My cranking battery problems continue. It took two hours this morning to get started. I tried attaching solar panels all sorts of ways to the cranking battery that read less than 10 volts. Eventually I decided to cable the DC-DC charger in reverse, charging from the house batteries to the cranking battery. It needed all the solar panels and a bit of sun to get the house batteries up to enough voltage to charge the cranking battery, but eventually it worked. I stopped it a couple of times during the day, and it did restart when the engine is hot.
The problem is, this is all very remote. I think I have passed three vehicles today. There is no way I will get a battery anywhere out here. I might have a slim chance of getting one at Mfuwe which is about 140km away. When I stopped today the cranking battery was very hot, and I could hear it bubbling, it is definitely in a very bad state. I am not sure if I took one of the AGM deep cycles out it would work as a cranking battery. I haven’t had internet for two days so I cannot look that up.
After starting so late, it was nearly 11 am, I continued south. Almost every village I pass people just stop and stare. Not many white tourists out this way. I have had to drive past several burn-off fires. It seems people start fires all over the place to burn-off the grass. A couple were right next to the road, so I rushed past, then checked underneath afterwards to make sure I had not snagged any burning vegetation. I saw some springbok or similar later in the afternoon. In between the villages its pretty much just scrub and forest. I really wonder whether I have seen Elephant tracks, but I am not sure. I probably only made 80km today, it was all such slow going. I stopped at 4:30pm because there was a village about 20km in front, I don’t want to get caught up around that looking for a camp.
