Flock of ostriches on way to Deception Valley
Photos © Alexandra George
In Part II new tracks take us to Deception Valley – to the island of trees where Delia and Mark Owens lived for seven years chronicling Kalahari lions and brown hyenas, stories later captured in their book, Cry of the Kalahari. Their legacy lives on as this book first stirred the dreams of so many who came after. The day-long drive delivered some of the Central Kalahari’s most thrilling wildlife encounters.
We set out just after 5 a.m. for the long drive to Deception Valley, where the Owens once camped and studied lions. This wasn’t just a game drive – it was a pilgrimage and I felt the weight of anticipation. Passing lone oryx in the half-light, I imagined what the Owens must have seen and felt in this place. It felt epic, stirring even, to trace the path of Cry of the Kalahari across this vast, wild land.
As dawn broke, the rising sun painted the Kalahari gold. After the rains the Central Kalahari was transformed – verdant, alive and full of movement. Driving into the morning on the road to Deception Valley, the grass, shoulder-high in places, swayed beneath a blue sky. Small groups of oryx wandering through the grasslands, a black-backed jackal was spotted in the long grass, a secretary bird, the largest bird of prey that hunts on foot, strode among the shrubs, a herd of springbok rippled across the plains, their movements fluid and synchronized like a dance.
Beneath the Island of Trees
The journey to Deception Valley offered a series of quiet marvels. We came upon a vision of stillness and grace: oryx resting in loose clusters in an island of acacia trees, gathered like pearls beneath scattered boughs. Some rested in the shade, others watched us from behind thin curtains of acacia branches Their elegant horns caught the light as they stood in the shade – quiet sentinels in a sea of green. It was a scene so timeless, it felt painted onto the Kalahari itself.
Herd of oryx resting in island of acacia trees on way to Deception Valley
Ostriches in Bloom
As we drove on in scorching 95-degree temperature, we came upon flocks of ostrich – the soft brown of females – who drifted through the grasses. The ostriches moved as one – graceful, towering, and improbably elegant – across a field ablaze with yellow wildflowers. In that moment, the Kalahari wasn’t a desert at all, but a place of riotous colour, unexpected beauty and graceful choreography.
Flock of ostriches moving gracefully as one across a field of yellow flowers
A Long-anticipated Moment: Arriving at the Owens’ Grove
It took nearly six hours by game vehicle from Tau Pan to reach the remote sweep of Deception Valley, bumping along sandy tracks under an endless sky deep into Deception Valley, toward a grove that now flourishes with shoulder-high grass and acacia trees, lush, shaded and vibrantly green after the rains. This, we were told, is where Delia and Mark Owens lived for seven years.
It was an emotional moment to stand before the lush island grove where the Owens spent seven years – a place transformed into a green oasis by the rains.
KB, our guide, said: “The Owens made the Central Kalahari Game Reserve world famous. Many visitors from all over the world, who’ve read Cry of the Kalahari, ask to come here – to stand where the story began.”
Walking Through a Dreamed-of Place
To walk through this grove — lush now, alive with birdsong and the rustle of grass—was to step into a story I’d read some years back. I had long imagined the Owens’ camp and the vast solitude of Deception Valley, but nothing prepared me for the vibrant stillness that greeted us. There was no obvious trace of the camp that once stood here, no plaque or ruins.
The Owens’ island grove where they spent 7 years studying lions and brown hyenas
It was in this same valley that Mark and Delia Owens once followed lions like Satan, Big Foot, and Mocha—each with a personality as vast and raw as the desert itself.
A Runway Marked by Bushes
As we stood near the grove, our guide and tracker pointed out a seemingly unremarkable line of low bushes in the grassland beyond. To the untrained eye, they blended into the green-and-gold sweep of Deception Valley. But this was no accident of vegetation.
This unassuming line of bushes once served as Mark Owens’ visual guide for landing
his small plane in Deception Valley
“These shrubs”, KB, our guide explained, once served as visual markers for Mark Owens, who used them to guide his small plane down to land. He used the second band of bushes stretching across the horizon to guide his small plane safely down.
Mark Owens used the small plane to track lions, hyenas and other wildlife across territories. In the days before GPS and airstrips, this modest patch of brush was his runway – rough, narrow and carved from memory. It was almost impossible to imagine now, amid this lush and blooming landscape, how barren this place becomes without the rains. But the Owens’ ingenuity still lingers in the land, if you know where to look.
Myth and Memory in the Kalahari
For readers like me who fell in love with Cry of the Kalahari, there’s a powerful image etched into memory: the Owens sitting by their campfire as lions approach, not as threats, but as wild companions choosing their presence. I always believed those lions came of their own accord, drawn by curiosity, not coercion. But as we stood in the very landscape where those stories unfolded, my guide offered another perspective – one shaped by a lifetime lived among lions.
Cover, Cry of the Kalahari, first edition, 1984: an international bestseller published in 34 distinct editions and at least 6 languages.
“Lions don’t just hang around people,” our guide, BK, said. “Not unless you feed them. Believe me, I was born around lions.”
He wasn’t dismissing the Owens’ work – only reminding me, gently, that even the wildest stories are more complicated than they seem. Delia never says they fed the lions, but to someone like my guide, their long-term presence around camp suggests a different kind of exchange. It was a moment that made me realize how much of the Kalahari exists between what’s told and what’s lived – and how both are needed to understand the full picture.
Remote campsites on return
After the picnic we paused nearby at one of the CKGR’s remote campsites – their signature wooden showers open to the wild, blending into the landscape. It was in one such campsite that conservationist Dr. Peter Lindsey of the Lion Recovery Fund (LRF), during his 2023 crossing of the CKGR, encountered a massive black-maned lion lounging casually around the shower structure — a sight, he noted, “not for the faint-hearted.”
Dr. Peter Lindsey, Lion Recovery Fund, met this lion in front of camp shower on his trip across CKGR (Credit: Dr. Peter Lindsey, Director, LRF)
In the Kalahari, it’s a reminder that in the CKGR, lions can pass through any camp. The line between wild and human is thin — and the lions always have the right of way.
As we left the campsite, we took a picnic break next to a waterhole, much needed after the 6-hour drive. Like many of the waterholes we encountered across the CKGR this was a solar-powered waterhole that helps sustain the region’s wildlife while treading lightly on the fragile landscape. These unobtrusive systems are a testament to Botswana’s forward-thinking approach: conserving wildlife through innovation that leaves no footprint.
Kwando tracker, PK, unloads the cooler box for our picnic lunch in Deception Valley
On the way back from Deception Valley, the landscape continued to surprise – a lone southern giraffe standing tall against the open sky eating acacia leaves, as if keeping watch over the land.
A giraffe browses near the shrub line that once guided Mark Owens’ landings.
More oryx moved through the grass with confidence, and springbok flicked their tails as they passed by. The road may have been heading homeward, but the wilderness offered no end to its wonders.
Springbok in motion, oryx at rest—Deception Valley’s tranquil pace.
Signs of a Modern Nation
The next morning, that sense of harmony between wild nature and thoughtful innovation lingered as we waited at the Tau Pan airstrip for our flight to Nxai Pan. KB, our guide, pointed out two tall men in pale blue uniforms waiting to board with us – solar engineers flown in to service the off-grid systems that power the eco-friendly Kwando Tau Pan Lodge, from water pumps to kitchen fridges. Their presence was a reminder of the unseen hands ensuring that even in the heart of the Kalahari, the lights stay on and the water flows—all powered by the sun.
Two solar engineers wait for flight to Nxai Pan – they are responsible for managing Kwando safari lodges’ eco-friendly solar grids. Safari lodges in Botswana run on green energy.
KB explained that just 10-15 years ago, such roles might have been filled by foreign expatriates. Today, companies like Kwando Safaris are championing African talent – men and women alike – across tourism and conservation. In these brief encounters, the Kalahari offered one final, stirring truth: this is a modern nation, where people are not only protecting the wilderness, but guiding its future.
Leaving, But Never Letting Go
Our 30-year-old pilot flying us from Tau Pan to Nxai Pan trained in aviation school on Botswana.
We left the Central Kalahari as we had entered it—in a tiny plane lifting off from a gravel airstrip. From above, the wilderness looked endless once more. But down there, tucked among the grass and silence, were lions, springbok, giraffes, bat-eared foxes and the oryx resting in the shade—and the vivid recollection of three extraordinary days I won’t soon forget. This is a place that speaks softly, but stays with you long after you’ve gone.