dwc0201

Time to spend a few minutes on this before it is all forgotten...first I will say that we had a wonderful time and it was more than either myself or my husband expected. In fact if there was one thing I did wrong it was giving us a few days in London instead of spending all of our time in Africa. We won't make that mistake again.

We started out with just two nights in Luangwa River Lodge. It was everything that I expected, very nice accomodations and our best food of the trip. I don't think I could have stayed more than two days without putting on extra pounds. There was only one other couple in camp so it was quiet and relaxing. We saw wonderful game there including two leopards (or maybe one at two different times?) In fact we saw a Leopard being chased from its kill of an impala by about 30 baboons as the vultures took advantage. It looked like the Leopard had it fill anyway as there wasn't much left on the carcass. I am glad LRL was our first stop because we did see alot of other vehicles on drives, which I had expected, but I think it would have bothered us more after being at other camps where we rarely saw other vehicles.

The only thing we didn't see at LRL was lions but our next stop was Kaingo for three nights and that took care of our lion fix. We saw a couple of young males lounging one day and the next day saw 3 lioness and 6 of their cubs which was wonderful. We were able to follow the lioness' on a couple of different days on their hunting and with some good guiding got to see a kill from start to finish. It took them a few tries but watching their strategy was amazing as they took down an Impala and made short work of it.

We also loved watching the elephants at the river crossings and all their interaction with each other. We had one elephant at Kaingo getting up on it's hind legs to reach the top of the tree, great pictures. Also saw hundreds of cape buffalo in large herds and alot of giraffe, kudu, hippo etc. something around every corner.

Our last stop was down to the lower Zambezi to Chiawa for three nights. The game drives were very disappointing when we there and we had been told by others that were at Sausage tree the week before that there was alot to see but for some reason the animals had moved to a different part of the park during our stay.

We had requested a superior tent at Chiawa and it was beautiful. We also had one afternoon where we just stayed in our tent and watched the animals come to us as we had elephants, cape buffalo, wart hogs and a large group of baboons right at our front sitting area. It was great to see them interact without knowing we were there.

Chiawa was a little less my style as they tried to create "surprises" which meant events for dinner or planned seatings that I found a bit frustrating. It is hard to do a bit more freestyle on a safari because timing of everything is key for meals and drives but sometimes you are tired or just tired of talking to others that make planned events difficult. They did have a wonderful staff and the best of intentions as prior to our arrival I requested at least one dinner alone with my husband but they did it without asking on the first night we arrived- after a boat, a jeep and airplane to arrive at camp just in time for the evening drive then didn't give us time to clean up before the dinner. Again, the best of intentions but I would have preferred to have a bit more input.

All in all a wonderful trip and I sure we will do this again.

We do have pictures that we will post at some point in the next week or so. Thanks to all of you for your help in planning.

Debbie

matnikstym

Debbie-
Glad you had a good trip and enjoyed LRL. Kaingo is on my list. Too bad about the animals at L.Z! Can't wait for your pics.

Leely

Thanks for the report, Debbie. It does sound like a great trip. When you say you saw "a lot" of either vehicles at LRL, how many/how often?

I'm looking forward to the photos.

dwc0201

Leely, Sometimes we might go an hour without seeing another vehicle, sometimes it might be every 15 minutes. There was only one time we were around more than one vehicle and that was when a leopard had been spotted so there were 4 or 5 other jeeps.

Others on the board can probably tell you how many other camps share that area but I would guess 6 or 7. We still really enjoyed being there and would not have done it differently but I am glad we moved on to Kaingo after a couple of days.

cw

Thanks for your report, especially useful about the other vehicles.

How does Chiawa compare with the other camps on the "managed" dinner times. Did you dine with your ranger, alone, or with others? Or were the other camps more flexible about timing?

I found the larger the camp, the more fixed the dinner hour seemed to be.

Looking forward to your photos.

CW

dwc0201

I think you probably hit it right that because Chiawa is a larger camp then dinner seemed more of a production. They have to wait to get everyone gathered after drives and all and then have the staff sing for a bit.

Each camp does things differently and while this wasn't my cup of tea there are many that love Chiawa. We only had a few people at the other camps so it was less fuss.

atravelynn

The lion hunt and kill must have been very exciting. And the baboons chasing the leopard! Wow.

I think there may be some competition between Chiawa and Sausage Tree on surprises and festivities. I had more surprises at 2 nights at Sausage Tree than on most of my entire safaris.

The animal viewing right from your tent may have been the best surprise of all.