Anette's Adventure: Safaris, Victoria Falls and up close with baboons

It was so good to be back on the road again after staying put in Nkhata-Bay, Malawi for so long. I hopped on the bus to Lilongwe and managed to hitch a ride the next day with the Mufasa lodge owner all the way to Chipata on the Zambian side of the border. It is so easy to travel by your own transportation compared to all the mini buses and shared taxis one ends up taking.

My plan was to go to South Luangwa National Park in Zambia so I got a minibus from Chipata to the park after a long ordeal of hassling the price. By this time I am so not into negotiating prices any more...just give me the real deal man.... but no way... I have to almost have a fight with them to get my moneys worth. Anyways, I ended up paying an ok price. But to get to this park was just a long journey. It is a 130km stretch on a small bumpy dirt road and I thought it would take some time but not 5h! How can one even drive so slow that it takes 5h to do 130km?? Well... on a road like this yeah it is almost faster to bike. I got to the park or Mwufe village in the dark and managed to bumped into the lodge owners of Flatdogs, where I planned to go. However, the nicely informed me that they are not open YET. Oh shit, I thought, I did 5h of bumpy soar bum road for nothing? I have to go back? in the dark? Well.. this is backpacking... you just have to deal with it..things change. But the owners, two pretty young guys, informed me that I can always go to Croc Valley lodge, they are open all year around...but maybe there is nobody else there since it is the low season. Good luck, sionara! (they didn't even give me a ride...) Luckily, a sweet local women took me to a taxi driver. I was not allowed to walk the 3 km as animals can attack you, besides it was pitch black dark anyways. So I got to Croc Valley and it was completely dark... power cut... and I definitely thought I would be the only one there. But then as I walk to reception, tadaaa, the power came back on lighting up this beautiful place and there was four guys sitting at the bar chatting away. Ah thank god for other backpackers, I thought... now this is way better :)

The five of us ended up having a great time at South Luangwa and we were a good mix, there was one Dane, one Ozzie, one Malaysian, one Brit, and one Finn. A pretty good mix and we were all world travelers :) so we ended up having a good time. We went both on a morning and evening safari. This park is huge about 9000 km2 and even though it was the low season, meaning wet season with high vegetation, we managed to see elephants, giraffes, hippos, wilderbeast, crocodiles, zebras, water hog, so many different birds, impalas, pukus, and then finally at the night drive we saw a young female lion! It was pitch black dark and suddenly the cat came out of no where from the bush right besides up, ran onto the road in front and then walked a bit a head before going off into the bush again... Wow, I got so scared! It is dark, and we are in an open safari truck, and then there is a lion just coming out of the bush right next to us. Ah, I have so much respect for nature and the animals that wiiiieee I leave them alone. Like the elephants. They are huuuuuge and if they get annoyed they can just lift their trunk and hit you... running attack! Well, I don't think that really happens a lot but still, respect man!

I had a great time at Croc Valley http://www.crocvalley.com and I could of easily stayed there for a week. It is a beautiful place, very calm and right at the river where hippos and elephants cross. Fortunately, it was high water in the river so no hippos came to swim in the pool as they usually do. Instead we had a good time there instead.

After a couple of days we all where heading different directions. Me and the Brit planned to go to south to Livingstone and the Ozzie and the Malay headed for Malawi. The Dane was lucky enough to have his own bike and went off to Malawi and Tanzania. After a last good meal we said our bye's and me and the Brit tried our luck hitching south to Lusaka. But it was not so much of a luck since no one picked us up so we decided to stay a night in Chipata and then take the 5am morning bus, which we did take the next morning and we even managed to get another bus straight to Livingstone when we got to Lusaka. So we managed to travel almost all of the country in one day, Chipata to Livingstone in 12h, not bad.

Livingstone is where Victoria falls is on the Zambian side.
Vic falls is also the seventh world wonder and I can see why! It is absolutely stunning, especially now in the wet season when million of liter of water runs through the falls. Lots of
power right there! The Zambian side of the falls are beautiful and you are really close to the falls. It is not just one fall but something like 1km of falls on one stretch of cliffs. We were so close to the falls that the mist that comes out of it just pours down like rain. It was fantastic! Just like a shower really. And the sun was shining so beautiful sunny shower :)

I really had a good day there even though I got attacked by a baboon! I stupidly had two bananas in my bag, which of course the baboons can smell right away. And this big male baboon noticed this and when passing me on the trail path he just decided to grab on to my bag and pull it towards him. I

freaked, turned around to walk away but I got pulled back by this huge creature and there was not really much I could do. Luckily there were some guys walking by and I managed to get a hold of one of them and just grabbed on to him and screamed. I think I took him by surprise but he acted fast, shouted to the baboon and managed to pull me away. I am not sure if he hit it or not... but it let go of my bag! You can imagen how fast I ate those bananas after that! Waaaaaa.... I was shaken... these baboons are huge! If it could stand straight up it would be even taller than me... Then I also heard afterwards that they can easily bite through your arm and basically do whatever with you as humans have no chance. So that was my up closer with an African baboon.

I also managed to get really up close to a White Rhino the next day when I went on a walking safari in Mosi-ou-tuna nation park at Victoria Falls. This was also quite an experience and a but different than sitting in a safari truck. They do not have any cats in this park but there were dangerous animals like phaetons and the odd charging water buffalo. Luckily, no animals charged us and we did not step on any snakes. It was a pretty calm walking safari but I really like the hiking part and being on the same level as the animals. We saw beautiful giraffe with a small baby and I have to say that the giraffes are my favourite animal. If I could, I would have one in the back yard... they are so graceful and seem to not give a shit.. hahaha.. I like them!

Safari and water falls, that was mainly my taste of Zambia. I had only ten days there but I truly enjoyed it. Lusaka, the capital is not my favourite but I would definitely go back to South Luangwa national park and of course take a shower at Vic Falls again!