Nic again

After we left Livingstone, we crossed the border into Zimbabwe and the town of Victoria Falls. From there we visited the falls again. We had heard that it was better to view the falls from the Zimbabwe side, but I don't think either of us realised how much better the view would be. This time we saw the main flow of water and it was incredible. Even one of the more minor flows was more impressive than anything we had seen on the Zambia side. We got drenched by the spray, but it was great fun.

We then decided to take a night train out of Vic Falls to Bulawayo, which took 13 hours. The line is run by the National Railways of Zimbabwe, but the carriages were made in the UK 50+ years ago and were still painted in the 'Rhodesian Railways' colours. A long time ago I can imagine that the train would have been real luxury, but lack of funding (and probably demand for that sort of luxury on a train) has led to severe deterioration. Despite this, it was still great to try out a different method of transport and we did get some sleep!

Once in Bulawayo, our desire for our own transport grew too strong and we decided to hire a car. This enabled us to visit the Matobo National Park and the Khami Ruins. Both are important in Zimbabwe history and Rich has been reading about these sites in a Wilbur Smith book, so was particularly keen to visit.

We spent a day in the Matobos, a boulder strewn landscape, where we visited Cecil Rhodes grave and saw some ancient cave art (although the cave art was barely visible due to disastrous attempts by modern man to preserve it). We also drove through the Matobo game park where I practised my best David Attenborough/Gordon Buchanan impressions in anticipation of our trip to Botswana. We were told the park had Rhino and Leopard, but after a couple of hours of driving we had only seen baboons and an antelope type creature (we have tried our best to identify it, but have had no luck).

After exiting the park, we decided to check out an old railway station. As we drove along I spotted what I thought were Rhinos by the side of the road (or very fat grey horses as I caveated to Rich whilst he turned the car around). They were Rhinos (not sure if they were black or white) and our first sighting of one of the 'Big 5'. The irony that we spent a couple of hours in a game park looking for them, only for them to be found by the side of the road was not lost on us!

The next day we headed to the Khami Ruins. Khami was the capital of an ancient civilisation (like Great Zimbabwe) and there was evidence of some pretty impressive buildings (although we also saw some men 'rebuilding' the ruins from piles of bricks which made us slightly sceptical of their authenticity). On the way back to Bulawayo we managed to pick up a puncture. Neither of us have had to change the tyre on a car before, so it might as well have been on the side of an African road at midday! After some help from a local man and the use of the lonely planet to boost up the jack, we were on our way. That night we headed back to Vic Falls on the night train.

That brings us to today. This morning we took a trip out to Livingstone Island. Named after David Livingstone (as many things around here are), it is claimed that the island is where Livingstone first saw Vic Falls. The island is on the edge of the falls and gives access to a natural pool right on the edge of the main falls called 'Devil's Pool'. We swam out to the pool and were able to sit right on the edge of the falls. It was amazing and really got the adrenaline pumping!

Tomorrow we travel into Botswana and on Saturday we pick up a Toyota Hilux 4x4. We will then drive it around Botswana and Namibia, finishing in Cape Town on the 9th October. We are really excited about this part of the trip, and I can't wait to start proper game viewing. It's likely that we won't have internet access for a few weeks, but we will provide the next blog update when we can (hopefully with lots of pictures of animals).