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Kalahari Desert Botswana: Jack’s Camp to Kubu Island (200km)
Fancy abandoning car travel for the day? The only way to get across this spectacular, if unforgiving, lunar desert is by quad bike.
Base yourself at Jack’s Camp safari lodge: after breakfast, you’ll set off in convoy, across vast expanses of white salt-pans. As the day heats up, mirages swim and eddy; ragged flights of swallows cast bas-reliefs on the parched ground. Open the throttle, close your eyes and go for it – there’s not much to crash into.
Break your journey for a picnic lunch on what seems like the moon – and squint at that smudge on the horizon. Kubu Island is what you’ve come to see: a granite outcrop studded with baobabs and deemed the most sacred secret of the Kalahari bushmen. Jack’s Camp staff will prepare your base for the night, so you can eat under a star-spangled sky and fall into a bed clutching a hot-water bottle.
Black Tomato (020 7426 9888, www.blacktomato.co.uk) has a five-day trip from £4,299pp, with flights from Heathrow, air transfers and full-board safari.
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