Zimbabwe Part 3

Mucheni Gorge

Rather ambitiously as it turned out, we had decided to leave Tashinga for Chizarira late on the morning of the game walk. Initially our passage to Chizarira was more of the same; good progress on a reasonable track through glorious countryside. However in the early afternoon, after we had passed into Matabeleland, we turned on to a track that obviously saw vehicles from time to time and as a result the surface, a bone jangling mix of corrugated sun baked mud and patches of broken lumps of basalt, reduced us to a crawl. So much so that we were in danger of arriving at the park gates to find them closed; throwing caution, the contents of Boris and our senses to the wind we ‘sped’ the last 15 miles or so to the turning to the park at all of 20 mph!

From the park gate and its sleepy attendant, there was a steep drive out of the rift valley and onto the plateau a thousand feet above. By the time we reached it the park office was shut, unsure of where the campsite was we drove to the park village; adjacent to all park office complexes, they house all the park staff often, because of their remoteness, with a school for their children. Here, having been asked to return to the office the following morning, we were redirected to the Mucheni picnic site overlooking the gorge. Johannes and Anna-Marie had urged us to camp at picnic sites in the national parks; they were isolated, only large enough for one overnight vehicle and campers, often unfenced or at worst poorly fenced and as close to bush camping with the animals as you could get in a national park. The small picnic area was on the lip of the gorge, with an open sided, thatched rondavel for shade and from where, despite the gathering gloom, there were stupendous views into and along the sheer sided, four hundred foot wide rocky chasm. Heaven!

After a disappointingly animal free and quite night, we had long special breakfast in the rondavel, binos to hand taking in the view and spotting the birds flying below us. Another picnic site nearby had a similar rondavel, only this time it was on the lip of the escarpment where the river that had cut the gorge entered the rift valley and we looked out over the wide, desiccated yellow-brown valley splashed with shimmering sections of the distant Lake Kariba, across to Zambia. As we sat in silence contemplating another panorama words could not adequately describe, we were alerted by the clink of boulders moving and the snap of branches to the small greyish brown shapes of a herd of elephants feeding in the river bed hundreds of feet directly beneath us.

 Breakfast viewing,Mucheni Gorge picnic rondavel Chizarira NP

A very special place, but one we had to leave. Peter, having had one of those early hours prescient, niggling worries, had checked his passport at breakfast and discovered that instead of the four weeks we had paid for, our visa was for two weeks; it ran out in one day’s time on the 22July. Oh Lors! Peter was not best pleased, to be honest he was a complete grump ..be careful or you could be the next ‘Grumps’, Peter!.. he had desperately wanted to include a visit to the Hwange National Park before we got to the border.

Having descended the escarpment, we stopped where a poverty stricken mother, baby on her back, was selling what appeared to be the contents of her hut. We bought nothing, but the mother clapped with joy when Liz gave her an unwanted new pair of flip-flops, some baby clothes and a pair of baby shoes for her daughter.. thank you Maya and Lily! Back on the track from hell we again made slow progress and by early afternoon, our minds and bodies numb from the rattling and juddering we decided to call it a day, and look for somewhere to bush camp. Another bush camp, another unused track going who knew where through uninhabited, pristine woodland savannah; after following the track for about twenty minutes, we arrived at the perfect spot; a sunlit glade in amongst the mopane trees. Time to relax with a cup of tea!
Jonathan
On the road early the next morning and edging ever closer to what should be the tar road to the border, we paused at a ramshackle, unmanned roadside stall with carved wooden items for sale. From the nearby settlement of two poorly thatched huts partly obscured by scrub, a gaunt young man in torn, ragged clothing hurried towards us. After we had bought a few items, Jonathan, a charming, articulate and surprisingly chipper person, described how he and his young family survived the hunger that was a permanent feature of their life; existing from day to day on what roots, berries and so forth could be found in the surrounding woods and should he be fortunate enough to get money for the items he had carved, leaving his family for four days to walk to the nearest store and back.

 Jonothan's roadside stall, Matabeleland 

Initially we were the focus of attention for his sister-in-law’s family, then his wife appeared, cradled in her arms a baby that was obviously suffering from a chest infection. Distraught at the baby’s poorly condition but aware of the dangers of the uncontrolled provision of antibiotics, Liz was reluctant to offer anything more than some basic medication, a bottle of lemon juice for vitamin C, a water bottle containing filtered water, clothes to keep the baby warm at night and advice on basic medical care. Oh dear; how difficult it all was and how we hoped that death would not call on this poor family and that their innocent little child would not become yet another infant mortality statistic.
A Chance Remark
Once on the tar road and immediately passing signs for Hwange ..accompanied by sighs from a disgruntled driver!.. we were able to make good time and arrived in Victoria Falls by early afternoon. It was strangely comforting to be returning to a place we knew, coming home in a way. At the border post, in smiling response to a piece of light hearted banter by Peter ..to the effect that he would have loved to have spent another week in Zimbabwe visiting Hwange.. the immigration officer said, ‘why don’t you?’ and that he could extend our visas for a week at no extra cost! Bring on the choirs celestial! Make this man the next President of Zimbabwe!

Having taken a short time out to discuss the implications of this offer, we accepted and, with extended visas in our passports and a very happy Peter, we spent the night at a comfortable campsite in the middle Victoria Falls, in whose restaurant Liz ate crocodile for the first time. Yum!!. The following day, 23 July, restocked and refuelled, we drove back to the entrance to Hwange National Park. The approach road took us past a centre where a charity, Painted Dog Conservation, ran community awareness days and a wild dog preservation and rehabilitation scheme. It provided an opportunity for Peter to see these animals for the first time and at close quarters and learn about the nature of the animal; its need for huge areas to hunt in and despite the park’s massive size, roughly the size of Belgium, the inevitable conflict between livestock owners on the edge of the park and the predatory instinct of a pack of wild dogs.
Hwange National Park
At the park office at Main Camp, situated about mid way on the eastern edge of the park, the largest in Zimbabwe, we paid our entry fee. As with all Zimbabwean national parks, and unlike anywhere else in Southern and Eastern Africa where there was a expensive daily charge, here a one off inexpensive single payment covered up to seven days in the park; extremely good value even bearing in mind the state of the parks by comparison. Then, with the help of the staff, we worked out a three day south east-north west route through the park and booked campsites, where possible picnic sites, accordingly. We had arrived too late to be allowed to continue deeper into the park, so, after a short game drive, we spent the night at Main Camp’s dilapidated campsite, where collapsed security fencing allowed the animals free rein.

As had been the norm since leaving Mana Pools, we were the sole occupants and so had the undivided attention of the ‘attendant’, a lanky, almost gangling, and engaging man with a great sense of humour, called Binga ..you would need a sense of humour if you were named after a town on the shore of Lake Kariba! Binga was on temporary duty at Main Camp and normally the attendant at a picnic site in the south of the park where we were due to stay the following night. It was a site he would return to the following morning and, as it was where his wife and children lived with him for most of the year, except for a period of duty at harvest time at their distant family settlement, he called it ‘home’. Having ensured we had plenty of wood for the braai and that the donkey was fired up, he bade us a temporary farewell.
Binga’s Home
After a night’s sleep interrupted by a lion, only yards away and seriously in need of a course of Benylin, so wheezy were his roars, we spent the next day on an extended game drive, travelling south to Binga’s ‘home’, the Ngwethia picnic site. It was not until after six hours had passed and as we were approaching Binga’s home, that the animals that up to then had left tell-tale signs on the track but had remained disappointingly invisible, started to appear. The immaculate picnic site, an imperfectly fenced circle about two hundred feet in diameter, was set under trees and beneath them the grey-brown sand was swept spotlessly clean. The site consisted of an open sided rondavel, braai stand, ablutions and scullery; to the rear was a small shed like thatched building that was Binga’s family residence. There was no electricity, but there was cold water provided by the ancient spluttering diesel pump out on the pan that also supplied water to the larger of the waterholes there; however in order to save fuel Binga only ran it and a water supply during daylight hours.
Night Time Rumbles, Roars and Wreckage

 Sunset,Ngwethia picnic site 

In the early evening, the sky glowing with the brush strokes of the setting sun, the three waterholes in the large, flat, open expanse of savannah around Binga’s home were a magnet for elephant, giraffe, zebra and antelope. Binga kindly suggested we watch them from the top of a nearby termite mound outside the perimeter fence, whilst he prepared and lit the fire for our braai. By half past six it was dark and with the thin cream crescent of the new moon unable to spoil the brightness of their display we sat out under the stars, eating our supper by the flickering light of the fire. A group of bull elephants were also dining very close by; in addition to the crack of breaking branches, as they fed they emitted the deepest, longest, laziest, yet very resonant, rumbles imaginable. These rumbles, never heard during the day, reverberated around us, sounding like contented meal time conversation, and as such were strangely comforting.

We slept well until Peter decided a visit to the loo could be delayed no longer; Liz awoke and having been assured there were no lions nearby decided she needed a visit too. As we were at the bottom of the tent ladder, Peter’s assurances took a nose dive; a lion roared somewhere in the undergrowth just on the far side of the fence! It was too late to turn back; our bodies were in loo mode and not to be denied! A record breaking head torch assisted dash to, performance in and cautious but speedy return from the afore mentioned loo, saw us, breathing heavily and with backward glances, climbing back up into the boudoir, then laughing and listening to the intermittent roars as they receded into the distance.

The next night was spent at another superb, isolated picnic site, the attendant was just as charming and helpful and the setting was just as romantic; the black silhouettes of acacia trees against the setting sun and orange red sky; a sparkling ceiling of stars watching over us as we ate dinner by the fire; and the call of wildlife breaking the all enveloping silence of the bush at night. The wildlife became all too noisy and far too close for comfort in the early hours of the morning! Only this time, amplified by the stillness of the night, it was the alarming creaking and crash of a feeding bull elephant very deliberately pushing a tree over onto the perimeter fence. Then, so close he had to be inside the fence, breaking branches off another tree; its leaves and twigs were raining down onto the tent roof. It was the tree we were under and we began to panic!

We needn’t have, either by accident or the great beast’s concern for our welfare, he continued feeding but, as evinced by studying his foot prints in the morning, only on those parts of the tree away from Boris. However at the time we were imagining the worst ..’Globetrotting pensioners crushed to death by tree. Elephant arrested’ headlines in the Twickenham Times!.. but the snap of branches was replaced by the snaffle of leaves from twigs; then silence, the elephant had moved on .. how do they do it? Massive size and weight, yet not a sound!

 Once a permanent waterhole, now a sandpit.Hwange NP

Our final day in Hwange was spent travelling slowly northwards; stopping at waterholes, most with a broken pump and turning out to be little more than sand pits, but at one with water, seeing a pair of beautiful diminutive bat eared foxes, and taking detours to deserted game viewing platforms. The further north we went, the worse the track, the more scarce the game and the more frequent the passage of other vehicles .. well, there must have been at least three! By mid afternoon and as we drew close to our final campsite, we had exchanged flat sandy shrub savannah for hills incised by the now dry course of wet season rivers. Sinamatella Camp was on a plateau, with its part overgrown campsite on the edge of the escarpment; again the sole occupants, we camped as close to the edge as safety would allow to enjoy the marvellous views over the valley below to a range of hills in the distance.
Welcome Treatment
Our teenage attendant, Welcome, so called because his parents waited years for a child, put what was probably the only working light bulb in the campsite into the empty socket above the ladies ablution door, ushered us in and explained, not without some embarrassment, that as this was the only ablution that was open we both had to use it and the water filled buckets and tins lined up against the wall were for ‘washin’ and flushin’’, the camp water pump having packed up days ago. There were sinks, but no longer white and their tiling surround was more absent than present, the shower was missing the shower head and its floor a suspiciously dirty brown colour. But, hey, the ablution was open, there was water and we had a fit-all sink plug with us and, as Welcome pointed out to us, at night the outside light shone into the washroom through the fanlight above the door. Welcome, bless him, was making the best of a bad job and we were content; we had seen worse in West Africa!
Departure
After another cold night, our breath ephemeral mist lit by the rays of the early morning sun, we sat making the most of the view, our final breakfast in Zimbabwe and wished Louisa a ‘Happy Birthday’; Louisa, we hope that you had your ESP antennae fully tuned! The northern perimeter of the park was only about four hours from Victoria Falls and by three o’clock on 27 July, with Boris covered in a fine film of spray we were heading over the Victoria Falls Bridge into Zambia. 

 Victoria Falls Bridge.From exit point Zimbabwean border control.Bungee jump,right hand side of bridge 

Our Impressions.
We travelled to Zimbabwe knowing that some friends and acquaintances would disagree with our decision. We were not making a statement, nor minimising the ruinous impact of the later Mugabe years; we were curious travellers determined to see for ourselves, as far as was possible, what state the country, its people and its wildlife parks were in. Not as bad as we feared is the answer that we give. But this positive impression is heavily qualified by the fact that ours was a short and very incomplete visit to a small part of Zimbabwe.

From talking to the people we met, and not all were happy to discuss Zimbabwean politics openly or with others present, we became aware of their relief and belief that things were changing for the better and that those in the towns were faring better than those in the countryside. The rural population was still in crisis, surviving by reverting back to an existence that should have gone for good. They had no money and so couldn’t buy food and general goods, even if the stores had existed, and had to revert to a barter system with its inherent vagaries and uncertainties. Many, penniless and having of necessity eaten their seed corn, were no longer self sufficient and relied on food aid, augmenting that by searching the surrounding countryside for edible berries, roots and leaves. A rural infrastructure remained, but only in the sense that people now walked on roads and tracks still devoid of any form of meaningful public or private transport system. A rural health care system of sorts remained in place but, without transport, it was often impossible to use and seemed desperately underfunded and under resourced, patchy at best and in places missing altogether. In a way the plight of Jonathan and his family encapsulated everything that is still so badly wrong in rural Zimbabwe.

Yes the rural economy is recovering, but it is doing so from such a low point as to make it painfully slow for the majority and fatally so for a minority of those at greatest risk, the old and young. If you then add to this the impact of the double whammy of firstly the global credit crunch which the World Bank estimates will lead, in the very poorest countries, to 200,000 to 400,000 more children dying each year for the next five years; and secondly the effect on those same countries of the resurgent rise in staple food prices, up by 26% since last December, then those in rural Zimbabwe are still at risk for the foreseeable future.

 Sign of the times! 

The National Parks gamely carry on; the enthusiasm and dedication of the staff making up in part for the infrastructure and facilities that are pathetically outdated and decrepit. For us, all of this became part of their charm and the resilience of the staff, and the parks and game they managed under such testing conditions was quite wonderful. Particularly bearing in mind the appalling straits to which they had been driven; the staff at two parks confirmed that, faced with over a year without pay and the need for their families to survive, as a last desperate resort they had to shoot some of the game they were there to protect. Something they said that was sanctioned as a necessary evil by those in authority. This, plus the increased incidence of poaching (for exactly the same reason, survival) and the desperate fight for crop survival (elephant skulls lined the entrances to several settlements we passed in Mashonaland) would seem to have led, in some areas of some parks, to the game being scarce, secretive and skittish. The National Park officials felt that now a corner had been turned; they were being paid, investment in facilities and infrastructure was promised and they were looking forward to an increasing number of visitors to the parks they were so committed to and proud of.

We are glad we visited Zimbabwe and provided what little support we could to the rural economy, its people and the National Parks. But we realise that only time will tell if the genesis of all the incremental beneficial changes now happening in Zimbabwe, the political accommodation, survives and flourishes. For the sake of a proud and hospitable people we admire and a country and its parks we grew to love, we hope so.