“The Place that Dried Up”

Botswana doesn’t really have hills. In fact, Gaborone reminds me a lot of Lubbock. It is flat, hot, there is lots of dirt all over the place, very few trees, and you see nothing but sky for miles. But, we do have one hill, which is more than I can say for Lubbock.

Our one hill is called Kgale Hill and is on the southern edge of town. The name in Setswana means, “The Place that Dried Up” which is quite fitting, given the lack of vegetation and abundance of giant rocks. The television series, “The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency” was filmed on a set built at the bottom of the hill. Since the series is no longer it has fallen into disrepair, but tourists who’ve read the books and/or watched the show often visit the film set. The other thing Kgale is known for is all the baboons in the area. We saw lots of them during our hike.

Fortunately we did the hike last Sunday, and then I broke my toe on Monday. So I won’t be hiking it again for a while, but at least I looked impressive doing it, right?

And here is a picture of Kgale itself. Unfortunately I forgot to take a picture of town from the top of Kgale. Oh well, I guess that means I will have to do the climb again:

It takes about an hour to get up to the top, and then an hour to get back down. That is, if you don’t wander off the trail and get lost in the process. I was not the navigator; I was bringing up the rear. And since my hiking companions seemed sure of themselves I blindly followed them. That was until I said, “We definitely have NOT been before. We aren’t even on a trail! Where are we?” After about 20 minutes of wandering around, we found the trail and our fearless leader said, “Huh, wonder how I missed that?” Oh well, it was fun and at least I got to do the hike before the weather got too hot, and before I broke my toe.