Ok so here's me thinking that seeing Alex screaming the hospital down having her stitches put in, swearing at the doctors and nurses, sweating like a smack head in a chemist and then having all the ill Zambians staring at us as we walked through the waiting room out to our taxi - as being the funniest moment so far. Well we managed to beat that yesterday by having just the best day ever white water rafting on the Zambezi! I've never done anything like it before and what a place to start! The whole landscape was amazing, there are about 30 rapids on the river that run through a magnifiscent gorge the whole way through at some points hitting a depth of 85 metres. The sun was well hot, we got so burnt and it was so nice to jump out of the raft and swim in the river to cool down.

What a buzz though!!!!!!! it was amazing our group managed to tip up twice, the first time was ok for me as I managed to come back to the surface pretty quickly, but the second time - F****** H*** !!!!!!!!!! I s*** it, I really did panic! Cos I actually thought I was reaching the surface I could see light through all the bubbles and I thought 'Oh I've got enough breath in me to make the surface' and then I got swept under again by a current and my arms flapped, I swallowed half the zambezi, and my burnt red legs were kicking like mad and I just sooooo panicked and I seriously thought 'well, this is it!', but after a few seconds I managed to reach the surface and found that I was nowhere near our raft so had to float until the raft could come back to pick me up. I used this time to calm down and cry before getting back on the raft to attack the next rapid.

It was so funny though, cos as we reached each rapid we all went crazy! shouting and screaming 'FORWARD!!!' and all I could hear as we were holding on for dear life in the middle of each one was Alex shouting in a caring but loud, screaming, annoying voice 'STEPHEN GET DOWN!!!' It was so funny cos one time I turned round to see Alex hanging out of the raft with her legs held in by one of our fellow rafters - she was laughing so hard she couldn't lift herself back in! The river was well busy that day - there were four rafts, about ten kayaks, a speedboat with a madhead driver and a helicopter with an even madderhead pilot flying through the gorge about ten feet above the water and the gorge wasn't that wide really - Mad!! But what a day, even the walk down the gorge to get to the river was like hacking our way through a jungle - that was fun. But getting back up the gorge was a different story - we walked some of the way until we reached the cable car - I wasn't impressed but I had to use it as it was so hot and I couldn't walk any further - but it was so steep and rickety and being held together with wooden pegs didn't fill me with confidence, but anyway it got us to the top where we jumped on to our open sided bus and downed the free beer!!!!! A really really amazing day, oh and by the way Alex wore a rubber glove to protect her hand and thought it was hilarious to do her Michael Jackson impression all day! Well that's it from Zambia, just another day and then we're off to Botswana I think, so hopefully update you there. Thanks again for staying in touch, see you!!!