The FallsLivingston, Zambia
The Victoria Falls constitutes one of the most spectacular natural wonders of the world. The local people call it "Mosi-oa-Tunya" -- the smoke that thunders. 1,708 meters wide, the Falls are the largest curtain of water on the planet. They drop between 90m and 107m into the Zambezi Gorge and an average of 550,000 cubic meters of water plummet over the edge every minute.
From the Zambian side, just a few kilometers from the city of Livingstone, Anand and I hiked around and enjoyed the view. Compared to Niagara, where I have been countless times while visiting family in Buffalo or on my way up to school, Victoria Falls is higher and longer but less full looking. Perhaps this is because the water levels are a bit lower in August. Still, there are heavy sections of the falls and you can see more when the water is low. There is a beauty to Niagara I did not find at Victoria; there is a violence at Victoria I did not find at Niagara.
Most people come to the falls to engage in extreme activities: abseiling, speed boating, microlyting, helicopter rides, rafting, bungee jumping, etc. Each activity costs about US $100, which was a problem for us. So we found instead an activity called the "walking safari" that simply took us further along the rock face and right up to the edge of the dropping Zambezi River. It came highly recommended by a small group of Peace Corps Namibia friends we had been hanging out with for a week or so.
At first it seemed like a waste of money - an hour of walking across rocks and low water, balancing awkwardly while holding hands and hiking in the heat. After a short break closer to the edge, taking some pictures and enjoying a beer and a chat with Eustice, our guide, we were handed a pair of towels. Stripping down, we followed Eustice into the water and swam diagonally out across a heavier section of river towards the edge.
About 15 meters from the drop, there is a section of rock that we climbed up onto. Between this rock and the actual drop in the falls there exists a small pool of water about 5 meters in diameter. Within this space there is little current, and the natural rock formation creates a wall about 1 meter from the edge of the 108 meter drop into the gorge. Simply put, if you go too far right or too far left you go over. While we, and a slew of astonished onlookers across the gorge on the Zimbabwe side, took turns taking pictures and video, Anand and I spent the next half hour leaping, flipping, and diving above Victoria Falls. Eustice held my ankles as I stretched my upper body and arms over the edge and looked down. The amazing part, once you overcome the fear of death, is the lack of people around. We quite literally had this enormous section of the falls to ourselves. I will definitely figure out how to post the video when I get home in a few days. It is one of the most amazing things I have ever done, and I am certain the activity would never be allowed in a place like the US!
That night we went out on the town with our guides, drinking Mosi and hanging out a local outdoor club. The Zambian women were beautiful, very dressed up and surprisingly aggressive! The Mosi beer label is a picture of the Falls; we enjoyed pointing out exactly where we had swam that day.
Side Note cool story: There was this guy staying in Zambia living out of his Land Rover in the parking lot. An Englishman, he had been traveling down through Africa for 8 years now. 8 years! In the late 1990's he crossed into Sudan from Chad. Soon after, Sudan was engaged in a war with every one of its bordering neighbors, and our friend found himself stranded and unable to exit the country except by airplane. For the next 6 months he drove back and forth along different borders attempting to flee, memorizing road blocks and dirt road routes. Finally, and miraculously, the guy found himself hiding under his truck in the aftermath of a battle in which a rebel group took control of the area. He negotiated his way out with them to the Ethiopian border.
Etosha and the Caprivi Strip
The Etosha experience, prior to our arrival in Zambia, was fun but slightly disappointing. I would suggest to all those interested in game parks that it is probably worth the money to hire an expensive tour on a big Land Cruiser for a day or two. Poor as we are, we drove the northern Namibian game park ourselves. What did we see...? Well, a lot actually, just no cats. Giraffes, zebra, springbok, wilderbeast, elephants, crazy looking birds, impala, eland. They all come very close to the roads or you go to designated watering hole areas, few and far between this time of year (a good thing), to find the animals. What struck me most within the park was how well the animals coexist with eachother. I guess I just never really considered that herds of Springbok would hang out with herds of Zebra, no problem. Out of the entire 10,000 km road trip through SA, Namibia, Zambia, Botswana, and back to Durban Anand did all the driving.
I took over for 20 minutes inside Etosha. So I'm still no good at stick, very embarrassing.
There are few people in Namibia, and virtually no women. For a while we sort of forgot they exist, like when you spend four years living in a University town and forget that small children also exist. At least when we headed north east through the narrow Caprivi Strip, on the southern border of Angola and heading towards Vic Falls, we found many more Namibians. For about 500 km the narrow strip is lined with villages and schools, people selling oranges and carved wood art. There's not much to see, but we flirted with the idea of crossing into southern Angola before just gunning it to the Zambian border on Anand's birthday.
The Long Road Home After Vic Falls we chose to return to S Africa by way of Botswana rather than Zimbabwe. First, petrol is cheaper in Botswana (that's about the only cheap thing there). Also, I didn't want to run the risk of getting robbed for petrol in Zim right now, where with the shortages it is not uncommon for border guards to take your reserve canisters and even syphon out your tank, even as they let you through! Plus, who wants to support the raving lunatic running the country, Mugabe with his disastrous policies!
Botswana is boring to drive through, although it is similar to driving through a game park up north. The scenery is dull and the roads are perfectly straight for miles - you start to feel like you're in Nebraska or something. Along the highways we saw many elefants and giraffe. Stopping for a cold drink, beer posters advertise contests to win cattle and bulls as prizes. To be fair, we skipped Okavanga Delta, Chobe game park, and even Gaborone, opting instead to only spend one night in Francistown, the second largest city. Francistown felt more like Rockville Pike than southern Africa, and accommodation was not cheap. It cost us nearly US $50 to lounge in a cheap motel and fall asleep to Jerry Maguire. At least the food in these countries was pretty good. I really enjoyed the local chicken and chips and mealie-pop dishes.
From the Zambian side, just a few kilometers from the city of Livingstone, Anand and I hiked around and enjoyed the view. Compared to Niagara, where I have been countless times while visiting family in Buffalo or on my way up to school, Victoria Falls is higher and longer but less full looking. Perhaps this is because the water levels are a bit lower in August. Still, there are heavy sections of the falls and you can see more when the water is low. There is a beauty to Niagara I did not find at Victoria; there is a violence at Victoria I did not find at Niagara.Most people come to the falls to engage in extreme activities: abseiling, speed boating, microlyting, helicopter rides, rafting, bungee jumping, etc. Each activity costs about US $100, which was a problem for us. So we found instead an activity called the "walking safari" that simply took us further along the rock face and right up to the edge of the dropping Zambezi River. It came highly recommended by a small group of Peace Corps Namibia friends we had been hanging out with for a week or so.
At first it seemed like a waste of money - an hour of walking across rocks and low water, balancing awkwardly while holding hands and hiking in the heat. After a short break closer to the edge, taking some pictures and enjoying a beer and a chat with Eustice, our guide, we were handed a pair of towels. Stripping down, we followed Eustice into the water and swam diagonally out across a heavier section of river towards the edge.
About 15 meters from the drop, there is a section of rock that we climbed up onto. Between this rock and the actual drop in the falls there exists a small pool of water about 5 meters in diameter. Within this space there is little current, and the natural rock formation creates a wall about 1 meter from the edge of the 108 meter drop into the gorge. Simply put, if you go too far right or too far left you go over. While we, and a slew of astonished onlookers across the gorge on the Zimbabwe side, took turns taking pictures and video, Anand and I spent the next half hour leaping, flipping, and diving above Victoria Falls. Eustice held my ankles as I stretched my upper body and arms over the edge and looked down. The amazing part, once you overcome the fear of death, is the lack of people around. We quite literally had this enormous section of the falls to ourselves. I will definitely figure out how to post the video when I get home in a few days. It is one of the most amazing things I have ever done, and I am certain the activity would never be allowed in a place like the US!
That night we went out on the town with our guides, drinking Mosi and hanging out a local outdoor club. The Zambian women were beautiful, very dressed up and surprisingly aggressive! The Mosi beer label is a picture of the Falls; we enjoyed pointing out exactly where we had swam that day.
Side Note cool story: There was this guy staying in Zambia living out of his Land Rover in the parking lot. An Englishman, he had been traveling down through Africa for 8 years now. 8 years! In the late 1990's he crossed into Sudan from Chad. Soon after, Sudan was engaged in a war with every one of its bordering neighbors, and our friend found himself stranded and unable to exit the country except by airplane. For the next 6 months he drove back and forth along different borders attempting to flee, memorizing road blocks and dirt road routes. Finally, and miraculously, the guy found himself hiding under his truck in the aftermath of a battle in which a rebel group took control of the area. He negotiated his way out with them to the Ethiopian border.
Etosha and the Caprivi StripThe Etosha experience, prior to our arrival in Zambia, was fun but slightly disappointing. I would suggest to all those interested in game parks that it is probably worth the money to hire an expensive tour on a big Land Cruiser for a day or two. Poor as we are, we drove the northern Namibian game park ourselves. What did we see...? Well, a lot actually, just no cats. Giraffes, zebra, springbok, wilderbeast, elephants, crazy looking birds, impala, eland. They all come very close to the roads or you go to designated watering hole areas, few and far between this time of year (a good thing), to find the animals. What struck me most within the park was how well the animals coexist with eachother. I guess I just never really considered that herds of Springbok would hang out with herds of Zebra, no problem. Out of the entire 10,000 km road trip through SA, Namibia, Zambia, Botswana, and back to Durban Anand did all the driving.
I took over for 20 minutes inside Etosha. So I'm still no good at stick, very embarrassing.There are few people in Namibia, and virtually no women. For a while we sort of forgot they exist, like when you spend four years living in a University town and forget that small children also exist. At least when we headed north east through the narrow Caprivi Strip, on the southern border of Angola and heading towards Vic Falls, we found many more Namibians. For about 500 km the narrow strip is lined with villages and schools, people selling oranges and carved wood art. There's not much to see, but we flirted with the idea of crossing into southern Angola before just gunning it to the Zambian border on Anand's birthday.
The Long Road Home After Vic Falls we chose to return to S Africa by way of Botswana rather than Zimbabwe. First, petrol is cheaper in Botswana (that's about the only cheap thing there). Also, I didn't want to run the risk of getting robbed for petrol in Zim right now, where with the shortages it is not uncommon for border guards to take your reserve canisters and even syphon out your tank, even as they let you through! Plus, who wants to support the raving lunatic running the country, Mugabe with his disastrous policies!Botswana is boring to drive through, although it is similar to driving through a game park up north. The scenery is dull and the roads are perfectly straight for miles - you start to feel like you're in Nebraska or something. Along the highways we saw many elefants and giraffe. Stopping for a cold drink, beer posters advertise contests to win cattle and bulls as prizes. To be fair, we skipped Okavanga Delta, Chobe game park, and even Gaborone, opting instead to only spend one night in Francistown, the second largest city. Francistown felt more like Rockville Pike than southern Africa, and accommodation was not cheap. It cost us nearly US $50 to lounge in a cheap motel and fall asleep to Jerry Maguire. At least the food in these countries was pretty good. I really enjoyed the local chicken and chips and mealie-pop dishes.
Pretoria, the administrative capital, was very administrative. It was pretty, and is a cool college town, but downtown there is nothing but government buildings. At the hostel, Anand accidentally sat on a cat that had blended in with the black bean bag. That was a good laugh after the screeching stopped.Johannesburg is an interesting place. Tourists are scared of it for its reputation of muggings and violence, and South Africans seem to love it as a fast paced, high energy capital with bustling business and shopping opportunities. We stayed at a former Mafioso-type guy's house who was killed a few years back. Some Swiss dude bought his mansion and converted it into a hostel, perched above an area called Observatory that looks over the city. It was cool, felt like Sopranos, but some strange guests. The problem with Jo'berg is that it is expensive like Cape Town, but not so pretty. If you don't want to spend money and don't have people to see, you might leave fairly quickly. We spent about 3 hours at the Apartheid Museum - hands down the best museum I have ever visited in all my travels - and then made straight for sweet, sweet home (Durban).
Going Out with a BangAt 6am this morning Nupe (American med student), Janice (local friend) and I strolled out of Durban's Suncoast Casino into the uncomfortable early morning light after a long night of laughing, drinking, and dancing. We wore wide smiles, each about $200 Rand richer after the blackjack and roulette tables. The night began with a stand-up comedy show at the Playhouse Theatre downtown, and was followed by a crazy, late night at the bars. The comedy show was kinda weak, but it was still interesting to see S African humor, like how they can poke fun at Apartheid era subjects (making fun of the "Europeans Only" and "non-Europeans Only" lines at Heathrow), or joke about how a suicide bomber could never successfully strike in S Africa because the public transport system is non-existent and the guy would get robbed of his backpack and shoes before he could carry anything into a public place anyhow. One Indian Muslim comedian joked that he is so nervous now about terrorism that he often gets suspicious just looking in the mirror!
Late night Anand was exhausted, but I stayed out with the others and enjoyed flaming lamborghinies, getting shot down by married women at the bar, and dancing to one of the hottest DJ's in the area. South Africans know how to party. Durban is so cool just because it has everything; the range of bar or club nightlife choices, the markets, the businesses, the restaurants, the cultural mix (largely Indian), the famous surfer beaches, etc. I'd live here over Cape Town or Jo'berg any day.Tomorrow I begin my five-flight journey home via Jo'berg, Zurich, London, and Reykjavik. I'll frantically purchase the first fantasy football magazine I can find and begin the readjustment process to life in the Washington, DC area. Some of you will have to catch me up on the new slang, new music, the insanity in New Orleans, etc. 6 months is finally over. Monday is the first day of the rest of my life.
To those of you who have kept up with my stories, thank you for reading. I hope the blog has kept you sufficiently entertained at work. Give me a call once I'm back, and if I'm not too broke we'll hang out. Cheers.
