Crossing from Zambia into Botswana via the Kasangula bridge. There are now one stop border posts in new buildings for the border posts between Zambia and Botswana and Zambia and Malawi. Going through Botswana into Zambia took us 1-1/2hrs with a paid fixer as the Zambian side so inefficient, note we met some South Africans who didn’t pay a fixer and it took them four hours! Coming back from Zambia into Botswana the border post building is on the Botswana side and we breezed through in half an hour. The quickest border crossing I’ve ever done with a vehicle in Africa. Botswana side is so efficient
So after a couple of nights in Kasane camping we drove for day drives into Chobe NP and also arranged with National Park authorities and camp site administrators for travelling from Kasane to Maun for six days travelling through Chobe, Savuti and Moremi, camping in designated pre booked campsites en route .
The rains were just starting and huge thunderstorms in late afternoons and evenings, but localised so some areas the sand was firm offering easy going and other areas deep soft sand that you have to work the engine a bit. Other areas of dark coloured soft cotton sand turn into quagmire’s when wet so a good test of the Grenadiers off road abilities.
It was so hot 39/40c most days and the Grenadier took all this in its stride. I’ve found that I can’t air down too much in those temperatures as the tires overheat! Also in the southern stretches of Moremi they are using huge bulldozers to widen some of the dirt road. Just bulldozing through the Mopani scrub and so leaving sticks sticking up everywhere so a real hazard and puncture risk. We met other travellers who had slashed tires and others who got stuck in the slippery thick Savuti mud. We survived the journey unscathed and set the tires at a pressure of 28psi front and 34psi back and the Grenadier just cruised through. Even without the soft sand and muddy stretches it’s much kinder to us and the vehicle to air down a bit to smooth out the corrugations.
During some some very deep sandy sections you need to work the engine a bit harder bringing the revs up sometimes between 2500 and 3000rpm never above that. But in the slippery bog holes of black cotton sand I found keeping the revs low and just chugging through a better method as they are so slippery and didn't need the wheels spinning madly.
One section whilst camped up we decided to do a route called quarry hill. Quite a challenge and most turn around at the bottom and don’t attempt it. Any vehicle with big overhangs at the front or back as some pickup trucks have would do some damage or get hung up. Once your on it there’s no turning around for about 2km until you reach the top. This was the first time I had to use all lockers as some extremely steep sections I could not move at some stages with only centre lock as was getting hung up on the side steps. They did a good job and haven't bent although scraped along the bottom a bit. The difficulty in some sections was the tight turns as you reached the top of some steep inclines. I engaged and disengaged front locker frequently and all worked as it should. Coming back down I used centre diff lock and hill hold control. I’m very confident in this vehicle now and it can virtually go everywhere I want to go when travelling. Its quite surprising that even on that rocky terrain with all the weight we are carrying that I didn’t hit the rear bash plate but chose the route considerately and had the co driver out and directing at times
My rear bash plate seems to be doing its job more on the faster sections when bouncing up and down a bit with the undulations. I still think I could do with a suspension lift of some kind when travelling heavy as we do do. Because of the many days camped up off grid and touring the many tracks looking for wildlife we needed to carry the extra 100l of fuel and 100l of drinking water of which we used most of it in those six days.
I will fill you in on the wildlife inc the baboons in the next update I’ll do later
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luckily not on the beds but the smell was horrendous! Trying to clear up was difficult too as they hung around trying to steal stuff as we emptied the tent to clean out. The bastards 
Having had this issue before I knew how to get to and fix the problem by removing front light surround and front plastic part of wing/fender and the inner wheel arch to gain access to the fixings. I glued the grommets to the rad with gorilla glue so I didn’t lose them if it happened again. A suitable fix I thought. 
