I have decided to combine two days as one day
was just traveling and there was not much to report.
A few things I
forgot to mention when writing yesterdays blog while staying at Kasanka, so
here goes...I never emphasized why the Sitatonga are such unique animals. They
live for a great deal of their lives in water, it is their way of protecting
themselves from predators and because of this adaptation they have web hooves
so that they can move efficiently in water. In fact they are known as the
underwater buck. Our young scout kept telling us that you can see the Sitatonga
0405. None of us could work out what the hell he was talking about till we
realized he meant from 4am -5am in the morning. He was obviously trained in army language.
Rouvierre was saying that she thought he meant that you could see them at 4
minutes past 5 in the morning and she thought wow this guy I is obviously very
accurate with his daily sightings. She got the BB prize of the day!
We set off fairly early as the road out of the
reserve is long and quite narrow and even though we were very careful about the
missing the trees on the side, we did hit an overhanging branch and bent the
protecting bars that run at the top of the roof. Thank goodness they were there
or we could have done some serious damage to the body of the truck.
Again we made the mistake of thinking we only
had about 220 Km to go. As it turned out it was 380 Km of great North road which is not the most
pleasant experience. On the way up we must have passed at least 7 of the most
terrible accidents mostly involving the trucks. Most of them are huge petrol
tankers and are traveling at about 100/120 Km’s and hour which it is very fast for these narrow roads. We are so
used to double highways in SA so the trucks don't seem quite so daunting. They
certainly have improved the road since we were here last, the verges have been
fixed and widened but it is still pretty harrowing to try and get past them.
We were trying to get to Shiwa Ngandu, which
means the lake of the crocodile, before it got dark and wanted to see the old
Manor House as we have twice before been at Shiwa Ngandu but never managed to
actually get in and see the inside of the old homestead. It was built in the
1930s and is a real landmark in Zambia in fact there is a book that has been
written on it which tells the story of the farm and the family that built it
called "Africa House." Ernest is always so fascinated by these
stories and so this time he was determined to learn more about it and the
family. Last time we were here it was closed to the public but we had heard
that it was re-opened for viewing as the grandson had returned and was allowing
visitors, in fact we heard the house was now being run as a B&B.
Just to tell you something about the farm. It
was bought in the early 1900s by a the Cor-Brown family and in 1914 Stewart
Cor-Brown started building the house with money that he had borrowed from his
Aunt Ethel and he finished it in 1934. The property was 12,000 hectares in size
and was farmed as a cattle and game farm by Steward and his wife, a girl who
was 27 years younger than him. They had two daughters who both were married. The
one daughter had 4 children one of whom is Charles, the present owner who is
now living on the farm and running the place as a beef and game farm.
When we arrived there was the usual notice on
the gate to say “view by appointment
only.” This time Ernest was
so determined to see the house that he stopped at the farm manager’s office and managed to make an appointment
to have a tour of the house the next day at 9am. This rather threw our plans
into disarray as we were supposed to be leaving to go to Lake Tanganyika the
next day. Oh well that is the beauty of being vagabonds and we decided to just
stay another night.
We drove on to the hot springs which are 20 km
further and got settled into the campsite. It is always such a surprise for
anybody arriving for the first time at the hot springs, they are absolutely
beautiful and you feel like you are sinking into a warm bath.
As soon as we had set up camp, fed the men which
is always a priority, we went to have a dip in
the hot springs. I love seeing the faces of the guys when they first
sink into the warm water, firstly the surprise and then a sigh of "oh my
gosh, I can live with this" type look.
We had that same reaction when we visited here
for the 1st time many years ago. In fact Paul and Marguerite were
with us before and now again we just soaked in the water for hours.
We were very fortunate that the campsite was
nearly empty so we got the prize position right near the river which is about
20 meters wide and very fast flowing. It reminds me of the rivers in the
midlands, the big difference being this one is full of crocs which can eat
you!! (as our friend Lovemore Sibanda
explained it to us)
Another lovely evening under the stars with the
sound of the river, lots of stories on what we look like from the back when we
are passing one of those huge trucks and how nervous I get, even the soles of
my feet start to sweat never mind my hands.
Part two of our visit to Shiwa Ngandu will come
in a few days.
Until then!
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