Better than the Pony Swim in Chincoteague!

I always wanted to see the ponies swim in Chincoteague Virginia, but never made it for the annual event.  However, I think we may have topped it by watching the elephants swim the Chobe River.  I would put it down in the most amazing category, however Charlie, who looks like a true safari guy in this photo below is not too impressed if you listen to his comments in the video that follows.

We boarded our boat after reading these signs...

The elephants were heading to Sedudu Island, which is an island in the middle of the Chobe River.  I would call it the island of Doctor Doolittle's dreams.  The variety of incredible animals and birds that we saw as we did a lazy loop around it in our pontoon boat was everything you would ever want to see in a safari!

The elephants get there and graze, we watched them shake the grass before they ate it to wash off the sand, etc.

Here's the hippo just hanging out eating, I can't imagine if we saw one charge, there is crazy you tube video of one charging.  Here is the link:Hippo charge on Chobe

We also saw a water buffalo completely covered in mud, he shook himself off but I didn't catch it on video...

Here is a clean one, with a bird on his back.

A giant group of hippos just lying together...

One of the larger crocs we saw.

Awesome Africa!!

Elephants drinking..

Great video of the elephants playing.

A floating bar on the Namibian side where you can have a drink and watch animals on the island.

We headed back to the lodge, the most incredible two hour game drive ever, I'm not sure my photos and words do it justice.  So amazing that there are places like this in the world!

As the kids will tell you a song I am a big fan of is that Nelly Furtado song called "Forca" and the lyric that best describes the whole experience is, "It is the passion flowing right on through your veins,

  Then it's the feeling that you're oh so glad you came"...

Our family can say exactly that, we are so glad we came!

On to Chobe!

Before we leave the  lady at the Bushbuck River House gives us great advice about taking a Chobe River Cruise when we get to our next stop.  She recommends going out around mid-day to have a chance of seeing the elephants in the water.  Boy was she right-stay tuned!

We depart Zambia, head back across the ferry, before we get there I make Greg do a few U Turns so I can take photos of this school that we pass.  I didn't get one of the sign, and I can't even find it on google maps, but look at this "open air" classroom...

The other building on campus!

Seeing a school like that really puts all the conversations I had back in the Wakefield Schools into perspective...we used to worry about wifi in classrooms, and how the old middle school was in such rough shape that it needed to be torn down!

 Just a random shot of what it looks like at the ferry border post, everyone standing in line, for quite awhile, all on "Africa Time" where things just take as long as they take...impatient Americans can just take a number!

 Charlie in the top bunk...one of his favorite spots in the camper...

 Our lucky campsite the first night near Kasane, this place was amazing and we got the last spot (after exhausting all the other places!)  We used our time wisely though and have booked our river cruise for 11 tomorrow, all excited for it!  Greg and Charlie working the coals!

A beautiful sunset at the Big 5 Safari Lodge, best campsites, we have power hookup for the first time on our trip, what a treat!  The guy who owns the place went to Charlies' school way back and he tells us some funny stories about his time there, he especially remembers that if you used bad words they would wash your mouth out with soap & mouthwash in front of the entire school!

Charlie's other favorite spot, next to Mom for a bedtime story!

We ride to the Smoke That Thunders!

We roll out early and head to meet our bike tour.  They have a pretty big bike for Charlie to ride, and he managed to get on it, the only other option was to double up with one of us, which would have been too much for what turned out to be a LONG ride!

Our guide took us from the center of Livingstone to the falls, along the Mosi-oa-Tunya (smoke that thunders) road.  We rode through parts of the viilage where the locals live, everyone pointed at Charlie and waved.






We paused at the Zambesi River where we could see the mist from the falls in the distance, it was exciting to know we were riding to them, but it looked pretty far in the distance so we were hoping we could make it!

Our excellent bike tour guides, Wazee on left and Patrick on right.

Lots of baboons at the place where you enter the National Park...the ones with babies were very cute, although they are real pests, you can't have any food or they will harass you.

We first see the falls from the famous bridge.  that runs between Zambia & Zimbabwe.  We technically crossed into Zimbabwe but never across the border!

We watched crazy people bungee jump the bridge.  Our guide told us that he was there the day that the lady from Australia had the bungee cable snap...she lived to tell the tale, it is on youtube if you'd like to see it!

We got a quick snack to give Charlie some energy before we headed on our 12K ride back to town-a long way for six year old legs to go!  The guides explained that all the guys (passing us on bikes loaded down with charcoal and various supplies) were headed for the Zim border to sell whatever was on their bikes.  They get a better price in Zim and can make as many trips across the border in a day as they like without paying charges.  These guys LOVED Charlie, they cheered for him, stopped to talk to him, took pictures of him, he was the celebrity of the day.  They told us that they had never seen a boy so young ride that road.  The bike trip was really amazing and made us feel like we had earned our trip to the Falls, I was happy to have learned about it from a blog post on the area! (thanks bloggers!)

We were pooped when we made it back to town had a fabulous lunch, Greg tried the local beer which had a great label!

We decided to drive back & do the walking part of the Falls while we were hot, and the sun was shining!  (evenings and early mornings were quite chilly!)

The Knife Edge Bridge was very cool, you walk across very close to the Falls, and the spray is everywhere, rainbows too!  We all have our raincoats, get totally soaked, super fun!

We stopped for a sundowner at the Royal Livingstone Hotel, the hotel interior was right out of a movie set of old Africa.  Here is Greg looking over the river from the beautiful deck at the hotel.  Again the mist from the falls in the background.

Great day had by all!

Frightful Ferry & Border Crossing and A Sobering Check In!

We arrive at the Ferry which will take us from Botswana into Zambia across the Zambezi River.  My days as a Marine Inspector come back in a flash...I'll say that without even trying very hard I could find about 10 things that would have never passed a Coast Guard Inspection!
We can start with the lifejackets...the few I saw on deck..

There is also the lovely lifering...

I took a photo of the open machinery, (that you walk right past)but can't seem to find it.

We do the crossing and Greg dazzles us with his driving of the camper off the tiny ferry.

Greg then refuses to be scammed by the crew who does this for a living.  He waits in about ten different lines and pays all of our various fees.  We have two helpers that assist us with the process, but then they try to trick you with all of the charges.  Greg is not to be scammed, at the end he even makes them go back inside to one of the payment spots to find out the true cost of our "insurance" certificate!

A great indicator of the organization and swiftness of the entire spot can be summed up with the photo of the mailboxes that we stood near while we waited in one of the many lines...look at that efficiency!

We finally are in Zambia and through the border post.  After another checkpoint we head for our place to stay for the night, The Bushbuck River House.  We find it after a bit, I was a little turned around on which direction we were approaching from...but hey I've never been to Zambia before, right?

The place is beautiful and it leads right down to the Zambesi River.  The lady lets us park our camper right out in front and she gives us a tour of the property, with a few safety warnings I've never gotten anywhere else.  Here they are:

1. Watch out at night when you go out on the lawn, make sure you have a flashlight so you don't startle the hippo that likes to come up on the property.
2. Don't go down to the river, there are crocodiles.
3. Don't go past the very cool lapa (like an outdoor gazebo) where there is a small little tributary off the river, because there is a GIANT crocodile that lives in there.
4. Finally, Kelly is walking around barefoot and the lady warns her to wear shoes because there are scorpions!

We never did see any of the scary stuff, but I did see a Mopane Worm in the grass, these are a delicacy in Africa, people cook them & eat them... I have never been brave enough to try them!

Mopane Worm

So our stay there was really nice and it was a beautiful spot, you just had to not let your imagination get too carried away, or allow your six year old to roam about on his own!

The lapa, where the giant croc hangs out, down to the left!

We had a early dinner and a lazy night playing cards, as we got to bed early for our big day tomorrow a bike tour to Vic Falls!

To Elephant Sands!

I'm a little behind in my posts, I spent last week preparing for a trivia night at Kelly & Katie's school. I took all of our years of Wakefield trivia nights, combined with some excellent old trivia slideshows from Kristen Bodenhoffer (trivia goddess) that she used at her school in Virginia.  The trivia night was a huge success, I saw a few of the families that participated and they are already asking when the next one will be!

Our trip to Victoria Falls was absolutely incredible, we all loved travelling in the big motorhome, especially the kids when they could still be sleeping or in their pajamas as we drove away from a campsite.  

We crossed the border into Botswana and it was a slow, slow process.  We watched the sun start to set while we were still in the long line, not a good sight knowing that we still had a bit of a ride before we made it to our campsite.  Driving at night in Africa is not a great thing to do, always the chance that animals will be on the road and there are usually no lights, potential potholes, etc.

We kept seeing these signs as we drove into our campsite...Katie and Greg were speculating on what exactly they meant.

We survived whatever the experiments were!

Our first campsite, was at a rhino sanctuary, we never saw a rhino, but drove through some deep sand and fortunately never got stuck.  The tree was pretty cool!

We liked the spelling of Spongebob!!

We then started to see elephant crossing signs, which were correct as an elephant crossed the road right behind us!

Greg's question is the best, he is asking if its going to charge us!

We arrive at Elephant Sands, which was a place from my Southern Africa Bucket List book and I have to say that once again the author was correct- a place not to be missed!

Katie & the elephants on our arrival!

Here is Charlie at the waterhole, this is what brings the elephants, fresh water piped in...they actually fight over the spot where the fresh water comes in!  There is a tiny wall with a sign that reminds you these are wild elephants, I had our new reader Charlie read it to me as he was attempting to scramble over the wall!

There are NO FENCES around the entire place, elephants walk freely.  What keeps them from stepping on places they don't want them?  Concrete triangles...

Here is Katie standing on the little triangles.

We cook dinner and eat outside, and watch the elephants wander past on their way to the waterhole! (that is not just bushes behind Charlie)

Kelly took this great photo!  From here we rolled out early and headed for the Zambian Border Crossing, which is by ferry...

Fun Videos by a Talented South African!

Our dear friend Jenny, who the kids call their South African Grannie, has a daugher Sylvie McKeown who is a freelance journalist.  She writes great articles for Marie Claire magazine and ocassionally things for the Sunday Times newspaper here in SA.  This past weekend she had a two page spread in the fashion section! She recreated this seasons fancy accessories from all the big designers out of paper!

The photos of the items were neat, but the short thank you videos she made were incredible!  Here they are..

Louis Vuitton

Gucci

Valentino Garavani

Dolce & Gabbana

Prada

When I taught 4th grade computers we did a project on stop motion animation- I wish I had these then to show my students!  I hope you enjoyed them as much as we did!

Wonder of the World Here We Come!!

We are heading North to see Victoria Falls, in a giant driving camper.  Vic Falls is about a 15 hour ride from here and we will break it up by staying two nights in Botswana on the way to Zambia.

The falls lie between Zambia and Zimbabwe and there is great debate over which side is better to see the falls from.  Kind of like Niagara Falls and US side vs. Canadian, right?  They say Vic Falls moves twice as much water as Niagara Falls, hard to imagine!

I've been preparing for the trip by reading the Number One Ladies Detective Agency which was written about Gabarone, Botswana.  In the book, the detective lady is driving on the same road we will go on, when she hits a large snake in the road and it ends up under her hood..I'll be keeping a sharp eye out for snakes!  (we did hit a snake on our trip to the mountains,  we checked later and did kill him, he was also just a non-poisonous little river snake)

I will try to post photos from the road...here is our camper getting ready to go...