Zambia


Day 4 & 5 – 12th and 13th June 2019

The drive through the Chobe to Katimo Mulilo proved uneventful and we passed through the Wanella Border Post quite quickly.  The Sesheke Border Post (Zambia) however, was the most disorganised border post we had ever been through and took about 2 hours due to the Road Tax guy being on lunch for an hour.  Tip to travellers: don’t arrive at a border post between 13h00 and 14h00!
Because they don’t take cards and only Zambian Kwatcha is accepted as cash, our first stop was the ATM.  Yay, It had money in it!  With Kwatcha in hand, we proceeded through the process:
1.       Health Desk, who take your photograph (?)
2.       Immigration
3.       CIP (ZMW 200)
4.       Vehicle Clearance
5.       Road Council Tax (ZMW 30)
6.       3rd Party Insurance, which we had arranged on line with Phoenix Insurance, Lusaka, at a cost of R140.00.  The Insurers at the border were charging up to R500 for 30 day’s insurance.
7.       Road Tax for Toll Fees (US$ 20)
Kabula Lodge was everything we had hoped it would be – a beautiful setting on the mighty Zambezi.  Kennista, the Lodge Manager was super friendly and served us with ice cold Mosi’s before even checking us in 😊.

The results of next morning’s fishing expedition were many bottom ‘bites’ and one that got away from Johan.  Kennedy, our boatman, was rather amused by the men kissing their lures before letting their line out to lure the tigers.  Despite that, not a fish was caught.


Peter, Joanne and Johan Kleynhans on the Zambezi, Kabula Lodge

Our huge catch of the morning though was a female African Finfoot at the river’s edge!



We all enjoyed a sunset river cruise which yielded mainly hippo, a crocodile, reed and cape cormorants and loads of little bee eaters.

On route to Mongu today, we needed to pay a ZMW 65 Council Levy for the Sioma district, which was quite unexpected – we never realised that you pay Council Taxes for every area you enter.  We stopped off at the Sioma Falls which were quite something – the second highest falls on the Zambezi River next to Victoria Falls.


One of the four sets of falls at Sioma

After Sioma we arrived in Mongu where we had planned to stay at Liseli Lodge, which was fully booked.  They recommended Accoms, about 3 km’s down the road.  Despite a water problem, the folk here have really gone out of their way to make us feel welcome and provided really good service.  Our T-bone steaks for dinner arrived by taxi around 20h00, were bashed almost to death by the chef before being cooked, and, well, edible if you were as hungry as we were!

In the morning we leave for Kafue National Park for three days.

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