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!
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