surrounding communities and get a feel for educational projects that would compliment the research we were doing, and make sure the communities felt our presence was needed and wanted our assistance. November 3, 2011 Waking up to my first morning, I had the fortune of experiencing my first taste of rusk, which is a delicious hard dry biscuit that when dipped into coffee is pure magic! The plan was to head east to the city of Ghanzi where we would meet up with Cheetah Conservation Botswana, at their research camp. Things take a little longer in Botswana and everyone tends to run on their own schedule, including the vehicles, who decide when they want to run or not. Unfortunately, we broke down a few times with our trusty jeep, but luckily we found a few helpful individuals to fix the problem!

While driving to Ghanzi we passed by numerous herds of goat, cattle and donkey on the side of the road and many times right in the middle of the road. Apparently animals, especially donkeys, enjoy 'eating' the road, in where they stubbornly position themselves in the middle of the road, and lick the salt found around the pieces of broken road. So driving slowly and with caution is encouraged in Botswana, as donkeys will turn a deaf ear to your horn and approaching speed! We arrived at the research camp close to dusk, where we met fellow staff, including their watchdog Marcus (an Anatolian Sheppard dog, a great dog for herding goats and other livestock). Cheetah Conservation Botswana aims to preserve the nation's cheetah population through scientific research, community outreach and education, working with rural communities to promote coexistence with Botswana's rich diversity of predator species. I was interested in learning more about their programs that foster improvements in day-to-day farm management practices that can bring wider benefits to individual farmers.