Zambia

Once again we had heard rumours about the inefficiencies of the border officials that we were about to deal with, and once again we had no problems. They briefly tried to tell us that the visa waiver form had not arrived from the campsite we were due to stay at, but after trawling through various files it turned out to be lying on their desk after all.

We made the short drive to Chipata where we stocked up in the surprisingly expensive supermarket before heading for South Luangwa Park where we were due to see my mum.

The road showed evidence of the recent rains, with various stages gouged out by the water and when it started raining again it resembled a series of streams rather than the main road into Zambias busiest park. At one point, where they were having to rebuild a washed away culvert, we could see that the floodwaters had reached a few metres higher than the usual level.

We visited the campsite first, negotiating the various mud patches and puddles with care and soon decided that our plan of spending the evenings at my mums lodge was unworkable, as we would have to drive the track back to our camp in the dark. When we got to the track to her lodge we found the puddles were even deeper and at one point, when I chose the wrong side of a puddle to cross, the water flowed over the top of the bonnet.

We arrived to find my mum was out on a game drive, so we settled into the lodge as the staff handed us drinks while they tried to sort out a room for us. They ended up fitting us into one of their staff rooms as the mechanic was away. It was a lovely, one room thatched bungalow with a bathroom outside at the back.

We quickly and easily settled into the luxury lodge experience, spending our days in the park and our evenings eating and drinking and talking far too much. Our room was certainly the most comfortable that we had stayed in for the whole trip, and the novelty of showering outside in a thunderstorm will never wear off.

The highlight of our visits to the park was a pair of lions we saw lying on the road. They were lazing in the shade, occasionally moving to get more comfortable but after we had watched them for 15 minutes the male got up and went over to sniff the female. She got to her feet and turned away from him, which he took as an invitation. He climbed on, thrust and snarled for 30 seconds before getting off and roaring in delight at his performance. In the meantime, she rolled onto her back and curled up in a state of post-coital bliss.

There was obviously something in the water as we also spotted a pair of mating warthogs, apparently a rare sight.

Despite the rains the game viewing was amazing.

    Ominous rain clouds

The wet mud made it easy to spot tracks which led us to this lioness sunning herself by the road.

We left my mum to her holiday after three days and continued our journey heading for Livingstone as our plans were once again changed by the weather as the Lower Zambezi Park was closed. We stopped off in Chipata and near Lusaka en route and eventually found a campsite in Livingstone after visiting a few backpacker hostels and deciding they were too full of gap year students.

    Our preferred method of cooking

Our visit to Livingstone revolved around the Victoria Falls. We walked around the cliffs, getting soaked by spray in the process, and took a microlight flight over the top. We also walked onto the bridge between Zambia and Zimbabwe just downstream from the falls to watch the bungee jumpers, deciding in the process that it looked like a very silly idea.

       Bill

        Claire

We spent four nights in Livingstone before heading for the border and Botswana. The two countries share a border on a single point in the middle of the Zambezi so after getting stamped out we bought a ticket and tried to board the ferry. Unfortunately no one had mentioned the negligible tax that the local council charge for each car and we had changed all our left over Zambian kwacha into Botswanan pula. It took some persuasion to get the official to accept the pula but at last we had all the relevant paperwork and we could leave.