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October 30th – November 5th, 2021

Adventure heats up in Zambia

*This is a long one, but lots of new experiences for us. Also though these route has no doubt been done by many, I have not found many reports on it, so I have gone into a lot of detail.

I was a bit nervous, today was the first of several small but real risks that I’d signed us up for to make this itinerary work, and to keep things interesting. The key of course to not be too interesting, we wouldn’t want to get stuck, for example. This time it was crossing Lower Zambezi National Park. Normally you can only drive into the park from the West, or perhaps if you are adventurous and if the road is in good shape, you can take the northern escarpment road. Our guidebook advises against this, threatening real risk of a rollover on the steep roads, but it all depends on the state of the road in any given year, which will vary a lot.

The road east out of the park is not risky from a technical stand point, the climb not nearly as steep as the escarpment road, only that it may not exist. Or that it may be impassable, blocked by washed out ravines, or maybe trees pushed over by elephants might block the way. I don’t mean to be overly dramatic, but having been warned about the Zambian roads in November so many times, and having only heard a few reports of crossing by this route one can’t help but wonder if this is such a great plan. 

We left Mvuu at sunrise. Pete and Melissa were game for our scheme, although I am not sure I really briefed them adequately, but they are hardy travelers and as a team we are very good. Pete started off driving, moving at ‘transit speed’, occasionally a little over 30 kph. 40 kph is the rarely attainable speed limit in the GMA and the park, and one has to be very careful not to accidentally spook an elephant or come up on game around corners. We wanted to bank a little time for later in the day. 

We double checked with the rangers at the gate they assured us the road was passable. At the gate we also had a quick chat with another self drive vehicle, a South African couple that had moved to Zambia 15 years ago and was on holiday. 

In the short time at the gate we somehow managed to go from discussing the huge pack of wild dogs in the park to digress to politics, finding we were far on the opposite sites of the political spectrum. There was awkward talk of America’s last president, the current one, covid and the rest of it. At least we agreed on how great it was to be in the bush and not read the news. After we extracted ourselves from that we were on our way. They also planned to cross the park out the east, so we were likely to see them again and we hoped to avoid politics, though the husband appeared eager to dive right in. Luckily we did see them again, though not to talk politics as it turned out. 

Originally we wanted to take the main road deeper into the park before doing a bit of game driving, but we were worried we were wasting the little early morning time we had when wildlife might be most active, so we ducked down the the myriad of tracks closer to the river. 

A few spots required crossing very modest stretches of water, probably not even up to the rims, but there did seem to be some mud. Pete is a capable 4×4 driver, but as it is our car he deferred to our methods, which were to go into low range second gear for every crossing, no matter how benign it appeared. Every time we marched through without issue, even though it was overkill most of the time.

We marched in and out of the winterthorn trees, their canopy trimmed neatly by elephants, so we could see far into the forest. Impala, warthog, troops of guinea fowl, small groups of elephants all were mingling on the wide flood plains adjacent to the river. It looked just like the photos I’ve seen of the more famous Mana Pools, just across the river on the Zimbabwe side. Lots of birds as well, egrets and storks, ibis, a million doves, the occasional pied kingfisher, more carmine bee eaters all were present. 

We watched an elephant furiously charge a group of warthogs, who obligingly moved off, though they did not appear as alarmed as the elephant intended. We also had an adolescent elephant trumpeting angrily at us, ears wide in alarm, and an older elephant actually walked near to him and put their trunk on top of his, pushing it down, clearly saying, “That is enough of that.” And he stopped. These small interactions are what is so fascinating to see. 

Pete thinks poorly of lions and leopards, they get all the fame but you hardly ever see them do anything. But elephants and warthogs and herds of impala and puku are diurnal, or at least more so, and when we get these small glimpses of their life it is very special.

On another of the many unmarked loops in the park, a bit NE of the hippo pools, we spotted a male lion. He was sitting in the shade near a buffalo kill. After watching him do nothing (Pete started bird watching, uninterested in these boring cats) he was disturbed and had to defend his kill, from a pair of vultures. 

They would creep closer, sometimes side stepping so as to appear that they were just innocently approaching the buffalo, and then the great cat would rush the birds and they would fly off. He moved closer to the kill, and the vultures would move in again, slowly stepping a bit at time, patiently waiting, then stepping closer again. And he would rush them again. 

It was fascinating to watch, but was also eating up our time. We knew that we were going to have to get a move on if we were going to make it out of the park on time. Fairly confident that not much was going to happen with our lion anyway, we moved on.

Another kilometer and a half or so NE and the road cuts north, back towards the main road and Jeki Airstrip, where we would turn away from the river and start our eastward exit road.

We Get Stuck

The park had other plans though. We were presented with a muddy donga, about 1.5 land cruiser lengths long. It was mud, not water, and looked like it could be trouble. On the other hand there were relatively fresh tracks of another vehicle that had apparently passed. Pete looked at me questioningly, should he go for it? With false confidence I said yes, low range second gear and gun it to keep momentum up. Just one more of the many small crossings we’d made that day.

Off we went, engine roaring in low range, plowing across, and without any apparent effort at all the black cotton soil sucked us in and we stopped dead. Nothing. Our off-road tires had been reduced to slicks, fully caked with mud. We tried to back and fro with double diffs locked, but with no traction it didn’t matter. We were sunk pretty much to the rear axel, stuck.

This was a first for us, we’ve driven 50,000 kilometers around Africa in this cruiser and we know we are lucky to have not been stuck yet. Deep sand, no problem. In mud though we are novices, only a few other encounters. And the black cotton soil is famous. It’s wet clay make up is like some sort of non-newtonian fluid that doesn’t behave the laws of physics, both incredibly sticky and also fearsomely slick at the same time. When walking in it your get taller and taller as the mud builds up on the soles of your shoes, or in Jenny’s case, even barefoot she grew stilts.

It was the middle of the day, 40°C, we were deep into a national park with few visitors, almost non of which ever come this far into the park. We have no winch, though even if we did the closest tree was quite far away. Winch advocates will often say, “Well then you just bury your spare tire and use it as an anchor.” Yeah, right. If I’m going to dig a trench deep enough to drop my spare tire into I think I’ll just dig our my car instead, thank you.

We do however have a hi-lift jack, shovel, max trax and a Land Cruiser full of capable folks. I got out first to explore the scene. We were bogged deep. It was very hot. The mud sucked hard at my boots and I lumbered to hard ground. After a brief survey we elected to go for the max trax.

These orange traction boards are well regarded by the off-road and cost a fortune. To date we’ve only ever used them for leveling the car a sloped campsite, so let’s just see if they are worth the money.

We hemmed and hawed about strategy. Putting the max trax under the rear wheels, to lift the heavy back end of the cruiser, seemed like it might be the way to go. On the other hand the front axel and wheels were almost clear. If we could get good traction up front with the differentials locked, perhaps that would do it? It certainly looked like less work. 

Pete and Jenny forsook shoes, knowing it was hopeless. I clung to my boots, even though mud came in over the tops. Melissa was on animal watch, knowing there were elephants about and at least one lion 1.5 kilometers away. Which seems like a long ways, until you’ve got your back turned and are calf deep in the mud. 

We dug and dug, and the mud refused to dislodge from the shovel. Meaning every shovel full got heavier and heavier as we tried to knock the mud off. It was heavy work. We cleared the front tires, shoved a few sticks in front of the rear tires, put in the max trax and gave it our first try. 

The black cotton laughed at us. Nothing, not even a hint of progress. We conceded that we had sort of gone for the quick and dirty approach, hoping for an easy out. This time we got serious. 

We got our hi-lift jack out, and formidable tool that is capable of remarkable assistance in this sort of thing. After all, how are you going to jack up a car with a bottle jack when the mud is up to the axel? But also the hi-lift jack is the cause of many injuries, because if you don’t fully engage each click the long steel lever arm will whip back up and smack the user in the jaw. That was the last thing we needed, and injury deep in the bush with no vehicle, so we proceeded with caution. 

This time we dug more and got the max trax properly in there. We dug out the front axel more. We dug out the rear wheels more, though water seeped in around them making it hard to tell just how big the hole the rear was in. Clearly big.

Second attempt…nada. We got the slightest vibration of the tires riding on the studs of the traction boards, but no bite. We needed to jack the vehicle up higher, get the max trax fully under the front tires if we were going have any hope. I also was thinking maybe we had made a critical error, trying for the front tires. We thought we’d give it one more try before regrouping. 

At this point in time Melissa wisely ordered us to start taking breaks. It was blisteringly hot and we were pouring with sweat, working in the direct sunlight. We actually left the vehicle running and a/c blasting, so we took turns. Two outside slogging away in the mud, two inside drinking water and cooling off a bit. The a/c seems sort of like a wimp move for a real off-road African explorer, but I like to think that back in the day we’d have been almost as happy under the shade of the not so far away tree. And the risk of heat exhaustion was high.

I thought about Paul Stewart’s “Trek”, recounting a young kid digging out a Morris Traveler (!) from the sand of the Sahara, without a shovel, working at night to avoid the heat of the desert. Or Frederik and Josephine’s remarkable account of crossing the Congo (also without a winch) and digging the car out multiple times a day. If they can do it then so can we.

Or maybe we can’t. Getting close to try number three our other self drive friends from the gate pull up behind us. Can you believe it? We were stunned, having only seen one other vehicle so far that day. They walked up and greeted, graciously thanking us for finding the deep mud so they didn’t have to. We chatted a bit about them pulling us out, and we decided it’d be best if they try to find another way around the mud to try and pull us out by the front. 

Their finding a way around gave us time for one last chance to salvage our pride and try to get ourselves out. Initially we were relishing the challenge, but the heat was sapping our enthusiasm, that and we were on borrowed time to get out of the park.

Pete and Jenny work together back home and are a great team. They were out making the last sally against the black cotton. The hi-lift jack was doing it’s thing, though they snapped our wooden board we use as a base plate. They tried lifting each tire up so the max trax could sit under the tires. We had good contact, and I engaged low range first gear and made our last attempt. Nothing. We heard the tires trying to grab the boards, but at this point it became clear that the rear was too heavy and bogged too deep. This probably would have been obvious to more experienced off-roaders. 

It had taken them 30 minutes or so of hunting to find a way around, but their 100 series cruiser pulled up, this time in front of us. I pulled out our kinetic recovery strap, and right away they tried to put the strap on their tow ball, a huge no-no. This is because the tow ball is only supported at one end, and a very common very dangerous accident is for the tow ball bolt to shear and for the tow ball itself to fly through the windshield of the vehicle being recovered, potentially killing the driver. 

Right around when all this was happening a herd of elephant started crossing the mud about 100 yards away. Not what we needed, to be all chased into the cars by elephant. But they are dangerous, and everyone seems to agree that the elephants in the Lower Zambezi are particularly surly, too many years of poaching I suppose. We kept an eye on them, and they on us. I think they didn’t like the look of us either and thankfully they moved off without fuss. 

That over, I politely talked our friend into moving the recovery strap. He had some sort of tow hook under his bumper, and we had the tie down points that are stock on every vehicle. These are not meant for kinetic recovery, where you deliberately leave slack in the tow line and shock load it, counting on the elasticity of the recovery strap to compound the energy and snatch the bogged vehicle out of the mud. This works very well, but is dangerous and must be done correctly at every step. Those points we were using are actually for securing the vehicle when being shipped. Getting proper recovery points has been on my todo list for quite a long time and I never got around to it, which I was regretting now.

Strap rigged we went for a straight tow out, no snatching us out. He pulled ahead in low range first, and when the line came tight Pete did the same, me directing. And…out she came, no drama.

What a relief. We chatted a bit with our saviors, saying our thank yous emphatically and also discussing the route for the rest of the day. It was getting late to make Bridge Camp, but we’d see what we could do. 

It took us a while to recover from our recovery. We were more or less covered in mud, the vehicle was a mess. All our recovery gear was also muddy, and also had been sitting in the intense heat of the Zambian sun, so the jack was so hot we couldn’t even touch it without gloves. We retreated the whole operation to the shade of a tree. We washed the mud off in the hot dirty water of the mud hole we’d just got stuck in, which was no doubt some percentage hippo and elephant urine, but it did the trick. 

I learned a lot of lessons in that short time. Respect black cotton soil. Don’t take risks you don’t have to. That people with irreconcilable political differences are also capable of great kindness, though I can say after our initial conversation I had definitely lost sight of that.

Much of the rest of the afternoon was spent discussing the technical approach we would have taken next. I think jacking up each corner of the vehicle, and putting sticks and rocks under the front, and the max tracks under the back would have been the right approach.  Also just a ton more digging of that infernal mud. It was so sticky the digging experience was very frustrating. 

Alternatively I have heard of jacking up the vehicle high enough to push it sideways off the jack and into new tracks, out of the ruts we had made. Perhaps? Given enough time we’d figure it out I’m sure. 

After all that it was time to get going. Insult to injury, we had also just burned what little game driving time we’d had to try to see a bit of the middle of the park. Feeling buoyed by our rescue and fairly optimistic, why I do not know, we decided to take just the slightest detour from the main road to see at least a little bit of this part of the park that had so far eluded us.

Just before Jeki Airstrip we took the road that passes south of a pan of intermittent water marked on T4A. Right away the landscape South and East of Jeki airstrip was totally different than what we had seen. We could see for what seemed kilometers though the forest, obliging trimmed to the same level by elephants. Under the blue green leaves of the winterthorne trees we could see more elephant, impala, puku, herds of buffalo and waterbuck. It really lended itself to viewing with binoculars because you could see so far, yet still in the forest. The animals were still skittish.

Now it was business time, time to make our break out of the park. It is illegal to bush camp in the park and we intended to avoid it if at all possible. Not least because we didn’t want to incur another day of park fees, not to mention if there was some sort of fine for illegally camping in the park. We hoped to bush camp east of the park boundary, thinking that Bridge Camp was probably too far by now. 

Making the turn north the winterthorn gave way to thick dry miombo and acacia scrub, the road littered with fresh elephant dung. It was two spoor track, but for the most part in pretty good shape, with the odd go-around trees that had been fallen across the road by elephant. We joke that elephants hate trees, but of course they do this to get the sweet leaves that are otherwise out of reach.

The road tees at a junction, with the sign to the left showing “Lusaka”, the beginning of the escarpment road. The road the the right, no sign, is ours. It immediately crosses the deep sand of the dry Mushika River bed. The road is long, slow and just rocky enough that you can’t make any speed of note. We bumped, jostled and vibrated along, the hour getting later and the sun lower. We crossed countless small dry rivers that would certainly be difficult or impossible in the wet. There was also a lot of evidence of a road crew having been through, with branches trimmed with saws that would have other wise been across the road, and earth having been moved aside or pushed into washouts to make it passable. 

I imagine that we transited this road in the best condition it gets, with a full dry season of maintenance by whatever park staff that use it. I’m sure that every wet season it becomes impassable and the road crew must start anew.

We passed one wonderful bush camp site that was still within the park boundaries and we hoped we might see something similar once we exited. Eventually we crossed the green line on the GPS, and we began to accept that there is no eastern gate to the park. The terrain here is thick woodland with hardly space to pull off the road, and also thick with tsetse flies. Not very appetizing bush camping. Not too much longer we started to see the first settlement, and the first person we saw had a rifle slung, though it wasn’t clear for what purpose. He waved and smiled and we kept moving.

Just at dusk we arrived at the D145 tar road, and it was clear that we either would have to camp in the village or make the hour drive to Bridge Camp in the dark. Not having the energy to organize village camping, where we would no doubt be very welcome, but also the focus of a lot of attention and curiosity, we decided to break our “don’t drive at night in Africa” rule. 

This road leads south to the border and I was worried it would be thick with truck traffic, but it was quiet. Jenny drove, she is often what I call “the closer” good at the end of the day, at city driving, and at the dynamic driving through busy villages and roads where things are not predicable. 

People were all over the road. Bicycles, kids, women with loads on their head, people carrying thatch cut for roofing and charcoal for cooking and who knows what else. We think that in these dusky dark hours people are doing the hard manual labor that it is too hot to do in the middle of the sweltering November days. This means the road is for them more than us. Since there were no almost no other cars we drove right down the middle, finally arriving at Bridge Camp about an hour and a half after nightfall. 

Bridge Camp was very welcoming, knowing that our night drive was probably not all that relaxing the greeted us with, “It is all okay now, you have arrived.” We quickly made camp, gratefully took showers to rinse off the days labors, threw together some quick pasta for dinner and collapsed into bed.

The Petauke Road

Morning came at Bridge Camp the moment the upper limb of the sun broke the horizon, the heat was turned on. Hot and no breeze, even at the early hour of five-something o’clock there was no point in trying to stay in bed. We rose and lingered in the shade, sipping coffee and having a slower morning after our big day the day before. 

The fridge was turned down a wee bit too cold and the boiled eggs were frozen and unappetizing, but with the heat I didn’t have much interest anyway. After a slowish time of relaxing a bit Jenny realized before the rest of us that we actually had a pretty big day ahead and we should get a move on. This had the benefit of getting us into the air conditioned cab, so it wasn’t a hard sell for anyone.

The goal today was to drive the Petauke road to the Luangwa Valley. Normally the Great East Road is taken from Lusaka, a mostly excellent paved highway. It is a 10 or 11 hour drive from Lusaka if you are not fussing around, or you can break the day, as many do, at Bridge Camp. The alternative is the rougher and less certain Petauke Road (technically the D139 to D513 to D134) that is more direct, but a slow gravel road. 

Marked as dry season only, I read one report saying it took someone four days to take this route, but Tracks4Africa (T4A) said it was 7.5 hours, so we crossed our fingers for the latter, assuming the four days was an attempt too early in the season. 

Also on the list for the day was a minor provision, top up diesel and buy some more airtime. We thought we’d try the roadside market at the Luangwa bridge, but freshies were lacking, mostly a whole lot of dried fish. We would look further along.

After several days of dirt road traveling it was nice to be back on the tar for a bit and we enjoyed the easy cruising along tarmac. I picked up a speeding ticket for doing 67 in a 60 zone, oops! There was a camera trap, and the truck I was passing at the time also got flagged down.

The truck driver was having a fairly animated argument with the police, and the police were game, sort of, “Alright, you want to argue about it, lets argue about it!” Which I appreciate, that they didn’t take it as disrespecting their authority I guess. Certainly not the same you’d get from the police in America. 

I did not argue, and paid my 300 Kw ($17 USD) fine, complete with an “Admission of Guilt” receipt printed on nice stationary. The police officer did offer to me, “I help you out if you help me out.” Meaning he’d give me a lower fine if I didn’t require him to provide a receipt. I declined his offer of a bribe, and in a few minutes was on my way. All three of the traffic police present were friendly and all smiles, no guilt trip, just them knowing they had caught me and otherwise happy to wish us well on our journey.  

Surprisingly Petauke has no information on iOverlander, the crowd sourced app for overlanding information on fuel, campsites, water, shopping and the like. We found town to have all we needed. Fuel was cash only, because “the network is down”, a common refrain, but there was an ABSA ATM in town, as well as a Choppies grocery store. I bought eggs off some kid on the street, 2 kw/ea. The same price as in Chirundu, perhaps the egg price is fixed?

From here it was onto the unknown and back to rural dirt roads. The beginning, on the D139, is a wonderful graded road through the countryside. We aired down the tires a bit. Locals on bicycles and walking dot the road, the red dirt road stretched before us and the land cruiser ate up the kilometers, gliding over the corrugations as well as one could ask for. 

Large mango trees provide glorious shade in many of the villages we drove by, branches heaped full of almost ripe mangos. Looks like it will be a bumper crop of the fruit this year, I hope we are here still, I’m sure the mangos will be cheap by the looks of the volume available. Mosts of the fields we drove by were unplanted, appearing to be last years crop of cotton, among other things. 

Perhaps they don’t plant until the rainy season comes? But it is coming soon. So soon in fact that I my mind skips ahead to our next uncertainty. Will we manage to drive the infamous 05 Road up the Muchinga Escarpment from South Luangwa to Kasanka? Will we make it to Ntemwa Camp in Busanga Plains, where the camp owner has warned us of the bad roads and asked if we have a winch? Cottony cumulous clouds loom, laden with moisture and I ponder our back up plans.

Once we connect to the D513 the road slows a bit, a normal rural gravel road. Not bad, but not fast. Village after village passes by and we see some real country life. It is interesting to travel with our friends, who have never been to Zambia, who ask great questions on how it all works, most of which we don’t know the answers to. We note that almost everyone’s teeth are so white and beautiful, and I assume they’re not going to the dentist for their six month checkup?

Also deforestation is happening, the charcoal industry biting deep into the country side. I can hardly begrudge the rural community doing what they can to make a living, but it is very hard to see. A swath a half a kilometer wide or more stretches on either side of this rural road of trees cut down and charcoal pits smoldering. It is hard to see.

Another chore on the list is to top up our water tank. We kept driving by village boreholes, but many are placed amongst huts or are thronged with people. Eventually we passed one nearby the road, still with lots of people around it but easy to drive the truck to, so we may as well ask if we can get some water.

There is a bit of a commotion when we stop, and one older lady understands we want some water. It is children and women who pump the water, and without discussion they start to try to pour their water buckets into our tank. Not making us wait in line, not letting us pump our own water. Pouring a bucket into our tank is hard due to where it’s placed, so we start to fill some empty 5 liter jugs we have and pour them in. At first they pumped, but feeling guilty that they are doing the work eventually we were allowed in and Melissa took over the  pumping.

This trip we brought a small photo album from home, of our house, of sights near home in California and of our work. We’re a big curiosity in this group, and I wanted to share a little bit, not just swoop in, take water and leave, so I bust out the album and start showing photos. I crouched down to show some kids, and in seconds I was surrounded by an igloo of people all crowding in to see what I had. This was great fun, and worked to allow Pete, Jenny and Melissa to get the water filled.

We took a few photos and waved goodbye, all in good spirits. No one asked for anything except a few kids at the end asking for sweets or money. This contrasts to earlier on the same road or other places where the begging has been pronounced and uncomfortable. 

When kids get on their hands and knees and hold out their cupped hands as we drive by, I hate it. I think some tourists must throw out sweets or coins? I don’t know, but if you are traveling here please do not promote begging. In my mind giving sweets, coins or even school supplies is to make you feel good about yourself, less for their benefit. Give to reputable charitable organizations, or if you want to be more personal perhaps to the local school master or clinic. But beware of the risk, you are painting tourists as a source of free stuff.

The road turns worse, slower, rocky. In parts there are no villages and trees stand mostly unmolested, but a surprising amount of the road is lined with rural villages. Mostly people wave or are uninterested in us, a few kids running after us with big smiles. 

We wondered if when we got to the Game Management Area (GMA, a large sort of buffer zone around National Parks) if the charcoal harvesting would stop. There is no sign when crossing the line, and no, it does not stop. It thins a bit, but continues. Arriving at the Luangwa River the park is on the opposite bank and the GMA on our side with the road. Eventually the settlements thin out. Since our plans are to bush camp tonight I started to have some reservations, would we be able to find a place to camp out of the way from all the people? The daylight was getting lower and we didn’t have forever to find camp. 

We saw a large herd of elephants, giraffe, impala, and baboons. After some poking around we find a spur off the road that loops out along flats with grass tightly trimmed by hippos. Further along this two spoor track brought us out onto sandy flats, and after a grove of tsetse fly filled trees we found the most amazing clearing. 

A bush camp has a long list of requirements. It must be in a place that it is legal to camp (most, but not all, GMA zones this is allowed, check ahead of time), preferably in a place with some visibility and clear from brush so that you can see animals before their on top of you, out of the sight of the road to stay clear of the unwanted attention, though any local that happens across our camp is almost certainly likely to just be curious about our story. Clear of brush also means less flies, we also look for a flat camp site, a place where a fire can be safely laid, and if we are lucky a nice view. This time we had it all, one of our finest I would say.

That night we grilled chicken and butternut over the fire and listened to the sounds of the bush. Loud roaring and chuffing of lions came after dark, and with our brightest flashlight and the binoculars we could just see the eyes of at least four lions in the distance. Game was abundant in this area and we weren’t worried, they had much more interesting things to go after than us, but it was wonderful to see and know all this wildlife was about. 

Also we noticed the lights of someone else’s camp in the distance. Probably local fishing camps that we had driven by. On top of this we saw a small brush fire, ubiquitous in the rural countryside. Coming from California an unattended brush fire is unheard of and extremely dangerous, but here they are common and seem to fizzle out.

This one certainly fizzled, because it started raining. Dramatic looking thunderstorms began to sweep the Luangwa Valley, and we watched lighting in the distance as we ate dinner under the awning as it rained. The whole thing was sort of magical, what a first bush camp for our friends.

It was sweltering when we arrived, and with the cool breeze and rain dropped the temps quite a bit, thankfully. Lions roared, hippos wheezing and honking and hyenas whooping, we slept hard.

In the night I realized that we had driven over some dry soil that could turn to mud upon our departure from this camp, but we rose in the morning to find it baked dry by the early morning sun. 

Leaving early we enjoyed a game drive in the GMA on our way to Wildlife Camp. We saw Thornicroft’s Giraffe, only found in the Luangwa Valley, and herds of elephant and the other usual suspects. We also were driving an signposted loop towards the river and were stopped by a hunting vehicle. They declared that this was a private road and that we had to turn back as there were “active baits” in the area.

The guide did the talking and was very polite, but the client gave us the evil eye, clearly very annoyed that we had stumbled into his hunt. Hunting is allowed in the GMA, land leased to concession holders by the government who in turn organize hunts. The practice is in theory well regulated, though in practice it varies. 

Turning around we thought about the lions we’d seen last night and hoped that the active baits weren’t intended for them.

After what we felt was quite a journey, we arrived at Wildlife Camp, just outside the small town of Mfuwe and the Zambia’s most famous park, South Luangwa National Park. 

Wildlife camp has four sites set along the river, and several more set back a bit. All have access to the view of the river front, gazing across to the National Park. On arrival a large herd of elephant were at the waterhole near reception and made their way on to the sand bank in front of camp to drink from the river, and later crossed behind camp into the GMA. Wildlife abounds. 

There are also chalets and safari tents away from the camping area. There is a very welcome pool, to cool off from the over 40°C temps, as well as a bar. I saw a restaurant, but we did not eat there. 

Over the next few days we enjoyed South Luangwa National Park and Wildlife camp. Highlights were having a pack of wild dogs run through the back of camp. Later they made a kill out of sight and we saw them go down to the river to drink right in front of camp. We watched wild dogs from the pool! A few lions came near to camp one night, very loud, and staff later told us they killed an impala behind camp that night. That isn’t even in the park!

In the park we did a night drive organized by the camp and saw three leopards in one night, two of which were a mating pair. This on top of a Pel’s fishing owl in daylight, hyenas, bushbabies, and George the miraculous spotter picked up a tiny chameleon in the trees in the dark.

We also did a walking safari in the park and learned quite a bit about important elements of the ecosystem that are left out of our books. How termites are instrumental to the ecosystem, identified different kinds of trees, got a tracking lesson and more. 

On our own drives we did quite well too, though nothing overly dramatic. There are animals everywhere and it was hard to know which way to go. I think I slightly preferred the southern game driving tracks, but Jenny likes the north. All are good.

We also ventured into Mfuwe town to refuel and provision. Last time we really liked the Manyana Market, just out of town. Extremely clean and they have frozen meat and other goods, including probably the best biltong chili bites we’ve ever had. This time around though they were low on stock and we didn’t do as well. So we shopped in the open market, which has the benefit of being very inexpensive.

We spent the last evening getting packed and stowed for an early getaway, to drive the 05. It had rained again in the park at night, but Herman, owner of Wildlife Camp, thought the road would be drivable. He said that if the river was too high to camp there for the night and it would come down to a drivable level. There is a ranger camp across the river at the exit gate, and assuming we could talk to them he thought they would be okay with that. 

A little apprehensive about the big day ahead, we slept.

The Nitty Gritty

Lower Zambezi National Park

Fees are $30 pppd for international visitors. Vehicle is $15. The normal fee for international visitors is $25, but raised to $30 for self drive visitors, I don’t know why. The check in process can be a bit cumbersome, so at the gate if you know your plans you can pay for multiple days in a row, saving you time at the gate for future days. This has saved us a lot of precious early morning game viewing time at Lower Zambezi and South Luangwa.

If visiting this park in the future I think we’re likely to bee-line it for the area South and East of Jeki airstrip, even though it is further into the park. Even though it means getting up very early I think it’s worth being ready to enter at 0600, at least in the hot season, to gain those few precious hours and minutes of cool temperatures that animals will be more active.

To drive either the escarpment road or the road to the east make sure you are confident in your vehicle and preferably have some means of communicating for help. Satphone or inReach or whatever. If a satphone make sure you have a number to call too, it hardly will do you any good other wise. The eastern road would not be passable by a vehicle much bigger than ours, there were many low branches and we earned quite a few “bush stripes”, with brush dragging down the side of the vehicle.

From the turn north at the Mushika river (S15° 36.341′ E29° 45.364’) to the tar road, the D145, took us 3h 40m. I would have preferred to go slower, but we were trying to save ourselves some night driving.

Bridge Camp

200kw pppn ($12 USD). Camp area is uninspiring, with a shared shaded area and dish washing sink. Camp is very close to road, but thankfully traffic is minimal. Ablutions are near by, with hot water provided by a donkey boiler (read: intermittent supply). Hot water was totally unnecessary, in fact the cold water was fairly warm. Ablutions score, maybe a 3/5. Good enough, but a bit funky.

They do have a really nice bar deck, small swimming pool surrounded by bougainvillea, and food available. All with a view of the Luangwa River. This area is really nice and I could see spending an afternoon here. 

Wildlife Camp

$10 pppn. Sites 6-9 are riverfront. All the river front sites are good, with maybe a slight preference to site No. 6 for view and a bit more space. Each has a shaded picnic table, braai area, fire pit and electricity. Shared ablutions are close by and very tidy, with hot water. 

We got laundry done here for a reasonable fee. We also filled water here and suffered no ill effects. They have wi-fi, supposedly available at reception from noon-1400. To Pete’s repeated consternation it was never available from noon-1400, because that is when the boss was on lunch break and he took the wifi router with him. Regardless, if you need wifi it’s probably available sometime. There is cell reception for airtel at camp.