Hello all,
I've been hearing in hte news that many Britains can no longer afford to heat their homes due to rising fuel bills, will you all be blocks of ice when I return??? As always forgive the typos and spelling mistakes.
It's been a while since my last update, since then I have covered two further countries and am currently sitting in the town of Victoria Falls. This entry will cover Zambia and the next Zimbabwe.
When I last left you I was killing time in Lilongwe Malawi, waiting to head out to South Luangwe park in Zambia for another wildlife fix. The last few days were spent carrying out a couple of very rushed day trips and in the evenings talking with an absolutely inspiring 65 year old german woman. The first day I decided I was going to climb a 2170m mountain called Dedza on the Mozambique border and return to Lilongwe all in 12 hours. It was a 200km sucide drive down in a Minibus and luckly I met a local guy who had nothing better to do than climb the mountain with me. He was super fit and I was panting to keep up, despite the fact he was wearing flip flops and me full hiking boots. The views from the top of the mountain were stunning, you could see the flat green Plateau broken up by these lumps of rocks rising up as if some giant had thrown them onto the ground. See the pics for illustrations. The climb down was tricky one particular fall could have been quite nasty but I was very lucky.
During the Minibus ride home, we hit a massive downpour, you haven't seen weather unless you've been to the tropics. The sky literally opened up. I was sitting in the front luckly but in the back they had managed to fit about 30 people plus sacks of produce into a 14 seater vehicle. It wasn't all gravy though, i had to lean out the front to wipe the windscreen so the driver could see.
The next day I travelled to a fishing village called Senga bay, which was beautifully picturesque with another great view of the distant hills of Mozambique across the water. I was really quite disappointed I couldn't stay longer.
On one of the evenings I met a facinating 65 year old german lady who for the last 16 years had spent at least 3 months of each year travelling around Africa in a 20 year old land rover with her Husband. Unfortunately he died last year of cancer but this lady had returned as she had promised him on his deathbed that she would. She had driven from Cape Town to Kilimanjaro by herself. In africa this is unheard of, she was really an inspirational person, which some great stories. Who says age is a barrier to your dreams!!!
Finally I left for South Luangwe and the 4 day Safari was quite simply breathtaking. The park is found in the south east of Zambia and is one of the best kept secret places on this continent. The entry fee is a fraction of the cost of east africa but the animals and the setting was just as good, better infact. Here I saw all sorts of wildlife, fighting bull elephants, herds of Zebra, an agitated Bull Hippo charging out of the water. This all in the first 2 hours, the night drive was even better! Here I completed my viewing of the big five game animals. The night drive took place during a new moon, so it was pitch black and with out the large spot lamp you couldn't see anything. This first night though we stumbled across three Lions on the road who were preparing for a nights hunting. As we followed these lions we noticed a Lepoard up in a tree, it had heard the Lions coming and climbed in order to save its life. The tree itself had no branches lower than 5m, if i hadn't seen it myself I wouldn't have believed it possible for such a big cat to climb such a tree. If this wasn't enough a hyena ran into shot and was promptly chased off by the Lions. It was truly wonderous and this was the worst possible time of year to visit the park due to the rains spreading water about the place. I implore you if you like animals and are planning a trip come to this park between July and Sept, you'll be gobsmacked at this place.
So the four days in South Luangwe were great, after that was up I headed to Lusaka, in the pouring rain. I had hit the wet season and for the rest of my time in Zambia water from the sky and water-logged ground followed me about. Lusaka is a very ugly city, soviet in feel without much going for it. The highlight was going to the market which was soaked, there were puddles 1 ft deep with soaking mud all around. Despite this the stalls were all pristinely kept and the produce fresh. Well until a passing 4Wd runs through the puddle sending out bow waves and people running for high ground. The crazy weather doesn't phase the africans though they just get on with it.
From here I headed up to the Copperbelt region on the Congo border. I spent another inspirational 3 days at the Chimfunshi Wildlife Orphanage. Here a couple in their retirement have set up a Chimpaneze orphanage for chimps who have lost their family through poaching and seeks to reintegrate them into family groups and then release them into huge compounds where they can live a sembalance of a normal life that man has denied them. These animals are really smart and incrediable strong, yet display human emotions such as fear, anger, love, concern, empathy. We really aren't as different as we think. Also I met a hand reared female Hippo and got closer to one of these lubbering beast than I thought possible. All this created by two remarkable people Shelia and Dave Siddle who again show what is possible to achieve in life. My finally visit in Zambia was to a huge open cast copper mine. I managed to blag my way into a free corporate tour of the 3rd largest copper mine in the world. After seeing animals and wildlife it was another great experience to see how big a hole man can make. The number associated with this mine are staggering. the mine 65,000 tonnes of copper ore a day, moving 100000 cubic meters of soil and rock. The mine is 3km long and 400m deep. Thats one big sand pit.
From here I ventured back to Lusaka and decided that I wanted to see Zimbabwe to see what all the fuss is about...all that to come in hte next installment.
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