1:18:07
By this time, the great lake
has dried up completely...
1:18:10
...into a boundless, white expanse.
1:18:14
Mummified fish lie scattered
on the dry, cracked surface.
1:18:19
Animals migrating across the lake
from the Kalahari...
1:18:23
...plod through cruel mirages of water
that doesn't splash under their feet...
1:18:27
...and they pass phantom trees
that offer no shade.
1:18:37
After days of plodding,
some begin to panic...
1:18:40
...when there seems to be
no end to the vastness.
1:18:50
Some just give up and stop walking.
1:19:02
Some years, the drought comes
too soon for the pelicans...
1:19:05
...who nested in the center of the lake.
1:19:07
The parents stand around helplessly
as their little black chicks...
1:19:11
...suffer agonies of hunger
and thirst and heat.
1:19:15
They're almost fully grown,
but are still too young to fly...
1:19:18
...so they're trapped in
this boundless desolation.
1:19:23
One little one begins to walk
blindly away into the searing heat...
1:19:27
...and his parents can only look on in despair.
1:19:34
In the first weeks of his life,
this was a bountiful lake.
1:19:38
He cannot understand how his beautiful
world could change into this pitiless void.
1:19:43
So he walks and walks, hoping in despair
to find his beautiful world again...
1:19:49
...somewhere in this vast emptiness.
1:19:53
In the evening, cool, moist air...
1:19:55
...comes drifting into the desert,
bringing a promise of life-giving rain.