On day four of our canoe safari on the Lower Zambezi most of our group was enjoying a lazy afternoon snoozing in the shade or fishing. For a few of us, boredom set in and we decided that it was time to go for a swim. It may seem like a simple activity, but when you’re surrounded by hippos and crocodiles you err on the side of caution. We had a chat with our guide who said that we’d be safe in the shallows of this sand bar on the opposite side of the river. So, we piled into the canoes and made our way upstream before cutting across to the island.
It all went smoothly until we got close to the island and realized that what we thought was a rock was a hippo. A hippo that seemed to enjoy disappearing underwater and popping up in a completely new location. Our three days of canoeing experience told us that as we moved into the shallows the hippo would head for deep water. Fortunately for us this is exactly what happened and we pulled our canoes ashore.
We knew that we could swim off the sandbar. What we didn’t ask was where off the sandbar. The area where we pulled our canoes ashore was deep and we knew we couldn’t swim there. Everybody began wandering around our private island looking for shallow water and I began looking for a photo. There was this small pool of water which lent itself nicely to catching a reflection of the mountains in the background. In order to maximize the amount of reflection I set my camera up as low as I could.
If you click on the image and open up a larger version you can see our campsite in the middle of the far bank. It was a great place to spend three nights. I’ll be posting the morning view from our tent soon.
