Elephants - up close and personal

Having to wait 4 hours in the blazing Zambian sun, after a sleepless night on a bus, while Customs processed the stupid, mentally challenged, cerebrally limited passengers who tried to smuggle undeclared goods through the border, was almost forgotten when we were with the elephants.

How could you describe an interaction with this creature? It would be easy to say what the skin felt like with it's rough protruding hairs, or that a grown male stands about 2.5m at his shoulder, or that their ears are like massive fans that move the air with an audible whoosh, or that their tusks are just colossal teeth shaped into, well, a tusk. It also wears and cracks and chips and yellows with age and that right at the heart of it, lies a massive nerve.

Not only is their anatomy extraordinary; think of their trunk. At the end of which an appendage looks like a double barrelshotgun, or better yet, a giant grey, almost armour coated double barrelled nozzle. This truck and its tip can tickle your face as lightly as a feather, but is also capable of ripping a human apart with consumate ease.They can sniff out that handful of peanuts you have with ease, grab just one miniscle nut, place in their mouth and come looking for more! Elephant made, spittle based peanut butter is something I will not forget - I haven't had smeared on my hands in a long while!

Their society is incredibly advanced. Learning is passed from generation to generation through play, observation and trial and error. There is a very definite classic cognitive learning style that mimics our own. They are very like humans in every respect, but obviously not looks. Doh! Or maybe we are not very much like elephants……

In the presence of these elephants, you sense an almost infinite patience with us that hints at intelligence far deeper and more astute than our own. One could believe that elephants know that they are capable of overthrowing these irritating humans, yet they continually tolerate us and the behaviour we bring with us. You feel as if their intelligence may almost be something that reaches far back into the eons of time, long before man started his climb to the top of the animal kingdom; long before he became custodian and was no longer a participant.

Time spent in the presence of such majesty will long long be remember and appreciated. It is a unique priviledge to be so close and personal with these elephants.

The Smoke that Thunders

"….Papa Lima through 4500…..loitering over the Falls…..clearing the area in 2 minutes……over"

"….roger that Papa Lima….."

There is so much to take in when you get up there. And only once you are up there, with a whole lot of nothing between you and the ground far below, a little bit of windsurfer sail and what is effectively a lawn mower engine pushing you along, do you feel your skin tingling. Not from fear, because once you take the sights all in, it is absolutely spectacular!

"……Can you see the giraffe feeding down there?...."

After a few moments, yes I can. It takes a little while to get a grip on the perspectives here. But once done, everything else comes a whole lot easier to see.

"….You know why and how it got the name the Smoke that Thunders and Victoria Falls?....."

"……Yep. David Livingstone was told the local name, but decided to call it Victoria Falls after his Queen…"

At high water, when the rains make their way into the catchment area and gather in the Zambezi River, the Falls will see approximately 900 million cubic litres of water fall over the lip and crash into the river and rocks below - per SECOND. From any angle, it is an incredible sight.

"…..On the Zim side, you can see plenty of people wearing their raincoats in the spray…"

"….Look at those hippos. This river is practically choked with them!...."

Above the Falls, it is green and lush. But below the Falls, where the river has cut a 120m deep gorge, the plains are brown asthe river zigzags across the landscape. The constrast is startling!

"……There goes a bungee jumper!"

From up here the water seems to fall in slow motion and the resultant mist never seems to disipate, the bungee cord takes an age to arrest the jumper's fall and the river cruise boats seem not to go anywhere.But our time in the air doesn't contract in the same temperal motion.

"…..Papa Lima deaprting area and descending……"

"….roger that Papa Lima……safe landings. Out"