Greetings at the beginning of another week in Zambia. We are officially at the halfway point of our stay here and will return to West Fargo in exactly one month. Yay for home!
This weekend, Leah and I traveled to the town of Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe. We are going to split blogging duties about the weekend. I’ll tackle the first half.
Crossing the border between Zambia and Zimbabwe is a bit of an interesting process. In many ways, it is much easier than the US/Canada border. No one asks you questions or searches your vehicle. On the other hand, though, the need for buying visas makes the lines long and slow. We probably waited at the border for over an hour just to get 15 people across. That’s nothing compared to the line of semi trucks that stretch a mile on either side of the border crossing. We were told these trucks often wait in line for 3-4 days to cross the border.
In Zimbabwe, we stayed at a lovely place called Lokothula Lodges. The spacious lodges were almost luxurious compared to our accommodations at Mushili Way. Having got in later than expected, we rushed off to the Boma for supper. The Boma, which means “eating place” is a buffet style restaurant featuring traditional African food and entertainment. At various points in the evening, we played African drums, visited a witchdoctor, and wore African robes. Some of the food I sampled included lamb, chicken, pork, warthog, ostrich, guinea fowl, and kudu (a type of antelope). The warthog was absolutely wonderful! Leah and I both were brave and tried to the Mopani worms. We even have the certificate to prove it! Truth be told, they weren’t bad at all.
The next morning, our group got up before dawn to participate in a lion walk. African Encounter, the parent organization of African Impact, also runs a program called ALERT/Lion Encounter which is a breeding and rehabilitation program for the African lion. The program involves raising cubs from a young age, acclimating them to human contact, and eventually relocating them to various game reserves where they can breed and then their cubs will be completely wild having never been raised by humans. In doing the lion walk, we not only contribute financially to the organization, but also help them by giving the lions more human contact. The organization does have a website if you want more info. Google ALERT and Lion Encounter and you should find it!
After a brief education session where I learned all that, we began the lion walk. I thought it would be a pretty fun experience, but I was absolutely blown away at how awesome it was. Leah and I got to frequently stroke the lion and pose for pictures with it. We were accompanied by a brother and sister that were 18 months old; the brother, however, was a bit temperamental and didn’t want to be touched so we stuck to the female. The staff was incredibly enthusiastic and took loads of photos of each person with the lions. It was a once-in-a-lifetime experience that won’t soon be forgotten.
Though very tired, Leah and I went with some friends to the Zimbabwe side of Victoria Falls after the lion walk. There is quite a debate over whether the Zim or Zam side of the falls is the best. After seeing both, I can’t quite decide. If someone wanted to know which one view to see, I would recommend Zimbabwe because it offers a crisper more complete view of the massive Victoria Falls, although the view is not necessarily “better” but different. In Zim, you can literally walk to the edge of the gorge and look over, but be careful because they have no guard rails. It’s an awesome experience to walk through this tropical rainforest nestled in the midst of the dry African bush while getting soaked by the mist of Victoria Falls. Wow!
Leah will go through the rest of the weekend’s highlights, but I just wanted to make a quick note about the political situation in Zimbabwe.
As purely a tourist town, Victoria Falls is quite isolated from everything. We did, though, see political posters for the MDC and Morgan Tsvangarai. Mugabe’s official presidential photo is displayed in most buildings, though. The biggest evidence of a crisis was the lack of tourists in Vic Falls. The markets, lodges, and everything else is taking a big financial hit because of the news out of Harare and other areas of Zim. It was shocking to actually see the 5 billion dollar Zimbabwe note that is worth $1USD at best. However, the evidence of Mugabe’s good side was also apparent. The city was considerably cleaner and more modernized than Livingstone. The streets seemed much safer, even in the midst of a crisis. If anyone asked me if they should visit Livingstone or Victoria Falls (the town), I would definitely recommend the Zimbabwe city. I just hope and pray that the people can return to some sense of normalcy. They are a kind, welcoming, and friendly group of people and deserve a good leader. With the news breaking today about upcoming talks between Mugabe and Tsvangarai, let’s hope things get better soon.
More to come about Zim from Leah and more to come from me about my experiences in Livingstone.
Until then,
Zac
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