Livingstone, Zambia

It was a busy day today. We were at OR Tambo at 9am to check in for our flight to Livingstone, on the Zambia side of Victoria Falls.

I had had a hard time keeping it straight when planning about which city was on which side, and what excursions were on each side. Canadians only get a single-entry on each side, ($50 USD for Zambia, $75 for Zimbabwe). The tour operators don't make it clear about which country they occur, as they just want to book everything for you. Anyways, we would find out if I booked it correctly over the next couple days :)

There was a long line up to check in, about. 45 minutes. It was quite a difference from two weeks ago when we flew through to Mozambique. December is the start of busy season, oh well.

The flight was 1:15h, plenty of time for a cheese sandwich and drinks to be served. It hit the spot.

Immigration took a while as the official had to fill out lots of paperwork for each person. We took 45m to get through, and there were at most 75 people on our flight.

Anyways our luggage was waiting st the carousel, as well as a taxi driver from the hotel. It was a bit confusing as it was a person with airport access who greeted us, and then handed us off to the taxi driver outside.

It was hot, about 35C. It was much more humid than Johannesburg. There had been a mix up with the reservation and so we were all in one family-sized chalet. I had originally booked the family chalet when it was just Marissa, as it was cheaper for her; but then when Nancy joined it was just as easy to have two chalets. The Green Tree Lodge either mixed it up or overbooked, it wasn't clear.

The manager was very good at going through our options for excursions. We had reserved Devils Pool in advance for tomorrow morning, which was good, because it's getting popular and you need to book at least a week in advance. Other people at our lodge had showed up expecting to book and couldn't get in :(

We arranged for a taxi to take us to the Falls at 4pm, when it would be (slightly) cooler. The sky darkened with storm clouds just as we left. We drove through heavy rains for the ten minute drive to the Falls, at which point the rain slowed to a light drizzle. The heat and humidity had broken, and it actually felt nice out!

Paid the $20 USD park entry fee and we were off to see Victoria Falls! It was still drizzling enough that I kept my camera on my pack. And then we were there! It's low flow at this time of year, and on the Zambia side there's not much water, but the plus side is that you can actually see the gorge. At high flow, all you see is a big mist.

There's different vantage points along the well maintained path. It's also possible to walk out on the dry river bed of the Zambezi, and peer over into the gorge. We didn't do this, although the tourists who did made great subjects in my pics.

It stopped drizzling after about 10 minutes. There were still dark clouds on the horizon which also worked well for pics, instead of a bright haze.

It was quite impressive to see the size of Victoria Falls, with some imagination for high flow season.

Bought a little knickknack for a souvenir from Zambia, as we were in the country for only 24 hours.

We decided to stop for dinner in town, at Olga's Italian restaurant. They have the best pizza in town. I think it's also the only pizza in town, so the claim of best is factual. We had a Mosi beer (the local name for the Falls is Mosi au Tonya, literally, smoke that thunders). Drove back to the lodge and called it a night.