Last week we were lucky enough to spend some time in Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe. Following a 13-hour flight from Sydney, a night in Johannesburg and another 2 hour flight we found ourselves in a dry, desolate land. Upon arrival we instantly regretted skipping out on the extra six bucks a night for an air conditioned room greeted with that sort of thick pervasive heat that follows you around and seems to slow everything down in its path, including the locals. We found that the Zimbabwean psyche at first was very hard to read, did the people genuinely despise us or was it all in our head. On one hand we would be greeted with a big smile and a joke (usually the local men) and on the other either contempt or ignored altogether (usually the women.)

We also found out pretty quickly that the owners and operators of the various hotels and activities around the area had an unwritten agreement to charge the same overpriced amount regardless of quality. This found us in a tiny heat box of a room that would have been worth much, much less in other parts of the continent. Despite this, we were eager to see what the place had to offer and set out on various ventures around town.

First up was a cruise down the mighty Zambezi river, Africa’s fourth longest river that originates in Zambia and cuts through or borders five other south-east African countries before it spills out into the Indian Ocean. This was also our first opportunity to see some big African game, following our rather disappointing first and second animal sightings of the trip of cows and donkeys. We were dropped off at the ‘dock’ and were greeted by a lavish three story set-up with tray wielding butlers sprawled across each deck. This would be a pretty decent setting to check out the river. A few hours later we had eaten crocodile, drank the local beer, wine and Zimbabwe’s best Pina Colada and spotted numerous 100% pure wild African hippos.

The next day we bit the bullet and ventured out into the searing heat to check out the real reason any self-respecting tourist ventures to this corner of the African domain; natural wonder of the world and much hyped Victoria Falls. First inhabited by the stone-tool wielding Homo habilis some 3 million years ago, and then “discovered” much, much later by the great Scottish missionary explorer David Livingstone in November of the year 1855, this tourism hotspot sounded too good to miss. Having had previous history wading through crowds of temporary water enthusiast at the world’s second most impressive waterfall  – Iguazu of Argentina, I (Tom) was ready for a solid few hours of platform skirmish to get my two minutes of viewing at each designated spot along the edge of the great ravine. When we arrived however there were only a handful of other people in the whole area. Admittedly it was low season as it appeared that even world wonders can’t escape the wrath of the Zimbabwean heat, and a large portion of the falls was bone dry. The view nonetheless was spectacular and we enjoyed casually perusing the various flows and watching how close local fishermen would get to the top of the massive drop-off to fish with strange, homemade nets.

Our last adventure in Zimbabwe was too hard to resist, a night safari in the Stanley and Livingstone Private Game Reserve – boasting being home to “The Big Five”, a term that you have to get used to hearing when in these parts. We were picked up in a 10-seater custom-built safari truck by the affable Patrick, who proceeded to teach us all about the native animals that had been in his care for several decades. Before we took off on our hunt however we had to pick up some more passengers and stopped in at the Stanley and Livingstone Safari Lodge. This place was ridiculous. A polite young employee showed us around the various rooms – bar, lounge, wine cellar/romantic dinner getaway, and other rooms that I didn’t even know the name of. This place was straight out of the movies, with a huge elephant head on the wall and all the trimmings. After our tour we picked up none other than the two middle-aged Belgian couples that we had met the night before on the river cruise, before they went up another set of stairs on the boat to the “signature” deck. These people clearly had no problem indulging themselves on their grand tour of Africa.

Now that our party was full we headed out on the track and proceeded to drive past all sorts of wild and wonderful birds and animals. Soon, however, it was night time and our guide left off the headlights and pulled out a single spotlight which he proceeded to erratically point in every direction in the dark trying to catch the mirror-like eyes of the various animals that crept around in the bushes all around us. Although impressive, this technique didn’t seem to work too well, or perhaps all the animals had gone to sleep because we barely saw anything after that. We stopped off for dinner in the park and were treated to some delicious food (including Kudu.) We were still buzzing about how cool it was to finally see some animals when the middle-aged Italian man piped up and started telling us that the tour was no good. Apparently he was a safari veteran and had been on several safaris in Africa where he saw “leo-pards”, “leo-pards everywhere.” He then proceeded to list every type of pasta that he enjoyed eating when he was at home in Italy. Now we have made it to Rwanda, about to head out into the jungle to chase gorillas. 

Words: TE, Photos: NP & TE