Flying Adventure: Southern Africa – Day 15 (FBTauPan – FBSK – FAPP):
This is our last day on tour and we are meant to head back to Pretoria, South Africa.
But last night’s storm has not yet cleared in the early morning and the weather is not for flying, not in any reasonably feasible direction. And there is another little problem. We are out in the remote bush, no cell phone signal, no telephone lines, no TV. Zero, nix, nada. And consequently, no access to any weather forecast or report. It doesn’t make decision making easier.
We decide to go for an early morning game drive around the Tau Pan and see how things develop as the temperatures rise.
He is still hopeful to spot the famous black-maned lions of the Kalahari. And they are somewhere around the area. So we try to track them down. Unfortunately without much luck. Enough reason to pass by here on another flying tour. It’s an amazing place and there is certainly no reason to be disappointed as we spot a beautiful leopard on his early morning mission.
Two hours later the rain has subsided and the clouds start breaking up towards the east and in the north behind some remaining rain cell. We have options, if we can’t make it south to Gaborone, we can divert to Francistown in the east or back to Maun in the north.
Tau Pan to Gaborone
If you have a plan, you can worry less and enjoy more. So, in good spirits, we load the aircraft, start up and take off.
As we climb out of Tau Pan the horizon looks acceptable to fly towards Gaborone and a potential escape to the east looks positive too. We set course for Gaborone.
As we get closer to Gaborone the cloud ceiling is getting lower and lower. We have virtually caught up with that weather front which past over the camp last night. It is moving to the south east, straight towards Johannesburg and Pretoria. Not really great.
Fortunately however, Gaborone airport is under Marginal Visual Meteorological Conditions and we get cleared in for landing. Once on the ground, we pass by the Met office to check up on that weather. As suspected it moves right along our route back to Pretoria. So our plan for the day, is now definitely canned and buried.
We have two feasible options at hand:
- To stay over in Gaborone and cross the border to South Africa tomorrow morning with a technical stop in Pilansberg en route to Pretoria. or;
- To try to fly north of the weather front along the Waterberg to Polokwane, and clear the border there.
Gaborone to Polokwane
As the passenger and fellow adventurer on board has a commercial flight back to Europe tomorrow evening, we decide for option 2. A domestic flight tomorrow morning has definitely less risk of delays than an international flight with a technical stop en route.
We climb out from Gaborone in a northerly direction and then fly along the Waterberg to Polokwane.
After clearing the border into South Africa we check the weather for the leg to Pretoria. Pretoria itself seems to have cleared up by now, but the weather along the route to get there is clearly not flying weather and would require a substantial detour to the east.
We decide to rather stay over in Polokwane for the night. “Gethereitis” is a bad pilot attitude, and flying the last leg tomorrow morning is certainly safer than pushing for home tonight.
We book in at the Garden Court Hotel , which is a convenient 10 min drive from the airport and has recently been fully refurbished. Ideal for a stay over and heading out early tomorrow morning.