Today was boat day. Our morning and evening excursions were on a couple of small boats on the Kafue and Lufupa rivers which converge near our camp... a small pontoon boat that seats about 10 people, and a very small flat craft with several lawn chairs for seating. A very relaxing day out on the water. Our lodging here at Kafue (kuh-fooey) is right on the bank of the Kafue River...
My writing desk here at Kafue, overlooking the river - Dear Dr. Livingstone. I suggest you make due haste. So much here to explore and discover...
Our beds at all of the camps had mosquito netting, though we found insects to not be much of a problem, other than one area that had tsetse flys, the ones that carry malaria and whose bites are nasty...
I'm watching baboons chase each other about now as I'm writing in Linkwasha Camp in Hwange National Park... they are all over the place! The baboons and antelope come to the water hole here by the lodge about mid-afternoon, before the elephants and larger critters come later on toward sunset. Harmony and sharing... oh, would that humans were so in synch with nature! As Darwin said, it's not necessdarily the strongest or most intelligent that survive, but those who cooperate. Oh, here come the zebra now.
But back to the water, and our boat day, at Kafue now... we saw crocodiles (wow, they are fast, and vicious, we are told). Jesus Birds, so named because the walk on the lily pads, appearing to be walking on water. We saw mostly birds and hippos on the boat excursions. Again, these guides are incredible at spotting wildflife.
Gordon was piloting our very small boat with the lawn chairs, and spotted movement on the bank of the river... it was a leopard... we got only a fleeting glimpse as it passed through an open spot in the vegetation. Leopards are very shy and not a threat to man in the wild really unless cornered or otherwise threatened. Score! I was very pleased since I had missed the earlier leopard sighting... dwindling populations have made seeing a leopard anything but a sure thing these days, we are told.
During our tea break, we went ashore and had drinks and snacks, and Arthur showed us a game, Nhodo, played with pebbles and a ball-like seed pod about the size of a tennis ball. It is very much like the game of 'Jacks' we played as kids. Jan gave it a try but isn't planning on quitting her day retirement...
Our camp manager welcoming us back after the morning boat trip...
We had our farewell dinner at Kafue tonight with a fire under the stars, and singing and dancing. Again, the staff wanted us to sing them a song after they had regaled us with some wonderful dancing and chanting and singing to the beat of drums. Poor Artuhr... he had to witness another lousy rendition of Take Me Out To The Ballgame. Hey, we didn't know we would be called on to perform on this trip!
Again, a good time was had by all...
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