May Holiday - Botswana, Zambia, Zimbabwe

During the May holiday, a group of us volunteers backpacked to Botswana, Zambia, and Zimbabwe, all countries east of Namibia. We strapped on giant heavy backpacks and actually walked across each of the borders, finding rides in minibuses and bakkies in between. It’s quite an experience to go through customs to exit one country, then walk a dusty road or path until you get to the next country…a little bit heart-racing, especially to Zimbabwe! It does not feel at all legitimate.

BOTSWANA

Our first stop was Botswana. Botswana has been ranked the least corrupt country in Africa and 74% of its adults are literate (hello Detroit!), but it also has one of the highest rates of HIV/AIDS, which has led to a life expectancy of only 33 years! How HORRIFYING.

Once you cross the border from Namibia to Botswana, it is actually a wildlife reserve, so it was a bit frightening to walk through it (which is not really advised) and imagine what wildlife could hop out at any moment, especially as we walked past the giant mounds of elephant poop. We were completely overloaded with stuff, trudging uphill to hitchhike a ride, and of course it started to thunder and rain. By the time we got to the hike point and found a ride it was dark, so we spent a freezing trip in an open-air bakkie (which is the back of a pickup truck) to our campsite. What a start to the trip!

Most of our time in Botswana was spent at or near Chobe National Park. We got to take both a safari drive and a river cruise through the park. I sat there with my mouth gaping as I watched dozens of elephants drink water about twenty feet from my face and thought over and over “I can’t believe this is my life.” It was AMAZING. We saw hippos, impala, giraffes, baboons, hyenas eating an elephant (what a smell!), lizards, kudu, warthogs…

Warthogs paying us a visit at our campsite

Kudu

Impala and giant lizard!

Hyenas mowing on an elephant

Papa, Mama, Baby Hippos

See the moon?

Feel free to use as your desktop background.

not a crocodile, just a lizard

Doesn't this look like a fairy tale character?

Baboon

VICTORIA FALLS, via Zambia and Zimbabwe

Victoria Falls is one of the Seven Natural Wonders of the World. It is over a mile wide and 354 feet high – that is taller than a football field is long! Victoria Falls is bordered by both Zambia and Zimbabwe. Zimbabwe’s civil unrest has led tourists to overwhelmingly choose to go to Zambia to see the falls instead. We chose to do both.

ZAMBIA

From Botswana we headed to Zambia. We took a short ferry ride across the border and got a taxi to the hostel where we were camping in Livingstone. From the ferry to customs to the money exchange to the taxi ride, locals were harassing us and trying to trick us out of money, which was extremely frustrating, especially because I had gotten sick that morning from my malaria medication and was NOT in a good mood.

The city of Livingstone is what I pictured an African city to look like, with vendors selling fruit and bread and eggs, and shops along the sides of the dusty road. It took some getting used to the harassment, but I did like the city.

The Zambian side is right on top of the falls, which means you don’t quite get the scope and size of them. Also, due to the intense rainy season this year, the levels were at the highest they’d been in 50 years, so the falls were difficult to see because of the thick clouds of mist. Regardless, they were beautiful and awesome! We first climbed down a path and over some boulders to the Boiling Pot down below, which is the whirlpool created at a bottom section in the river. After climbing back up we set across the most terrifying little footbridge over a part of the river and the falls, which I don’t have pictures of because you get DRENCHED. I’m sure the view was incredible; I wouldn’t know, since my eyes were focused in terror on my feet shuffling through the gushing water. The good news is a woman proclaimed “I’m cleansed! I’m cleansed! The water is HOLY! It is taking our sins!” and when another wave of spray pelted us, “THANK YOU JESUS!” So I got that going for me.

We had timed our trip to coincide with the full moon, as it creates a rainbow over the falls. I wish I could describe how incredible an experience that was! The rainbow is just enormous and jumps out of the falls themselves, and the moonlight creates this ghostly, magical aura. It was striking.

Down at the Melting Pot

See the footbridge?

Me getting my sins cleansed

Very poor representation of the full moon rainbow

ZIMBABWE

Oh Zimbabwe…

We, again, walked across the border from Zambia into Zimbabwe. My heart was really pounding from the moment we left Zambia customs and for the first few hours we were in Zimbabwe. I’ll save you the suspense: ultimately we had no issues or threats, and the harassment was certainly there but even less than in Zambia.

So there was no violence or crime that we saw, but it was very sad. Prices were wild, groceries were deficient, streets were desolate. It was pretty eye-opening, and I know that the villages are much worse. We talked with some locals at our hostel, which has begun renting to locals because there are just no tourists to bring in money. One guy told us about his father, who had gotten involved with the opposition party against the government, having to flee his village and hide out with his documents during the elections. We were also told that people really did get their hands severed to prevent/punish voting this past year. A South African said he was visiting while he could because pretty soon people won’t be able to go into Zimbabwe.

With all that said, the falls from the Zimbabwe side are astonishing. Picture yourself counting rainbows as you walk through them, thick mist coating the air and rocks and tropical plants and trees, millions of gallons of water per second crashing into the rocks and river below … the local language calls the falls Mosi-oa-Tunya – ‘the smoke that thunders.’

On the dirt path back from the falls to our campsite, elephants were just hanging out! The destruction they cause walking through the brush is astonishing. We took a few pictures until one elephant gave us the fake charge as a warning to back off…one of the more terrifying moments of my life, wow, was I SHAKIN'.