The Falls were beautiful! Apart from
admiring the falls from various angles, (which is better from the Zimbabwean
than the Zambian side) we also looked at people starting their whitewater
rafting and kayaking down the Zambezi river. We were fine with looking, this time we did not feel like participating in any of the activities. On the way back to the exit we saw a little African
paradise flycatcher (terpsiphone viridis) with its long reddish brown tail flying from one tree to
the other. It was a beauty to watch. Later we also walked over to the old
bridge (built by the British in 14months over 1903-1904) that marks the border
crossing between Zambia and Zimbabwe. The border control only allowed one truck
at a time on the old bridge. There is also a train crossing – but I would not dare to
stand on the bridge when the train crosses. The bridge is sturdy yet it doesn't look like it's built for heavy, modern trains.
 |
| The Victoria Falls. The highest point is over 100 meters (108m) |
 |
The nice thing about visiting the falls from Zimbabwean side is
that you can do a longer walk along the Falls
(more photo opportunities, haha).
|
On the same day we continued driving towards Hwange
national park. This drive is not that long, we arrived in the afternoon on the same day.
Hwange seemed to be rather empty, both of travellers and of wild animals. We
discussed the camping options with the staff at the Sinamantella campsite office
upon our arrival. We were given the option to either camp at one of the picnic
sites or stay at the campsite where the office was. The Mandavu Dam picnic site
was slightly more expensive than the main camp (USD 25 per pax vs USD 15 per pax)
but it was an exclusive campsite just for us. That sounded like a nice option. We decided to take that for the first night and stay the second night at the
main campsite. On top of campsite fees we also had to pay national park fees of
USD20 per person per night.
The choice to stay at the Mandavu Dam had
been good. The campsite on the first night had great views of a lake where
crocodiles and hippos were swimming around. We met a group of Canadians at the
picnic site who were there just spending the afternoon and watching hippos and
taking pictures. One of them was running her own safari operation in Botswana
and had now her daughter and friends visiting from Canada. They were on a
longer trip since it was low season for her safari business. The hippos
mostly stayed at the opposite side of the lake but we could see two hippos
fighting. It was incredible to watch with binoculars! They were too far for us
to take pictures even with Claudio’s camera.
Later we went for a short game drive but did not see anything
particularly interesting.
 |
View of the lake at Mandavu campsite. The hippos kept themselves
to the opposite side of the lake, yet with binoculars we could
observe them fighting with mouths wide open. I was in awe. |
 |
Skulls at sunset at Mandavu. The left one is an elephant skull
(I don't know what the one on the right is). |
We drove off to the main camp on the 17
th
of January and did some game viewing along the way. We decided to have a light
lunch of vegetarian pasta after arriving at the campsite and picking our spot.
We sat down at the table and wondered a little about the small hawks circling
closeby in the area. There seemed not to be any particular reason for them to
be there but they flew over rather close to our table. We decided to keep an
eye on them. We found out the reason for their presence very soon. I asked
Claudio to pass me the pasta spice and lifted my plate up . Claudio teased me
to say please, so my plate was on display just for a few seconds – enough for
one of the hawks to dive over and grab my pasta off my plate, spilling the rest
on the ground. Me and Claudio just stared at each other stupefied. A hawk just
stole our food! I cursed at it but then we couldn’t help but laughing. Cheeky
buggers! They are used to campers turning up with meat for the barbeque. I wonder
how many steaks have gone to the hawk’s nest instead of on the campers plates.
 |
| Food thief watching for her next target from the safety of a tree ! |
We decided to go to the campsite restaurant
for dinner and save our steaks for a safer location. In the meantime, we did some chores at
campsite in the afternoon. I washed the biggest pile of laundry by hand that I
have ever done in my life. I miss having a washing machine! I told Claudio that
if he buys me dinner I will wash his laundry. As you can imagine, he agreed
(although he tried to say that if I wash his laundry it’s just a payment for
getting permit to sit two more days in the car – nice try! Didn’t work).
 |
The greatest amount of handwashing that I have done for years.
Or ever. |
While waiting for our orders at the
restaurant we spoke with a Zimbabwean couple sat at the table next to us. They
also said they had not seen much animals. It seems that this time of the year a lot of
the animals ross over to Botswanan side, and there are less animal sightings in
Hwange. We did also suspect poaching – Zimbabwe has had challenges with
poachers before. For example, the rhino population has been wiped out
completely by poachers. In any case we enjoyed the chat. I think overall all
the Zimbabweans were very friendly and nice people. (Note: We did read on traveller websites later that many other travellers had had better luck than us. Many of them had been to Hwange around the same dates as we were. We were just unlucky this time - even lions and leopards had been spotted in January).
Once we were done in Hwange (on the 18th
of January) we continued our journey towards the Mana Pools national park. Although
we thought there were less animals in Hwange than in Namibia and Botswanan parks, we did still see some warthogs,
one elephant, many impalas, lots of hippos and some crocodiles in the reservoir
pools, a few small tortoises crossing the road, lots of hornbills (most
yellowbilled), some blacksmith lapwings, redbilled teals, cranes and storks,
waterbucks and a few zebras.
 |
CA and a tiny tortoise that we moved to the roadside.
Luckily Claudio spotted it - it was in the middle of the road
under the risk of being ran over by a Landy! |
The drive we had ahead is almost 650km and
we knew a great part of it will be gravel roads, some of which may be in bad
condition. It would definitely be 2 days of driving there and we had not looked
up any suitable campsites in advance. We thought we would either camp out in
the wild, or if we see a nice campsite along the way we’ll stop there for the
night. We stopped at a petrol station to fuel and then continued the drive.
 |
Drinks for Landy and for us at this petrol station. Landy
did not want any Coke zero. |
We turned off the tarmac road into a gravel
road leading East slightly before the town of Binga (a small town on the
southwestern shore of Lake Kariba on the Zimbabwean and Zambian border). After
that the road was rather bumpy and the area also far more rural. We mostly saw clay huts, although
there were also some tile buildings and even individual stone houses. As we had
to drive rather slowly, all the children and even many adults greeted us
happily. I waved at all the children and even most of the adults. This was
clearly countryside and there was nothing wrong with waving at complete
strangers when passing by. The children loved it. They waved cheered and shouted at us when we
passed by. I waved until my hand was
aching (and until Claudio gave the remark “Do you think you are the Queen?” Lol)
 |
| I could live in a clay hut if I had a view like this from my window. |
 |
Views along the roadside in Zimbabwe on the way from Hwange
to Mana Pools. |
 |
| The Green Mamba at a roadside stop. |
We turned northwards slightly after halfway
along this road. There seemed to be a campsite called Gache Gache on the shore
of lake Kariba but we already knew we would not make it all the way there
before sunset. It seemed likely we needed to find a place on the roadside to
camp at. The road we turned into was even bumpier and smaller than the main
road. The villages however seemed better organized and have nicer houses than
the ones along the “main” road. Many of the tile buildings even had satellite
dishes on the roof. There were no electricity lines after we had turned off the
tarmac road – in the countryside the houses have solar panels (if they can
afford them), otherwise there is no electricity in the houses.
We camped on a roadside spot near a
village. Nice camping, only event was one scared impala running out of the
forest and disappearing over the hill. A few minutes later two dogs followed.
They seemed to have lost the trail there as the dogs returned later to sniff
the trail but there was no sight of the impala. Good for the impala!
 |
| Roadside campsite on the way to Mana Pools. |
The road that we took into Kariba town on
the 19
th was in a bad condition. There was corrugation, bumps, water
on the road and lots of branches growing into the way. We collected quite a few
smaller tree branches and leaves on our roof rack when driving past. There were
also one million horse flies in the bushes. Although we don’t’ have air
conditioning in the car we had to give up a couple of times and close the
windows after we had been invaded a couple of times by 30-40 horse files.
Getting them out of the car was not particularly enjoyable and did not help
Claudio concentrate onhis driving. I admire his calmness while driving on a
difficult road and not reacting at all although he was being badly bothered by
the flies. Finally we got out of the bush and could see Lake Kariba from top
of a hill.
 |
| Our first view of Lake Kariba. |
 |
The Green Mamba on the hillside on the road we stopped to take
pictures of Lake Kariba. |
The road improved slightly and continued
under three massive powerlines. We guessed these were powerlines coming from
Zambian side and going into Harare. It was a little odd driving on a gravel
road underneath massive electric cables. The road went towards a river
crossing. There was also a detour option to go into Kariba. Claudio obviously
wanted to try out the river crossing – it said on our Tracks4Africa map on the
GPS that the crossing is difficult and there is no bridge. Perfect for Claudio,
what else does one want when one has a Landy? I was utterly horrified when I
saw the steep riverbench going down into the river. To be fair the river was
rather small this time of the year but the sand looked wet and muddy. I was
thinking that either we will fall over going down or we will get stuck in the
mud. But nope, Claudio went down the hill (whilst I was contemplating whether I
dare to watch or breath - and my heart was definitely making an attempt of
exiting my body through my mouth) and then up again on the next hill on the
other side. There was another steep climb and we were back on a more or less
“normal” gravel road. I thought it was an awesome crossing. I again applaud
Claudio’s skills as a driver, I could never have managed that myself.
 |
Road underneath the powerline.
(Sorry, no pictures of the river crossing, I was too horrified
to be able to take pictures). |
We stopped in Kariba to fuel, fill up our
cooking gas bottle, have some cold drinks, admire the view from the massive dam
at the east end of lake Kariba with the power station on Zambian side of
Zambezi river and an unsuccessful attempt for lunch (café is closed on Mondays)
then continue towards Mana pools (northeast from Kariba).
 |
An extra passenger travelling on the windshield wipers. We found him
when we stopped at the petrol station in Kariba. |
 |
The dam at Lake Kariba. The power station is on top right,
above the dam wall, on the Zambian side. The powerlines
go into Zimbabwe and all the way to Harare. |
 |
There was also a wall sized map of the dam area with a few
facts of the building and the dam. |
The road from Kariba was a nice tarmac road
and one of the main truck roads. The
road is hilly and we could smell the brakes of many of the trucks burning as we
drove past them. Nice. Many of those whose brakes had burned earlier had ended
up downhill over the edge of the road and into a ditch. We saw a car wreck at
every turn and corner – and still they don’t stop when their breaks are fuming…
We had to sign up to get our permission in
the national parks office on the way but all payments were to only be made at
the Nyamepi campsite. The road to the campsite was 70km of awfully bumpy gravel
– corrugations from hell. A road to rip your car into parts (we had our hazard
lights go off on the way out of the park. Landies break easily. Luckily the
issue resolved after we stopped for a wile at the end of the road). The road was also wet at places, and as it had
been raining for about an hour or more on the day (plus on several days before
the 19th) we encountered several puddles that extended across the
road, some quite deep, some shallower. The “Green Mamba” got a proper mud
coating – and at times we got splashed too if we were not fast enough with
closing the windows. We also encountered one flash flood that made a bridge
crossing impossible. Earlier floods had already taken a piece of the edge of
the bridge off so we could not see where the road was. We decided to wait and
see if the water would go down. So, we got out of the car, opened the back door
and the fridge and made ourselves some cheese and chutney sandwiches in the
rain whilst we observed the water. It was actually going down really fast and
we could continue across and along the
muddy road after under 30min of waiting.
 |
| The flash flood had covered the bridge. |
After we entered the National Park we did
not need to wait long to have our first interesting wildlife encounter. There
were two female lions sitting in the middle of the road rather soon after the
gate. They got up and disappeared in the long grass and bushes before we had
time to take any photos. Nevertheless, it was a great welcome to the Mana Pools
National Park. Hello, lioness, hope to see you again tomorrow!
The campsite itself had a stunning
location. We were camping right on the mighty Zambezi river. We had a resident three
hippos and two crocodiles when we arrived. In the evening we made a fire, and Claudio
barbequed his steak (I was on a vegetarian day). As soon as it got dark the
elephants started coming down to the river to drink and grazed under and from
the nearby trees. There were 4- elephants and they were only 20 metres away
from our dinner table. One of the elephants was putting food in his mouth
whilst farting and pooping from the other end. What an engine! The hippos also
got closer at dark – we used our torches to check their locations but they just
peacefully grazed in the shallows of the river in front of our camp. It was
awesome – hippos on one side at 20metres and elephants on the other. No car, no
shelter, no viewing spot. Just a dinner table and a couple of chairs. Wildlife
viewing can’t get better than this.
A hyena also turned up attracted by the
smell of Claudio’s barbeque. I dealt with this one much better than last time,
I was actually very curious about it and laughed at it trying to sneak to steal
the steak. Claudio kept a watchful eye on his meal. Later when we were having
dinner we heard some noise from the barbeque pit that was a little further away
from our car. Claudio went to check and I heard “that bloody sneaky bastard!”
Apparently they hyena had stolen Claudio’s grill cleaner. It’s plastic but it
has a sharp, metallic end to it. We hope the hyena didn’t eat it – it would be
a dead hyena if I did. The hyena did not turn up the next day, and we didn’t
find the grill cleaner so we aren’t really sure if it actually really ate it
and died of that. Hyenas are not intelligent.
In the morning we got up at 5.45am and went
out for a game drive before having breakfast. The roads were very muddy and
soft. When we reached the pools we parked and saw a crocodile sliding into the
water to accompany the hippos that were already gathered in the middle of the
lake. We were unable to follow the road that runs along the side of the Long
Pool – there was too much water on the road and too many deep and soft ditches.
We did a little detour and after a couple of turns parked again at a different
spot around 7.10am to observe more hippos in the pool and impalas grazing
behind the lake, Claudio was taking pictures of them. While he was focused on
his camera I did my usual check of the background area for any animals we had
not yet spotted. I saw a large animal sat under a tree. Wow. I had to re-check
with Claudio’s binoculars because I couldn’t’ believe my eyes. There were more
of them approaching. I looked at Claudio – he was still taking photos and was
looking into a different direction. I handed him the binocular and said:
“Claudio, look under that big tree behind
the hippos. I just had a count of four of them!”
Claudio: “It’s a lion!”
Taitti: “No, it’s four lions.”
Claudio: Now I can also see the male
approaching
Taitti: That makes it 5 lions.
We continued the drive along the wet roads.
I was wondering whether we will get through – and what would happen if we do
get stuck. Well, we have the san boards on the roof so we should be able to get
out. We passed by a pool that was covered in bright green weed. There were
hippos in the pol and they looked hilarious when they popped their heads up and
had the big green leaves stuck on their heads. Unfortunately they were too far
for my little camera – below is a shot
but once Claudio uploads his photos on Flickr there will be much better ones to
look at.
 |
On all green lake and a couple of little dark dots.
The dots are the hippos. |
The roads were getting seriously wet now
and we did a couple of detours to avoid the worst spots. Then, just as we were
driving over a wet, muddy plain (that didn’t look too bad ) Claudiodrove
slightly off the previous track to avoid the muddy spot.
Bump. We felt the car
go down in a hole.
I looked around. Oh, crap. Elephant tracks in the mud.
We
had just driven in a particularly deep foot step.
Claudio looked at me. “Now we really are
stuck”
Me: “Yep. Just went in a hole. What do we
do?”
We got out of the car and Claudio assessed
how deep we are. The spot we got stuck in was all muddy. There were little
islands of grass that we could step on but all the rest was elephant tracks,
full of water and mud. Step in one of those and you were quickly up to your
ankles in mud and water. Nice. Claudio got back in the car and carefully tried
reversing out but we were not going anywhere.
Sigh. Time to get the sand boards down.
This is why we have them! Claudio spent
a while getting the sand boards down (with all the stuff we have on the
roof it wasn’t quite straightforward) and then we laid them together under the
car. He tried reversing off again but the right rear tyre kept spinning.
Claudio asked me to try to push the boards deeper, and when that didn’t help
push the right one deeper at the same one as he was reversing. I was down on
my knees in the mud, and quickly had myself covered ina layer of mud up to my
shoulders. My trousers and shirt looked rather amazing. The mud was
unbelievably smelly, too Reminded me of the smell in the lab we had when I
helped with the mudflat surveys during the Singapore Mega Marine Survey.
Disgusting. But what can you do? We needed to get out.
 |
| Landy is stuck! |
 |
| Trying to squeeze the sand boards in... |
 |
| No matter what I do the wheel is just spinning! Damn it. |
Claudio eventually decided to take the heavy lift out and try to jack the right rear wheel up so that we can push the sand board all the way in. However, as we needed to put in the sandboards from the side, he couldn't place the lift right next to the wheel and decided to try lifting from the back. We got started well but then the lift slipped in the mud. Claudio moved it and tried again. He got the lift rather high up - and then it was again on an angle, leaning towards the bak door. Craaaap! If we keep jacking we will have a hole in the back door or at the back of the car. Claudio still tried wedging it back and forth but it was not getting any better. We already had a scratch on the door - and a lift that was stuck in a position that we could not get it up or down without making a hole somewhere in the car. Of course, we still couldn't get the sandboards in so that Claudio could have reversed the car out (getting the lift out without making a hole on the door). So, what to do now?
Claudio got the GPS out and concluded the ranger station is about 2.4km away. One of us has to walk there. He asked me whether I want to walk to the station or wait at the car. Walk??? We had just seen 5 lions this morning and several elephants and buffalos. Walking around in this park didn't feel like a good idea, although it as allowed to get out of your car. I bored for Claudio doing the walking. I'll stay in the car (and get in and lock up the door at sight of any dangerous animal. Well, honestly speaking the only ones likely to be trouble could be the elephants and if I can't move the car it doesn't really make much of a difference where I am if an elephant gets upset. But I didn't think that would be much of an issue so right after Claudio got out of sight I first cleaned my hands, arms and tried to clean my shoes, and then took the binoculars out. I found two cranes making big circles in the sky, a hawk I could not identify either, the same impalas and waterbucks we had already seen when we first got to this spot. Later a very pretty little bird landed on a tree branch in the middle of the open. It did little circles flying around and showing off it's bright blue wings and then returned to sit on the branch. I first thought it was a bee eater but with the help of our guide book identified it as a Lilacbreasted roller (coracias caudatus). The bird is one of the prettiest I've seen. I did not manage to take a picture but you can find a picture of it here.
Claudio had left at 10am and I didn't expect him to be back before maybe 11 or perhaps even closer to 12. You can imagine how surprised I was when already at 10.45am I heard the sound of engines. My guess was he found the group of South Africans and Kiwis we had sen the day before arrive at the campsite. Yup, it was them. There was about 12 of them in the 3 cars. They first tried pulling our Landy out with their Landy but there wasn't enough power so we hooked up another car onto the belt. They pulled our Landy out just a notch. Awesome. That meant we had moved the heavy lift and could now remove it without making a hole on the back door. About 30 seconds later the hole Landy was out of its hole. Hooray to the Kiwis and South Africans, our day was saved. We drove back to campsite and spent the rest of the day hosing down the Landy, washing all of our clothes (by hand) and cleaning all the equipment. That was one proper mudbath! Claudio was also feeling like Da Man for having walked in area with lions and buffalos, completely unharmed, haha.
 |
| The Landy is free! |
 |
| The tracks in mud we made while being stuck. |
In the evening we just did a short drive around the park. No lions this time but we saw a group of hippos out of the water. They made their way quickly back to the water when they saw us approaching. I was still very excited, it's not often you see hippos on land at close distance. On the way back we drove past the lodge area and spotted the same group of Canadians we had met at Hwange. We drove over to say hi, and then returned to campsite for dinner and packing up. We left for Lusaka the next morning.
The border crossing between Zimbabwe and Zambia was one of the slowest we have been through. As Zambia had just had presidential elections we found the border very empty. Most people avoided travelling in fear of riots and demonstrations. It was still rather troublesome getting through the customs as there was document for the car that only Zambia and Zimbabwe require, and when we had checked in advance it should not have been required (we read later that only the Chirongo border crossing that we used sometimes requires it - so we chose the incorrect place to cross). So, not having some interpol clearance document (information that can easily be checked on the computer and that is actually the job of the interpol officer - problem is Zambian customs don't seem to have computers...) In addition the customs, for some unknown
reason, did not want to give a Temporary Import Permit and first wanted Claudio
to get a transit permit (perhaps because we were only going to stay a day or
two). Luckily Claudio has a Carnet and he used that one instead. By the time we got to the time we were
supposed to get the Carnet stamped, the guy in that customs office had gone out
for lunch. Right – so only one dude can stamp? When he is going out for lunch
or to the toilet, the queue waits? Of course. TIA – This is Africa.
Finally, we found out that the dual visa for Zambia and Zimbabwe that we had bought wasn't valid at this border crossing. So - first we had to go through some hassle of car inspection, then we had to buy a second visa for Zambia. Eventually Claudio also managed to settle the insurance papers and finalise the customs documents (whilst I was waiting in the car, resigned, as I thought this was far too slow). After all that we were on the way to Lusaka to look for a backpacker place there.
