South Africa to Zimbabwe Day 12

---

Africa in comfort

Friday, August 27. The two-hour flight from Joburg to Victoria Falls in Zimbabwe (Zim) is uneventful. We load onto two large vans and head for Stanley and Livingstone Hotel which turns out to be a series of separate one-bedroom bungalows designed to look on the outside like native huts complete with thatched roofs. The place is meant to capture the opulence and comfort of the early English-based hotels. Rooms are furnished with antique furniture and fittings. Even the books on the desk and tables in the living room are old. Ahren and I are impressed. And delighted. We hear that this is a very fine, very expensive place. It is not normally on the tour and we don’t know why it’s on the tour now. Perhaps the economy led to rooms going empty so they greatly reduced their prices to attract a tour operator and fill the beds. Whatever the reason, it’s an unexpected treat.

A big oops

When strolling through the manicured grounds, we hear disturbing news. Three of our remaining tour-group have been left at the airport, separated from the rest of the group most likely in the passport melee. The problem occurs because only 27 of the original 43 tourists opted for this leg of the tour and none of us is sure who should be on the vans. And we are separated into two groups so we don’t even know how many of us there are.

Crusin' down the river

Anyway we all feel terrible, but they are rescued and we all make the sundowner cruise down the Zambezi River together. The Zambezi separates Zim from Zambia, but the wild-residents that live on the river-banks are multi-national, apparently moving freely between countries; no passports required. Elephants swim, their trunks serving as snorkels, and hippos laze, their jaws stretching open in humungous yawns as the orange sun sinks into the river. Welcome to Zimbabwe.

---