up the trek somewhat. It took them 25 days to trek from Sebetwane’s Drift to Lake Ngami, arriving there on 25 September 1877. Here the group split up. Ten to eleven families under Louw du Plessis trekked to Rietfontein to join the first trekker party, while the rest trekked northwestwards along the Okavango River. Since October 1877, most of the group who had trekked along the Okavango River had died of malaria. Malaria once again took its toll on the trekkers and from October 1877, most of the group who trekked along the Okavango River, died of malaria. Here things took a turn for the worst as tsetse fly killed off their oxen and they had hardly any provisions left. Some of them lost hope and turned around, trekking back to the Transvaal. Most of the group trekked westward, directly into the dessert to the Debraveld, to escape the double threat of malaria and the tsetse fly while another group continued on their trek along the Okavango because they feared being without water again. It was here that the Thirstland trek must have experienced its all-time low, since most deaths because of malaria and loss of livestock occurred during this time. Furthermore, a few people died after eating poisonous wild plants, and one person was murdered by Bushmen. When the first trek party, which had set off northwards from Rietfontein in January 1878, came across this group of trekkers, the indescribable wretchedness and dilapidated circumstances of these trekkers shocked them deeply. Because of the unhealthy conditions of the Debraveld, the trekkers had to continue their journey once again. The different trekker parties united, trekked further north, and then stayed over for a while at Leeupan and the Kaudum. Of the group of ten families under Gert du Preez, comprising 65 individuals (the “mak volk” included), all of the men died and only three women and 19 children survived. When the other trekkers heard of their ordeal, an expedition was sent to rescue the survivors and bring them to the laager at Leeupan. Up until then, nothing had come of the trekker’s main goal of finding a new and “better land to live in”, and on top of that, the trek had impoverished them even more. They were surrounded either by hostile black tribes or inhospitable areas and the trekkers eventually did not know where to go to from there. And