Things in the Zambian National Parks are more controlled than the last time I was here, as usual due to the stupidity and lack of forethought on behalf of a few.
Unescorted game viewing drives during the day are still permitted, but night drives must now be escorted from one of the camps.
Al, Wolf and I went on a day drive and saw some animals although with the tall grass it was difficult to see much. Most of the trails are very vague and there is no guarantee that they will not peter out or come across some part that cannot be crossed due to mud and ruts. We saw sable, impala, a couple of warthogs and lots of gorillas as we drove on a 35 km circular route.
The camp has an airstrip that looks to be about 3500 ft and in good condition. It serves the two camps that are about 2-3km away. Joe the Game Guide for Hippo says that they get 10-15 flights in each year but that most people drive in.
Most of us went on an organized game drive on the Wednesday night and while we saw some animals we did not see too many. There were some hippo feeding and out of the water but we did not see any elephant or lion.
Joe had told us (as I think I mentioned) that elephants and lion routinely will walk through or very close to the camp. The photo below shows a pile of elephant droppings and the chalet we stayed at in close proximity.
On Thursday Al Wolf and I decided to go up river to see the Lubungu potoon, and see if we could find the sulphur hot springs. It is about 15km up river and the pontoon is just above the confluence of the Lungu river and the Kafue river. (It eventually joins the Zambezi near the camp at Kanyemba where the wedding was. It is about 400km further down the river)
All went well until we stopped to do some fishing on our return about 12 km from Hippo. The boat motor refused to start and a combination of that and a marginal battery eventually had us paddling down the river back to camp.
We had a couple of interesting encounters with hippo that were lined up across the river in about four places and they kept surfacing and snorting as we got closer to “their space”. We were within about 10 meters of one big fellow. Again they were not surprised by us and were essentially non-threatening, but a sage reminder of how vulnerable we were and the awesome power of nature.
On the way up we had seen a croc sunning himself on a rock and he slid off the rock as we got closer.
Fortunately we were on the other side of the river as we paddled back.
After about two hours we were back at camp and about 30 minutes before Eve was ready to alert Joe and the others at the camp of our non-arrival.
We chilled out with a beer and some dinner and around 8pm Joe came by in one of the game viewing vehicles to tell us that they had just seen three young male lions pass through the camp.
We hopped on the vehicle and within 10 minutes were looking at the lions in the bush only about 50 meters from the housing area for the camp workers. They were happy to be looked at for a while by spotlight but eventually wandered off to a more secluded place. A great way to finish up our last day at Hippo Lodge.
Truck loaded to the gills with tomatoes and a couple of passengers hanging on. Typical for Zambia and Africa in general!
Our return the next day was uneventful and I discovered that the previously cancelled flight back to London (due to the BA Cabin Crew strike) had been reinstated for the next morning. June and I flew back and she was able to see the latest addition to the UK family before flying home.
