Ok, so we've done this a bit arse-about. Having entered Zambia from Malawi, in the far east, the plan had been to work our way slowly across the country over a couple of weeks before ending up at Victoria Falls in the far south-west. Instead, we sped over 1000km across Zambia in less than 48 hours and have been in the town of Livingstone, the gateway to Victoria Falls, for the past three days.
The reason for this is the fabled Lunar Rainbow.
The Lunar Rainbow is a phenomenon that occurs during the full moon in just two places on earth (and has been sighted just once ever at a couple more), and Victoria Falls is one of these places. Basically, as far as we could tell, it was a rainbow at night time, which in itself sounded hella cool. Arriving in Zambia when we did, our timing was such that we had just two days before the full moon, and so we decided that what is a once-a-month opportunity for the local folks here might be a once-in-a-lifetime shot for us. We went for it.
We made two stops along the way, firstly in Chipata, a bustling but pleasant town just inside the Zambian border where we took the final decision to make the big trip across the whole country, and then the following night in Zambia's capital Lusaka, which I would describe as Nairobi's uglier, less appealing sister. This is not a compliment.
The saving grace of these journeys was that the roads were generally good and the buses of decent standard, which made the trips far more pleasant than might have been expected. Arriving in Livingstone on the night before the full moon, we were tempted to go straight into the falls to see the Lunar Rainbow that night (it is also visible the night before and after the full moon) as the evening was clear, cloudless and beautiful. We didn't have the budget to go in on two separate nights, so it was with some trepidation that we decided against going in immediately, and made the call to wait until the night of the full moon itself. We hoped we'd made the right one. So we instead spent the first night in the fantastic Fawlty Towers guesthouse (yes, it's actually called that) chilling out and doing something very uncharacteristic for us - drinking beer.
Victoria Falls - known in the local tongue as Mosi-Oa-Tunya (The Smoke That Thunders) is, of course, one of the world's great natural wonders at any time of day, at any time of month, and so the following morning Jen and I made the trip into Victoria Falls National Park for a daytime visit. I'd read a lot about the monumental volume of water that crashes down over the falls every second, but these are all just numbers on a page until you actually view the thing in person and see just how much of the wet stuff there is - it is truly awe-inspiring.
In fact, the amount of water is magnified at this time of year due to the water level being at its highest - it doesn't just come tumbling over and down the falls, it sprays into the air all around the park. We'd been warned that we'd get wet, and so paid $1 each to hire a raincoat at the entrance to the park. This proved to be money well spent, but even so nothing prepared us for the almighty soaking we copped whilst exploring the falls - it was truly like being caught in a storm.
It meant that in many places the view of the cataracts themselves were somewhat obscured, but somehow the atmosphere was enhanced by the drenching. We were also able to climb down a rocky path to the Boiling Point, where the water swirls to a quite frightening degree, and to go onto the suspension bridge which separates Zambia and Zimbabwe (Victoria Falls is on the border between the two) where we could watch the bungee jumpers take their life into their hands (which we might have done ourselves if we'd had the spare $130 each in our budget to do it) and visit Zimbabwe, if only for a matter of seconds.
The relative lack of commercialisation of the place - given its status as one of Africa's premier tourist destinations - was both welcome and refreshing, and extended to an endearing lack of health and safety precautions, meaning you could get close to the flow of water right on the lip of the falls. I mean, like, really close.
The day visit to Vic Falls was spectacular, but as the clouds gathered in the afternoon we were feeling more than a little apprehensive about our prospects for the main event that evening. The National Park has a money-making scheme going on whereby on the days of the full moon they open the park at night, but don't let any day visitors stay inside to wait for the rainbow. Nope, you have to leave the park and then pay again (with an extra $5 Rainbow surcharge added) to come back in. Bastards. It was for this reason that Jen and I, as well as a few others including new friends Duncan and Sandra, an Australian/German couple, Canadian teacher Derek, and Ken, a Brazil-born US army officer stationed in Afghanistan, initially went to the Zam-Zim bridge where admission was free and from where we had been told the rainbow was also visible. After an hour of standing on the bridge looking at nothing but night air, we came to the conclusion that this had been an utter lie. So while Derek and Ken inexplicably returned to Fawlty Towers, Duncan, Sandra, Jen and I paid up and went into the park.
The clouds had long dissipated and the night was by now brilliantly clear, so we were hoping for something special. I'll let you be the judge as to whether or not we got it.
Yep, I reckon so too.
There were several great viewpoints - the first couple were understandably, and deservedly, well attended by tourists (though, thankfully, nowhere was particularly or unpleasantly crowded), but the four of us were thrilled to head a little deeper into the park to discover an entirely different rainbow out of sight of the main one. It was down towards the wettest part of the falls, so taking pics down there was a little treacherous, but I think the ones we got were worth it.
And with that, breath sufficiently taken, we returned to Fawlty Towers to show Derek and Ken what they'd missed. Another pleasant day doing nothing but relax and sink a few cold ones has now passed - tomorrow we'll begin our journey back to the other side of Zambia, and will work our way all the way back here again in a couple of weeks on our way toward Botswana.
The smoke will still be thundering then. But there won't be a rainbow at night.
Things Jennie will remember:
1) The irony of being surrounded by "ze Germans" in a place called Falwty Towers (Don't mention it... just don't mention it).
2) Realising just how low Sean and I had lowered our standards when he can blog that the buses here are of a "decent standard" - they are still 5 seats across and therefore flipping squashed.
3) That getting drench at the falls was more like having a bucket of water tipped on you that didn't stop
4) That it wasn't the money that stopped me from doing a bungee but more the 111m drop to my death that petrified me
5) Being in Zimbabwe for all of 4 seconds :)
6) Thinking how annoying it is that since the SA World Cup Zimbabwe no longer offers the 'day visa' for you to cross over to visit the falls on their side - silly billies
7) The baboons at the falls - scary buggers
8) Our taxi driver back from the falls who I'm pretty sure was very stoned
9) The site of the spray of the falls from the road - it looks just like a building is on fire in the distance
10) That we made the right decision to travel to see the lunar rainbow (and being thankful that we'd met Jake earlier on our trip who'd shown me how to use the exposure setting on my camera!)
Here are the photos:
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