Saturday, July 24, 2010

Boating / Drifting on the Great Zambezi River

On Tuesday night we went to sleep on our tents to much noise on the river – hippos.  I, Rita, thought they were just fussing at each other, via for their positions .  Steve on the other hand is convinced it is mating calls.  Whatever!  Steve and I already saw a little crocodile while walking around the camp grounds.  The kids and we were warned about crocs and poisonous snakes.  There is a three legged dog here to prove they are dangerous.

On Wednesday we woke up to a beautiful few – the river, the sun rising, and a pod of hippos out in the river.  We rented a boat with a driver and went slowly down the river.  At times the engine was turned off and we just drifted, once in a while turning it back on to fix how we were drifting.  We saw two little crocs and then a bigger one.  Then we got pretty close to the fourth croc.  He must have been sleeping.  He suddenly flipped into the river.  Steve managed to record this.

croc comp

We got pretty close to several pods of hippos.  One pod was up on land and so we got to see up close what they looked like and not just a bunch of backs sticking out of the water.  That pod had little babies!!

Hippos comp

Our driver was  looking for elephants.  We went past several places that they usually are.  Then we found five male elephants!  We just sat and  watched them for awhile.  We also saw a variety of birds.  Then we held onto our hats and speed back to camp.

elephant comp

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