We have now been traveling through Southern Africa for almost a month and there are few animals we have not seen: a leopard, a cheetah, an African bufalo, and a hippo. We were in Botswana and heard that we MUST take a guided mokoro (small boat carved out of a tree trunk) trip through the Okovango Delta so we lined up a three day expedition in which we take a small boat, find a place to camp and take “bush walks” (safari’s on foot) during the day. It sounded like a great experience, so we signed our lives away, paid for our trip in full, and the next morning we loaded onto a large safari truck which would shuttle us from Maun, Botswana into an outlet of the delta. Upon arrival, we met our guides, aka polers, who have lived as bushmen their entire lives. We were settled into our small boat in no time. The small boats hold two people, the poler (standing in the back), and a few small bags between the two people. The boat has only one or two inches of clearance above the water, which leaves little room for error. The poler had strategically placed us and our belongings in the boat for weight distribution, me being in the front narrow end.

The poler pushed off and we were floating down the water in no time. The sun had just begun warming the earth. The sky was nice and clear. The water so calm that there was a perfect reflection of us, our boat, and the sky above. I laid back soaking up the sun enjoying the relaxing ride to camp. Our poler pointed out several small colorful frogs perched on the weeds, and explained how his village prepares waterlilly root for mealtime during the dry season. He also stopped the mokoro in front of some hippos who were snorting loudly about 110 meters away. As he explained where they live in the water and how dangerous they were, we strained our eyes to get a better look at their heads popping in and out of the water. Chris asked to get closer, but our Poler refused because getting closer than 100 meters can be extremely dangerous. I was glad we were not going to move in for a closer look because statistics show that hippos claim more human lives than any other animal in Africa (except for mosquitos).

After several minutes, we were slithering through tall watergrass and clear waterholes on our way to camp. We were enjoying the scenery and warding off bugs when suddenly there was a gigantic splash 6 meters in front of me. I looked up startled, only to see that the splash was made by a huge hippo that was charging straight towards us. The hippo was so quiet under water that the poler didn’t see him until we were almost on top of him. It was charging us full speed, me being his closest prey. Time slowed down that instant. I stared for a milisecond in complete horror as I watched the hippo’s mouth open, it’s teeth showing the pain they could induce. The water droplets rolling off the hippos face… Chris turned to the poler asking what we should do. The driver froze doing and saying nothing. I remember repeating Chris’s question along with a slew of other words. I stopped breathing as my heart pounded in my throat. I looked at the hippo gaining ground, then back to the poler, then again at the hippo. Hoping Chris was with me on my idea, I stuck one leg in the water ready to jump out and run. I remember my life flashing before my eyes as I said aloud: “I’m going to die today.” At that point, the hippo was upon us. I was completely helpless. I could do nothing more than pray. It was the shortest and hardest praying I’d ever done in my life. As I opened my eyes a second later, the poler had begun pushing us a way from the hippo and was yelling at it. The beasty animal took one more leap at us  and with one meter left between her and I, the hippo suddenly veered off up into the grass. Had she taken one more leap towards us, we would have been gone. Done. Finished off.

Photo taken from Blue Heron Pictures (leblanc0444 on flickr)

We continued backing away from the wild hippo as I sat there shaking in the tiny little boat which could have been destroyed with one snap of her teeth. I was far beyond crying. I was horrified, fearful, and shocked.  Trying to make sense of everything that had just happened, I closed my eyes and tried to breathe. What are the odds that this would happen to me? How unlucky was I? No… how was I so lucky? That could have ended horribly but we all survived. There was not a scratch on us. There was only an up close viewing of a hippo that will be seared into my memory forever.

**For those interested, the rest of the trip was great! During our bush walks we saw giraffes, zebras, wildebeests, warthogs, impala, baboons, and elephants. In fact, the elephants not only ran us out of camp on the last day but they blocked our hiking route back to the mokoro so we had to take off our shoes, roll up our pants, and trudge through the mucky hippo and crocodile infested water to get to the small boats. It was an experience of a lifetime…