The Central Kalahari Game Reserve isn’t that far away, but it’s one of the most desolate wilderness areas in Africa. It’s one of the most beautiful too. Olof Bergh spent eight days there living the slow life.

I’ve always loved the word “Kalahari”, which is actually derived from Kgalagadi. “Kgala” means “the great thirst” in Tswana, and it’s no secret why this wide, empty land got that name.

The word Kalahari simply tastes dry and dusty. If you say it out loud, you can almost feel the sand and plains on your tongue.

And it sounds like adventure. Have you ever seen the distant look in older men’s eyes when they talk about the place? It’s as if, in their mind’s eye, they can see the still-smouldering campfire while the blood-red new day breaks over the plains.

The Kalahari is a mysterious place with many stories and legends. Everyone knows the legend of the so-called Lost City and its secret treasures. Even the Bushmen refer to an old civilisation that used to live here – they call them the “old people”.

These tales have captured the imagination of many a fortune seeker and large expeditions have travelled through here in search of ruins. Some adventurers of yesteryear never made it back.

But many did return with stories of the wind exposing ruins of an ancient civilisation in the sand, just to close it up again the next day. Nobody has been able to fix the co-ordinates.

Expeditions still venture into the Kalahari annually to find the Lost City, but one suspects that for most modern-day participants it’s only an expensive excuse to have a double single malt on ice by a Kalahari campfire.

In summer the Kalahari doesn’t always look like a desert. During the rainy months it morphs into a lush green paradise with large herds of gemsbok gathering on the pans, which are a sea of waving blonde and golden grass taller than a Land Cruiser’s bonnet.

To most South Africans, the Kalahari is the savanna with red dunes that starts somewhere between Kuruman and Vryburg. However, most of this desert lies in Botswana. It also comprises the widest part of the country, from the southwest right up to the north, where the Okavango River trickles into the sand.

The Central Kalahari Game Reserve, deep in the Botswana interior, is one of the world’s most desolate places, and practically the very centre of the Kalahari.