THE Shashe River has shrivelled to a brownish serpent of sand.
Thirsty elephants dig for water in the riverbed with their feet
while lions take advantage and stalk their prey as one species
after another trickles to the river for a sip of the life-saving
liquid. Shaggy water buck, elegant eland, nimble-footed impala,
baboons squabbling among themselves but intermittently preening
each other's glossy coats, are all the spectacle of the river
bed water. Generally, the Shashe River forms the international
border between Zimbabwe and Botswana as it snakes down to vomit
into the Limpopo River but at this point, the boundary recedes
with some 16km semi-circle into Botswana. The place is aptly
named the Tuli Circle. Legend has it that the name was derived
from prevalent wafting dust (ituli in Ndebele). The early
pioneers of Cecil John Rhodes, the British colonial
expansionist, with the agreement of local tribesmen established
the Tuli Circle as a no-go area for the grazing of local cattle.
This preserved the grazing