Disabled walkers make history in Etosha

AT the halfway point of their mammoth trans-Namibia expedition, a disabled team, the production crew and the logistics people all enjoyed a rest day in the Namutoni area of Etosha.

An opportunity to charge batteries both physically and metaphorically, and to rest in preparation for their first pioneering visit to Etosha and then the arduous days that lie ahead in the mountains, river beds, plains and dunes of the Namib Desert and the Skeleton Coast. The team suffered a casualty just two days ago, when Richie Bell-Bates was forced to quit the expedition and return home.Richie was born with no arms and has adapted brilliantly to lead a full and reasonably normal life.In his own words ‘my feet have become my hands and I need to constantly both protect and look after them’; and so it was that the relentless pounding of the daily treks and moreso the continually wet sand and mud encountered on the Chobe flood plains began to generate possible hygiene and longer term hazards to his feet and consequently to his well-being.For the remaining nine contributors, their visit to Etosha has represented a landmark step.It seems that never before has a group been allowed to walk inside the national park; but this team of disabled volunteers, the heartbeat of the Beyond Boundaries documentary series being filmed here with the intention of ‘challenging preconceptions about what disabled people can and can’t do’, have now trekked for two consecutive days in the eastern part of the park, at times close to the famous salt pans.Certainly the Director of Parks and Wildlife, Mr Ben Beytell, and his MET staff based at Etosha should certainly take huge credit for co-ordinating this pioneering and innovative event, which is most unlikely to be repeated.And so history was made.Immanuel Kapofi, the Namutoni area warden, accompanied the team on both days together with five armed rangers and expedition leader Ken Hames and the necessary camera and sound crews.Etosha, like nearly all the country, has profited from the recent good rains, and has the appearance of a veritably verdant pasture.With virtually every depression in the ground becoming a waterhole too, the wildlife viewed from the public roads in the park is presently less prolific than in the dry season, but the disabled walkers – by way of their route which at times followed private park tracks only used by game rangers – happily encountered some wonderful game on their walk.Besides springbok, wildebeest, zebra, kudu, ostrich, the expedition team walked alongside a huge herd of oryx near the off-limits Mushara waterhole and then later came within a safe distance of some magnificent elephants.Heidi Thomas, a paraplegic who has needed to make use of a wheelchair since breaking her back in an accident three years ago, perhaps sums it up best: “I felt privileged in the first place to be chosen for this expedition from a total of over 4 000 applicants, but now to be able to become one of the first people ever to walk through this incredible park makes me feel even more honoured and fortunate.I have been so, so impressed by the whole of this awesome land, Namibia, that I cannot wait to return here again.”It is to be hoped that this brave collection of people with a disability and the magnanimous gesture on the part of the Namibian authorities will together combine to bring the abilities of disabled folk very much more into the public domain.The team suffered a casualty just two days ago, when Richie Bell-Bates was forced to quit the expedition and return home.Richie was born with no arms and has adapted brilliantly to lead a full and reasonably normal life.In his own words ‘my feet have become my hands and I need to constantly both protect and look after them’; and so it was that the relentless pounding of the daily treks and moreso the continually wet sand and mud encountered on the Chobe flood plains began to generate possible hygiene and longer term hazards to his feet and consequently to his well-being.For the remaining nine contributors, their visit to Etosha has represented a landmark step.It seems that never before has a group been allowed to walk inside the national park; but this team of disabled volunteers, the heartbeat of the Beyond Boundaries documentary series being filmed here with the intention of ‘challenging preconceptions about what disabled people can and can’t do’, have now trekked for two consecutive days in the eastern part of the park, at times close to the famous salt pans.Certainly the Director of Parks and Wildlife, Mr Ben Beytell, and his MET staff based at Etosha should certainly take huge credit for co-ordinating this pioneering and innovative event, which is most unlikely to be repeated.And so history was made.Immanuel Kapofi, the Namutoni area warden, accompanied the team on both days together with five armed rangers and expedition leader Ken Hames and the necessary camera and sound crews.Etosha, like nearly all the country, has profited from the recent good rains, and has the appearance of a veritably verdant pasture.With virtually every depression in the ground becoming a waterhole too, the wildlife viewed from the public roads in the park is presently less prolific than in the dry season, but the disabled walkers – by way of their route which at times followed private park tracks only used by game rangers – happily encountered some wonderful game on their walk.Besides springbok, wildebeest, zebra, kudu, ostrich, the expedition team walked alongside a huge herd of oryx near the off-limits Mushara waterhole and then later came within a safe distance of some magnificent elephants.Heidi Thomas, a paraplegic who has needed to make use of a wheelchair since breaking her back in an accident three years ago, perhaps sums it up best: “I felt privileged in the first place to be chosen for this expedition from a total of over 4 000 applicants, but now to be able to become one of the first people ever to walk through this incredible park makes me feel even more honoured and fortunate.I have been so, so impressed by the whole of this awesome land, Namibia, that I cannot wait to return here again.”It is to be hoped that this brave collection of people with a disability and the magnanimous gesture on the part of the Namibian authorities will together combine to bring the abilities of disabled folk very much more into the public domain.