Thursday, April 3 – transit from Livingstone to Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe

I’m heading to Zimbabwe this morning. My route will be as follows:

• Taxi to the Zambia Border Station (very close to the entrance to the Zambian Victoria Falls, 150 ZMW)
• Walk across the Victoria Falls Bridge to the Zimbabwe Border Station
• Continue the walk to my hotel

The Zambian Border Control Station. There was no wait here; just a quick interaction with the immigration officer. Not too difficult to leave a country (well, usually!)!

Trucks lined up, waiting to cross into Zimbabwe.

The bungee jumping location on the bridge.

View of the falls from the bridge (Boiling Pot to the right).

Close up of Boiling Pot.

Welcome to Zimbabwe!

The Zimbabwe Border Control Station. It was about a 30 minute walk between the two border posts. I could have taken a taxi, but you know, that cheapness thing! Plus, it probably wouldn’t have been much quicker, as traffic on the bridge was pretty ugly.

There was a little bit of a line to enter the station, but it was mainly populated by locals. I was the only one in the queue who needed to acquire a visa. That went pretty quickly though; took 15 minutes and cost $30 for a single entry visa. And I had a nice conversation with the immigration officer as my visa was being processed!

And continuing my anti-taxi attitude, I decided to walk to my hotel. That took about an hour, which included a few rest stops (and navigation checks) along the way (I was carrying my luggage, after all!).

The high temperatures in this region were consistently in the upper 80s. I worked up a little bit of a sweat during the walk!

The Drift Inn is located in a quiet area outside of the Victoria Falls city center, which I liked. It abuts the Victoria Falls National Park; but unlike my stay in Zambia, it was alright to walk outside of the compound. Well, during daylight hours only!

Kind of cool that I was assigned the Botswana room, since that will be the next stop on my trip!

$105/night (including breakfast)

The hotel and the grounds are lovely.

I hit the pool soon after check-in! (That’s a bar and lounge area in the background)

Travel Note: The US dollar is the preferred currency in Victoria Falls, which is convenient. And credit cards are readily accepted. Even better!

Friday, April 4 – Victoria Falls

I have a singular focus today: Victoria Falls. But first…

…a hearty English breakfast. Very good!

A couple from Switzerland sat with me at breakfast. They’re on a 5 month driving trip through southern Africa. Wow! She’s on a 6 month furlough from her job with the International Olympic Committee, and he’ll be looking for a new job when they get back. Very adventurous!

On my way to the falls…

Understood!

It was a 40 minute walk to the falls. The entrance fee is $50 (compared to $19 on the Zambian side!).

There are 16 different viewpoints of the falls within the park. Let’s get to it!

A rather overcast (and misty!) day. Not very picturesque unfortunately, but at least the cloud cover makes it a little cooler!

It hasn’t been raining. That’s spray/mist from the falls!

This is interesting…

…I like the jury-rigged support!

Are those blue skies I see in the distance?

Dr. Livingstone, I presume? (he’s everywhere!)

More blue skies. I’m hopeful!

I did not spend much time at this viewpoint. I was getting soaked very quickly!

Like on the Zambian side, I didn’t venture far on the paths here that were basically getting rained upon. Not my idea of fun! Loser! I know…

Clearing up. Worth the wait!

Wow!

Rainbows everywhere. I love it!

My favorite photo from the time in the park.

(In fact, tomorrow I’ll be joining a tour group as I venture into Botswana. When I showed the photo above to the group, one of them pulled out a postcard with the exact same picture. Nice!)

I ended up spending over 4 hours in the park. And I’m obviously happy that I did! This is a perfect example of why I do not like to be on a schedule; I was able to wait out the overcast sky conditions.

So, which side of the falls did I prefer, Zambia or Zimbabwe? Probably kind of obvious that it was Zimbabwe. But I’m happy that I did both. The hike to Boiling Pot was fun. And it’s so easy to navigate between the two countries that it seems like it would be a waste to travel all this way and not see both sides.

Travel Note: I became aware of The Seven Natural Wonders of the World upon my visit to the park today. Are you familiar with the list? Here it is…

• Aurora Borealis, aka The Northern Lights
• Grand Canyon, United States (been there)
• Great Barrier Reef, Oceania (been there, with Holly!)
• Harbor of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
• Mount Everest, Nepal and Tibet (been there, kind of, via a flyover)
• Parícutin, Mexico
• Victoria Falls, Zambia and Zimbabwe (been there, both sides)

So, four out of seven; guess I have some work to do!

Saturday, April 5 – Victoria Falls

I’m switching hotels today because I’m joining a tour group this evening that will take me into Botswana tomorrow.

Shearwater Explorers Village is a large complex located close to the Victoria Falls entrance. Some might think the proximity to the falls is a good thing, but I didn’t. That’s due to the fact that sightseeing helicopters were constantly flying overhead. The noise was a little annoying!

I much preferred the solitude and intimacy of the Drift Inn. Oh well, it’s only one night!

Entrance to the resort.

My bungalow.

The room was included in the cost of the tour. (I paid extra for the single supplement)

Dining/Bar area.

Our group was getting together this evening for an orientation and dinner. So I spent the rest of the afternoon roaming around the town of Victoria Falls.

A sculpture garden located near the entrance to the falls.

I was going to grab a drink at The Lookout Cafe, known for it’s view of the Batoka Gorge (downstream of the falls and bridge); but all of the seats with the view were occupied. Oh well…

A view of the gorge from the cafe.

I thought I had brought all of the plug adapters I needed with me, but no! This oddball is the configuration used in this part of southern Africa. Fortunately these first hotels I’ve stayed at had plugs that allowed for varying types of configurations (including U.S.). I’m not confident that that will be the case in Botswana though, so I picked this up at an electronics store for $3.

The only issue was that it’s an adapter for a U.K. plug. Doh! No problem; I’ll just plug my U.K.-to-U.S. adapter into this!

As you have probably surmised, there wasn’t very much to see in the town of Victoria Falls.

The tour I booked is through G Adventures, and covers 8 days, 6 of those in Botswana. But in reality, it’s basically a 6 day tour, because day 1 is just a meetup in Victoria Falls (today), and day 8 is the departure from Windhoek, Namibia. And if you want to break it down even further, there are only 5 days of activities – day 7 consists of an 8 hour road trip from Botswana into Namibia.

Our group consisted of 11 people – one couple and 9 solo travelers. That ratio surprised me! It’s a wide age range too – the lone couple is a little older than me, but the solos are mostly in their 30s and 40s (one is in his 50s). There were 5 solo women and 4 solo men. The breakdown by country is:

• Canada – 3
• United Kingdom – 3
• United States – 2 (both of us from Wisconsin. Crazy!)
• Germany – 1
• South Africa – 1 (currently living in Seattle)
• Switzerland – 1

Our group leader/guide and driver were both locals, from Zimbabwe and Namibia, respectively.

After our orientation meeting at the hotel, we all went to a nearby restaurant for dinner. The place chosen was very touristy, with all of the diners that I could see being westerners. Seriously! Not off to a good start. I’ll keep you posted!

Travel Note: I typically avoid going on group tours, preferring to set my own itinerary and schedule. There are certain instances though when it seems like the best option (like here in southern Africa). Below is a list of the other tours I’ve been a part of:

• Costa Rica
• Kruger National Park
• Peru / Machu Picchu
• Egypt (incl a Nile river cruise)
• Galapagos Islands

I will say that for each of the above tours, my time with the groups has been very enjoyable. We all got along well. In fact, I’m still in touch with one person from the Costa Rica trip that was 25 years ago. Maybe the comradery is due to the fact that we all are of a similar (travel) mindset. Hopefully my experience on this tour will be similar. Fingers crossed!