Week 7 - Zambia, Botswana

Sunday, January 6, 2019

We set off again. Our time in Malawi was already over and another border crossing was on the agenda. It's noticeable that the landscape in Malawi is very dominated by agriculture. Maize in particular is planted a lot. It's incredibly green. Many people work in the fields. They're planting or plowing. Fish is dried and sold by the roadside. The border crossing into Zambia in the early afternoon went without any problems and extended waiting time.

Right after the border, it's visible that Zambia is more prosperous than Malawi. Brick houses with corrugated iron roofs can now be seen.

We arrived at our camp named Croc Valley in Luangwa National Park at 6:30 pm. The park is located on the Luangwa River in eastern Zambia and is the southernmost of three national parks in this region. South Luangwa was established as a game reserve in 1938, declared a national park in 1972, and today covers over 9,000 square kilometers. Animals like giraffes, buffaloes, and elephants are abundant. In addition, the Luangwa River is home to many hippos and crocodiles.

And it's these hippos that almost made it a sleepless night for me. Our camp was right on the riverbank. There were no barriers, as it seems that the hippos love to come out of the river at night and eat the green grass on the campsite. A camp employee proudly said that he would buy us a beer if we didn't see any hippos passing by our tent that night. It's not particularly dangerous if you don't get in the way of the hippos. Hippos are the animals that kill the second most humans annually, after mosquitos! For those who know Cédric, you can probably guess where we set up our tent... Right! Right on the riverbank. I was probably too tired to argue with him. You could hear the hippos roaring the whole time, and occasionally a head would pop out of the water in the darkness. So, we went to sleep. At midnight, it started raining heavily. And with the rain, my imagination started running wild. All sorts of scenarios went through my head. What if a hippo comes out of the river, gets caught in our tent's guyline, and panics to run back into the river? What if the heavy rain causes the riverbank to collapse and we plunge into the rushing river with our tent? All my thoughts ended with a certain death by drowning wrapped in our tent in the brown Luangwa River. And so, I spent the rest of the night sleeping with my pocket knife in hand. Convinced that I could cut through the tent wall to save us :-)

Note from C. Spring: Slept perfectly, deeply, and soundly!

Monday, January 7, 2019

I woke up with my pocket knife in hand. This means that nothing happened. Without taking down the tents, we set off in the 4x4 vehicles for our game drive in Luangwa National Park. Unfortunately, we didn't see any lions or leopards. But we saw a crocodile lying right next to the road, which then glided into the water and swam away, and of course many impalas and s4=iraffes. Back at the camp, we had to rescue our lunch from the very cheeky baboons. Eating was only possible in the shelter. In the afternoon, our journey continued.

Tuesday, January 8, 2019

Another day of driving awaited us. Our destination was Lusaka, the capital of Zambia. Many billboards in Zambia are written in Chinese. We made a stop at a shopping center. When it was already dark, we arrived at the campsite. Unfortunately, it was pouring rain. It was impossible to set up our tent on the green. Everything was already full of mud. Almost everyone took a room. So, we had to set up our tent in a shelter. But we had to clean it first. Broken beer bottles and a stench that accompanied us the whole night. The washing facilities were covered in flies, moths, and mosquitoes. I can't even say if any hot water would have come out of the tap. I wanted to spend as little time as possible there, and probably we've just gotten too used to showering with cold water. That was probably the low point of our camping days so far.

Wednesday, January 9, 2019

Breakfast at 5:00 am. Departure at 6:00 am. Destination: Livingstone. 475 kilometers. Arrival around 2:00 pm. It's amazing how much the weather can make a difference. We arrived at the beautiful campsite in Livingstone in brilliant sunshine. After lunch, there was still almost a whole afternoon to swim in the two pools and enjoy the view of the Zambezi River from the bar. We had a delicious dinner of fish with potatoes, and the night remained dry. We have reconciled ourselves with the camping life again.

Thursday, January 10, 2019

Our destination today was Kasane, a town near Chobe National Park. We left again at 6:00 am and crossed the border to Botswana at the Kazangula Ferry at 9:00 am. We had to load our truck onto a ferry for a few minutes. In a few months, a bridge is set to open. The Chinese are currently in the middle of construction. Botswana is a landlocked country with borders to South Africa, Namibia, Zambia, and Zimbabwe. The border crossing here also went very smoothly. The only exceptional thing was that we had to disinfect all our shoes. This precaution was introduced due to the outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease. Shortly after the border, our cook had to buy something in a grocery store. Especially in the grocery stores, you can see that we are in a different country. The shelves are unusually empty. Malinga, our cook, couldn't find everything he needed in the first and second grocery stores. And some of us now have a problem. You can't buy drinking water in either store. The shelves are completely empty. Fortunately, we still had two 5-liter bottles.

At the campsite, we prepared ourselves for the night in the park. We packed our day backpack and were picked up at 3:00 pm with 4x4 vehicles. On our game drive to our bush camp in Chobe National Park, we saw many elephants, hippos, giraffes, and various birds. In the camp in the middle of the wilderness, we had dinner by the campfire. A few meters behind our tents, there were several elephants. And if you shone a flashlight into the darkness, you could see many gleaming pairs of eyes. After the safety information (don't go to the toilet alone at night, don't leave the camp), we went to sleep.

Friday, January 11, 2019

We got up before sunrise. The night was peaceful. With fried eggs and toast, we had a great view of a giraffe standing just a few meters in front of us. With the sunrise, we set off on another game drive. We saw many lion tracks. Thanks to the good knowledge of our guide, Piqué, we found the lion family under a tree. Shortly before noon, we returned to the camp, where we quickly packed everything to set off for Zimbabwe. We wanted to arrive in Victoria Falls in the early afternoon. Another border crossing without any problems. Another visa adorns a page in our passport. The empty pages are gradually running out.