Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe

12/11/22

Never regret. If it’s good, it’s wonderful. If it’s bad, it’s experience.~Victoria Holt

My fellow travelers and I set out mid-morning toward Victoria Falls National Park, a 15-minute walk from our accommodations at Shearwater Explorers Village. At the main street we turned toward the park and were joined by a Zimbabwean man named Excellent who we suspected would try to pressure us into buying trinkets or something. My travel companion, Martjie, is a marvel of charm and level-headedness with her years of travel and sunny personality so she played it cool hoping he would give up. Not only did he not, another friend named Enough materialized from nowhere, trying to sell me copper bracelets, explaining how poor he was and how hard Covid had hit his village. Now our senses were on high alert. And they were insistent. When a third man came from behind- bad vibes aglow- and kept coming closer despite my repeated glances in his direction, pretending to pee in the bushes to distract me, I feigned a pebble in my shoe so we could stop and let him pass and keep him in our sights. By now we were almost at the park and the man with Martjie had a mood that was turning dark when she refused to buy his $5 billion Zimbabwe note (it’s a thing and it’s worthless) because he wanted money. She wisely convinced him that she’d give him some money for safely guiding us to the park gate. We made it into the park but were rattled by the encounter all day, despite all of us being seasoned travelers and still getting surprised by this.

The park is a long pathway with nine gorgeous views along the gorge of Victoria Falls as well as an overlook of the bridge into Zambia. It’s definitely a sight worth seeing.

Victoria Falls, looking onto Livingston Island
South end of the gorge sported a rainbow this day

Unfortunately, part way through we noticed two men that kept crossing paths with us, like you do at the grocery store with another customer. Except we got bad vibes from them and at one point caught them filming us. Criminals often work in teams, notifying others in another location of details. Proactively, we decided to join a large group ahead of us- strength in numbers, right?- and then made friends with a lovely South African couple currently living in England. We confided our concerns and they were compassionate and sympathetic to our situation so we spent lots of time taking photos together to let the men finish their walkabout and leave the park. Thanks to everyone keeping a level head and some smart thinking all was well but we will be on extra-high alert from now on.

I napped, had a quick snack, and set out with my travel companions for our sunset cruise on the Zambezi River, the 4th longest river in Africa at 2400 km and runs through four countries to the Indian Ocean.

Sunset cruise vessel

While waiting to get underway, we watched a huge elephant swim across the river! At one point his periscoping truck tip was the only part out of the water. Amazing. We also saw dozens of hippos including two babies (they live in groups of 15-20, weigh up to two tons, and can run 32 km/hour!), and learned that when they open their jaws it’s a sign of aggression. I certainly wouldn’t want to encounter them in the water or on land!

Hippos showing aggression toward the boats
Open-mouthed hippo. We saw dozens of them!
Another family of hippos showing aggression

We floated into Zambia and saw crocodiles, baboons, cranes, herons, and other birds I couldn’t identify. Our captain was a comedian and the overall experience was lovely, watching hippos eat and play while the sun set. En route to our hotel, the transport bus encountered a water buffalo in the road (very dangerous) and we could just barely see the rest of the herd lurking in the shadows. This area is free range for game of all kinds so anything is possible and you best be paying attention. He moved to the shoulder without incident.

Three baboons in a tree on the banks of the Zambezi River

I’m grateful all worked in our favor and that we’ll be leaving tomorrow. It’s unfortunate because there are many shops offering beautiful African art which I’d love to peruse but the pressure tactics are a huge turn off and leave us feeling unsafe to walk around.

Always trust your gut and pay attention. I’m congratulating our inner knowing and experience that paid off.

Tomorrow we’re back to nature!

Love,

Wen

Zambia in the background
Wild bee hive in a tree of the rainforest at Victoria Falls National Park
The famous bridge to Zambia
Elephant skull- so huge!
The national park – we walked from one end to the other, less than a mile. This is an UNESCO heritage site

6 responses to “Travel Savvy Pays off in Victoria Falls”

  1. Cathy Jakubowitch Avatar
    Cathy Jakubowitch

    Glad your instincts and connections with others are keeping you safe. Sadly there will always be some risks when traveling abroad, but hopefully your travel savvy will keep the positives far outweighing the negative, as it seems this far. The pics of the Falls are glorious!

    Liked by 1 person

    1. Wen Avatar

      Agreed 100%

      Like

  2. hunbunx2 Avatar

    Wow! That trip to the falls was pretty scary. Glad you were in a group and used your intuition to thwart them off. Bet you will be glad to get out of a tourist area. Stay safe.

    Liked by 1 person

    1. Wen Avatar

      Thanks. It’s a bit too touristy but otherwise a nice visit. I’m happier with nature 😊

      Like

  3. Helen M Mackay Avatar
    Helen M Mackay

    Same problem that I had. Walked with a black man and all was well: not because he was male but black. Shops lost a sale to me due to pressure tactics. Only place I encountered it.

    Liked by 1 person

    1. Wen Avatar

      I’m sorry that happened think they lose a lot of business because the pressure is a turn off but it must also work often enough or they wouldn’t keep doing it.

      Like

Leave a Reply

Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in:

WordPress.com Logo

You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. Log Out /  Change )

Twitter picture

You are commenting using your Twitter account. Log Out /  Change )

Facebook photo

You are commenting using your Facebook account. Log Out /  Change )

Connecting to %s

%d bloggers like this: