Victoria Falls - the most scenic place on earth to throw up

Marc here - taking a chance to post about our most recent vacation

We got off to a rough start on day 3 (I know, we're blogging out of order): Karla was sick, and had to skip the "Gorge Activities" in the morning.

So it was without my wife's support that I overcame my paralyzing fear of heights just long enough to get strapped into the safety gear - and then there was no turning back: we rappeled down a cliff, flew across the gorge on a zipline, and the piece de resistance was the "gorge swing" - which sounds harmless (ie. all the kids like to play on swings, right?) but actually involves a 30m free fall featuring 3.5 seconds of terrifying fear/adrenaline/gasping-for-breath, followed by the chafing of a lifetime from the safety harness as the ropes swing you way out into the middle of the gorge and away from the sharp rocks that you were falling towards just a few moments ago.
This photo (left) shows me stepping out into a free fall - it's hard to enjoy the scenery at 9.8m/s^2....









The key to the zipline is to run as fast as you can off the edge :)
In this case, at least I'm hanging on to something, which made me feel marginally safer...











Of course, the "the flying fox" style is even more daring (there goes Daryl)













Karla joined us at noon, for a speedboat ride to Livingstone Island to have lunch at the top of the falls. But first, we went on a guided swim to the edge of the falls (let's not forget my paralyzing fear of heights). Karla still wasn't feeling well - but she hung in there with us to make some great photos!
Right before the photos below were taken, Karla threw up, and then was the first to jump into the "Devil's pool" where you can swim right to the edge. I don't think she has ever been sick in such a beautiful place (rainbows/mist/waterfall/etc)













Jumping into this pool takes some courage - the edge of the falls is about 15 feet away.













The flow of water over the edge is only a couple of inches where we're sitting, but the current is very strong on both the left and right side of this "pool"













Don't look over the edge - it's a long way down. The cliff in the background belongs to Zimbabwe (the Zambezi river gorge is the dividing line in this area)








After a walk along the edge of the falls, we had lunch. The servers could tell that Karla was not doing well, and somehow they managed to find her a mattress, so she could rest - while Daryl, Sabrina and I enjoyed a fantastic lunch and drinks.

After 3 days in Livingstone, it felt like we were leaving Zambia too soon - but our time in Rundu and Etosha continued to exceed our expectations...

White-water rafting in Zambia!!

Africa! We have just returned from visiting 3 countries on the dark continent and we are awed by its beauty and the struggle of day-to-day life. It shares some similarities with other places we've visited, but combines it all together in a completely different way. And each area is distinct from the next. Different struggles and different successes, different things to enjoy. There were many heart-breaking situations we saw and heard about - so much to process. Not a dull moment, that's for certain! What with daredevil activities, a death threat or two, close encounters with wild animals, church politics and illness, we had quite the time!

We met up with our friends Daryl and Sabrina Neufeld who are volunteering in Namibia for a year at the local hospital as a pharmacist and a physio-therapist. You can check out their blog at http://www.neufeldsinnamibia.blogspot.com/

October 2

They drove from Rundu to Katima and then on to Livingstone to meet us at the airport. We travelled 24 hours, and then were delayed another 7 hours for our last 1 hr flight! We arrived, tired and excited and without our luggage. Stores were closed - it was 7pm after all. But thankfully, the Neufelds had enough stuff to lend us what we needed for the next day of white-water rafting on the Zambezi river at the base of Victoria Falls!!

October 3

The rafting was so much fun. We were a little nervous, and didn't know what to expect, but if I had known before what I knew after, I would have been even more excited! We drove in an open truck with bench seats to a Tire shop - that's where Bundu Adventures has its headquarters. (It's all very random, and I was never really sure where we were going or what we were doing.) But we paid there, and then headed to the falls! After an amusing safety briefing (featuring our guide, "Potato" reading an abbreviated list of all the possible injuries, followed by "Blah, blah, blah - just sign it!"), we got our safety gear and walked down the gorge to the river. There were lots of rafts, from different companies, but our guide was the best by far. We had spirit! We were the only raft giving each other high fives with our paddles. And Potato would explain each rapid with great detail, telling us where we were headed, and why. It didn't do us much good on the first rapid, unfortunately - we went down backwards which means much less control over the direction of the raft. The difference it made surprised me since I felt totally out of control the whole time, but I soon noticed that Potato was very skilled at steering our raft, even when we were too chicken to paddle at first!

Here's Marc almost falling out of the boat. My paddle held him in long enough for Daryl to haul him back in. There were no other accidental spills until later on...

Woohoo! Full recovery!!

Thumbs up!

Brace yourselves!

Yup, that's our boat!
One rapid was so scary, they were going to close it the following week. Wonderful timing! Wise, or chicken? You decide... I chose to leave our raft, (just for that rapid) go down the easier way, and let one of the daredevil riverboarders have a turn on the raft. Sure enough, the boat flipped, and everyone was thrown out. Daryl was thrown far and my raft went to pick him up. Sabrina surfaced underneath the raft, and had to go back under to come back up again. Potato gathered everyone quickly since they had to be on the raft (now upside down) before the next rapid. Woohoo!