Day 14 Zambia - Helicopter, Falls & Elephants

Up before the alarm went off again. Sheesh! This morning we had a 7:30 AM pickup – for a helicopter ride! The hangar was quite nearby and it didn’t take long before we were up in the air. We booked a 30 minute ride rather than the 15 minute one and we were so glad we did.

The first place we circled over was Victoria Falls of course. As we approached it, I thought the white stuff in the air was smoke from a burning fire. As we got closer, I realized that it was the spray from all that water! It really is quite a narrow gorge. Like on land, the mist together with the sun created a rainbow in the sky. We circled around it several times then moved on over to the rapids.

We plunged over the edge of the land into the gorge and followed the path of the white water rafters. We started at rapid number 6 and made our way to number 10. We twisted and turned along the class 5 and 6 rapids and wondered how anyone could possibly navigate the raging waters from a raft or kayak. I would have liked to do an ultralight flight but decided on the helicopter because it skimmed the river.

After that, we headed over a small rural village and could see the huts below like the ones we visited yesterday.

Then we went back to the river area for a bit. I was absolutely amazed at the width of the Zambezi River and all of the tributaries and arms that feed into it. The vastness is really quite remarkable and awe-inspiring.

When we arrived back at our hotel we headed to the restaurant for breakfast and it wasn’t yet 9 AM. Rather than relaxing for 5 hours (are you kidding?!) I decided to hire a taxi and go back to the Falls Park area on my own. The last time I was there, I didn’t have enough time to look at everything I wanted and I kept thinking about a pretty tablecloth I had seen.

The sales pressure was quite intense, more so than the downtown Livingstone Market, but I persevered. I’ve found that being polite but firm is the best policy. I bought a beautiful batiked tablecloth, not the one I had seen on Monday, but a nicer one. Happy with my purchase, I headed off to see if I could photograph some crazy bungy jumpers.

We had been told that we couldn’t cross the bridge from Zambia into Zimbabwe without paying a $110 USD visa fee. But I discovered that was wrong. After about a 10 minute walk past big trucks waiting to cross the border, I came to some kind of border office. They gave me a paper ticket with the date stamped on it, I passed that to a waiting guard, then I was free to cross the bridge.

Half way across the bridge is a sign saying “Welcome to Zimbabwe”. Hooray, I did it! Unfortunately I didn’t get my passport stamped to prove it, but oh well. I was able to see some of Victoria Falls from the bridge and also the foot bridge we went on the other day. I traversed the entire bridge and back again, stopping at the midway point. That is where the bungee jumpers leap from. Oh my gosh! I would try a lot of things but never that.

At the Zambian end of the bridge, there was a restaurant with a view of the bridge and the jumpers. I ordered a salad and some chicken with sweet Thai chili sauce – yum! Soon it was time to go back and meet Baison, the taxi driver that brought me there.

Just after 2 PM, three of us were picked up in a nice air-conditioned van and taken to the elephant safari park for our elephant ride adventure. The elephants at this park are rescue animals, abandoned for one reason or another. After a briefing and signing waivers (something we have had to do a lot on this trip) we were ready to meet our elephants.

My elephant was named Nandy.

To get on it’s back, you had to climb some stairs to a platform they have built. Elephants are really, really wide. In a way, it was similar to riding a camel and I was able to use my camera with both hands. But riding an elephant is not something I could do for very many hours in a day.

The elephant handler was very knowledgeable and answered any elephant question I had. The biggest elephant they have there is almost 4 meters tall! Mine was a bit shorter, but it still seemed like we were a long ways up.

The grounds are typical trees, grass and bush of the area and some of the elephants stopped to feed on whatever was handy. Half way along the trail, we got close to the Zambezi River. It was unbelievably beautiful and many of the elephants stopped for a drink there. I took lots of photos, needless to say. The hour’s ride was over before you knew it but I was ready to get off as my back was feeling the rocking motion.

The interaction didn’t end there, however. We got to feed each of ‘our’ elephants some treats. At first, I fed mine by throwing the food into his mouth. But then I wondered what his trunk felt like so I let him use his trunk to take the food. He kind of sniffed it in, then turned the end of his trunk up and put it in his mouth. He felt so cool and I didn’t want that part to end.

Before we left the park, they showed us the photos and video footage they had shot during the excursion as a sales pitch. I bought the photo DVDs as I knew I would hardly ever look at the video DVD. I am always behind the lens, not in front and the photos were very nice indeed.

We were late getting back to our hotel and to our 6 PM meeting with Anton and Mike, our Botswana guides for the next week. They gave us a run down of the itinerary and a few details not given to us beforehand. After that, we went to the 5 star hotel next door for supper and we were tired of our hotel menu. It was a marvellous smorg, pricey but oh so delicious!

It’s been a loooong, wonderful day!

Day 13 Zambia - Village of Musokotwane

There weren’t many people at breakfast this morning so we had to order off the menu instead of the serve-serve buffet. This is a process that takes much, much longer.

We were picked up in a van with a driver, our guide, Victor, and his assistant, Innocent. What an unusual name! We headed to a local market, much bigger than the ones I saw yesterday. Many people were just starting to set things up and I was fascinated by everything.

Again, I wanted to take photos I shouldn’t, so I did so surreptitiously. Victor said it would be OK to photograph the goods but that the people feel we are going to go back home and make money off of their photos. Not the case here!

Victor purchased various types of vegetables from different vendors and we walked through quite a bit of the market. He also purchased a live chicken which was trussed up and put in the back of the van. Yikes! I know, I know. I just hate the thought of killing a live chicken. Cèst la vie! 

Along with the vegetables, we also bought soap, salt, and charcoal. I spied a fabric booth on the way back to the vehicle and found a beautiful fringed rectangle which I shall use as a tablecloth.

The village we went to was 30 kilometers north of town, then a further 7 kilometers on gravel. And what gravel it was. The driver slowed down to 5 k to bypass huge potholes in the road. We arrived at the village of Musokotwane shortly after 10 AM and were introduced to the host family.

Shortly after that, we went on a walking tour of some of the homes in the village. Each time we stopped, one of us presented the woman of the house with a long bar of soap (about 6 bars of soap altogether) as well as a bag of salt.

Each of the village homes have a cell phone for communication and we saw solar panels on some of the roof tops. I photographed some of the families and the children. They were tickled pink to see their photo on the back of my camera. I loved the experience and I was in my element.

When we got back to the host family, groceries were unloaded and the lunch preparation began. Veggies were chopped and the cooking started. Charcoal was used in their tiny stoves and once the food began to cook, it smelled fantastic!

Also happening in the yard was the building of an addition on one of the houses. Bricks had been made and had dried in the sun for 3 weeks. Two young men were building a wall using the bricks, and the mortar was made with the same material dug from a hole in the ground. They added quite a bit of water and stirred a great deal to make the mortar.

Some of the group helped with the cooking but we ended up leaving most of the job to the more than capable women while Victor talked to us about customs, and the history of the Zambian people. We could hear banging happening just outside the wall of the home and went to investigate. A young man was making the holes of a cooking stove by pounding a punch and making the small square holes for the stove to get air for burning.

Finally the meal was ready and one of the women dished it up for us. We were offered our choice of plates and when we sat down to eat, we weren’t sure what to do as there was no cutlery in sight. Victor showed us how to make the pap into balls with our hands, then use it to scoop up the various vegetables. I remember Abdellah eating that way in the Moroccan home we visited, while the rest of us asked for a fork.

The pap was quite good with all the various vegetables, much better than I recall it being on previous occasions. I found the chicken to be quite tough and it got stuck in my teeth. I didn’t eat much of it. I hope my leftovers went to good use.

After lunch, we went for a walk, a long, hot, dusty walk to the village’s dam. We met cattle who were on their way to have a drink. It was probably 33C and I was really feeling the heat. We were all hoping to tour the nearby medical clinic and see inside, but it was closed for the lunch hour. Around 2PM we got into the van and headed back into Livingstone. The air conditioning was a welcome relief from the unrelenting heat.

We had about an hour’s rest at our hotel and I had a quick shower to wash off the mountains of dirt on my feet and legs. At 4:10, we walked over to the hotel next door and went aboard the Lady Livingstone for a sunset cruise. It was the last hurrah for the whole group as the New Zealanders were leaving the tour tomorrow.

The boat wasn’t very full and we had a beautiful view from the top floor. Along the way, we saw impala, crocodiles and hippos along the bank. The sunset was truly beautiful.

The night wasn’t over yet. When we returned, we had a participatory drumming session with a fellow by the name of Boyd.

We each got a drum and he showed us various drumming patterns. It was great fun and we sounded pretty darned good I thought!

We have one more full, exciting day in Livingstone. It’s 9:30 PM and I am exhausted, again!