22nd Sept. Nata Bird Sanctuary

22nd Sept. Nata Bird Sanctuary.
I guess you might say we started heading home today. We left Kasane this morning and drove south some 300kms over uninspiring country apart from a couple of Elephant herds close to the road, and made it as far as Nata, an uninspiring town on a major intersection. Some 20kms out of town though was this bird sanctuary started up by a local community group to protect the area’s birds and also make a bit of money for themselves.
The land here is flat, grassy, leading down to a large soda ash pan. On first impression we thought it might turn out a waste of time as all we saw the first few kms were a couple of ostriches. But as we made our way to the dry river bed that flows into the pan in the wet season we came upon a series of water holes filled with sand pipers, pied avocets, pipits, plovers and the odd duck thrown in. Our overnight pass allowed us to stay wherever we wanted to in the sanctuary. So here we are, on the banks of a dry river bed, waterholes either side of us, and a procession of birds any twitcher would be envious to see. As the night lengthens the twittering continues with the odd splash of some newcomer. When the river flows into the pan the area is full of lesser flamingoes and other birds after the crustaceans in the pan.
We had to park close to the track leading to the river mouth as the grass was long and prickly. As the sun began to drop we suddenly had a line of safari vehicles passing by heading to the mouth to watch the sun set. We felt obliged to greet all and everyone as they were literally a metre away. We even were the object of a couple of camera clickers. Once they had headed off it was just us once more, and the birds. An idyllic situation and quite unexpected. A memory that will last.