The Essence of the Journey!

South Luangwa National Park

By: Celeste

 

Lusaka along the Great East Road about eight hours to Chipata into the Great Rift Valley – doesn’t that sound great? The South Luangwa Park is world renowned for its wildlife. Our visit here so many years ago is dominated by two very distinct memories: roads too wet to travel on and hippos surfacing like primeval beasts out of crescent-shaped oxbow lakes, green swampy vegetation adornments spread over their massive heads and backs. Nothing like it for a skin treatment.

 

We camped overnight at Mama Rula’s with the children thoroughly enjoying playing with the five (or more) dogs and Jack Russell puppies.

 

Danica was particularly excited to explore Luangwa after reading about it in the non-fictional book entitled “Bulu” (also a Jack Russel), also describing the establishment of the Chipembele Wildlife Educational Centre by the authors Steve and Ann Tolan.

 

We headed for the Park along a winding tar road, cyclists carrying seemingly impossible loads: fruit and vegetables stacked up in woven baskets; hay bundles; buckets in candy colours twenty at a time forming a three-metre tall hat! And then the road ran out, down to a horrid, rutted, potholed track weaving alongside the roadworks. We crawled, aiming for the Moondog Café alongside the Mfuwe Airport, which, according to the guidebook had a large information board about all the accommodation options in the area.

Not. No Moondog, but there was a café. But even the cappuccinos tasted sour with the news that the trailer’s chassis had cracked through again – so the whole process was started again. We were very lucky this time to have the tri-party all fairly close at hand – welder, welding machine and power. Meet and greet more locals, chatting about the merits of bicycle up-grades and having cool drinks that even Marcelo (the least fussy) could not down! Hanging from an old, crumbling wall in the trees nearby (only found when doing you know what in the bushes) was an animal skin. One local sitting on a log was

 

The trailer was bombarded with re-bars welded on with eyes shut – no welding mask. A tar road between the airport and the surrounding game management area of the park was more pothole than tar and singe-lane narrow. Flatdogs Camp no longer offered camping but we settled in comfortably on the Luangwa riverbank at Crocodile Camp, huge pods of huge hippos spread out below, elephants and buck drinking from the opposite bank. Power (erratic), thatched lapa with wooden table and benches, white tree frogs, an unidentified snake under the washing line (dangerous business this) … what more could one ask for?

More close encounters. At 23h00 I was awakened by the sound of rumbling pachyderms, close by. A large male was exploring our vehicle only 3m from us. Trunk uplifted he found nothing to interest him in the black ammo boxes on the roof rack. Trunk tip still raised, he lowered the bulk to the rear left window and pressed. It must have been only a gentle push otherwise he would have got to the watermelon inside if he had really wanted to, I am sure. Meanwhile, his tusks had been scratching the side panel all around the diesel tank. Luckily it was not pierced. Danica must have sensed the danger, sitting bolt upright in her bunk. I whispered for her to be absolutely still and quiet. Obediently, she lay back down and promptly went back to sleep. The rotund rascal then soft-footed it around Nic and Zulfaa’s ground tent, popping open a sealed rubbish bin and breaking a few branches. After he had left, we all met out under the stars, a wee bit shaken.  

 

The young couple are from Sydney and have been working and wending their way across

Africa since the Soccer World Cup, planning to end their journey in September 2014 with their wedding in Greece. Full of fun, Nic, a chiropractor, played rugby and Frisbee with the kids and swam in the strangely-shaped pool. Knowing it used to be a crocodile farm made it feel a bit weird. We shared some meals with them and on our second day in the park we travelled in convoy, joined by a two-way radio. Early that morning we sighted a female leopard jostling with her two cubs – wow!

 

We were fortunate to see all three of the mammal specials: the Crawshay`s zebras (Equus burchelli crawshaii) lacking the shadow stripes; the beautiful Thornicroft’s giraffe (Giraffa camelopardalis thornicroftii) and a lone Cookson’s wildebeest (Connochaetes taurinus cooksonii) on Lion’s Plain. And that’s not all. On the leaf litter deep in the swamp in the thick riverine vegetation was ……….

 

PEL’S !!!