Deeper Into Wild Lion Country: Mabuasehube Botswana Overlanding (Wild Side of Mabua Ep 1 Part 2)

Welcome back

Welcome back to Tusk & Tyre Overlanding, episode one part two of our Wild Side of Mabua adventure. In part one, we left the tar, dropped into the Kalahari sand, and finally made it into Jack's Pan. If you missed that buildup, hit the link on the screen or in the description and start with part one, because in this episode things get real. Softer sand, wilder tracks, and a few moments we honestly did not see coming. Stick around. This is where the wild side starts to show.

Breaking camp at Jack's Pan

What an awesome, awesome night. Clear skies. Stars by the millions. Got some nice footage of the stars last night. But it's time to go. I've torn down camp. I'm ready to roll. There's some springbok and korhaan on the pan. I hope to get some footage of them, because the wildlife was scarce. But I'm happy to be here. So let's get this thing on the road. Adjusting some suspension.

Springbok on the pan

Just off the edge of the pan, a herd of springbok moves quietly through the bush. Some grazing on the short green shoots that returned after the rain, others lying down, resting in the open. The springbok may look delicate, but few animals are better suited to this harsh land. They're what ecologists call mixed feeders, able to switch between grass and browse depending on what the season offers. That flexibility is what lets them thrive in the dry heart of Botswana. What's remarkable is how little water they actually need. Springbok can go weeks without drinking, drawing almost all their moisture from the plants they eat. When food is scarce, they turn to succulents or high protein shrubs, perfectly adapted to squeeze life out of an unforgiving landscape. And when the rains come, they know exactly where to find the first new growth, on the pans where water once pooled and the soil is rich in minerals. In earlier times, these herds would have joined the great migrations. Thousands moving across the Kalahari with the seasons, following rain and food. Those mass movements have long faded, but the instinct remains. They still roam far, always chasing the promise of fresh grazing. What you're seeing here is the quieter side of that story. The pause between journeys. The herd relaxed, bellies full, some lying down to chew and rest. It's a rare moment of peace in a life built on movement. Out here, even in the stillness, the springbok embodies survival. Not through power or aggression, but through balance, awareness, and perfect design for the desert.

Leaving Jack's Pan: the cutline

Well, I've arrived at the cutline, the turnoff at Jack's Pan, and yeah, sad to leave, but I'm excited for Mabua. Hoping for lions. Hoping for lions. Yeah, sad to leave, but let's go. Only my tracks. Nobody has been on this road since two days ago.

The drive to Mabuasehube

So onwards to Mabua. 10 km from Jack's Pan, the road cuts through low camel thorn trees. A stretch of quiet bush where the stillness is only broken by the wind and the occasional call of a bird. Corne is on route to his next stop, and a surprise visit along the way. Perched high on a bare branch sits a young pale chanting goshawk. It's one of the most recognizable raptors of the Kalahari. Long red legs, sharp eyes, and a calm patience that defines the open desert skies. These hawks are skilled hunters, taking lizards, small mammals, and even other birds. A fork-tailed drongo, barely a quarter of the goshawk's size, dives again and again, striking from above with fearless precision. Encounters like this reveal how complex the world truly is. The Kalahari isn't ruled by size alone. It's ruled by awareness.

Very nice drive from Jack's Pan to Mabua, until about 10 km before Mabua. Then they've tried to build a road, but I rather prefer the sand, as the corrugations are absolutely horrendous on this road. I'm currently driving at 15, 16 km, and I've got about another 7 km to go. So I'm going to take footage on the GoPro, and yeah, so allow for the last 10 kilometers to Mabua at least an hour, 40 minutes, an hour. So yeah. Let's get this on the road. That's it. Another 315 m.

Arriving at Mabuasehube Gate

Then I'm at Mabua gate. Hey man, been a long time. Yeah, the last 3 km wasn't so bad. So all in all, there's about 7 km that's badly corrugated, but if you take it slow, then it's good going. So enjoy this moment with me, arriving at Mabua gate. I didn't make any bookings, so I'm winging it. Hopefully they've got space for me at this time of the year. I don't think it's too busy, and I'm sure that they will be able to help me somehow. Good morning. How are you? Afternoon. How are you? All right, the formality is done at Mabua gate. They've got two nights for me at Khiding Pan. Onwards to Khiding I go.

Where we are: the history of Mabuasehube

Corne just cleared the gate at Mabuasehube. And while we head toward camp, let me tell you where we actually are. This corner of Botswana was once a lived-in landscape. Records from the 1930s mention families using Mabuasehube Pan itself as a base, until drought pushed them towards Tshabong. Long before it was a park, it was a place people knew and named. The name Mabua is translated from the local roots as red earth, or red sands, fitting for these Kalahari dunes stitched together with camel thorn and open pans. It was only in 1971 that Botswana set this aside as the Mabuasehube Game Reserve, about 1,800 to 2,000 km2, and later, in 1992, it was absorbed into the bigger Gemsbok National Park.

What you see ahead, those wide shallow basins, aren't man-made. They're fossil pans of the southern Kalahari, old wind-scoured depressions that once held shallow water. When they dried, they left clay and a little salt, and that still pulls wildlife in after rain. That's why the camps are built around pans. The pans are the heart.

Mabua has about seven main pans with camping areas, and a few extra sites near the access routes. Altogether, it's only around 17 individual sites for the whole area. And every single one of them is unfenced. There's no barrier between you, lions, or whatever decides to walk through camp at night. That unfenced freedom is actually listed as one of the big attractions here. But it also means you camp with respect. So when people say Mabua feels different, this is why. It's newer than the old 1938 Gemsbok park. It sits on ancient Kalahari pans. It kept its small number of sites, and it never lost that raw, self-reliant style of camping that Botswana is famous for. All right, gate's done, tyres are on sand, and now we're driving into the reason we came.

Driving to Khiding Pan

Well, after about a 30 km drive, I'm arriving at Khiding Pan, where I am going to spend two nights at Khiding. Looking forward to these two nights, and hopefully I will encounter the lions. Well, I am arriving at Khiding camp. I have stayed here before, and we did encounter lions at Khiding camp. Welcome to Khiding Pan. Got my parking spot and I'm ready to set up camp for the afternoon. Just going to have a relaxing afternoon and enjoy the scenes and the surroundings. So stick with me while I set up this camp.

Setting up camp

So all I have to do is, I let the step ladder go down. I've got one lock on the roof in the camper, which I then loosen. It's loosened. I switch on the actuators. And while that is going on, I then open up my kitchen, and I open up my fridge. Okay, I need to take out the bed first. So this is how it is, the bed. Locks like that, and I pull it open. I've got space to take out my gas pot and slide open the fridge. So I get inside and I just push up the stabilizer bars. I'm camping. So going to have a nice relaxing afternoon.

A bush fix for water

Got some chores to do that I need to sort out, and then enjoy this awesome view over the pans. Thing I want to show you, that in the bush you have to make plans and you have to think out of the box. So on my Ford, I've got a tank underneath my Ford F250. Two tanks, one each side under this chassis. And I've got a small transfer pump that I use to pump that water into my main tank, but I forgot the wire at home. So what to do next? Luckily, I've got two fridges here in the back, and I took the one fridge plug from the battery, plugged it out, and I put the two wires in there, and it made my pump work, so I can transfer water to my main tank so that I can shower. So think out of the box. Let me show you this. Yeah, I just stuck it in there, and the pump is working. It's transferring the water via hose pipe to my main tank. Slowly, but it gets there eventually. And obviously when I can hear the pump struggling, that tank is empty. Then I switch it off. So yeah, when in the bush, think out of the box.

My happy place

Well, very good evening here from Khiding Pan at Mabua. Why am I doing this? This is my happy place. Here in the bush. This is my happy place. If today was the last day on earth, this is where I would spend it. And I'm bringing it to you guys, because there's a lot of people that do not know about a lifestyle like this. There's a guy on TikTok, I can't remember his name, but he made a video about camping, and then, oh no, you know, you can't camp because this and because that, and I don't think he's ever camped. And I'm not talking about camping at Hartenbos for 2 or 3 weeks. That's not my scene. That's not camping. I'm not a person for crowds. I've been on my own for 5 days and I'm happy. I've got a family, got a wife. Son is in school, the other one is close to being married. My wife is having a holiday in Phuket with my cousin, and I was invited to go with, and I said to them, no, foreign places is not for me. To sit on an airplane for 27, 30 hours. I would rather be on the road for 30 hours if my destination is this. And once you touch the soul of the Kalahari, you'll always come back. I don't think that you can get a sunset like this anywhere in the world except for Africa. As people of Africa, born and raised, nothing, nothing is more beautiful than this.

Sometimes the beauty of this life hits you harder than you expect. Out here in the heart of Mabua, I found myself trying to explain why I do this. Why these dusty miles mean more to me than any overseas destination ever could. It's not just travel, it's connection. It's the silence between the wind and the sand that reminds me who I am. The dying sun spilled its last red light over the pans, and for a moment, I just sat there, a silhouette against it all. No words left, just gratitude. Because this, this is where I feel closest to life. And if I must drive 20 hours to reach this feeling again, I would do it in a heartbeat.

Evening cook and signing out

After a great, great afternoon at Khiding Pan, watching the sunset, listening to the bush choir, I just got caught in the moment, and I was sitting on one of the benches here. It got very, very late. So no time to make fire to braai, because then I'm going to eat I don't know what time. And also, being in the surroundings, you don't want to be out there. Steak and veggies already in the air fryer. Let me start this guy. Let's start at 15 minutes. Usually that's good, at 200 degrees. I like my steak medium rare. Okay, 15 minutes. I'm back. Steak and the veggies is done. That's going to be some nice food tonight. Okay, that's me for the evening. Going to have my meal. I'll maybe show you a picture of what it looks like. And then I'm going to have a nice shower in my camping setup. And then I'm off to bed bright and early to catch the sunrise for tomorrow morning. I've just got to watch out, there's geckos and stuff running around here. But me, signing out for the evening. Cheerio.

Morning at Khiding: the ground squirrels

And my little friends are back this morning. Here's the African ground squirrel. Very used to humans. Going to take the camera off the tripod, so the shots might be shaky. Hey. When you catch a fright, you catch it in your mother tongue. He was biting my toenails. Hey, stay away. Thought my toes are break. Yeah, I was busy with some other videos, so I don't have my long lens on. Let's see if I can go closer to them. No, they're running away. Well, I'll be back shortly with my morning coffee. Good morning. Cheers, on a nice cup of coffee. What an awesome morning. I've got ground squirrels keeping me company.

The night the hyenas came

But what an awesome evening. This morning, nature called about 4:00. And what we usually do is, I put the lights on, then I scan through the windows to check if there's anything in the surroundings. And I opened the camper door, and as I walked out, to my left there were two spotted female hyenas. So I'm not too scared of hyenas, although I will never take a chance. And well, nature called. So they were roaming around. They came to the front, went around the camper, came into the A-frame, and they were looking at me. They turned around again and they walked the other way, and they were gone. But an awesome experience. It wasn't lions, but at least it was hyenas. Sorry, I'm looking around, I've got these squirrels around me and they can be nasty. My feet are on the ground, and because we've got a paved slab here, I don't really wear shoes, if I'm just off the slab or on the slab. And that was my evening. Went back to bed, woke up, and started making coffee. And the squirrels arrived.

I must probably take a game drive this afternoon for a while. Although all the previous times that we were here, the game was around the pan, and on your game drives you saw nothing. So basically it's pan-to-pan driving, and it will take two or three days to go through all the pans. Hey, I'm not lunch.

Bush shower and the dented air con

Well, it's time to have a bush shower. So let me set up this quickly. A very easy shower tent. And while I'm busy doing that, you can see the air con has got a big dent in it. I transport boats for clients, and most of them are catamarans, and the one keel took out, well, the one keel was very close to the vehicle, and when I turned and reversed, that happened. So, something I still have to fix.

Afternoon game drive and the bumper bush fix

I went on a game drive this afternoon. Really, no results. No predators, no plains game. It's very, very scarce, which is very unusual for Mabua, as I've always seen plenty, plenty of game when at Mabua. But maybe wrong time of the year, just after the rains. Maybe there's a lot of water in the field, that's why you don't see the animals. And just an interesting fact: Mabua means red sand. The other way around, "se" is red, and "mua" is sand. So just an interesting fact, that's what Mabuasehube means.

On my game drive this afternoon, I started hearing this rattle. I've heard this rattle for quite a couple of kilometers, and I think it's that bad road, just before Mabua gate, that 10 km. I started hearing the rattle there, but it wasn't as bad. You just think it's something rattling. On the game drive this afternoon, that rattle suddenly became enormously hard. Stopped, got out, as we are allowed to get out of our vehicles here in Mabua, in most of Botswana's game reserves it's allowed, although it's at your own risk. And the bumper was starting to fall off. Luckily I wasn't too far from camp. So I drove back, parked the vehicle, got underneath, and I saw, out of eight bolts, only one is left. On the one side, all four are gone. On the other side, three are gone. Managed to tighten that one bolt, and on the other side I had to put a ratchet strap, like that. So it's hooked underneath the chassis and hooked on the slam tray. And this bumper now is going nowhere.

Tighten it very properly, as they say. That's going nowhere. Just a tip: always carry ratchet straps with you when overlanding. As many as you can, different sizes, big, small. There's a lot of things that I've done with bush fixes on the ratchet straps, and not just tying down things on the roof racks, but stuff repaired like tow bars starting to come off, we tie it with a ratchet strap. If you're towing a trailer, the axle, something goes wrong there, tie it with a ratchet strap. So just an overlanding tip: always carry ratchet straps, from big to small, long, short, as much as you can, because when in trouble, you can never have enough. Because on these bush fixes also, they chafe, they break, you have got to put another one. So yeah, that's the bush tip for this episode. Carry ratchet straps. And maybe not a Ford.

How I got into this: the Okavango, 1998

In each episode, I will share a little bit of myself, on how I got to loving nature and overlanding so much. So the seed was planted back in 1998, where I worked for a construction company, and we landed a project in the Okavango Delta, on Chief's Island, where we built Chief's Camp for Abercrombie & Kent at that time. So we received GPS coordinates from the client, and we drove out. From Maun we drove, I think it was about 120 km, and that 120 km would take you about 17 to 20 hours, depends on the time of the year. There were even times of the year where the Okavango flooded and we couldn't drive in, and we had to fly in, and then all the material was also flown in with Dakotas. Rest of the year, when you could drive, it was brought in by Samil 100s.

Getting back to the story: we landed this project, we drove to site, we got the GPS coordinates, we laid out the site, the layout of how we would think the lodge needed to be situated for the best view, and when the clients arrived they said, excellent, we can go ahead. So in Botswana, in the Okavango, you are not allowed to put permanent structures in. So all of it was wood and tents and non-permanent structures, so that if the concession got cancelled, then you have to take it out. We had a little construction camp of tents, army tents, where our kitchen was, and we had a tent where our bathroom was, and small tents where each of us had a room and where we slept. And we had nights where there was a big commotion, and then there was a lion attacking antelope or zebra, there's just so many stories. But what I can specifically remember was a leopard taking down, I can't remember exactly, I think it was a lechwe, that the leopard took down in camp, and killed it, and walked off with it, and ate it just outside camp. And then another instance was a baboon chasing a leopard. We were back at camp for lunch, and we just heard this big commotion, cats screaming and baboon screaming, and when we walked out of the kitchen tent, we saw the leopard and the baboon chasing through the camp. And the baboon was a big, big male with big tusks, and he was chasing the leopard. I don't know for what reason, but that's one of the things that I can remember. So that is where the seed was planted. I even, in that time, bought myself a 4x4 trailer, not even owning a 4x4. I just got in on an auction and I bought it, because I'm going to set up this and I want to go to these places. Only many years later was I able to overland like I like, and camp the way I am now. So in each episode I will share a little bit of the story, and then eventually, in an episode, I'll tell you my first experience. So hopefully you like it, and hopefully you'll be back.

Last evening: the stew

Well, join me on this last evening at Khiding Pan, on my Wild Side of Mabua trip. I'm making some beef stew. Going to put some curry in there, and I'm going to put some veggies in there. I've already browned the onions. The meat is in, and I'm busy browning that. And then I'm going to add some red muscadel from Darling Cellars, also from my trip in Yzerfontein. And I'll bring you guys back when I'm putting in the veggies. That's my meal for the evening, and my lunch for tomorrow. Padkos. They call it padkos.

Guys, thanks for joining me on this awesome, awesome trip. I hope you enjoyed it. This is the last night that I'm cooking food. Let me put this lid on before I get too excited. Can't wait to go back, do the editing, and bring this all to you guys. Have an awesome, awesome time. Never give up. If you never give up, you never fail. Start overlanding, if you're not overlanding at the moment. If you're overlanding, please share your journeys, we like to watch. Time out.

The road home

The road home. After a trip like this, it's different. There's something about watching the landscape pass by through the windscreen, the long stretches of the tar, the gravel shaking underneath the tyres. That gives you time to think, time to feel, time to be honest with yourself. You know, didn't see lions this time. No cheetahs running across the pan. No big moment that makes the thumbnail. And yet, this was one of the most meaningful trips I've had in a long time. Because somewhere in the silence of those pans, in the long dusty tracks with no one around, I remembered why I do this. Why I come back to these wild places over and over again. It's not for the sightings. It's not for the drama. It's for the way the Kalahari slows you down, strips everything back, and gives you room to breathe again. This trip reminded me how small I am under an African sky, and how lucky I am to be able to load up my vehicle and disappear into the wild whenever my soul needs it. It reminded me that peace doesn't always come from what you see. Sometimes it comes from what you feel, where nothing is happening at all. So as I drive back home, watching the dunes fade behind me and the world slowly return to its normal speed, I realize something important. Adventure isn't always loud. Sometimes it's just quiet roads, long thoughts, and a heart that is a little fuller than before. To the Kalahari, thank you. And to everyone who rides along on these journeys, thank you too. This trip didn't give me lions, but it gave me something far more powerful. It gave me myself again. Until the next road: stay wild, stay kind, and never stop searching for the places that make you feel alive.