Early departure today to tour Victoria Falls. I was awake early, before my alarm clock rang. I got up and opened the sliding wooden shutters that cover the patio doors. I got back into bed to read, but out of the corner of my eye, I noticed movement outside the patio doors.
I guess the bellhop really did mean “monkeys”. I got up and got the camera and got a few shots, but everytime I would get back into bed, other monkeys would run by. Mommies with their tiny babies hanging from their underbellies ! I just wasn’t fast enough with my camera.
At 7 am I went down for a nice leasurely breakfast (again a great buffet spread). At 8:20 I was at the reception desk, ready for my tour.
A few tidbits of background information:Formation of Victoria Falls: “ 5 million years ago, geological shift that caused an uplift in the area of central Botswana. This blocked the course of the Upper Zambezi river, which had been flowing south to join with the Lijmpopo River and created a paleolake, the remnants of which today form the Makgadikgadi Salt Pans. When the lake overflowed into the Matesi River, it carried away the earth that had been covering the basalt rock, and then began to remove the basalt one block at a time from within the fault lines. The result is the huge gorge we see today, where the mighty Zambezi continues to remove basalt rock along the area of the falls. There have been 8 previous sites of the waterfall, created as the river has worked its way back upstream from the fault line. These are clearly visible when viewed from the air.” I was hoping to do a helicopter tour over the falls in the afternoon, but my fall at the falls kind of changed the plans ! ! ! More on that later.
The walk along the Zimbabwe side of the falls is definitely the best. You walk along a path for about 1 mile, and have various views of the series of falls that make up “Victoria Falls”.
Entrance to the park
Routes travelled by Livingstone
"Dr. Livingstone I presume !"“Dr. David Livingstone visited Victoria Falls in the middle of an extraordinary journey across Africa. His career spanned 25 years in Africa, traversing 45,000 km of uncharted territory. He dedicated the last 5 years of his life to shutting down the slave trade in East Africa. He was on the shores of Lake Tanganyika when Stanley greeted him with the now famous phrase “Dr. Livingstone I presume”. He died in 1873 in Northern Zambia. His two companions, Sussi and Chuma, buried his heart there, then carried his remains 1500 km back to the coast, where they were shipped to Britain and laid to rest in the “Explorers Corner in Westminster Abbey.” Must remember to go see that whenever I return to London.
The walk along the falls was spectacular, but also very wet. I kept having to cover up my cameras or try to dry them with my tank top.
The Devil's Falls, the first one we encountered
Trees and lianas along the way
Devil's Falls from a different angle
portions of Victoria Falls
Thorny bushes to stop people from walking into the forest, or over the edge of the gorge
Portions of Victoria Falls
Looking back towards the Devil's Falls, beautiful rainbow !
middle portion of the falls
A glimpse of what it was like trying to take pictures in the spray from the falls. Check out those thorns !
Looking over at Livingstone Island on the Zambia side of the river. Do you see the people on the left? They are getting ready to go swimming in one of the natural pools at the top of the falls
And the lady goes in, helped by her guide. That's just a little too close to the edge of the falls for me !
One of the rare looks at the complete falls, all the way to the bottom of the gorge
Close up of the bottom of the gorge and the force of the water
They don't call it "thundering waters" for nothing !
Beautiful view of the gorge and the river
Double rainbow ! Double happiness.
It's been a great morning.After reaching the farthest part of the falls, we headed toward the bridge that crosses the Zambezi from Zimbabwe to Zambia. Obviously a high bridge, since it crosses the gorge, so this is the bridge from which they do bungy jumps. Got some great film footage ! You definitely have to be crazy to jump off a perfectly good bridge.
Do you see the person dangling at the end of the rope ?
Here's a close up, and you can see the 2nd person on the other rope, ready to help them back up.We walked back the mile, but this time along a path that kept us away from the falls and the spray. Nice wooded area with bird song. We were only 4 people in our little group: a couple from Italy, a guy from Germany and me. We were always waiting for the Italian couple, so our guide pointed the German guy and myself in the direction of the park entrance, and off we went. It was nice to be away from the other groups as well. Just as we neared the park entrance, we saw a group of baboons on the path. Mamas with their babies and some males as well.
Check out the 2 babiesUnfortunately a large noisy group came up behind us and scared the baboons away. I continued on the path, at the back of the large group, and as we came to the buildings at the entrance, we came upon a group of Velvet Monkeys. Cute ! Much smaller than the baboons.
There were at least 20 of them roaming around this area. I heard some women screaming just a few steps in front of me. They were running away from some of the monkeys. Actually, one of the male monkeys was chasing them. The ladies ran into a washroom. I decided I did not want to be cornered there, so I took some BIG BOLD steps to walk past this little male monkey. Well the #&%^&%()#$ was right behind me, less than 6 inches from my leg, reaching out to grab it. I wasn’t sure if he was going to scratch me or bite me so I started to run, still looking behind me at the monkey. I only took about 2 steps and CRASH ! I fell really hard on the uneven surface of the walkway and scratched the hell out of both knees and one elbow. My cameras went crashing down. One of the guards who had been standing nearby came to chase away the monkey, as I got back to my feet, bleeding badly from my left knee, with part of the skin dangling down. Not a pretty sight. Another lady came to help me get to the restaurant just 10 feet away. I went to the bar and asked for some napkins and water to clean my bruises. I guess shock was setting in because I was shaking so badly the same lady got me to sit down. She even offered to wash my cuts, but I preferred to do this myself. Anyway, cuts cleaned up, the rest of my group arrived and we made our way to the bus. When I got to the hotel, I immediately hobbled over to guest services to ask if they had a nurse or doctor on staff. The cut on my left knee is quite deep and I wanted to make sure it was completely clean and disinfected before letting it close up or bandaging it up. Sorry, they only had a first aid kit. The girl at the desk took about 10 minutes to locate the kit, get some cotton swabs and help me clean the cuts. The piece of gangling skin was bothering me and I wanted to cut it off, so the girl went to get some scissors and I cut it off ! Almost passed out after than so I’m glad I was sitting on a couch in the lobby. The girl gave me 3 small band-aids and suggested I go to the pharmacy they have in one of their shops. I’d been there yesterday to buy some sun-screen lotion, so I knew where to go. I hobbled over to the shops, got some ointment (oxytetracycline) and some pain killers (Ibuprofen). When the pharmacist saw the 3 tiny band-aids I’d been given, she went to get 2 big bandages (free) so that I can cover the wound up tomorrow when I head out to Chobe National Park for the Safari.
I hobbled on to my room; it would have to be at the other end of the hotel complex ! I showered and cleaned the wounds again, took two pills and laid down with a wad of toilet paper handy to sop up the liquid that was oozing from the gash in my knee. That’s a good sign though… right ? The liquid was fairly clear as well, apart from the blood.
After a few hours of rest, I had to get dressed to cross the street and get more American money to pay for my re-entry into Zimbabwe tomorrow, when I return from Chobe (Botswana). I figured that since I was already dressed I should also have a very late lunch, or a very early dinner, so that I could spend the rest of the day resting in my room. I treated myself to a nice sirloin steak !
Back in my room, I got caught up with sorting my electronic pictures and writing my blog. It is now 8 pm and I have to get dressed again to go to the lobby to hook up to the Internet.Again, quite a nice day despite the fall. I’m going to have a pretty big scar on my left knee so that I always remember my trip to Victoria Falls.
Started the day with some monkeys, and ended the day with some monkeys. I can just imagine the little guy who took me down bragging to the rest of the monkeys in the pack, about how he took down this big hairless person, all by himself !
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