Back Under Sail - Zimbabwe

We arrived in Zimbabwe with a sense of apprehension - it's torrid current and historic political situation, recent hyper inflationary period in 2008, stories of land seizures, murders and corruption had filled us with a cautionary approach to our time travelling in Zimbabwe.

Trillionaires!  The largest note in circulation during hyper-inflation before the economy finally collapsed in 2008.

What a pleasant shock it was to be greeted in Victoria Falls by some of the nicest people we've met on our entire trip.  The positive vibe only increased as we travelled from Vic Falls to Kariba - we had a lovely dinner with Rose and Don (who drove us from Vic Falls to Mlbizi) at their house in Mlibizi, and then a wonderful trip across Lake Kariba on the Sea Lion Ferry.

When we arrived in Kariba, we met our guide for the next part of our adventure - sailing a catamaran on Lake Kariba for five days with game walks in the Matusadona National Park.  Rob Fynn, our guide, was a wonderful character full of stories spanning the last 50 years of life on Lake Kariba and in Zimbabwe.



We would spend the next five days sailing on a 33ft Wharram Tiki catamaran "Gache Gache" (named after one of the rivers feeding Lake Kariba) - camping on the shores of the lake and enjoying the remote beauty of one of Zimbabwe's larger national parks.

Lake Kariba was formed in the 1950s when a large dam was built in Kariba, blocking the path of the Zambezi river and flooding the once fertile Zambezi valley.  The ecological implications of the dam - and particularly the current practice of maximising the water level held within the lake - are still being seen today.  As the land was not cleared prior to the flooding, there are forests of petrified trees jutting from the waters - making sailing through these a bit interesting!

The lake is full of crocodiles and hippos (Rob estimated one croc for every 50m of shoreline) - meaning that the waters along the shores are extremely dangerous.   This became a bit tricky for us, as even though the Tiki only had about 0.8m of draft, we still managed to run aground on various sandbanks as we tried to get in close for good views of the hippos.  We got our views - but having to jump in and push off to get under way again got the adrenalin pumping!

The elephant population in the park is quite robust - and occasionally they either swim or, as the water recedes in the dry season, walk from the mainland to the islands.  Quite a sight!

Each morning and evening we went on game walks in the park with Rob - a Professional Hunter and therefore allowed to carry firearms - as our guide.  Rob's knowledge of the park and animals was quite impressive.  It was also a bit scary having him tell us story after story of people being killed by elephants and other animals - and reaffirmed that we may have got a little too close in Botswana.

The Matusadona is a wild park - the roads are virtually unusable, meaning access is almost exclusively from the lake.  Combined with the low tourist numbers generally in Zimbabwe, we really felt how much 'wilder' Matusadona was compared to the other parks we've done safaris and game walks in.  While in many places we were able to get within 5m or less of 'common game' like impala, in the Matus the animals were clearly not acclimatised to humans as in the more touristy places.  While this meant that it was harder to see game, it also provided a more romantic and authentic experience - allowing us more natural interactions with nature.

We also got to see first hand a small fishing village on King Island (illegally within the park).  Rob stopped in to buy some dried fish for his staff in Harare - it was interesting to hear the fisherman estimate that they harvest 2 tonnes of fish from the lake each week.  (Mike - who had tried his hand at fishing for both bream and tiger fish to no avail, was tempted to give up the line and take to the locals nets!)

Lake Kariba experiences katabatic winds - strong easterlies in the mornings, followed by dead calms in the middle of the day and then westerlies in the late afternoon.  We had fun sailing the few times we made it out after our morning game walks in time to still catch the winds on our way to the next campsite.  

And each day, after some convincing on the first day that we would be safe from the crocs, we went for swims offshore in the lake.

Each night we had wonderful sunsets - enjoying a sundowner as Rob set up camp.  It was great having a cook/guide/captain on board - what a relaxing way to go - maybe we need to have some crew come along in the Pacific!  

 

While the Matusadona has one of the largest wild lion populations in Africa - and we were treated to the roars at night (once very near our camp as we were sitting down to dinner) - we weren't able to locate them on foot.   The closest we came was finding vultures over a recent kill, but it was in bush that was too dense for us to see much.

Overall, we loved our time in Zimbabwe and on Lake Kariba.  Rob shared some truly special, and heartbreaking, stories with us.  He had owned a resort on Forthergill Island, which was seized under Mugabe's regime.  The resort is still there, languishing under the new 'owners' with no guests or direction.

We really bonded with Rob, who was kind enough to invite us to stay with him in Harare where we met his mother, 'Maasie', and staff.  Hearing the experiences of white Zimbabweans, many of whom lost everything or almost everything they had under Mugabe's regime, really put into perspective the adversity that people can overcome in life.  We loved our trip, but particularly appreciated how lucky we were to have had Rob as our guide and be given a glimpse into the heart and soul of Zimbabwe.