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The Cheetahs

November 24th – 25th, 2021

In the morning we arose to the aftermath of our insect attack. Dead termites were everywhere, their wings and bodies stuck to the side of the cruiser, the tent, even the teapot. After a simple breakfast our guide showed up on his bicycle, ready to take us to the shoebill. First we had to drive the seven kilometers to headquarters at Chikuni to pay for our permits. The guide jumped in the back seat, and off we went.

Leaving the tree line and out onto the wetlands proper, it was just a wide open flat expanse of short grass, nothing else. Since the wetlands are not currently wet right here, this is a huge grassy plain. Big sky country as they say. The guide told us that deep into the wet season this is all under water, that you could fish for bream and tigerfish from our campsite, a small island of trees which would only be inches above the water level. The Bradt guidebook says that the water level only comes up one meter, but the water moves an astounding 45 miles inland at the height of the rains. 

The plains are impressive on their own, but further along we began to see antelope dotting the horizon. A little further along and it became a lot of dots. Driving closer still we were overwhelmed at the magnitude of the herd in front of us. Here were thousands and thousands of black lechwe, found only here. We’d seen red lechwe in Busanga, even a lot of them, but nothing like these numbers.

After watching them for a bit, we moved on towards Chikuni. Headquarters is a loose collection of some small buildings, mostly housing for staff, all set in amongst some scattered trees. There is also an airstrip, and I got the sense that this must become an island later in the season.  

Arriving, the road goes through a gap in a short farm-style fence, but a bakkie (pickup truck) was blocking the way. Some staff were milling around, and clearly they were in the middle of something, so we waited. Looking into to the bed of the bakkie it looked like there was a lechwe in there, maybe even dead? At the least very unwell.

They pulled ahead a little, and watching a little longer we saw them pull out what was clearly a dead lechwe from the back. It slid off onto the ground with a thump and was dragged off by another vehicle.

What was going on? We couldn’t figure it out. They drove up and waved us forward, and we were directed to park off to one side. One of the staff told us to get out and motioned us over to where the managers were and one of the dead lechwe. They were up against a chain link fence topped in barbed wire, and much to our surprise, inside were three live cheetah, very intent on the lechwe. 

What the heck was going on? Cheetah, in Bangweulu? This is a place known for lechwe, birding and the shoebill stork. Are there cheetah here? One of the staff came over and explained, albeit very briefly, that they were releasing these three cheetah into the wild. Today. Right now. And we were going to get to watch!

What extraordinary luck. The staff were all busy, but we were told we could watch and take photos.  

There were five cheetah inside an enclosure, measuring maybe 30m x 30m; we later learned there were two females and five males. Today they were releasing the three males, with the females planned for release in a couple of weeks.

One of the lechwe was drug over to the opposite side of the enclosure, to draw off the females. The other was presented in front of the males (how the males and females were separated initially I don’t know), who were snarling occasionally and fixated on the lechwe from behind a gate in the enclosure.

The staff hitched the legs of the carcass to a long rope, the other end hitched to a land cruiser. Some shouts back and forth between the staff to make sure the females were suitably distracted, and one of the staff just opened the gate while the other began to slowly drive away, dragging the lechwe behind. 

It all was happening very fast. We could hardly take in what was happening before the gate was open, and less than 50 meters away from us were three agitated and hungry cheetah, nothing between us. 

I should note that cheetah are the least aggressive of the big cats and the least likely to attack a human. But at the same time, we’re not accustomed to being on the ground level with three big predators; the whole thing was exhilarating. 

The staff member, who opened the gate made a hasty retreat, and slowly the bakkie began dragging off the carcass, towards the plains. The cheetah could tell something was going on and seemed agitated, but they were also clearly hungry, intent on the lechwe. One of the staff told us that in preparation for this they hadn’t fed them for three days.

The cheetah were snarling, biting onto the lechwe, occasionally hanging back to check the surroundings and moving along as the land cruiser drove ever so slowly forward. He drew the carcass, and cheetah with it, out onto the plains. A hundred yards or so from the nearest building he stopped, got out and slipped the line off the lechwe. 

That was it. Cheetah reintroduced to Bangweulu Wetlands. Job done. Well, not quite. We all stood there, about 50 meters away, even the veterans spell bound at being right here with the animals while they had their first meal in a while. It was fantastic. What incredibly good luck on our part and really interesting to see.

We ended up standing there chatting, taking photos and watching the cheetah for a while. The staff told us this was a joint effort between African Parks and the Aisha Foundation, which specializes in cheetah wildlife management. One pertinent issue with cheetah is their low genetic diversity and resulting weak immune system. To support gene pool diversity Aisha helps relocate cheetah from areas that have relatively high density to places that do not. Bangweulu was a native cheetah habitat, with the last one seen here, I believe, in the 1950s, so it was a good match.  

They released five other cheetah in 2020, but three of them died. Two from drowning and one from getting gored by a lechwe. Now there are two remaining. These five are meant to bolster the population. The strategy is to stagger the release of the males and females by a few weeks. The females are in estrous. The males know this, and this should, hopefully, “anchor” the males to the area. 

Bangweulu is not a fenced area, so cheetah could, in theory, leave. However, all are fitted with satellite tracking collars, and if a cheetah strays out of the wetlands and into the surrounding community, they’ll be darted and returned to the wetlands. Since the lechwe stay in the wetlands, the hope is that the cheetah will stay where the food is. 

Incidentally, the African Parks manager gestured at the lechwe on the horizon when he told us that we were looking at about a third of the 47,000 lechwe in Bangweulu. Over 15,000 lechwe, just right there. Unbelievable.  

The cheetah were making the most of their meal, and eventually one of them started standing watch while the others ate. Cheetah are used to having meals taken from them by hyena or lions; they’re not strong enough to fight them off. Because of this they usually eat very fast. These three seemed pretty relaxed now though.

We had just a spectacular time witnessing this release and also talking to the African Parks manager, the Aisha cheetah specialist and a few of the other staff. I didn’t ask them personally about being in the blog, so I’ve left their names out. But if you guys read this, it was a real privilege. Thank you.

What a morning, and we hadn’t even started the original task, shoebill stork tracking. We were pretty pumped up, but they thought it was time to leave them alone and see what they would do. We went off to a tiny park office to pay our park fees, camping fees and shoebill tracking fee. This is all cash only, which we found to be an almost universal norm in Zambia.

Shoebill Tracking

Payment done, our guide had us drive about 500m to a very tiny channel, the edge of the swamp. Here we met our two boatmen, grandfather and grandson, that would take us into the swamps. The vessel was a large fiberglass canoe that held the five of us easily. Off we went. The boatmen poled us, and I could see the bottom of the channel, less than a foot deep some of the time.

The boatmen didn’t speak, they just wordlessly poled us along. At first we are looking over a small berm into flatlands, just a little dyke making this small canal. But soon we entered the tall stands of papyrus and hippo grass, and we pressed deeper into the swamp.

The channel was often incredibly narrow, sometimes the reeds drug down the sides of our craft, hissing along the hull, grass slashing at our faces. Other times the channel spilled out, wide and shallow with clumps here and there, birds perched on odd reads and rustic thatch fishing huts on small islands.

Birdlife was excellent, coming so fast I had a hard time identifying them. We saw a lot of red bishops, weavers of various kinds, ibis and a huge flock of open billed storks. Also yellow billed ducks (I think?). But the best of all were the kingfishers. Sure, pied kingfishers. But also my malachites abounded. I lost count at 12, and we saw much more than that. They were beautiful little birds, and fairly tolerant of us.

At one point we drifted along a small dyke, and a group of children ran alongside us. The guide said that they wanted me to take their photograph. Normally I don’t take photos of people without asking, but these kids were clearly camera comfortable. Even though they didn’t get to see their photo, they smiled big smiles. 

The boatmen poled on, and we wound our way towards shoebill camp, an exclusive fly-in camp. Our guide told us this was near where we could begin looking for the shoebill, on foot. More poling, gliding along glassy, shallow water surrounded by blooming lilies, papyrus and hippo grass. The channel opened up, and we skimmed our way past fishermen setting nets, some just standing waist deep in the water.

Eventually we arrived at a collection of fishing huts with quite a few villagers. We caused a bit of commotion arriving, getting the impression that there isn’t much entertainment out here, and today we were it. Now a hike would begin, for how long it wasn’t clear.

We gained an entourage. Officially our party was our guide, the two boatmen, another guide from the fishing huts and us. It seemed they knew we were coming and had been out tracking the bird before our arrival.

Unofficially our entourage was much larger with many kids in tow and a few young women, all curious to watch these wazungu come and look for the “shoebillbird,” as they called it. The ground was grassy mud. Wet but firm enough that it didn’t stick to our shoes, it made for pleasant walking. 

We walked. Somewhere along the way we passed a small herd of lechwe that didn’t give us much notice. Sometimes we hopped from grass tuft island to grass tuft island through shallow water. The locals of course just marched on through, barefoot. Our boatman wore rubber boots.

Coming to another one of the berms that were man made, perhaps to forestall the floods a little bit, we were told to wait. The guides would fan out and find the bird, then summon us. We waited. After a while our guide was looking unhappy.

Yesterday and this morning he was very confident of finding the Shoebill, “Very easy,” he said.  This contrasted somewhat with what I had heard, that it was not a sure thing. But now it seemed it was not so easy. “Very unlucky. Very unlucky,” was his new mantra. We waited quite a while, and he didn’t think the scouts would find the bird. It was hard to say, as there was a definite language barrier, but it seemed like they’d found it earlier in the morning, but it had moved.

The shoebill is noted for its extreme patience in hunting. It will stand motionless for hours in a likely fishing spot, waiting for its prey. So it’s not unreasonable to think a bird found earlier would still be here, but today it was not. 

We had brought our GPS with us because we thought it would be interesting to see where we went in the swamp, and for a while Jenny spent some time with our child entourage showing them the countries in Africa we had been to. Communication was difficult, but they were fascinated anyway, repeating each country name in unison after Jenny said one. “Botswana.” Jenny said. “Botswana,” came the chorus of children. “Namibia.” “Namibia.” And so on. It was fun.

After a long time, some of which Jenny spent mumbling that this seemed like a whole lot of trouble to see a bird, we were beckoned. It seems they had found the bird. There was much shouting by the scouts over long distances, and we moved up. We hiked for quite a bit more, maybe another half hour. Our guide told us to take off our shoes and roll up our pants; we would have to wade a bit through the swamp.

All the time I was thinking that this was not at all what I expected. This seemed like real tracking, that might not actually work, through real Africa. These children were not so bored with the tourists that they left us alone; we were still an interesting attraction. Also, I was thinking that this tour would not work for a lot of people. A boat journey of unknown duration. A hike of unknown distance. Waiting. Many stares from the villagers. And now some muddy wading barefoot through the swamp. 

Mud was imprinted everywhere in a collage of lechwe tracks mixed with their droppings. We marched on, the warm mud and everything else squishing not unpleasantly through our toes. We were thoughtfully directed around sharp grasses to a final berm at the edge of more swamp. 

There. There it was, the elusive shoebill. A large full-bodied stork with blue-grey plumage and an enormous bill, with a sort of permanent smile on its face under intense eyes. This particular shoebill was still fairly far away and a little bit obscured by some reeds. Jenny, while appreciating the overall experience, was underwhelmed. It did seem like a whole lot of fuss to see a bird a 100 yards away. 

I had been snapping photos all the while with my telephoto lens, but our guide was not satisfied with the view I was getting. He wanted to get me closer. There was a shallow bank, about 50 meters across some swamp, that would provide a better view, but also not so close as to impose upon the shoebill.

He flagged down a local fisherman. They exchanged a few words, and, I was ordered into his canoe. 

The craft was not impressive. A long and narrow dugout that had done a lot of service. The boatman stands balancing in this improbably narrow boat and poles along. Perhaps it might accommodate another person, but we had seen many similar canoes this morning, none of which had two people in it.

The dugout was pushed onto the bank, and I climbed in. Well, when I say “in,” I actually mean “on” because this canoe was so narrow that my hips were wedged in between the gunnels. This was not totally impractical because had I been able to sit in the bottom of the canoe, I would have been sitting in the few inches of water that seemed to permanently reside in the bilge.

Water was clearly entering regularly, mostly through the substantial hole in the bow. The whole thing didn’t seem very seaworthy, but we didn’t have far to go.

We pushed off, and for a moment I was concerned. The boatman swayed and jerked, trying to counter the properties of his unfamiliar cargo, me. I also wobbled back and forth, but eventually we found some cooperative equilibrium, and with a scant two inches of freeboard, we began to creep across the channel.

For those few moments I thought to myself, “Hey, maybe this will work.” Then, maybe not. A series of dynamic oscillations began, each of us trying to counter the other with the gunnels getting perilously close to the water. We shipped a scoop of water and lost freeboard. At this point it became irrecoverable. I had a leg half out and my hand on my camera and lens, ready to abandon ship. 

Wobble, roll, dip. Big scoops of water came in, and the craft sank to the bottom. The language barrier between our entourage and Jenny was instantly bridged, with interested and skeptical stares turning to gasps. I stood up, camera held high, laughing. The boatman didn’t seem to have an opinion one way or the other; he just got to work salvaging the situation. We were waist deep, and he reached down and pulled up his boat; I helped with my free arm. 

With the boat awash, he began a practiced maneuver, shoving the dugout fore and aft rapidly, the developing wave slopping out the ends of the canoe, its freeboard getting a bit higher with each slosh. At the end, he bailed a bit with an old water bottle, and in those few moments it was time to try again.

I was not confident. Getting in this small canoe while beached was not easy. While standing in the water, it seemed even harder. He held the canoe steady, and I got in, and teetering wildly, he poled us closer to the shoebill.

We sank again. This time we were close to shore, and I slogged my way to calf-deep water, allowing the boatman to recover without me getting in the way. He kept looking at the guide, willing him to get me to be smaller or better at canoeing, but it didn’t work.

I took my photos and was ready for retreat. This time the boatman put me in the canoe and just pushed me across, wading behind. Even this ignominious arrangement was not stable, but we got the job done. I waded the final meters to shore, wet and muddy but otherwise no worse for wear. Since I had the camera, regretfully, there are no photos of this episode.

The original plan was to pole Jenny closer too, one of us at a time, but after watching my experience, she declined.

I should mention that I am a career mariner, and no doubt my friends back home will be amused by this episode. I would say that I am adept at most forms of watercraft, though I admit, canoes are not high on my list of preferred vessels, and now even less so.

Additionally, I am not the first in my family with this problem; my sister-in-law and mother-in-law pioneered the canoe-sinking-in Africa club. On a tour in Lake Manyara, to the horror of their guide, they managed to sink their canoe in the crocodile-infested waters of that lake. Not a good habit we are forming!

After that debacle concluded, we made our way back. Barefoot, we walked back through the muddy fields and grass to our original, larger and more stable canoe. Our entourage remained behind, and we shoved off and began gliding back, the boatmen polling in wordless unison.

Back at the land cruiser our guide asked us if we’d like to go on a game drive, but we declined and headed back to camp. We could have gone out later in the day for a game drive, to see again the large herds of black lechwe, but it had been such a full day so far we decided to quit while we were ahead.

After showering off the mud of the swamps and passing a slow afternoon in camp, we settled on an early dinner so that it would be concluded by sunset, before the insect swarms set upon us. Even the African Parks manager had noted that the termites were particularly thick last night, so that made us feel a little less wimpy.

Our plan to be done by sunset was good in more ways than one because rain clouds loomed. I hoped the rain wouldn’t be too heavy. I was worried about the roads getting out of here.

Escape from Bangweulu (sound familiar?)

Not long after we tucked into the tent, equipped for the early night with our indispensable e-readers, the pitter patter of rain on the tent started.

And it didn’t stop. Mostly gentle rain, along with distant thunder and lighting, came down all night long. We got up fairly early, rain still falling. The awning was handy; we set it up in a jiffy, and this gave us a place out of the rain to make coffee and tea and contemplate our plans. 

Originally we had planned a short game drive to see lechwe again, but knowing the roads would likely be a challenge, it seemed best to just get on with it. At first the tracks were no problem. Out of Nsobe is two-spoor track, thin grass over packed mud, and driving was easy. We heaved our way up onto the causeway road, and that too was pretty good. 

However, not long in, we came to the section we were worried about, where we had slid a little on the way in. It turned out that this portion of the road was still under construction, and there were a couple score of villagers with their mattocks and hoes working on the road.

They saw us coming and stopped, moving aside, knowing that we were likely to have a hard go of it. I felt their eyes on me; it seemed like they knew what was going to happen.

Dropping into low range, we started off, the road here a soft, sandy clay. We’d seen the park bakkie drive out at the end of the day yesterday, but today there was no sign of their tracks, either covered by the rain or by new soil as the road was built up by the road crew. 

Since it was essentially a brand new road, the soil was not compressed at all. There was no hard-packed track for our wheels to follow in. So we cut new track in this soft mud, and at first the going was okay. Not too fast, not too slow, but in short order the rear tires sank, and a huge commotion came from the road crew.

We got out to survey the scene, and in moments, we were surrounded by villagers, all talking at us in Bemba and at each other. Some shouting, some laughing, some with intense urgency. Obviously we were a big topic of discussion, a distraction from the morning’s toil in the rain.

We hadn’t sunk in too bad, and Max-Trax where clearly the answer to this problem. A winch would not have worked in this situation. Any trees, as meager as they were, would have pulled us further off the narrow causeway toward the ditch, not forward. I started to get them down, and already some of the locals were getting what they use in lieu of Max-Trax, branches cut from trees. Even with the language barrier, we got them to stop, and we showed them the Max-Trax. Immediately they understood and took them from our hands and started digging.

The whole thing was really hectic, locals shouting at each other and us, and we did our best to control the situation. I hopped back in the driver seat, and Jenny got the crowd to stand back for a minute so I could back out of the hole a little, giving room for the Max-Trax. 

This worked really well, and with only a few shovel fulls of mud removed on each side and the Max-Trax placed, I drove right out, no problem. Except for the scene that was developing. Both Jenny and I were being hounded, in any given moment being asked if we would give them our hats, our jackets, some money. But also we were being asked where we were from, did we like Zambia, anything.

We got stuck again. We repeated the same procedure, and the locals were getting good at this. Roll back. A few scoops with the shovel. Place the Max-Trax, stand back and I drive out. We popped out again, and this time Jenny and I agreed that I should just drive on, maintaining momentum in the thick mud, until I got stuck again. She would walk behind. 

This getting separated was uncomfortable. There was a sort of mob mentality building around the scene that we had created. I got stuck again, and one group had run ahead with me. We had to wait for the second group, with Jenny, to walk up to us with the Max-Trax. During the time it took for this to happen we were each independently hounded, give me this, give me that. Lots of questions in Bemba that we could not understand. 

Finally someone with good english, along with one of the campsite staff, showed up. He was clear. “How much will you give these people for their help?” I had been waiting for this and was grateful to have someone to talk to that we could communicate with easily. We suggested 200 ZMK ($11 USD), and they discussed and replied that it was not enough. “Five hundred.” I responded that we would pay 400 ZMK, no more. He told the crowd, and a cheer went up. 400 ZMK was a good price. I was relieved that part was over, and it seemed they were happy. We weren’t out of the woods yet by any stretch.

This was frustrating because although there was no question that they were helping and saving us time, we could have easily done this ourselves, but the help was, in this situation, not optional. This was a much easier recovery than the one we’d found ourselves in Lower Zambezi National Park. We were not sinking as deeply, and the Max-Trax were working just as they should, with minimal effort. The price wasn’t the issue, but being hounded by the crowd and the near mob-like scene was making us uncomfortable.

We got stuck a third time, got unstuck a third time by the same procedure, and I ended up driving quite a ways on firmer soil. Jenny caught up, but she had additional trials. She had to argue and yell at some locals who were arguing over the Max-Trax, wanting to help and also ensure their share of the tip, and with others who had jumped onto the rear bumper to ride on the car, exactly where we did not need additional weight.

We came upon a new road crew and a new and particularly soft section of road. An argument began among the locals, yelling at each other, pointing at us, and we could tell that they were arguing over who should help us through this next stretch and how any additional payment should be handled. Our campsite staff member was still in the crowd, and he argued valiantly on our behalf that we had already agreed to a price and that should get us to the end, but it was impossible. Not unreasonably, this new party wanted their own compensation. 

Some of the first group were getting particularly angry now. I brokered that. I would pay our campsite staff member, who would in turn share this out to the first group. And then we would make a new deal with the new group, but the first group must leave. They were satisfied with this; we paid, and thankfully they began to trickle away. 

The situation is difficult to describe, and I want to emphasize that at no time did this feel unsafe (with the possible covid angle as an exception, though in this isolated population I’m sure we posed more risk to them than the converse). That they would, as a community, help was assumed by all. The tip was just that, a tip, not a stand off or an ultimatum, “If you don’t give us X, we won’t help you.” The issue we were having was the chaotic fervor of how it was all transpiring. It takes some getting used to.

Negotiations began anew with group number two. Again, this did not seem voluntary to us, like we could decline help and just manage on our own. We were surrounded by a throng of people, but thankfully three elders made their way to us. They clearly had the respect of the crowd and our appreciation for getting a handle on things.

We haggled, starting again at 200 ZMK. A younger member suggested 600 to an elder, which even he balked at, thinking it was too much. We could only get the gist of it, as this was in a mix of Bemba and English, but finally he agreed to start there, and turning to us, made his opening gambit of 600 ZMK. Foolishly we countered with 400 ZMK, this meaning he only had to make a single concession to settle in the middle at 500 ZMK.

They seemed very happy and agreed to help us to the end. Nobody could agree on whether this new section of road was 500m or one kilometer, but they would get us there either way.

On we went, getting stuck two more times. Finally we were onto solid road. We paid the elders, and the crowd dispersed. Right at the end of this whole circus, a women standing in the back of the crowd looked right at me and gave me a rueful look that to me said, “Yeah, this is an absurd scene, and you caused it.” No translation necessary.

We were both spent, not a sip of coffee had been drunk yet and it was still early. The plan was to make our way through northwest Zambia, seeing a few of their famous, or not so famous, waterfalls en route. Today we weren’t sure how far we’d get, so we plugged Mumbuluma Falls into the GPS and figured we’d see how it went. 

It was still raining, and if it persisted, we weren’t in a hurry to get to camp anyway. This route would take us out the alternative approach road, the D48, to Bangweulu, so we would now know for sure which is the easier road. Spoiler alert, it is the D733 that we’d taken in, not this route out to the south.

On we drove through all the puddles from before, now larger, waving all the while at all the packs of children that came charging out, impervious to rain, to see the wazungu drive by. After checking out at the gate and passing the small village there, we took the new-to-us right fork and pressed on.

The road deteriorates, gets smaller and narrower, a bumpy red-dirt track through attractive forest land. People thin out, and the forest thickens. If it wasn’t for the state of the road, it would be a really attractive drive.

We turned right onto the D47, stopping for a snack and coffee top-up at the now derelict Lake Waka Waka campsite. You could easily still camp here if you were self sufficient, but in the dripping, grey atmosphere of today it did not look attractive. Onward.

Finally we were back onto tar. It was clear that Mumbuluma Falls was too far, so we lowered our sights a bit to Samfya, a small Zambian resort town on the western shores of Lake Bangweulu. This road brought us within spitting distance of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, which always looms mysterious and dangerous in my mind, having read about so many of the troubles there.

We were firmly off the tourist trail now, in real Africa. Not that where we’ve been to date isn’t, but this is uncolored by any attempt whatsoever to satisfy the likes of us, just Africans going about life. Mini busses, trucks, road-side fruit stalls, Chinese made bicycles heavily laden with charcoal or mangoes or wood.  

After what seemed a really long day we arrived at “Samfya Beach Marine,” a little seaside resort, though I use the term loosely. Samfya appeared an odd surprise to us; out of nowhere popped this tidy lakeside town with white sandy beaches and a few bars, restaurants and lodges set up for locals to come and party on the weekends. Thankfully it was not the weekend. Samfya Beach Marine officially claims to have a campsite, but it is a modest corner on a sloping hill to pitch a tent, not suitable for a vehicle with a roof top tent. Instead they gave us a spot to park the car on the grass, and we were satisfied.

It is Thanksgiving day, the big American holiday based on feasting. Instead we made phone calls to family back home, ate leftovers, made a big batch of popcorn and drank several cold beers while staring into the lake.

The Nitty Gritty

I hope to add a short video to this post soon.

I posted the official rate sheet for park fees, camping Bangweulu activities in my last post. As I said before, Nsobe is a first class wilderness campsite, but do come expecting fine amenities, you should be self sufficient. In our minds the showers and ablutions were an unexpected bonus. 

In spite of our adventures I do recommend the Shoebill tracking, and I’d be curious to know if others felt their experience was as unvarnished as our own. Of course it all depends on where the birds are, you might go and pole your way right to them in the canoe, or there could be considerably more hiking needed. Our guide estimated that we hiked five kilometers round trip. 

Samfya Beach Marine I can’t really recommend as more than a stopover. It was 150 ZMK pp, fine enough but a little overpriced for the afterthought that we were. That said, everyone was perfectly friendly. Ablutions here were 2/5, with the ladies side being maybe 3/5. The mens’ side is always worse. 

Roads – Of the two roads to enter Bangweulu, the northern road, the D733, was in much better condition when we traveled. It was a wide graded road with some bad sections. The southern road, on paper the more logical approach if coming from Kasanka, for example, was certainly drivable but is slow going. 

Once out of Bangweulu and the GMAs and back on the tar, the D235 to Samfya is in variable condition. Much of it is fine enough, but it is punctuated with enough bad sections and pot holes that it does become tiring. I would say it actually improves a bit the further along you go. Roadside vendors are present in almost every village, with tomatoes, mangoes, onions and dried fish being the staples. 

Note: a huge thanks to my editors! Jenny proof reads most posts for accuracy and grammar, and if I post something totally improbable or with lots of errors, it’s probably because I was too impatient to publish and she didn’t get a chance to read it. My mother is also providing great feedback and editing. Thank you!