Day 19 - Into Zimbabwe

Day 19

We head for Victoria Falls today, which is a short drive, but we have to go thru the border in order to do so.  We are up and on the road by 9.

Within 15 minutes we are at the border crossing and have to get our passports checked in order to leave Botswana.  This is fairly painless. We drive a couple of hundred feet and get to the border to enter Zimbabwe.  There are lines of trucks waiting to be processed and lots of safari vehicles. There is a long line of people waiting to get into the building and we go stand in line. Misheck shows up a couple of minutes later and gets our passports along with our Visa money to see if he can get it processed faster.  Judy raises her concerns about letting go of her passport but Misheck is patient in explaining why he needs them.  Some of the people had already paid for their Visas (100 bucks each on line) while the rest of us had to have the exact US cash.  It was weird in that Australians and US citizens had to pay 30 bucks while Canadians had to pay 75 bucks.  We felt bad about this but not nearly as bad as those who had got their visas ahead of time and paid more!

Customs took about 1 hr. and once thru, we were off for our final leg to Victoria Falls.  It was only 70 km and we were there. We took a short drive thru Victoria Falls, stopped at the Victoria Falls Hotel for a 15 minute walkabout and then boarded the bus to go to Victoria Falls, which is next to Niagra Falls in size.  The cost was 30 bucks (US) to in to the Falls. We walked around, took some photos and then met at the restaurant for some lunch.  It was quite hot by this time (1 PM) and we were all anxious to get to our lodge.  The Akizuma Lodge is very nice, but our rooms are not ready for about 45 minutes.  There is a pool, warnings about crocs, and the rooms are quite nice.  Wandering about the place are monkeys, baboons, and warthogs!

We get into our room, and just relax, as it is quite warm outside and the room has A/C and also wifi, which is a treat.

At 4 PM some of us meet Misheck at the lobby and he drives us up the road to the helicopter pad.  There is a choice of either a 15 or 25 minute helicopter ride, and Tim, Mike, Bob, John, Chris and I have all signed up for the 25 minute ride. I get a really good seat beside John and Chris. Time and Bob are across from us and facing backwards which is not that great for photo taking. Mike was lucky and got the shotgun seat beside the pilot. The flight is really neat as you get to see the falls from the air after you have walked around them a couple of hours prior. We also flew over the Chobe National park which we had viewed the day prior. We say some large herds of Elephants and Water Buffalo as well as Giraffe during our flight. None seemed bothered by the chopper as they are up there all the time, catering to the tourists.

Supper is a buffet again, and we get a supposed deal on it (35 bucks knocked down to 25) There is also a show of some young Africans singing, dancing and playing drums around a large fire which is quite entertaining.

After supper, everyone heads back to their rooms in fairly short order. Tomorrow is a