The past several weeks of tapering rain have dissipated into crushing heat, giving opportunity for volunteers all of the country to take advantage of the Easter holidays to stretch our legs and venture out of our post for the first time since January. I travelled with my friend Brittany to Mongu, the capital of Western Province and the seat of the Lozi tribe, to witness the largest tribal festival in Zambia. The Kuoboka, meaning "movement from water," takes place every year around the first week of April to celebrate the centuries old annual migration of the royal family from the rainy season palace to a dry season residence. The royal family is moved on elaborate boats from Lialui, the royal island village on the Zambezi flood plain, up the river to a second palace outside of Mongu. The festival was unfortunately delayed by several weeks due to an unexpected death in the royal
family so we missed the big event by chance this year but I was able to pursuade the royal guards to allow me a few photographs in the royal village in exchange for a couple American cigarettes.
B and I hitched back down the Western road into Kafue National Park after a few humid days in Lozi land and rested our heels at the Mukambi Safari Lodge on the Kafue river. We had spotted a few elephant in the area from the back of an empty dump truck on the way to Mongu and wanted to check out the wildlife a little more closely. Given that our original plans had to change due to the delay of Kuomboka, we jumped at the opportunity to spend time around this world reknown superhighway of rare birds, hippos, and crocodile. The dinner menu at the lodge was also noteworthy and the short stay acted as an absolutely amazing early birthday present for myself.
The stay often found us riding through Kafue park in an open back Landcruiser at sunrise in search of Africa's big five, the tourist wildlife most associated with Victorian era exploration and the safari experience. Rainy season brought the savannah grasses up to over a meter in height and made it impossible to spot the large predatory cats who relish this time of year for the abundance of game and ubiquitous camoflage of overgrown bush. Elephant are numerous in the Kafue river basin and we saw quite a few of this beautiful mammal. This young bull was found feeding at dawn atop a termite mound adjacent to our camp. I snagged a great video but was unable to load it for you guys due to the limitations of Zambian internet access.
We were able to spot side-stripped jackals, zebra, puku, kudu, impala, springbuck, baboons, and several amazing birds. Kafue park is a world reknown bird watching locale and the only natural habitat of the Queen's Babbit, a rather small yet impressive species. Our guide seemed dissapointed by our reaction to spotting one and informed us that one a year is seen on average in that area of Kafue park. Wattled-toed cranes, condor heron, hippos, and crocodile populated the area immediately next to the river and livened up our mid-day boat tour safari down the river. I found the hippopotomus to be quite a bit more dangerous than the crocodile, as they are apt to charge any boat that strays to close (thankfully they can't actually swim, they just walk on the bottom of shallows), and preferred watching impala graze by the lodge.
After an action packed stay at Mukambi, we hitch-hiked back to Lusaka and headed into Southern province, destination: Lachinvar National Park. This reserve is tiny compared to the giant Kafue (the size of Switzerland) and is listed in the Lonely Planet travel guide as difficult if not impossible to travel to without a chartered flight. Indeed the park boast no lodges or accomodation of any kind and is mentioned by the guide seemingly just to dissuade visitors. However, Peace Corps volunteers who have survived living in the bush will basically go anywhere they damn well want to go. We pulled into Monze late in the afternoon and negotiated to ride into the bush with a local farmer who dropped us off a mere fourteen kilometers from the park entrance. We were fortuitously picked up within minutes by who else but the Department of Fisheries. The field officer found my work in Mkushi very interesting and insisted on taking us to Lachinvar to see his research site.
Our host took us around to the all of the traditional sites that we had come to the park for and delighted in supplementing what we had read in the ever cynical Lonely Planet travel guide. The great hollow baobab tree had been a site of traditional practice for centuries before the land was purchased for farming years before being granted as a national park. The local members of the Tonga tribe holds that entering the tree is a cleansing experience but that turning your back on the spirits withing will result in a series of misfortunes for the offender. Given the circumstances of our arrival, we found it wise to exit the tree by walking out backwards just to be safe.
The park is also home to the drum rocks. Carved out of a great hollow stone upon the floodplains are pitched drums marked by centuries of usage. One is able to craft percussive melodies on this ancient natural instrument. These drums have been used in traditional events for generations and it was a pleasure to play them and follow in a long continuum of music creation. In addition, the park also has a population of water buffalo, red lechwe, and a natural hot springs rumored to have healing properties. We enjoyed our tour of the park and set out on our way back to Lusaka the following day to get back to where we once belonged.
The past several weeks of tapering rain have dissipated into crushing heat, giving opportunity for volunteers all of the country to take advantage of the Easter holidays to stretch our legs and venture out of our post for the first time since January. I travelled with my friend Brittany to Mongu, the capital of Western Province and the seat of the Lozi tribe, to witness the largest tribal festival in Zambia. The Kuoboka, meaning "movement from water," takes place every year around the first week of April to celebrate the centuries old annual migration of the royal family from the rainy season palace to a dry season residence. The royal family is moved on elaborate boats from Lialui, the royal island village on the Zambezi flood plain, up the river to a second palace outside of Mongu. The festival was unfortunately delayed by several weeks due to an unexpected death in the royal 
B and I hitched back down the Western road into Kafue National Park after a few humid days in Lozi land and rested our heels at the Mukambi Safari Lodge on the Kafue river. We had spotted a few elephant in the area from the back of an empty dump truck on the way to Mongu and wanted to check out the wildlife a little more closely. Given that our original plans had to change due to the delay of Kuomboka, we jumped at the opportunity to spend time around this world reknown superhighway of rare birds, hippos, and crocodile. The dinner menu at the lodge was also noteworthy and the short stay acted as an absolutely amazing early birthday present for myself. 
The stay often found us riding through Kafue park in an open back Landcruiser at sunrise in search of Africa's big five, the tourist wildlife most associated with Victorian era exploration and the safari experience. Rainy season brought the savannah grasses up to over a meter in height and made it impossible to spot the large predatory cats who relish this time of year for the abundance of game and ubiquitous camoflage of overgrown bush. Elephant are numerous in the Kafue river basin and we saw quite a few of this beautiful mammal. This young bull was found feeding at dawn atop a termite mound adjacent to our camp. I snagged a great video but was unable to load it for you guys due to the limitations of Zambian internet access.
We were able to spot side-stripped jackals, zebra, puku, kudu, impala, springbuck, baboons, and several amazing birds. Kafue park is a world reknown bird watching locale and the only natural habitat of the Queen's Babbit, a rather small yet impressive species. Our guide seemed dissapointed by our reaction to spotting one and informed us that one a year is seen on average in that area of Kafue park. Wattled-toed cranes, condor heron, hippos, and crocodile populated the area immediately next to the river and livened up our mid-day boat tour safari down the river. I found the hippopotomus to be quite a bit more dangerous than the crocodile, as they are apt to charge any boat that strays to close (thankfully they can't actually swim, they just walk on the bottom of shallows), and preferred watching impala graze by the lodge. 
After an action packed stay at Mukambi, we hitch-hiked back to Lusaka and headed into Southern province, destination: Lachinvar National Park. This reserve is tiny compared to the giant Kafue (the size of Switzerland) and is listed in the Lonely Planet travel guide as difficult if not impossible to travel to without a chartered flight. Indeed the park boast no lodges or accomodation of any kind and is mentioned by the guide seemingly just to dissuade visitors. However, Peace Corps volunteers who have survived living in the bush will basically go anywhere they damn well want to go. We pulled into Monze late in the afternoon and negotiated to ride into the bush with a local farmer who dropped us off a mere fourteen kilometers from the park entrance. We were fortuitously picked up within minutes by who else but the Department of Fisheries. The field officer found my work in Mkushi very interesting and insisted on taking us to Lachinvar to see his research site.
Our host took us around to the all of the traditional sites that we had come to the park for and delighted in supplementing what we had read in the ever cynical Lonely Planet travel guide. The great hollow baobab tree had been a site of traditional practice for centuries before the land was purchased for farming years before being granted as a national park. The local members of the Tonga tribe holds that entering the tree is a cleansing experience but that turning your back on the spirits withing will result in a series of misfortunes for the offender. Given the circumstances of our arrival, we found it wise to exit the tree by walking out backwards just to be safe.
The park is also home to the drum rocks. Carved out of a great hollow stone upon the floodplains are pitched drums marked by centuries of usage. One is able to craft percussive melodies on this ancient natural instrument. These drums have been used in traditional events for generations and it was a pleasure to play them and follow in a long continuum of music creation. In addition, the park also has a population of water buffalo, red lechwe, and a natural hot springs rumored to have healing properties. We enjoyed our tour of the park and set out on our way back to Lusaka the following day to get back to where we once belonged.
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