The Boteti palaeo-estuary in northern Botswana is located where the endoreic Boteti river, an overflow from the regional Okavango river system, enters the Makgadikgadi pans. The aims are to help identify precursor conditions for the origin
of microcrystalline silcrete–calcrete intergrade deposits while developing insight into pene-contemporaneous silica and calcite matrix formation. General precursor conditions require the presence of cyclical endoreic freshwater inflow into a saline pan. The pan should