Sikumi Tree Lodge Hwange

Today I did the lion encounter. And let me be the first to tell you that having two fully grown males running directly at you is a scary experience. That's right: fully grown. For some reason on the video they were playing with little cubs, while we got the big guys. I got picked up at 6:15 AM and taken across the border to Zimbabwe for the experience. It has to be first thing in the morning, because lions sleep almost 20 hours a day, and ...

... this night ended up? The best was the Zambian nun on the boat drinking wine the whole night. We docked just after sunset and returned to the campsite bar to continue the drinking until around midnight. This was a good night to meet the new people who joined the trip in Victoria Falls.

... Since we had such bad luck sighting a lion in the wild four of us went for the sure thing by signing up for a lion walk. I had my hesitations that it would be too much like a petting zoo with cubs. I was pleasantly surprised when we met the first lions; a pair of twelve month old brothers. These lions were more than big enough to kill a human and there form of "playing" was a bit rougher than we could endure. We must ...

... and were conned into buying things, and then Rachel and I headed down to see the falls themselves. We were warned that we would get wet but we were not quite prepared for how wet we would get. I was soaked! I might as well have jumped in the falls. There was so much spray it was like we were in a torrential rainstorm. I took about a million photos as usual and then we went to dry off in the town. I had my first frothy cappuccino on the whole trip and it was delicious!!

... VC salesman. While in VF, I decided to go for a walk with the lions as part of my on-going quest to outdo my ex-wife Greg who keeps blabbing about how he petted a cheetah in the wilds of South Africa and keeps showing off his stupid "cheetah petting" certificate!!! Greg will be quite jealous with my freshly laminated "walking with lions" certificate!! I also chose to take this little stroll with the cats to prove to my colleagues, who ...

The 16th started early with a pick up for the lion walk. We went to the scrub land to firstly watch a video about the programme to breed and re-introduce lions into areas where they have been lost, or serious number decline has occurred and as part of this they introduce them to people at a young age. We then met our three lions for the morning Nala, Narnia and Amanzi...two 10month olds and a 6month old. They were so cute and we could ...

The 14th i got my trips paid for and got my medicine and chilled out the rest of the morning. At lunchtime, we caught a taxi to the Zimbabwe border, and waited for our pick up for the Rhino walk. The Rhino walk is back on the Zambian side, so we paid our day visa (as our passports said we hadn't paid when we entered Zambia...guessing someone pocketed the money we did pay and we had no receipt!) and re-entered the country ...

Départ pour la Zambie où Richard doit nous quitter. Nous passons le Zambèze avec le bac et c'est après que l'attente commence, interminable, à la frontière. Finalement, ça passe mieux avec quelques dollars et nous pouvons continuer notre route. Nous roulons encore une heure avant d'arriver à notre hôtel, situé entre Livingstone et les chutes Victoria. Déjeuner très rapide et pas de sieste pour Guy, nous repartons aux chutes en taxi ...

We travelled into Zimbabwe, where we were warned not to use the ATMs as we would get the 'official exchange rate'. Our guide Fred organised to take everybody to a dark pub where a black-market money man arrived with a backpack of money and a shifty deal was made. The smallest note was 100 000 and Pete came back with a stash of cash - $100USD was equivalent to $45 million Zimbabwe dollars which was almost 10cm thick. It was like being in some gangster movie. Seriously the ...

Day 22 We had a very good sleep the previous night - a little rushed getting ready that morning. We loaded the bus at 7 am and headed to the Okavango. It rained the night before and we were worried that it would rain more while we were in the Delta. The border crossing was very quick today- a pleasant surprise. Upon arrival in Etsa 13 we boarded two 4 wheel drive vehicles and headed to the campsite, Delta Dawn. The women who runs the campsite said that there are ...