By Frank & Edna Calenda, 5-time travelers, Indian Harbour Beach, Florida
Picture yourself in the deepest, darkest Africa. You’re following your guide on an early morning walking safari. You round a bend in the trail. Staring you in the face is a lioness with a look that says, “One step closer to my cub and you’ll be our breakfast!” You hear your armed guide whisper, “Don’t run, just be calm and she won’t bother you.” You check your urge to flee. You watch. Then, you slowly and carefully take a few photos and gratefully follow your guide away, but not without a few anxious glances over your shoulder. You can’t help but wonder, “What’s next?”
On this safari, you’ll never really know what’s next. It could be two juvenile elephants, still young enough to enjoy wrestling in the nearest water hole. It could be coming on to a herd of Cape buffalo, one of the most dangerous and formidable animals to roam the jungle. Your guide will fill you full of stories of these animals being hunted and wounded, but then circling around to make the hunter the object of the hunt and, many times, coming out the winner.
A cheetah could be basking in the warm morning sun, having already filled its stomach on a misshapen antelope. Or you could come upon the King himself. Being inherently shy, he stays away from the main pride, especially during the time that the young cubs are active. He quietly lies in the high grass where he can’t be spotted, except at the last minute when you turn and there he is.
All this can happen on a safari. This particular safari was taken with Overseas Adventure Travel, also known simply as OAT. This company will jet you from most any major city in America to many exciting areas of the world. This one was to southern Africa.
Our lodgings were what I like to refer to as “5-star tents.” Not all the camps were tents, some were thatched roof cottages. They are all well-appointed with a private bathroom in each facility. Land Rovers were usually provided in the mornings and afternoons for extensive safari rides.
Travel from camp to camp was not possible by road. Roads might be available, but one certainly wouldn’t want to ride over them for seven to eight hours. Instead, OAT provided travel using small aircraft. Mostly they were Piper aircraft and the flights were usually 30 to 45 minutes in duration. Most of the landing strips were runways carved into the jungle floor, a full half mile of dirt.
Our safari also took us to one of the most beautiful places in the world: the famed Victoria Falls. Originating in Angola to the North, the Zambezi River flows for 600 miles through the African plains until it comes to the rift created by volcanic action millions of years ago. This is more than just a sight to see, you will actually feel its massive vibrations long before you see it. The roar of falling water resonates to your very core.
Time passes quickly because you never want to move your eyes from the ever-changing views. You’ll need a water-proof cover for your stroll along the face of the falls. If you’ve seen Niagara Falls, you’ve seen only but a brief image of what you’ll view at Victoria. Niagara is impressive, but Victoria is the grandfather of all falls.
And so it goes from camp to camp for three weeks. When you wake each morning you ask yourselves, “Do I want to be jostled and bumped around again today? Haven’t I seen enough animals to last a lifetime?” Then, you recall the sounds of the night, the grunting of the hippos as they passed your window, the mighty roar of the lion that has made its catch, and the answer flashes into your mind that you haven’t seen enough.
This is wild Africa. This is the trip of a lifetime and you rush into the day with renewed vigor wondering what amazing sights await you. There’ll be tears in your eyes when you have to leave and you’ll promise yourself that you’ll return some day. That’s exactly what we did.
Frank and Edna Calenda were so enamoured with southern Africa that they visited the region twice with OAT. Find out why on our Ultimate Africa: Botswana, Zambia & Zimbabwe Safari.