Unexpected Parties and Gecko Encounters

Yesterday turned into another of those bizarrely spontaneous days that Zambia has treated us to so well...

We had spent the morning and most of the afternoon writing our general report and the report for the camps when suddenly, mid-afternoon, Bernadette's friend Chali (who we've become quite good friends with over the past few weeks) turned up and announces he'd like to take us up to a bar to watch the football match. Seeing as we were somewhat bored of statistics, we agreed and so we ended up watching the Zambia v Botswana game in a near-empty bar, which gradually filled up. As the game progressed and ended (a draw, much to everyone's disappointment as Botswana is 'not a footballing nation') we'd been chatting to some acquaintances we'd made during our time in Mazabuka, and as twilight fell (around 5pm) we even managed to find ourselves part of a barbecue (that is, eating the products - not on it ourselves). We happened to also bump into Pennias, the SAPEP co-ordinator, who was having a reunion with old school friends: we were eventually persuaded (not that it took much) to join them at one of the clubs in town.

When we arrived it was probably at the fullest we'd ever seen that particular club - not full by any English club standards, but with a definite mass of people. At some point Bernadette turned up too - she evidently knew too well where to find us - and joined in some dancing. Eva and I managed to persuade some of our friends to join us back at out lodge for dinner (at about 10pm) during the course of which we found a gecko in our room - Eva is terrified of them. After chasing it around for about ten minutes, I think it became sufficiently confused that I managed to catch it with my bare hands (not quite Bear Grylls but getting there) and throw it out.

We then went for one more dance before returning and falling into bed - today will be rather more boringly spent report writing. And tomorrow we've got to hand them in, and that will be the end of this placement with SAPEP - an alarming prospect...

Hope everyone is having a lovely weekend - tell that English heatwave it'd better wait until we get back!

Last Nights Under the Stars

Well, we're back from our second and final camp with orphans and vulnerable children, and it really feels that our time here in Zambia is drawing to a close (we fly home on Tuesday!). We have photos, but uploading these first three took me so long on this internet connection that I just don't have the patience. Give us a few days and they'll be up.

The camp, although tough and tiring, was actually quite enjoyable. Wilson drove us out into the bush on Monday evening, and as soon as we arrived we received a few hesitant English greetings from the older children - although it was very dark by that time, our skin evidently still gave us away. There wasn't much time to do anything that evening other than sit around the campfire which we lit (I'll certainly miss how easy it is to do that here what with all the dry wood) and sing songs, after having our dinner which some women from the nearest village were preparing. It was still nshim, of course, but we were prepared for it this time and, dare I say it, we may even be beginning to grow accustomed to it! I wouldn't say we exactly enjoy it yet, but the sauce was good. Making sure the fire was well stoked, we soon wrapped ourselves up and went to bed - very close to the fire. I feel a little selfish that we steal all the prime warm spots whilst the children sleep under blankets away from the fire, but they seem to sleep with no problem at all - we wake up whenever the flames die down.

snug as bugs in rugs...

The morning started early with the mandatory road run; Eva got all sporty and joined them, whereas I managed to wriggle my way out by going for a walk with Kenneth to the nearest houses to see if anyone had a pump to blow up the footballs. The first couple of huts didn't have a pump, but then one man offered to take the balls to his friend and bring them back later. We left them with him and headed back for breakfast. 

Breakfast is one of the meals on camp which I really do enjoy. The women made the incredible sweet and milky rooibos tea, which we consumed with bread (and a hard boiled egg some mornings). We then sat with the children in order to fill in questionnaires which Eva and I had created: these evaluate the children's attitude towards problems before the camp and again after the camp, to judge the programme's effectiveness. We had tried to make the questionnaire as simple as possible: we read out the questions (which Oliver and Kenneth translated into Tonga) and they only had to write down the question numbers and a multiple choice letter from a-d. However it soon became clear that this was beyond many of them - even though the ages ranged from eight to eighteen years, at which point you would expect them to know the alphabet, several of the children were unable to follow the counting of the questions or to write any recognisable letters. When it came to writing 'yes' or 'no', a few just made any mark they could to fill the paper.

This was followed by Oliver's motivational talk before we began the day's activities. The activities are all aimed at promoting teamwork and peer support between the children: there was the 'electric wire', where the children must help each other to get over a rope without touching it, the 'spider web' where the children must pass each other through gaps in a rope construction, and 'crossing the river' where they were given a long rope and told to use it so that they must cross the 'river' without touching the ground. By English standards, I would imagine all the games were completely against all health and safety regulations, but they were fun just to watch, never mind to play. 

Lunch was nshima, beans and cabbage (surprisingly tasty) and in the afternoon we played more games with the children and had our bath. This time there was even a grass shelter constructed, so we weren't completely exposed to the rest of the bush whilst we washed! As darkness fell again, Eva and I decided it was time to crack out the marshmallows which we'd bought for the children to roast on the fire. We told them all to find sticks, and the ensuing experimental cooking caused great excitement.

The next day began with more team games, and then the 'atomic bomb' (which sounds a little more dramatic than it actually is). Oliver had made a creature out of clay, and a 'spy' from each group of children was allowed to see it. The spy then had to describe the creature to the 'messenger', who in turn had to relay the information to the rest of the group so that they could replicate it. Eva and I were honoured to judge the final products...

The afternoon was occupied by a more sobering activity - collecting the testimonies from the children. A particularly shocking story was that of Fiona: her parents had died and she was living with her aunt, who was abusing her and even threatening her life. She related a moment where once her aunt had even tried to pour bleach into her mouth. The SAPEP team are following up on her problem, but the number of children who are abused on the death of one or both of their parents is horrifying, and there are no effective schemes from the government in place to deal with it.

The serious atmosphere never lasted long though - during our break Eva and I were persuaded to cycle around on a bicycle which was far too large for either of us (our feet didn't even touch the ground!) I think Wilson and Oliver derived more amusement from this than the children did - Eva said she felt like a circus monkey.

After lunch we gave our human rights lesson, in which we taught the children about the Universal Declaration on Human Rights and invited them to make some role plays based on various rights. They came up with slightly more bizarre scenarios than you might expect in an English school: the 'right to life' play featured Satanism and a witch doctor, and whenever we asked them to think about owning property the prime example they invented was buying a car - a true sign of status in rural Zambia. Later it was time for the 'bridge of life' - a rope bridge had been constructed between two trees and the children had to cross it. We did of course have a go, and discovered that they had made it look a lot easier than it actually was.

After another nshima dinner, it was time for bed (or at least Eva and I decided it was - the children stayed up singing and dancing long after we had nodded off next to the fire). We were relieved to know that it was our third and final night in the bush: although it is truly beautiful to fall asleep under millions of stars, the bruises from the ground got the better of us (and the fact that I found a millipede up my jumper). In the morning it was time to go - although we found time for a few balloon races first.

When we'd left the SAPEP offices on Monday, Bernadette had sadly mentioned that it was her birthday - I say 'sadly' because everyone else had completely forgotten. We promised her a party as soon as we got back from the camp, so last night (having bought a cake and gorged ourselves on pizza to get over the nshima diet) we invited her over to our lodge (also mentioning it to a few of her friends whom we've met during the past few weeks). We couldn't resist the temptation of buying non-blow-out candles, and our mischievous-ness was rewarded with great amounts of laughter. They really were pretty spectacular - we ended up having to find a glass of water to put them out! After a few drinks, our fairly sleepless nights in the bush were taking their toll and it was evident that we couldn't stay up much longer - we made our exit and blissfully crashed out in real beds with real sheets and mattresses...

As I mentioned, today has been spent sedately going through the questionnaires and compiling our report. The data is somewhat confusing and mildly depressing: some of the results would appear to have gone the opposite way which we may have desired, especially concerning the children's attitude towards rights. But then again, some of them were so baffled by the questionnaires themselves that the results can hardly be considered reliable.

We've got a quiet weekend of report-writing ahead, although knowing our luck it will never be quite as peaceful as we think!

We'll update soon. Lots of love - back in under a week...

A Weekend of Luxury Before the Bush

After a wonderful weekend, we’re back in Mazabuka and all prepared to go on the next camp this afternoon. I’ve been waiting for the hotel internet to work all morning so we can upload the photos, as the credit on our dongle is running low, but that appears to be a lost cause.

On Saturday we were picked up from Mazabuka by Guy and Ryan, two of our South African friends from Lusaka, whom we’d also persuaded to give Bernadette a lift with us so she could visit her daughter up in the city. There is only one tarred road to Lusaka, which runs down the middle of the province and along which most towns are situated, and for some reason this was closed; we had to make a very long detour along a dust road, delayed further by the fact that there were several ‘abnormal load’ lorries which wouldn’t let anything else pass.

Eventually we got into Lusaka and the guys put on a pretty good lunch spread – bread rolls with just about any filling you could ask for. Eva and I then spent the afternoon lazing and in the evening we were all invited over for dinner to another of the South Africans’ house: Jaco was renowned for being a brilliant cook, and his wife Julie-Ann was an equally incredible baker. We were treated to sausages which were actually created before our very eyes, with homemade mustard and beer bread.

We carried on later to another party hosted by a friend of the guys: on arrival, we were stunned by how many non-Zambian people of our own age live in Lusaka! There were Europeans, two Russian girls, a Canadian girl and of course many South Africans, all dancing and chatting in a back garden which the host had turned into a fairly decent dance floor. We partied away and made a fair few new friends.

The next day, the adventure continued: Eva and I were taken out by Guy, Ryan, Jaco, Julie-Ann, Caitlin (the Canadian girl we met the night before) and Anouk (who originated from France but sounded like she had lived almost everywhere) on a cruise down the river. Jaco knew the owner of a large two-storey boat used for tourist cruises, which we were able to hire out for the day – whilst enjoying the view and chatting to the others, the staff on the boat made us a wonderful dinner of baked potato and steak on the barbecue (or braai, as I keep being told).

The relaxing journey down the river seemed to be over all too soon, and the guys kindly gave us a lift back to Mazabuka, picking up Bernadette along the way (who unfortunately did not seem to have had as enjoyable a weekend as we did).

We’re currently waiting for Wilson to take us into the bush for the next camp for orphans and vulnerable children. The exceedingly lovely staff at our current lodge have allowed me to take a blanket – hopefully the nights will be a little more comfortable this time!

We’ll update again when we’re back on Thursday – no communication from the bush I’m afraid. And then it really won’t be long til we’re setting off back home.

Lots of love to everyone, hope you enjoy your week.

Contraceptive Chats

Yesterday we had such a boring day that I didn’t think it was worth writing about. Kenneth dropped round in the morning to tell us that Pennias, the leader of the drama group and the co-ordinator of many of the SAPEP groups in Mazabuka, would pick us up at 1pm to go to a women’s talk group. When it got to 5pm and we’d still heard nothing (we were going slightly mental from being stuck in and around our lodge for two days) we went to visit Bernadette at work to see if she knew what was happening. She called Kenneth, who couldn’t understand why nothing had happened, but he said Pennias would call again tomorrow. Meanwhile we sat and chatted with Bernadette for a bit, and unexpectedly got given a meal of nshima, relish and chicken (I say unexpected in the sense that we hadn’t asked for it, but we have come to realise the extraordinary generosity of people here so it shouldn’t have been too much of a shock). What was rather more shocking is that we both actually quite enjoyed it!

Today we waited again for Pennias – it got to 2pm and we were losing hope. However he did eventually arrive, and so we walked to where the women’s group were meeting, in on of the shanty compounds. It was about a 45 minute walk, and rather hot, but on the way we were reminded how different these towns are from the tourist cities of Livingstone and Lusaka – never mind our cities back home. There were stagnant pools in the shade, rubbish everywhere and a rather dubious smell, and yet these are the living conditions of thousands of people. We made our way to a woman’s garden where the meeting was to be held, and on the way Pennias explained the purpose of the group. The women had been educated by SAPEP about family planning, AIDS prevention and treatment, and many other issues which women in the community were affected by. This group had then gone out into their compound and formed discussion groups to educate women and spread the information. The meeting with Pennias was just to provide feedback to SAPEP and discover whether the programme was working. They gave interesting comments, including that women found it easier and more comfortable to talk to them than to health professionals at the clinics. This is obviously beneficial, as it means that women who would not have sought advice before could receive the correct information – as long as it was given to them correctly. For this reason, Pennias checked what they were saying about contraceptives (down to the fine details of how to put on a condom) and the HIV anti-retroviral treatment – it was a very interesting conversation.

Pennias giving his condom talk

It was really inspirational to see a group of women who were so keen to learn and share information, and I couldn’t help asking them whether they thought there was a similar need for education about the law, especially on the issues which affected them: abortion, contraception and domestic violence. They snapped up the idea, and before Eva and I knew what was happening, we were being told that we’d formed a new community group which we were the leaders of. Here I’m embarrassed to say we had to do a bit of backtracking – although we’re law students, we have no idea about the details of Zambian law and our efforts to find out have been somewhat fruitless. The women seemed slightly disappointed about this, but I suggested that SAPEP find some volunteers from a Zambian university to give legal workshops. At least by giving the suggestion, I felt that perhaps we’d got the ball rolling. In the mean time, we’ve offered to give a human rights workshop when we’re back from the OVC camp next week (Zambia have supposedly signed the Universal Declaration on Human Rights, but they are not actually legally bound to enforce it).

us with our new legal education group

This weekend we had nothing planned, but felt a desperate urge to get out and about after being cooped up. So our South African friends from Lusaka have offered to give us a lift up to the capital for the weekend. At least it will be a change of scenery!

We hope everyone has a good weekend, loads of love from us.

today's amusement: this is attached to the prison, which I found hilarious. Apparently it's only for staff and visitors...

Also, I haven’t forgotten about uploading the pictures from Livingstone, I just thought I’d wait and use the free internet in the hotel. Unfortunately, this doesn’t actually work most of the time – as soon as an opportune moment comes along, I will seize it!

Supporting Zambia = Boundless Generosity

Zambia have just beaten South Africa in the semi-finals of the African league. Woooo! (We were supporting Zambia as, having watched the match in the hotel bar surrounded by Zambians who were buying us drinks and food, we felt a definite sense of loyalty).

Until this evening our day had been pretty empty. Since we’re back in Mazabuka, we were supposed to have meetings planned for today, but Kenneth never arrived, despite our attempts to contact him. Eventually we managed to get hold of Bernadette, who came to see us this afternoon. We were presented (not offered) with beers from another of our fellow hotel guests sitting nearby, and this constant flow of beer continued well on into the evening. We tried to refuse, but apparently this isn’t the done thing in Zambia: we were advised that if we didn’t want to drink the beer, we should just keep it unopened under the table and put it in our fridge. Suffice to say, we now have quite a supply.

The whole build up was because of the football game due to start at 8pm this evening. Our beer-benefactor and his friends were rather on the tipsy side by 5pm, and we wondered how we were going to manage to get to kick-off without being under the table. When we said we were going to make ourselves some dinner (we’d bought some beans and egg and toast) he refused to let us ‘slave away’ – instead he bought us whatever we wanted off the menu. We both felt extremely guilty about this – in England, it seems people generally don’t buy you anything unless they’re expecting something in return. Here however, it was explained to us that people will be as generous as they can towards guests, and if their generosity is refused it will be deemed to be offensive. After a pork chop and a tikka masala respectively, we weren’t complaining.

Eva, Bernadette and I watched the game in our hotel bar, accompanied by various acquaintances of Bernadette’s (from whom we got some bizarre comments after they’d had a few drinks – one guy said to us, on inquiring after our age, “Ah, I thought you looked young, if I squeezed your nose then milk would still come out.” What this was supposed to mean, we have no idea).

All in all it wasn’t the most eventful football match – it went to penalties. Still, we had a great night (and have come out of it several beers better off).

We’re due to meet Kenneth in the afternoon tomorrow, so hopefully in the morning I will manage to upload some of the photos we’ve been missing over the past few days.

Hope everyone’s had a brilliant day and is still enjoying this heatwave! Lots of love.

A Week of Wonder - Where to Start?

Well it’s been a fair few days since we’ve had a chance to update, due to a complete and utter lack of internet. What an incredible few days it has been though.

I think we left you after our first couple of days in Livingstone – since then, things just carried on being equally as incredible. On Saturday we were up early to make a brief expedition to Botswana, our final destination being the Chobe National Park where we were due to go on safari for the day. We were picked up by a minibus and taken into Botswana with another volunteer staying at our backpackers, Chris, who had been working in a hospital. To get over to Botwana we had to cross the Zambezi river where four countries bordered: Zambia, Botwana, Zimbabwe and Namibia. We got on a little motorboat to make the two-minute crossing, along with a load of Dutch girls and and two elderly English couples who were joining us on the safari, and after going through immigration we were picked up by another minibus to get into Chobe.

crossing to Chobe

There were quite a lot of us to fit into the minibus, and in the process we experienced a rather amusing cultural faux-pas. The driver was trying to squeeze us onto the seats four abreast, but as one of the Dutch girls made her way into the back with her friends, he grabbed her arm and said, ‘No, you are too fat. Erm… Let that girl go there, you come in the front.’ He was rewarded by a chorus of offended gasps of disbelief from all the girls! They evidently hadn’t heard that calling someone ‘fat’ here isn’t an insult, and is sometimes even a compliment.

We arrived at the lodge, just outside the national park, to be given a breakfast of muffins and coffee (Eva and I jumped on the food like we hadn’t eaten in a month). Our morning was to be taken up by a river safari, and in the afternoon we would go on a game drive. We all piled on to a two-storey boat and began our float down the Chobe River.

The cruise was very peaceful, and to say that we got our money’s worth would be an understatement. The riverbanks were lined with crocodiles, hippos, buffalo, elephants and every type of impala and deer you could imagine. And it wasn’t just the land which was alive: the smooth surface of the water belied the world underneath, which would be revealed as a hippo’s head surfaced, or as ominous ripples spread from a point.

a waterbuck

buffalo

impala

scary guy

the impala suspiciously eyeing the croc

this monkey had shockingly bright blue... well, spot them for yourself! 

The mammals were so incredible, it was easy to ignore the birds which darted through the air and strutted through the shallows. Storks were everywhere, not to mention the huge eagles which soared overhead. I’d never seen birds quite like this – even the swallows which swooped right alongside the boat looked wonderfully vivid.

the most beautiful bird I've ever seen

a vulture over its nest

these birds were absolutely huge - one would easily have risen way past the height of my hips

As we returned to shore, the weather was beginning to warm up (it had been a disappointingly grim morning). We had a buffet lunch which was surprisingly good – of course, we made the most of it. Then it was time to set off on the drive into the park on an open-topped truck. Just in case things were running too smoothly, we got a puncture on the way into the park, but luckily one of the English men was a farmer and manage to change the tyre very efficiently.

I never would have thought it would become commonplace to see giraffes and elephants, but after a while driving around the park we began to realise that we couldn’t stop to photograph every new herd which we came across. It was truly beautiful though – the only way I can demonstrate this is with another inundation of photos…

a dried-out buffalo carcass - evidence of the lions

cutie 

baby elephant 

elephants' bums

giraffes have to splay their legs to reach the ground, which I find hilarious

he was a big guy

being groomed by several little birds

can't remember the name of this, but I thought it was incredibly odd-looking

On leaving the park, we’d managed to see three of the ‘big five’: the giraffes, elephants and hippos were all very accommodating, but the lions remained stubbornly elusive and the rhinos have been poached to extinction in the park (although I was harbouring a secret  hope that there might just be one hiding somewhere that we might come across). But, feeling well satisfied, we made our way back to the hostel.

Although we couldn’t have asked for better days, our nights were somewhat boring in comparison to the other places we’d visited, mainly due to the fact that although the hostel was full of other people like us, they were all in groups which seemed rather comfortable with their own company and difficult to integrate ourselves into. However that night we somehow managed to get talking to the massive group of Irish medical students who’d been working at Livingstone Hospital. After a few drinks and a lot of talking, we’d made some new friends an ended up frequenting Livingstone’s nightlife for the evening.


We groggily awoke the next morning at the unearthly hour of 6am to go on an elephant encounter – something I’d been looking forward to especially. We were given cups of coffee (which, considering the hour we’d gone to bed, was much appreciated) before being introduced to the elephants which we were going to ride: these ones are fitted with tracking collars yet aren’t trapped within any boundary, but stay within a close radius and allow themselves to be trained due to the food they receive in return. It’s only when faced with these giant creatures that you can really take in their enormity – they each already had a guide on their back who was dwarfed by the creature on which he sat. Eva and I were placed on Madenda, the ‘Dancing Elephant’ – we only found out the meaning behind his nickname when we were already on his back, the guide explaining that he was rather impulsive when it came to snacking and if anyone tried to prevent him from wandering off in search of food, he would start ‘dancing’ and attempt to throw them off. We soon experienced this wild streak when, instead of following the elephant in front, he began rampaging through bushes to get to one particular tree and tore literally half the tree off to munch along the way.

Unfortunately I haven’t yet got the photos of the elephants off Eva, but as soon a I do I’ll pop them up. We ended the morning by sitting with our elephants and feeding them - ours was incredibly greedy and it was a struggle to keep his eager trunk out of the food bag! When we left, the trainer demonstrated how clever the elephants are: he told them to 'salute', and each elephant curled up its trunk and raised its front right foot off the ground. Just to confirm, these elephants are only trained on a reward scheme, and are never punished.

After lazing around the pool for the afternoon, we had booked a sunset cruise for the evening, with food and an unlimited bar! The food was plentiful and enjoyable, and we became so engaged in chatting to the others (including American volunteers, some of whom were studying Law like us, and an English boy called Josh who was just about to start Law at uni) that we almost missed the sunset - glad we didn't though, because it was truly beautiful.

\

We hadn't planned anything for our final day in Livingstone, but during the course of our stay we'd heard so many wonderful things about the trip to Livingstone Island, a tiny land mass in the middle of Victoria Falls, that we were persuaded it was a must-see (I was further enticed by the prospect that it included an Eggs Benedict for breakfast, which I'd been craving since we got here). The boat left from the Royal Livingstone Hotel, which seemed to me like the most luxurious accommodation I've ever seen. The grass was green, the pool was clear and surrounded by plush white sun-loungers and even an upholstered chaise longue. Feeling decidedly out of place and awestruck, we walked down to the little motorboat and joined a German couple, ready to be ferried over to the island.

a view to the island - what looks like smoke is spray from the falls just over the edge

Motoring towards the edge of the falls was a bizarre experience - it seems like it wouldn't take much just to whisk the little boat over the drop. I was trying to imagine Livingstone himself doing this in his little canoe - what on earth possessed him to try it, I don't know. But we reached the island, right on the edge of the falls, and our guide led us around barefoot because of the mud. He held on to us, and got some photos of us with the most incredible backdrops I have ever seen. We could literally look down Victoria Falls to the bottom.

We even got to have a dip in a little pool right on the edge of the falls. This wasn't the infamous Devil's Pool, which is at the top of the main falls and is only open for swimming at the end of the dry season when the currents are weaker - instead it was a small crater at the top of the secondary falls (which become dry altogether at the end of the dry season). Still, I think it was the most awesome place I'll ever get to take a dip.

Eva was rather taken with the 'Loo With A View' - a hole in the ground which looked out straight over the falls

We got out of the water to be greeted by a wonderful breakfast, as promised, straight from the Royal Livingstone: a very fancy Eggs Benedict, a muffin, a scone and freshly brewed Zambian coffee. All with a view over the falls. It was delicious.

The day was concluded in a lazy manner of sunbathing. Today we had the old bus journey back to Mazabuka - we're in a different lodge again, as our last one was incredibly noisy, and so far this one seems brilliant. Hopefully Kenneth will remember to pick us up tomorrow so we can continue with our SAPEP work - no more tourism for us!

Hope everyone has had a good few days, and apologies for being out of touch. Lots of love.

Jumping Off Things

I feel I should probably apologise to our parents before this post. We’ve had the most incredible day, but we do not accept liability for any undue stress caused by these circumstances…

Today we had booked in for abseiling, zipwire and a gorge swing across the Zambezi River. We arrived at about 9am (after a freezing ride on an open-topped tented truck) and before we knew it, we were being given a safety brief and reading disclaimers (all of which seemed in order from what we knew about legal contract formation). Looking at the surroundings and the setup, I began to think we were slightly mad: here we were in a foreign country with goodness knows what safety regulations, about to jump off a 100 metre cliff face in various ways. What were we doing?!

The first activity was traditional abseiling, which looked rather ominous from the vertical cliff face. Somehow I ended up going first, and stepping off the edge really got my heart going. However once the top was over, it actually became quite fun doing the whole jumping thing: you have to put your feet against the wall and then bounce out way from it, letting rope out as you go. I was glad we had someone at the top to moderate our speed incase we slipped. Also you had to be careful to push the same amount with both feet otherwise you span – I did end up doing this once, but it was an incredible way to see a 360 degree panorama of the gorge.

Eva and I watching critically as the instructor abseiled down

Once I got to the bottom, I waited for Eva to get down (I have a feeling that she was probably a bit smoother at that than me) but then it dawned on me that, having descended to the bottom of the gorge, we had to get back up again. So we set off along a track that led us back up to the top, all the way to the top of the gorge. We were slightly unsettled by the rustling which came out of the long grasses on either side – I’m not sure whether the assurance that ‘we never usually have lions here’ helped or not.

When we trekked back up, it was time for the zipwire. We had two options: either seated (attaching the wire to the front of the harness) or flying (attaching the wire to the back). We tried one of each, choosing the seated first as at least then, you have something to hold on to. The flying position gives you no choice but to look down! The zipwire did turn out to be a popular choice for us, as instead of the trek back up the gorge, we got reeled in again – not that we’re lazy or anything...

Next was ‘forward abseiling’. This was something I’d never heard of before: they attach the rope to the back of the harness and you abseil down facing the ground. Getting off the top was easily the most terrifying thing I’ve ever done – not only can you see the ground looming and have a feeling you might just fall in to it, but there is also the bizarre feeling that if you let too much rope out, you’ll face-plant the rock face (which I think is a physical impossibility, luckily). Again though, once I got off the top it was actually brilliant fun, and I found it exhilarating to bounce away from the wall and feel myself flying through the air.

Eva got down without any problem too, but it meant another hike back up the gorge (which Eva definitely managed with more style than me). But next was the gorge swing: the bit I had been waiting for, and Eva had been dreading. It involved being attached to a long rope, and jumping off the edge of the gorge. There was then a freefall of 53 metres (over half the cliff) before the rope became taught, and then you swung up to the other side of the gorge, and back again, until they lowered you down to the ground when you stopped swinging. We hadn’t seen anyone try it – I’d done a similar thing in the US on an adventure park, but never on such a scale or in such surroundings. Eva wanted to go first this time, as she had a feeling she never would if she waited, but after a few minutes she came back from the platform and asked me to go first. Whether it was a fear reflex or what, I don’t know (also I’m sure the guy at the top was slightly hypnotic) but I just didn’t think about anything: the next thing I knew I was freefalling like a leaf (or perhaps more like a stone) from the top of the cliff. Because gravity completely took hold, I also didn’t stay the right way up – it was genuinely the most terrifying but wonderful three-and-a-half seconds of my life. When the rope became taught and I began to swing, I had a chance to enjoy the view, with the curve of the Zambezi flowing at the bottom of the gorge, the trees beneath and the rocks on either side. It was bliss (except for the rather painful harness around my legs).

I waited for Eva at the bottom with Isaac, the guy who took the harnesses off, but after a few minutes, the message was shouted down that she couldn’t do it (I’m sure this was a ploy so to get me fit on the hike back up to the top). After many minutes’ persuasion back at the top – Eva said she wanted to jump but just couldn’t – she finally conceded that perhaps she would do it after some food. We had a very acceptable meal of chicken, cold pasta and salad, and after another few minutes having a pep-talk, we decided to do the jump in tandem (we’d be joined at the hip – literally – and have our feet strapped together). Eva closed her eyes as we jumped, but eventually we were both falling through the sky and screaming. She says she was glad she’d done it, but isn’t likely to try it again!

After a few more whizzes down the zipwire, it was time to call it a day and head off (after a couple of beers with the staff, which we were happy to see they saved until after the day’s work). Now we’re feeling incredibly exhausted, I think through a mixture of both exercise and adrenaline, and both of us are feeling incredibly satisfied.

We went out for dinner and ate crocodile last night – it was really good, and tasted a little like chicken but with a texture similar to steak. Mmmm…

Now we’ve had our day of adventure and survived, no need to worry about us! Glad we’re still here to tell the tale. Loads of love from us.