Vic Falls and the Zambezi...

 

Greetings From Namibia!  Hi all! Sorry it has been a while, but this is the first chance we’ve had to access the Internet since July 24th. Pretty amazing when I think about home and everyone with a cell phone, cable TV, high-speed cable-modem access, etc. And especially how ‘plugged in’ I used to be. Nothing like being out of touch! Just to give you and idea, though, most of the lodges we stay at have 1) no phones or TVs in the rooms, 2) no doors to the rooms (if it’s a tent) or no locks/keys to the rooms (if it’s a conventional-type bungalow), and 3) a personal escort to and from your room after dark to protect us from prowling animals (which, if you ask me, is a joke…if a lion does appear, what is the little guy with the flashlight gonna do that I can’t? except maybe climb trees faster, and frankly, in that situation, I don’t need that kind of competition.). As a result of the above features (or lack thereof), you can understand how an Internet connection is completely out of the question… Thus I have to do the updating from the bigger, city hotels when we pass through…
 
Before I get started on the latest installment, to cover from July 25th to August 5th, let me set some more background on our accommodations so it’s easier to understand for everyone. Think of the Three Little Pigs. These guys each went their separate ways and built three houses, remember? The straw house, which the wolf demolished easily; the wood house, which he got with moderate effort; and the brick house, which wouldn’t fall no matter how hard he tried. Well, to make things easy to picture, I’ll break our lodging down into one of those three categories (straw house, wood house, or brick house) so you can get a clear understanding of what separates our white tender flesh from the lurking African wildlife!
 
This brings me to our first stop after Leopard Hills in South Africa. We caught a small plane (as in, ‘check your stomach in the rear luggage hold before take-off, please’) back to Jo’Burg, and then caught a commercial flight to Lusaka, Zambia. The first thing that struck me was the amazing array of people on board this flight – every race and color and ethnic group was represented. Kinda like walking in Times Square, NYC. In those circumstances I always wonder, ‘what brought all these people together at this particular time and place in the universe?’ It’s hokey, but it never gets old for me. Reminds me of a Vonnegut line – the opening to his last book, Timequake: ‘all things - past, present, or future - are purely coincidental.’ Or something like that. Anyway, the flight was uneventful and we arrived at Lusaka International Airport. Now, bear in mind that Africa’s airports are not exactly ‘modern’. It’s amazing, really, and it gives you this false sense of ‘pioneering’, I suppose. In truth, I think I like it because it just means the place we’re at has not yet been corrupted by mass media and commercialism.  

From Lusaka we transferred to a small charter to Jeki Airport, which serves the greater lower Zambezi area, population: 14. It was a beautiful flight over green and gold rolling hills and I chuckled as we prepared to land at Jeki. Basically, the runway was an open strip of red clay just off the banks of the Zambezi River. And the terminal?  A guy in a chair sitting under a shade tree. No joke. It was great! From Jeki we made our way to Sausage Tree Camp.
 
Sausage Tree is classified as a ‘wild’ camp. By this I think people mean to say that it is pretty remote and that the local animals pretty much have their run of things. This is not – in and of itself – a bad thing, so long as you understand the rules. In truth, it’s pretty humbling to re-learn your place in the animal kingdom in this way. Each time you leave your tent, you look around for animals… Each time you walk back from dinner, you nervously hope the coast is clear… And in the middle of the night, you worry each time the lion’s roar sounds closer… Of course, all this was made doubly interesting in that Sausage Tree’s accommodations are definitely in the ‘straw house’ category. We had a beautiful tent on the river’s bank, but at no time did we feel as if it was going to keep anything dangerous out! The real appeal of Sausage Tree is the Zambezi River. Water was a nice change of pace for Cathy and I following the arid South Africa game reserves. Sausage Tree was definitely more tropical and we could take full advantage of the river. The Zambezi is the 4th largest river in Africa, and it creates the natural border between Zambia and Zimbabwe. On the surface it looks tranquil and serene. In reality, however, this river is deadly with a capital ‘D’. Not only does it play host to the dreaded Zambezi Shark (a super-aggressive hybrid-type bull shark that can actually tolerate fresh water for long distances… it leaves the ocean and swims up the mouth of the Zambezi, usually claiming a few victims along the way…), it is also home to ridiculous amounts of crocodiles and hippos (Africa’s deadliest animals due to the number of boats they tip over). We learned all of this first hand as we set off to fish on our first day at Camp – we stumbled on a dead hippo in the water, which was being devoured by 25-30 crocodiles. Really, really creepy to see those eyes and snout just above water, gliding quietly along, barely making a ripple. If anyone one of us had dared the water by chance or by sheer lunacy at that point, we’d have lasted no more than 30 seconds. The crocs were that fast and that vicious. Once recovered, we continued our fishing, which was superb. Apparently, the Zambezi is home to one of the strongest and most vicious fresh-water fish, the tiger fish. These guys go 8 to 20 lbs and put up an incredible fight. Over our 3 days, Cathy and I caught 2 each. It was a real rush, too. But man, are they mean looking. Imagine a salmon-sized fish, but take away the head and give it a barracuda’s. They were u-g-l-y, and would make you forgo the river on their own, despite the crocs, sharks, and hippos! 

 
Speaking of hippos, we got or fill at Sausage Tree! We could hear these guys leave the water and graze near our tent at night – at times, we swore they were no more than 10 feet from us, munching away on grass… Can you imagine? This 2 ton beast of an animal, about 10 feet away, separated by only a canvas tent… Needless to say, it was tough to get back to sleep once we heard them!
 
At Sausage Tree we also got our first glimpse of true village life. We boated 90 minutes upstream to a small village called Mugurameno, where we strolled through ‘town’ and visited the local school. The homes are basically clay huts with thatched roofs – they are probably 10-12 feet in circumference, and life is as rural and poor as I’ve ever seen it. Everything was red clay, dusty, and hot. Crops are grown near the river (I assume to be closer to the water source) and fishing is a main source of sustenance. In fact, when we first pulled up to the town, the first people we came across were kids. Most of the adults were out fishing. There were kids everywhere, though, and some were very young. We learned that it’s quite normal for the parents to leave the 12 year old in charge of the 6 year old, and for the 6 year old to be in charge of the 1 year old… The school was – again – humbling. Resources are pretty scarce but they make a good effort. The head mistress showed us around a bit and Cathy gave her a donation for the school. Not much, by a US standard, but hopefully it’s enough to help them along a bit.

From Sausage Tree we moved upstream a few hundred miles to Victoria Falls in Livingstone, Zambia. We stayed at Tongabezi, which falls into the “wood house” category. Livingstone used to be the capital of Zambia (when it was called Rhodesia, after Cecil Rhodes, the pioneering British businessman) and is pretty commercial compared to Sausage Tree and the lower Zambezi. Tongabezi would definitely not be considered ‘wild’ as far as lodges go (although the vervet monkeys around the dining hall were pretty quick to swoop in when you dropped anything), and I even got to go out for a run! The highlights of our stay at Vic Falls were 1) the Falls themselves and 2) white-water rafting down the Zambezi. Simply put, Victoria Falls blows Niagara Falls away. It is twice the height and twice the width. The locals call it ‘Mosi Oa Tunya’ which translates to ‘The Smoke that Thunders’. The eponymous Dr. Livingstone apparently ‘discovered’ the Falls in 1855, in much the same way Columbus must have ‘discovered’ America (‘What do you mean “discovered,” Funny-White-Man? That’s been here for years…’). 

Victoria Falls is apparently one of the ‘Seven Wonders of the Natural World’, and justifiably so. (Can anyone name the rest? It’s Angel Falls, Venezuela; The Grand Canyon; Yosemite National Park; The Harbor of Rio De Janeiro… and what else? I forget already…) Cathy and I got some great photos at the Falls as the park there takes you much closer than you can get to Niagara. And, in spite of growing tourism in Zambia due to the problems in Zimbabwe, we were the only ones there! Try that at Niagara Falls!

White-water rafting was the other Vic Falls highlight. It was my first time rafting and it was a great adrenaline rush. Apparently, The Zambezi is a Grade 5 river (whatever that means) and it starts out pretty scary – you make you way into the gorge via this makeshift rubble and wood path that leads straight down. You lose your footing about 100 times and generally feel quite stupid. Of course, this in only amplified exponentially when you see the 140-pound guides sprinting down with medical kits, rafts, and oars on their shoulders… So if you actually make it down into the gorge, the rest is all gravy! Or at least, that’s what I told myself! Rafting the rapids was a lot of fun. It was wet, and scary, and exciting. It was also a great was to see the gorge, since you got to drift and swim in between the rapids. I got to climb up the rock face and jump about 45 feet into the river, too. That was awesome, but nowhere near what those whack-jobs do off the Victoria Falls Bridge. It’s the highest bungee-jump in the world, I think, and Cathy had a passing notion. 800 feet! It made me queasy to even think about it. We stuck to the boating instead, and made it safely (and soaked) from rapids 10-25. We weren’t experts, by any means, but I am happy to report that no one fell out and the boat never tipped!
 
It was in Zambia, by the way, that we first began to REALLY see the stars of the southern hemisphere, including the Milky Way. Every night you pick up Venus (the Evening Star) first, then the Southern Cross, then Scorpio (with it’s orange/red heart star, Antares), and then the Milky Way. You really could make a trip out of just staring at those stars each night… They seem so bright and so close that you could just reach out and grab them…BOTSWANA NEXT
 
All the Best,
BEN & CATHY