Vacation with the grandparents-Nata and Chobe

Brent’s parents arrived on December 26 and after a few days to get over jet lag, we headed to the northern part of Botswana to explore Chobe Game Reserve and Victoria Falls in Zimbabwe. We had an amazing time!

On our journey north, we stopped at Nata Lodge  to stay the night. It was so peaceful and relaxing and we had our own little cabin.

Beautiful rainbow at Nata

We got to see our first chameleon there

 

From Nata, we drove about 4 more hours on to Kasane to stay at Chobe Safari Lodge for the next 5 days. We were able to go on 2 boat drives on the Chobe River and 2 game drives in Chobe Game Reserve. Driving on the road to Kasane, we saw many elephants and giraffes just roaming in the wild. It was so great to see these animals in their natural habitat, not bound by fences.

The open dining hall where we ate breakfast/dinner

Sunset on the Chobe River

New Years Eve dinner

On our first game drive

We saw a puff adder snake just moments after getting into the park

Cape Buffalo

Baboons were all over the place

Botswana has the more elephants than any other country. We saw between 150-200 elephants in a single day.

We were looking for the big cats all day and on our way out of the park we ran into this mating pair. Too cool, they truly are so majestic

We also were able to do some boat drives. We were able to get up close and personal to some hippos, elephant, and crocs

The above picture was taken and about 2 minutes later this hippo behind us decided to charge our boat. We were chased twice by hippos and these big fellas are faster than you think.

Yikes we were very ready to  get away from this guy.

A croc basking in the sun

Taylor feeding our hungry fella on the boat. I really need to learn to rub in their suntan lotion!

Elephants love to play and swim in the water

Brent and his dad got to go fishing and Brent caught a catfish

We also enjoyed the pool at the lodge, especially Taylor, but Bradyn was also a good sport in letting us hang out by the pool.

Taylor loved wearing her mask from new years eve the rest of the week just around the lodge. She was “super Taylor” when she wore it and could jump higher and run faster with it on. Love this girl!!