Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Recently, in the western part of Botswana's Okavango Delta, I watched as
a huge female African elephant plunged from the shore of one of the islands
and swam swiftly across a wide branch of the river. She held her trunk up
like a snorkel as she swam. Elephants are excellent swimmers, and can easily
travel across the delta even when it is in full fl ood.
This elephant, one of many living in the delta, did not look as if she
would brook any sort of interruption of her natatorial activities. Nonethe-
less, guides at the Abu Camp, a tourist facility a few kilometers to the west of
where I saw this elephant swimming, have managed to train several female
Figure 100
An African elephant swims easily from one island to another in Botswana's
Okavango Delta. African elephants have recently been tamed, which makes it more puzzling
that they were not tamed earlier during the long history of humans on the continent.
