Blogs from South Luangwa, Zambia, Africa

It is getting close to dusk when we see the leopard in the tree. Half asleep, it ignores us completely. We drive off to watch the sun set across the river and then quietly return. With the aid of our lights we find the young leopard again. He is slowly walking in dense vegetation, carefully approaching a group of impala. Closer and closer but an impala suddenly barks, it has sensed his presence. Now they are all alert, looking and listening in the dark. The leopard moves away, these will not be his dinner tonight. We drove in to South Luangwa National Park, Zambia, from Malawi. It was a warm drive along a good road, with a chaotic but friendly border post at halfway. We passed many clusters of brick huts, basic villages where families live ... read more

Our week started exploring the beautiful Victoria Falls that borders Zimbabwe and Zambia (one of the world's seven natural wonders). The Falls are created by the mighty Zambezi river (Africa's 4th longest) and the power of the water pouring over its edge was evident as we got soaked from its mist! Even in the campsite, which was a couple of kilometers away, the constant drum of the Falls could be heard. Having previously whitewater rafted in Iceland and New Zealand (Donal) we were very excited to tackle the Zambezi river. It is renowned for its Grade 5 rapids...... "extremely difficult, long and violent rapids, steep gradients, big drops and pressure areas". Not concerned we signed up but after our first Grade 5 rapid we were ready to go home! Completely overturned, fighting against the subsequent rapids, ... read more

23 December 2015 We left Malawi (The Warm Heart of Africa) yesterday to enter Zambia ( The Real Africa). Our fellow Canadian, New Zealand and Australian travellers were once again annoyed that the Irish got away without splashing out $50 for a visa. We on the other had were very smug, not only did we save money the visa stickers would have wasted a whole page on our passport which has an ever increasing number of stamps. We have spent two nights at Croc Valley campsite which had a massive orange river right beside it. We were surprised by how much noise the many hippos that lived there made all day and especially all night. It was quite an experience. I was a little apprehensive when Chris told us it wasn't unusual for hippos to graze ... read more

Kiboko safari at Track and Trail Camp in South Luangwa Park. Monday 31st August. Within half an hour of arriving at the Track and Trail camp we saw several kudu, elephants, baboons, an impala, a hippo and a crocodile. The main park, the best in Zambia, and the most majestic in Africa, according to my guide book, is on the other side of the river from where we are sipping cold beers. Tomorrow we'll start at 6am and go on a game drive into the park, but for now we're relaxing after the six hour drive from Lilongwe, the capital of Malawi, into Zambia. The terrain on the way here is much the same as in Malawi, perhaps a little more affluent. The houses are built the same way, but more of them here have been ... read more

A while ago we discovered that many of the posh, all inclusive luxury safari lodges allow less financially well endowed customers (such as ourselves) to bring their own tents and camp for a small fee. This means you can stay somewhere absolutely beautiful, in a fantastic location complete with swimming pools and lovely things, for about $7. It also means you won’t be able to afford to eat in the restaurant, so will have to live on peanut butter and smuggle your own wine into the tastefully appointed riverside bar. This doesn’t bother us at all, because we have no shame. We took this approach in South Luangwa National Park, a few days before Christmas. The place we chose, Track and Trail Safari Lodge, had a beautiful curvy swimming pool placed high on a wooden platform ... read more