Tales from a Zambian Adventure

While living in Africa, it would have been a complete shame if we didn't try to as much as possible and to see as much as Africa has to offer. So for a week, Mike and I backpacked across Zambia to complete 2 of our life goals - to see Victoria falls and to go on Safari. Our trip started out with a sunrise in Mzuzu catching the bus to Lilongwe (Malawi's capital), and we had a surprisingly pleasant bus trip. We thought that perhaps this was a good omen and that our travel would be smooth sailing - but this was a premature hopeful thought. 

We spent 2 days in Lilongwe with our good friend Amy who showed us around and gave us a place to stay. We walked everywhere!!! We didn't realize how sheltered Mzuzu had made us, because when we got off the bus in Lilongwe we were completely giddy. Some context - in Mzuzu, you pretty much know every white person and our biggest grocery store is about the size of a store in a mall at home (a small store). In Lilongwe it is tourist season, which meant that if we said hi to every white person we wouldn't have made it a block in 1 hour. The stores are also much bigger! Real grocery stores! And clothing stores and shoe stores and CHEESE! It was all very exciting, and we felt like we had stepped into a different universe. Who knew 3 months in Mzuzu would do that to us! Huge thanks to Amy for making Lilongwe an awesome part of our trip with wining (I should say Brandying) and dining us. It was a perfect start to our Zambian adventure. 

While in Lilongwe we found out that there was no direct bus to Lusaka, Zambia on the day we wanted to travel. So Monday morning, bright and early, we caught a mini-bus from Lilongwe to Mchinji, a border town to Zambia, which took about two hours. Along the way we met some American Peace Corps also travelling the same way as us, who also happen to live in Mzimba, Malawi - about 2 hours outside of Mzuzu (New Friends!). Crossed the border - not very secure fyi - and taxied it to Chipata (Zambia's border town). Hung out in Chipata for a couple hours to get a bus to Lusaka, Zambia's capital. So far so good! Buses were alright, if not slightly uncomfortable and the travelling took the amount of time it was suppose to. Night bus to Livingstone (our destination) was cancelled, so we ended up staying the night in Lusaka and catching the 6am bus the next day to Livingstone. Lusaka is the most developed city we have seen so far - they even have a subway, a KFC and a real mall! If we had more time I definitely would have liked to check out the city more.

Finally made it to Livingstone and it is great! Grocery stores, nice people, nice weather - and the backpackers we camped at was really nice. Came out of our tent to go find some dinner and turned out that right next to us were some other Canadians that we travelled to Malawi with. Perfect timing so we had some Italian with them at Olga's, a great restaurant! Of course, Mike and I had pizza. The next day we did some shopping in the local craft market, and oh yeah - went to Victoria Falls! We spent the day doing the trails, taking a ridiculous amount of pictures and watching the monkeys. It was absolutely beautiful - not built up at all like Niagara Falls but surrounded by trails and trees. The falls were not quite at their full potential since it is the dry season, but they still made a spectacular sight. It really was the perfect day. We ended it with a booze cruise on the Zambezi river with friends to watch the sunset and see hippos. 

Next day we watched the sunrise as we rode the bus back to Lusaka at 6am. The plan = 6am bus to Lusaka, 2pm bus to Chipata, arrive at 9 and taxi to Mfuwe to do safari. Lesson learned = you cannot plan in Africa! Our 2pm bus to Chipata didn't arrive in Lusaka until 4pm, and didn't leave until 6:30pm and then took until 4:30AM to get to Chipata!!!! Turns out that it takes 2 and a half hours to get to Mfuwe from Chipata because of construction - so we watched another sunrise in the process. Worst travel day ever! But when we made it to the campsite, our moods completely changed. Right on the Luangwa river facing the South Luangwa National Park, our tent sat perfectly to view the wildlife that lives by the river. We ate breakfast and relaxed all day watching hippos, elephants and crocodiles. We took the night game drive safari at 4pm so that we could have 2 hours of day light viewing, watch the sun set and have 2 hours of night viewing. We saw hippos, zebras, pukus, impalas, crocodiles, a fish eagle, a field of giraffes, a leopard eating its meal ... and elephants!!! It was absolutely amazing and made all that travel worth it. To top it off, when we got back to the campsite there was a hippo grazing among the tents. We brushed our teeth not 10 feet away from it - I know so dangerous! But it was alright, we didn't try to ride it or anything. 

The next morning we watched our last sunrise in Zambia, which was definitely the most beautiful. To make it perfect and elephant walked out into the river to say good bye. We should have known that the day could only get worse. We took a private taxi to get to the border so that it would only take 2 hours and we didn't have to worry about Chipata - so silly thinking that things would go smoothly! Apparently, we didn't learn our lesson about planning not working. Along the way our driving off-roaded a little and pulled the fuel line out, completely stranding us in the middle of nowhere.  But no worries, we are in Africa and if anyone can fix a car in the middle of nowhere with no tools or equipment, it's an African. Some rubber lining form the trunk, a plastic bag, some wire and some grass and its fixed. 5 hours later we are on our way back to the border. We made it back to Malawi and mini-bused it to Lilongwe. Of course when we went to book our bus tickets back to Mzuzu, the bus we wanted was cancelled. So much for our night in Lilongwe before heading home - we had to take a community night bus that only goes when its full and stops in every village in order to get home. 8 hours later and 2 in the morning we made it home! It felt so good to be back in Mzuzu - this trip really taught us that Mzuzu is now our home, at least for the mean time. 58 hours of travel, 9 modes of transportation and the completion of 2 life goals - backpacking across Zambia was an amazing adventure and I am so happy we did it.