got him going so we were able to get to the lovely breakfast of bacon and egg rolls which we shared with Team Maverick.

Then it was off to Etosha Game reserve. We were in the gate 5 minutes, before coming across 2  young male lions under a tree at a water hole surrounded by Springbok, Kudu, Black Faced Impala, Zebra, Wildebeast, Kori Bustard and Oryx. The park is dry but to see so much around the water hole is mental.

The park itself looks in places like a moon landscape, the sand is very white or light grey which gives everything a washed out clean look. It is truly stunning and must be much different after the rains. After about 50k we came across the Pan. This is a shallow lake but there was no water in it. The Pan is truly vast I think it is the size of Wales in fact. There was no water in it so it really looks like a moonscape here. The skeptics would say that this was where the lunar module landing was filmed.
Hell man this is nice! Even Bheji got out for a leg stretch. The vastness is breathtaking.

LuLu really has her work cut out for her today. The roads are not paved and very corrugated in places. If anything is going to shake loose then it will today. Sure enough disaster strikes but not from the direction we expected. Our two new cooks broke the news that their crew is back from the dead and want them back. We had grown very fond of our waifs and were saddened with this news. However life goes on and tomorrow when we say our farewells we will dig deep and move on.

Our sundowners tonight are at a waterhole near camp. We were treated to a wonderful moment when two Elephant came down to drink, these were soon joined by Giraffe who are really awkward when the drink and very vulnerable so don't hang around for long. As if this wasn't treat enough along came a herd of Eland who also started to drink. Some parts of this park are like the garden of Eden.
Well it was into camp to put the tents up in the light of the day and this is the first night to stretch the awning. I am so looking forward to see the camp set up fully. Bruce and Chill have put a lot of work into getting this sorted out.
Now it is time to relax in front of the fire. Chur Bro

Well the Dtours team will need to pick up its game today. Arriving late last night we only put in a very quick appearance at Joes Beer house. The kitchen was closed so we made our way to the Kebab store just managing to be the last ones fed for the night. The kebabs were fantastic and the staff were really nice. It was a great way to end a tough but fun day. Gabby even got into her work by cleaning up after us, a great start in her new role.

We had a lekker doss, so we are sorted for any kak that comes our way today.
So nice to have some time to relax this morning, do some shopping and get connected with this interweb. Well it appears that these fancy Apple devices turn into Granny Smiths as soon as you leave the 1st world and the blackberries show their true worth.
Us old ballies are struggling with the technology, I'm wishing Steve Jobs had visited the African continent with his phone and Chill can't seem to get a handle on Twitter.

Leaving Windhoek in the sun and warm weather LuLu quickly hits her pace. She is loving this trip as much as we are. The betties are looking paraad in their new save the Rhino T shirts so will be helping to spread the word as well.

Bheji had a leg stretch on the long endless roads of Namibia, it seems just to far to walk so he's back in Kombi.

What a laugh seeing a warthog crossing sign on the highway but very necessary as we quickly passed so many of these just at the side of the road. We are suddenly driving through bushveld with baboons, impala, ostrich, korhaan (I know these have a new name but we are old ballies so will stay with the old one), helmeted guinea fowl, red hornbill, yellow hornbill, pale chanting goshawk, kudu, and blue throated bee eater to name a few.

The new sims installed but still no Internet so back to MTC in Otjiwarongo. Apparently you need to change the settings manually. Gee it feels so nice to be connected again, am going to struggle when we get to more remote places. This town sure is fairly typical of Africa, the city park has lots of people sitting around waiting. Never sure quite what they are waiting for?

Grabbing a few provisions, gas up and we are off to checkpoint jol.

This ride is gonna be kif in Etosha!

Leaving Cape Town in convoy, it is amazing how quickly we all spread out. Leaving Cape Town behind, we entered wheat country and even came across a few vineyards. Very beautiful fertile solis. LuLu battled into the wind at times but managed a very respectable average speed of about 70k. After the early troubles we were all delighted with the way LuLu was running. With over 9,000k to get back to Durban this would be her second huge effort in successive years.

We stopped quickly in Clanwilliam for a shop for dinner and sundowner essentials. In Africa sundowners are an age old tradition. We also managed to pick up a aux cable to connect our iThings to LuLu's amazing sound system.

The terrain changed gradually becoming more arid with a myriad of interesting desert like flora.
Meanwhile the dinosaurs were taking some steam over working out this inter web stuff. Learning how to facebook to twitter and understanding tweeting handles and blogs and websites was leaving us very frustrated. There seems something incongruous about using technology in a 1973 Kombi. After all Bill Gates and Steve Jobs were likely conceived in one of these vehicles!

Turning a corner we came across the #PutFootRally's worst nightmare, a dead car! The VW Beetle was seized and out of the rally on the first day. We only met these okes the day before but we already felt great loss for them. Driving a van with the same motor gave us additional respect for the way LuLu was handling things.
There was nothing we could do to help while they waited for help from JoBurg so on we drove.

The Put Foot has an amazing vibe which we are finding out about as we get to meet more of the teams. A typical example of this was around sunset another Kombi just like ours came up behind us and very slowly started to overtake us, rather than going past they invited us to join them for sundowners. Big shout out to #timutimu8 strangers one minute and best of friends the next. We even helped Chase out with a visual anal examination.

We quickly fired up the Braai with supplied hardekool while Chill thrilled the camp with a moving rendition of amazing grace on the bag pipes. The bagpipe whisperer legend continues to grow and the micro vibe around D-tours with it. It was a very contented crew that sat back and enjoyed a few beers and wines to celebrate a very successful first day on the tour.
The bad news for our fellow crews continued though. We were approached by Jackie from #sargerofti to see if we could take a couple of their crew onto Windhock where they hoped to reunite with the vehicle, if it could be repaired, or catch a permanent alternative lift if not.
Always happy to help we quickly made a plan for our ride to now house 6 crew and told them to have the two at our car at 5am and set our alarms for an early start.

Day 2
Aargh is that alarm for real? I thought this was a holiday? We had only managed 573k of the 1,800k needed over 3 days so there was a need to try and pull a big one on day 2. We wanted some wiggle room for any problems as well as not be late for the checkpoint party 2 nights away near Etosha.
Overnight the situation with #sargerofti hadn't improved so they confirmed that we would take Megan and Gabby, Jackie would go with # and the two boys would try to sort the car out. Our rejig worked perfectly and now we are 6.

Taking off in the freezing cold and dark the newbies quickly learnt that it isn't all beer and skittles in a 1973 Kombi with no heater. Cruising off with Toto's Africa playing from LuLu's sounds and in spite of the sub zero conditions they were happy to be continuing their rally albeit with a completely new crew. Once again the #putfootrally vibe transformed complete strangers to besties within minutes.

The sun rose over the incredible Namaqualand scenery and although we had committed to pushing through we couldn't resist working an entry for the pic of the day on the #putfootrally website. No one knows about this competition except us. We haven't even clued #putfootrally in about this competition yet. In our humble opinion Stew's photo of the start line was the pic of the day for day 1.
Today produced some absolutely stunning entries with our new "French Models" helping immensely.
This mornings sunrise was a stunner and we spent a few minutes enjoying it.

Back on the road we arrived at the border point to find two other crews there from #BookmarkAfrica. They had been quite festive the night before and were still pretty noisy at the border which didn't impress our Namibian border control officer.
It was nice to be through into Namibia and to see our new crew member pass through the border with no problems. It appears they are kosher and not escaped axe murderers.

Breakfast at Tiffany's was not going to happen but Wimpy pulled through beautifully. A quick team meeting and we officially welcomed our new crew to full team member status. Imake a difference pens, bracelets and T shirts quickly followed and a deal was struck. In true African style the boys no longer need to cook and clean for the rest of the trip.

Traveling on we were amazed by the changing landscape. Immediately after the border we noticed a much more barren landscape with much more open vistas, we were treated to some nice sightings of Springbok, an amazing Klipspringer on a rock, a sociable weaver nest and numerous Dassies. The constantly changing vegetation and rock formations keep us enthralled hour after hour.

LuLu is really flying today. We were off to a slow start which seems par for the course in the early cold morning, being air cooled she must be running cooler in the frigid mornings. After the sun came up LuLu really got not her work.

We had a laugh to ourselves when the #PutFootCrew raced past us mid afternoon just as we received a tweet from #PutFootRally saying the checkpoint wouldn't open till 3pm tomorrow. Of course you won't, you're miles from where you should be if your just passing LuLu. 

Chatting to some locals, we were told that Namibia had experienced their first Rhino poaching incident last week. It seems our precious Rhino are not safe anywhere. It was a sobering reminder that we are entered in the #PutFootRally to raise awareness of this terrible wildlife crime.

The mountains coming up to Mariental were amazing, the flat tops remind us of a continual Table Mountain. It would be nice to know mor about their formation. The lack of comms through this region left us without that awesome tool called Google so will need to research this later. 
Another plan out the window, instead of heading for Rehoboth things are going so well we have decided to head for Windhoek. Joes beer house is calling. 
Sundowner yes! Another amazing sunset with more new friends. Even better #tekkietubs didn't need us to check out their piles like #timutimu8
Onward to Windhoek and Joes Beer House where I think one or two other #PutFootRally peeps might be.
17 hours on the road and we finally approach Windhoek. Suddenly in the dark just before stopping for a beer for the night we are rewarded with a double honey badger sighting at the side of the road. What a way to end the day

Bheji posed for a quick photo outside our accommodation in Camps Bay and then we were off to registration at camps bay high school. All the teams rolled in to get their #putfootrally stickers and pick up goodie bags. This was our first ride in Lulu as a team.

The stickers finished her off nicely and she looks good to go! All the teams gathered for a few beers and some dinner and then a briefing by race organisers and a few words by #pufootrally legends @mikesharman and #getawaymagazine blogger @tysonjopson. Team DTours is Good to GO!

When that Blackberry alarm starts it annoyingly brilliant wake up siren, and its only been 4 hours since you set it, you know its going to be a long day ahead. 4am in Bloem and we were up and battling the frigid morning air.  Lulu was cold. She needed love and a slow start. 

A quick oil check, filled her up and we were on the road again. Onto the N1 and the Mother City was our destination. 1010km to Cape Town. It was a big ask of the vintage beauty. But we never doubted her for a moment.

We stopped somewhere near Colesburg for a break and some coffee. Freezing hardly describes how we were feeling. With no heater in the German Touring van and a few breezes blowing in here and there, we were starting to feel that icy period just before the dawn.

It was so cold that when the attendant tried to clean our windscreen it just frosted over. No problem – he fetched a bucket of hot water and poured this over the windscreen. It cleared it, but then the edges started to freeze. It was time to get out of there. Onwards into the Karoo. 

The rest of the day went well and we rolled into Cape Town to meet up with the rest of the crew at 10pm'ish! It was a long day but we were at the start. Lulu did us proud. Tomorrow – some final preparations and shopping and then registration at Camps Bay and meeting the other teams.