Safari Holiday 2012

In April 2011 I went on a very well organized tour of Israel with Oak Hall Expeditions (www.oakhall.co.uk), a Christian holiday company. Browsing through their website this year I discovered that they are reinstating their safari tours of Zimbabwe, previously suspended during the wilderness years( no pun intended). This time the safari tour was facilitated by ACTS of Mt Pleasant, Harare(www.actsoverland.com), also a Christian holiday company. I joined the camping package tour in its entirety from 17 August to 28 August 2012. It took us to Antelope Park, Hwange, Chobe National Park (Botswana)and Victoria Falls. I had been to all the places before except Chobe.

My earliest memories of Antelope Park date back to a school trip. In my days at Fletcher High School I served a stint as secretary of the Wildlife Club and the trip to Antelope Park was the pinnacle of our calendar. It was a very different game park from the sprawl of buildings that it is now. I remember there being only one building, a small stream with no weir and a modest collection of game. It nevertheless still impressed us.

Now there is enough to impress even the fussy. The documentary series Lion Country was filmed at Antelope Park. They have innovative long term lion conservation schemes in progress.  
As by-products of these schemes, guests are able to go walking and even hunting with lions. 
I found a lot more substance in the lion walk  than was apparent from the promotional pictures (www.antelopepark.co.zw).

The lion feeding was certainly not flattering to the image of lions. It left me with less respect for lions. They are noisy, selfish and filthy feeders  
Totally inconsistent with the royal image of the so called king of the jungle.

In addition to wild animals Antelope Park is also home to wild party animals. Our first night there was not the most auspicious start to the tour. There was a loud party not far from our camp site. The music was loud enough to vibrate my chest and carried on till 3:00am! Fortunately this was probably the only significant downside to the Antelope Park experience. The upside more than made up for it though.

Ivory Lodge Campsite in Hwange was tranquil, save for squabbling elephants at a nearby watering hole.   The salient feature of the campsite was that it was accessible to all animals in the Hwange Game Reserve and beyond. In other words there was no perimeter fence. My first experience of similar exposure was in 1999 at Swimuwini Rest Camp in Gonarezhou National Park. I was traveling alone at that time and on one of the nights I was the only person in the whole camp. The worst part was when I needed to run the 60 metre gauntlet to the ablution block in the middle of the night! After that experience I understood why one of the beds in the chalet I was in smelt of bed wetting.

In spite of the benefit of prior experience, last month at Ivory Lodge I was naughty enough to take excess water. So in the small hours of the morning, the inevitable call of nature happened. I agonized over the risk for almost an hour before the urgency overcame my fear. On emerging from the tent, I was pleasantly surprised to discover Ellie relaxing in front of the camp fire chatting to someone !

Now Ellie  has more courage than most. She was an inspiration to her fellow guests. I was one of her groupies who trailed her when she went bungee jumping
  
That photo looks amusing to me. Doesn't it look like her shorts have come off and dropped to her ankles?! I forgot to ask for her autograph but still got a hug.

Hwange Game Reserve in general is stagnating. There is nothing wrong with it but it just hasn't got it anymore, much like a girl I used to know. In contrast, Chobe National Park in Botswana has little going for it yet is mysteriously magnetic and full of vibrancy, much like another girl I used to know. One morning at the Sedudu gate I witnessed the biggest armada of game viewing Land Rovers I have ever seen. There was an intense sense of mission in the air as the queuing Land Rovers revved at the leash. The game drive that followed was fair for a morning drive. 

I have never had too much luck with morning game drives at Chobe or indeed anywhere else. So I looked forward more to the afternoon game viewing on the Chobe River cruise. By late afternoon, the relentless heat drives even reluctant animals to the river for a drink and/or swim. As expected, the cruise turned out to be most rewarding.

At school we had a handful of fellow pupils who were very hard to please. No matter how good the movie was, they always rubbished it saying they had seen better before. On this trip we had a similarly fastidious gentleman. No matter how good the game viewing was, he claimed he had seen better elsewhere. Fortunately it did not seem to spoil other guests' enjoyment too much.

One of the reasons suggested for the success of Chobe resorts is proximity to the Victoria Falls. Curiously Chobe now appears to have superseded Victoria Falls town in popularity, if number of cars in hotel car parks is anything to go by. I went through some of the Victoria Falls hotels and found further signs to corroborate this. Kazungula border post is very busy with day-trippers going to view the Victoria Falls but using Chobe as their springboard. What it means is that there are factors driving traffic away from Victoria Falls town. One of them could be greed. The last time I went to view the Victoria Falls I did not have to pay anything. This time I had to pay and foreigners have to fork out a whopping $30! I think it is a false economy that could be the tip of an iceberg driving away real big money. There is a growing culture of institutionalized extortion that is pervading many areas of Zimbabwean life well beyond holiday resorts. A plethora of unwarranted toll gates and endless spot fines are a case in point.

After the bad aftertaste of extortion had worn away, I went on to find the falls as glorious as ever in spite of the low water season.

In fact the geological features of the gorge are a lot more visible now (PHOTO13)
than they would be at full flood in May.

My previous camping trips had largely been limited to the Eastern Highlands of Zimbabwe where the biggest wild animal is probably the common duiker. So the idea of sleeping with only a piece of canvas between me and all the carnivores of Hwange Game Reserve was initially cause for apprehension. In hindsight, it was a dimension that enhanced the adventure. I probably would do it again. More importantly, I feel renewed and ready to get back to work tomorrow.