Victoria Falls

Zimbabwe

The Boarder Crossing

Chaos is the only word to describe what crossing the boarder to Zimbabwe was like.  Our “taxi” pulled into a car parking space just outside the small building, which had queues and queues of people even coming out the door.  This was going to take forever!  We queued in the line for at least 45 minutes and by the time all of our passports had been approved it was midday and it was starting to get really hot.  We hopped into a taxi that was situated on the other side of the boarder with all our bags (hopefully) and continued onto our hotel, which was 1 hour away, so I had a little rest on the way there.

The Zimbabwe Economy

Zimbabwe used to be a very wealthy country.  In fact it is considered the most fertile country in all of Africa.  Its loss of wealth is due to the current government that is governed by Mr Mugabe who is a dictator.  He encouraged people to drive out all of the white farmers and claimed the land as their own.  As a consequence the farms went to rack and ruin.  He has been in power for many years and most of the people we spoke to hope that he would not last too much longer and have a government that would be more democratic. 

The country experienced a tremendous rise in inflation in 2006 which meant that the Zimbabwe dollar rapidly lost its value causing the most simplest of things such as a loaf of bread to cost thousands of dollars.  People had to carry their money in plastic bags because they needed so many notes to purchase things.  They started printed denominations up to 200 trillion dollar notes!  In 2008 the situation got so bad you could not buy anything in the shops, the value of the dollar was worthless so the government zeroed out the currency, businesses and bank accounts were wiped to zero and people had to start all over again using US dollars as the currency.  I bought a 10 trillion dollar note for 1 US dollar along with some other notes as a memento.

The Hotel and a Walk around Town

As we pulled up outside the Hotel I had no idea where we were since I had slept the whole way there and saw at the end of a walkway “Casino” in faded letters.  Lucky for me the Hotel was a left turn just before the Casino entrance and looked a lot more inviting.  We checked into our room and I went straight on the bed and collapsed and started playing on my Phone, which I hadn’t done at all really for the whole trip.  We left the room to have a look around the place and then sat by the pool for a while.  It was a reasonably good hotel with some lovely ponds with signs that read, “Keep children away from edge.  Natural Ponds.  Baby Crocodiles may be living in ponds” it was a bit scary but at least I’m sensible. 

We decided to have a stroll through town to have a look at what the sort of shops there were and what kind of people lived there.  It was completely different to the other places I had been to on the trip so far and I thought that Zimbabwe was a much different country to Botswana and South Africa by the way people dressed and acted.  They were poor, were quite skinny and many people stopped us in the street to get us to buy their African Art.  Once we had finished our stroll through town we went back to the room and watched TV until mum and dad asked if we wanted room service.  I couldn’t have said no to something like that.  I had a burger, which was OK and for dessert I had bubble gum flavoured ice cream (which was supposed to be chocolate flavored), which was gross!  I only had a spoonful!  We settled down and we to bed knowing that the next morning we were going to visit the spectacular Victoria Falls!  You could actually see the mist from the Falls from our Hotel!

Victoria Falls

Victoria Falls from the Air

The Victoria Falls are known by every African resident and are a spectacular sight.  We figured this out when we went to visit them and experienced what the falls were really like.  Our tour guide, who was going to take us to the falls, picked us up in a bus and he explained about the falls and what to expect.  We were told to bring raincoats and when I looked up in the sky there was not a cloud in sight so I was curios and asked why.  He said because the spray of the falls go high into the air and falls down on you exactly like it would be raining, which was pretty awesome and would definitely cool me down after a hot day travelling around in the sun.  We experienced the falls in the best way possible by getting right up close and I learnt quite a lot about the history of the falls, about the first white man that discovered the falls, David Livingstone what all the different sections of the falls were called and how they were created.  I felt amazed as I looked over the 105 metres drop into the never ending canyon and the collection of jagged rocks at the bottom. 

Facts about The Victoria Falls

-       There are 3 sections in the falls and one island in between

o   The Devils Cataract

o   The Main Falls (Victoria Falls)

o   The Zambian Falls

-       The Devils Cataract is a 76 metre drop from the top of the falls

-       The Main Falls and the Zambian Falls are 107 metre from the top of the falls

-       The first white man to discover the falls name is David Livingstone, he was famous not just for the falls but also because he fought hard to abolish slavery in Africa

-       There is a statue and a monument that commemorates him at the base of the falls

-       He was not the first man to discover the falls, black indigenous people already knew the falls and had discovered them but he was the first to claim them and spread the news.

-       More English settlers came in and settled there and started a the town, which is now known as Victoria Falls 

After the adventure we walked over to the Victoria Falls Hotel, which was the first hotel built at the falls in the early 1900’s overlooking the lovely view of the Victoria Falls Bridge (which is the boarder of Zambia and Zimbabwe).  We stopped there for a High Tea, which I thought sounded so grown up and everything was going to be for adults when they brought out a delicious cart of sandwiches, scones (with cream and jam), brownies, cheese cake (which I didn’t like), some other dessert things and coffee!  What an afternoon tea!  We finished just before our stomachs exploded and went back to the room only to leave once again to a lovely restaurant called Mama Africa for dinner, which was also a pleasant experience.  Mum and Dad had traditional hot pots, Steve and I stuck to pasta and steak.

The Sunset Cruise

The second day we went out on a Sunset Cruise that lasted for three hours along the top of the Victoria Falls, which was extremely beautiful and peaceful.  We learnt about the wildlife that live along the river in a boat that was fitted with a bar that you could get free drinks from, which added to the peacefulness of the cruise itself.  We all gazed out of the open decked boat and spotted some pods of Hippos along the side of the river that didn’t seem at all interested in what we were doing instead they gave us some excellent photo opportunities.  The boat tour went around an island, which is actually a part of Zambia the neighboring country, so technically we were in Zambia without passports!  We also spotted a couple of crocs on the riverbanks and some elephants grazing.  The cruise was fun and by the end of it I realised that 3 weeks had already gone in the click of a finger to me, well I guess I’ve only got another 13 weeks to go!