Siavonga chilling

Simple ingredients for a relaxing weekend – good friends, gin and tonics, tasty food, warm weather, silly games, smiles, laughter, and a bit more to drink. Happy days!

Itezhi Tezhi

A great sounding name for a town but initially the discussion went something like this . . . So what’s there to do in Itezhi Tezhi? Well, not entirely sure, it has a dam and a lake, and . . . . How do we get there? Good question, better find out . . . And what do we do when we get there? Relax . . . ok I am convinced, let’s it the road. 

Along came another long weekend in Zambia and not being sure what to we chose to explore somewhere different and headed to Itezhi Tezhi, which has an almost mythical name in my book. The journey there was fun, the nice smooth tarmac disappeared far too soon and then we felt the bumps of basically a dirt track. Our 4x4 was fine though other vehicles were getting stuck even now in the dry season, so come October and the rains this route will surely become impassable. After using a pontoon to cross the Kafue river we then hit sand, which was much faster and more fun to drive on. 

And then came the relaxation as we pitched our tent in a simple but friendly and cosy campsite, got the braii started and enjoyed a beer watching the sunset over the lake. The rest of the weekend did not involve too much more effort – a lazy morning swim in the pool followed by a trip in a speedboat to explore the lake. We spotted a few animals along the way (hippos, crocs and antelopes) though the fun came from the fresh air by being on the water and the boat bouncing along (occasionally hitting the odd hidden tree stump which was slightly worrying). After all the training, the hotels and the dull food it was very good to get away.

  

 

Bat-astic

Next it was time for more wildlife watching but of a very different kind – millions of bats! Five of us (Mike and I plus three good Italian friends – Roberto, Lucia and Sue) travelled to Kasanka National Park (http://www.kasanka.com/) to witness the migration of fruit bats which takes place in November and December every year. It was without doubt a spectacular sight as early one morning (something like 5am) and a couple of times at sunset the sky was filled with approximately 5 or 6 million fruit bats; though we were not sure who was counting them. The screeching of the bats echoed around us and for the sunrise viewing we climbed up a 15metre high hide which meant that the bats were within touching distance flying over our heads. It was all quite an amazing, surreal experience.

Luxury and up close with the wildlife in the Lower Zambezi

Hooray, another visitor from the UK! Sadly Mike arrived with a bit of a bump as British Airways managed to lose his luggage (more on that later) but he was remarkably philosophical and in a short time he was kitted out with a new wardrobe – a mix of my clothes and a visit to a few ‘green’ (second hand) shops in Maz.

First stop on Mike’s fast and furious two week holiday was the Lower Zambezi national park and Stefan very kindly lent us his 4x4 which made getting to the park so much easier. Kanyemba lodge (http://www.kanyemba.com/) had been talked up by various friends who had already stayed there and we were not to be disappointed – amazing good, great view over the river, lovely pool, luxury rooms and hippos croaking at night. We managed to squeeze in a couple of sunset cruises, a canoe safari and a walking safari on Kanyemba Island. All were fun, in different ways, though I enjoyed the canoeing the most mainly because of how close it allowed us to get to the elephants, hippos and crocodiles and observe them. My favourite moment, which we were lucky to see a couple of times, was watching tens of elephants lumber into the river, swim across almost in formation and then climb up the bank on the other side; simply wonderful.

Kafue National Park

As Zambia prepared to celebrate its 47th year of independence on 24th October, and whilst flags of green, red, black and orange were being put up on Government buildings, a few of us escaped our towns and cities to take advantage of the long weekend. For a change we did not travel too far, only three hours westwards from Lusaka to Kafue National Park, which as an understatement is huge, roughly being the same size as Wales. For this reason we chose a campsite not far from the main road rather than venturing too deep inside the park.

This meant that maybe it was not the best location for wildlife spotting, though from our tents we could still look down on the Kafue River and see hippos, antelopes wandered freely around the campsite and baboons were ready to pounce on any food scraps as soon as our backs were turned. On the couple of wildlife drives we scanned the bush for any sign of movement, occasionally spotting elephants, zebras and more different types of antelopes. Any cats were nowhere to be seen so my own personal search for a leopard goes on. Otherwise, it was a case of eating, drinking and relaxing around the camp fire whilst insects buzzed, frogs croaked and hippos grunted around us.

Lazying around in Siavonga

After a busy week it felt good to escape Maz and do very little over the weekend. We barely moved from a friend’s house in Siavonga, enjoying the warm weather and her garden that has a lovely view looking out over Lake Kariba. There was plenty of cooking, eating, drinking, reading, watching movies and playing silly but amusing board games; all very relaxing. On the way home we became tourists briefly by visiting an impressive Baobab tree. It is called the Ngombe Illede which translates from Tonga as 'the cow that is lying down'. Despite falling down the tree continued to grow, hence its name, though with all its branches it looked more like a huge stag to me. The tree has a long history of acting as a trading centre for items like beads, clay pots, copper, ivory and salt, as well as supposedly slaves.

Smelling and slurping coffee

There are some weeks that I make endless lists of things to do and on one of them I have resolved to ensure that by the time I leave Mazabuka I have ticked off all of the local ‘attractions’. This includes visiting the Zambia Sugar factory, seeing Nakambala Leopards play a premiership football game in Maz, taking the local train at least one stop along the railway line and visiting the local coffee farm. So today 13 of us headed off to Munali coffee (www.munalicoffee.com – a farm around 30mins from Mazabuka. For a while I thought that there had been no communication about us coming (all my responsibility) but then a safari vehicle appeared and off we went around the coffee estate to see the growing, washing, fermenting and drying of the beans. We went into the factory and then did lots of loud slurping with our coffee tasting, trying to work out which flavour of bean – from cheap to expensive – we preferred. There is also a flour mill on the farm as they grow wheat, so we went around the mill, seeing some large object shaking away which looked like a 3 double wardrobes fitted together but turned out to be a giant sieve for the flour. We left with some goodies – coffee at factory prices and some freshly baked bread for free.

And here are the waterfalls

Starting from the left, moving clockwise, first up is Chishimba Falls near to Kasama, then the view from the top of Kalambo Falls, followed by Kundalila Falls near Serenje and lastly back to the full height of Kalambo Falls.

Pics from the warm North

It's beautiful up North

Zambia has numerous public holidays and this year with Heroes Day and Unit Day falling during the week it was a case of what shall we do. We settled for northern Zambia and lots of waterfalls. By ‘we’ I mean 12 of us, in 3 cars, covering 6 nationalities. Our final destination was Lake Tanganyika, some 800 miles from Mazabuka. Along the way we stopped at Multinondo Wilderness – one of my first trips around Zambia last year – and being in the middle of winter it was pretty chilly at night and even colder swimming in the streams close to our campsite. After a few days we continued north, trying to avoid potholes the width of the road and fairly deep too, and stayed in the town of Kasama. Here we visited some local rock art and walked around Chishimba Falls. During the trip they were probably my favourite falls as you get 3 waterfalls on one stretch of river and they got more impressive as we moved from the first to the last.

Next up was Lake Tanganyika – the second largest freshwater lake in the world and the second deepest – which shares its shores with Burundi, DRC, Tanzania and Zambia. At the Zambia port (!) of Mpulungu we packed almost all our camping belongings (there was plenty of them) onto a creaking wooden boat and set off for Isanga Bay (http://www.isangabay.com); along the during the journey the crew used buckets to remove water from the leaking hull. The reward was a picture perfect sandy beach and the promise of a relaxing time. After the chill of Multinondo to have to sprint across the sand because it was so hot was a pleasure. We spent an enjoyable few days playing volleyball and frisbee, kayaking, swimming and snorkelling. We walked to our second waterfall, Kalambo Falls, the second highest in Africa with a drop of 235 metres; impressively tall, narrow and a spectacular, scary view peering over the edge.

It was tough to leave our beach and there were a few debates about whether we really had to leave so soon. But we did and we retraced our steps along the same route, the cold weather returned which meant bathing at Kapishya hot springs after dark was a real delight. We toured through the grounds of the Shiwa Ng'andu estate (http://www.shiwangandu.com/) briefly glimpsing the very English country house built by Stewart Gore-Browne. The last stop was in Serenje, a fairly non-descript town with the attractive Kundalila waterfalls close-by. And that was the end of another great trip, well almost, as first we had to survive a scary taxi ride from Lusaka back to Mazabuka where once it started getting dark we discovered that the car had virtually no lights. We ditched the taxi as soon as we could and were rescued by a kind friend from Maz; all part of the adventure.

Chobe

Chobe was Chobe. As I had been there before little was new to me so it was more wonderful wildlife spotting by boat and safari vehicle, which is a great contrast. First by boat, and as the afternoon sun began to cool, we watched more and more elephants heading down to the water’s edge for drinking and cooling off. There were hippos everywhere, most barely visible with eyes and nose hovering just above the water, though a few did display parts of their huge bodies now and again including the massive, open wide yawn. Slightly further away on land we could see plenty of giraffe and different types of antelope. The following day we got very lucky as within minutes of entering the park by car our guide spotted a couple of lionesses hunting. We observed them for a while before there was an onslaught of tens of other safari vehicles trying to get in on the action. Not too far away we came across the lion cubs that the mothers had left behind, playing happily with each other, and therefore somewhat exposed if any larger prey came along. So for a one night trip across to the border to Botswaa these were pretty good highlights for me.

More from the Falls

Given how much we managed to do in Livingstone and the fun we had, here are few more photos including the delicious selection of desserts from high tea at the Royal Livingstone.

Treats and cruising in Livingstone

To put it mildly our time in Livingstone was busy and anything that we did I would happily do again, and hopefully Mum, Dad and Tom would say the same. It all kicked off with Mum’s birthday on 16th which was celebrated in style with all of us being soaked by the spray from Victoria Falls as we crossed the Knife Edge Bridge; fun though the pictures in wet clothes may not be too flattering! We relaxed, got fat and bloated enjoying high tea at the Royal Livingstone. For the record Dad beat us all in eating the highest number of savouries and sweets. We continued the eating by going on the Lady Livingstone boat for a cruise along the Zambezi river, which from the top deck involved minimal effort with tasty cocktails, a few courses of canapés, watching the sun go down in one direction and then turning around to see a full moon rise over the Falls. We also spotted a few animals - crocodiles and hippos. Despite a few reservations Mum (with Dad and I too) was persuaded that she should climb on board a helicopter for an aerial tour of the Falls, which was spectacular. Tom took a different flying route and went on a microlight, flying lower and closer to the water.

More on magical South Luangwa

And here are a few of those special animals

Out in the fields

“Just turn right, there” Teddy said as he directed the car to head into a grassy, potentially swampy, field with no apparent path in view. Today Marco took us to meet a sweet, charming old lady called Eusabia (70+ which is pretty remarkable in Zambia) who had been his cleaner, cook and surrogate mother/grandmother when he had spent two years living in a rural community called Chikuni; a village around 90 minutes south of Mazabuka. She is also Teddy’s mother-in-law and the guard at Marco’s home. The cluster of four homes (1-2 room buildings) and other constructions to keep goats, pigs and chickens were in the middle of nowhere, and surrounded by fields of maize. An accurate reflection of rural life in Zambia, though the family with their crops and animals are probably in a better situation than many others. Our visit was being honoured by the slaughtering of one of the family’s goats for lunch. Before the meal Teddy proudly showed us some the crops that he had planted, whilst Marco and Lucia (switching on their work, agriculture brains) gave him marks out of ten for his efforts. The goat was served alongside nshima, onions, relish and green vegetables; simple but tasty. In return we handed over a few provisions with promises of further support if asked for. Despite some of the frustrations of working here, the welcome, warmth and friendship offered by the people that I meet makes me forget those troubles.

Weekends at the Lake

Zambia is landlocked but it does have one very large area of water, so for two weekends in succession we headed to different parts of Lake Kariba; first Siavonga and then to a nice lodge near to Sinazongwe. Needless to say life was tough as we enjoyed the warmer temperature, ate far too well with numerous braiis with great meat, pasta and salads, played games of volleyball and then when we became bored with that took down the net and played beach football, and drunk and danced into the early hours. There was no swimming due to the dangers of crocodiles but even so it felt good to be close to water.