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Zambezi Rafting
Video of our rafting trip:
Cees & Hélène rafting the Zambezi
White Water Rafting trip 0n the Zambezi river
Cees and Hélène
Newyears day 1995
Exciting and thrilling journeys begin in different ways:
Alice fell through the looking glass, Dorothy got swept away in a tornado and Gary (rumours have got it) got kicked in the head by a cow.
So unexpected things may change your life, but on the average unless you don’t take the initiative yourself, life can become a boring way to spent your time.
So make something of your life!
Zambezi map
White-Water Rafting the Zambezi
The Zambezi River rises in a marshy dambo in the remote woodlands of north-western Zambia, at an altitude of about 1,524 metres (5,000 ft) above sea level. The area surrounding its source is protected as a national monument and forest reserve and lies close to the watershed separating the great Congo and Zambezi river systems.
From this quiet beginning, the Zambezi grows into one of Africa’s great rivers. It flows for about 2,500 kilometres across southern Africa, draining a vast plateau before eventually reaching the Indian Ocean in Mozambique. Along its course it passes through or forms the borders of several countries, including Zambia and Zimbabwe.
The most spectacular point along its journey is Victoria Falls, where the river plunges into a narrow gorge cut into ancient basalt. Below the falls, the Zambezi is forced through a dramatic succession of deep, zigzagging gorges. The combination of the enormous volume of water, the narrow channels and the underlying volcanic rock creates some of the most powerful commercially rafted white water in the world.
It was here, immediately below Victoria Falls, that Hélène and I began our 28-kilometre rafting adventure through the Batoka Gorge — a rather dramatic contrast to the quiet marshland where the Zambezi begins. We had been rafting twice before, once in Nepal and once in Sri Lanka. Both trips had been at high water and were certainly exciting, but neither had prepared us for what was waiting on the Zambezi River below Victoria Falls.We arrived in Victoria Falls on New Year’s Eve, travelling by four-wheel drive from Sinamatella Camp after visiting Hwange National Park. And Victoria Falls is certainly not a bad place to celebrate New Year’s Eve! We had a wonderful evening.
There was, however, one small problem. The following morning was RAFTING DAY. So after a rather short night, we had to get up early for our full-day rafting trip with SafPar.
Short Swimmers and Long Swimmers
Before descending into the gorge, the SafPar crew gave us our equipment and explained what lay ahead. We were also offered a choice between an active and a passive trip. On the active trip you paddled yourself; on the passive trip the guide controlled the raft while the passengers provided some very necessary assistance. But the safety briefing was a story in itself. Apparently, surviving the rapids was surprisingly simple. If you were thrown overboard — and, we were assured, this could happen before you knew it — you became a SHORT SWIMMER. The objective of a short swimmer was to get back into the raft as quickly as possible. If you failed to do so, you automatically became a LONG SWIMMER. And the objective of a long swimmer? To become a short swimmer again as quickly as possible.It’s as easy as that.
Suitably reassured by this impeccable logic, we put on our life jackets and helmets, picked up our paddles and began the descent into the gorge.Even getting to the river proved to be an adventure. The path was extremely steep and slippery, but eventually everyone reached the bottom — one way or another — and there, at last, was the Zambezi.
Into the Zambezi
A good rafting river can feel as though you have climbed into a washing machine on its rinse cycle. Looking at the Zambezi from the rocky shore, however, I began to suspect that somebody had put the washing machine on maximum spin. Our guide explained the commands and showed us how we had to move our weight around the raft. When entering a large wave, we were to wait for his command and then throw ourselves towards the appropriate side of the boat — highsiding — helping the raft punch through the wall of water rather than being overturned by it. The full-day trip covered about 28 kilometres and some twenty rapids.
Most were Grade 5 — about as serious as commercially rafted white water gets. One rapid, however, was Grade 6 and carried the wonderfully reassuring name
Commercial Suicide.We walked around that one.Even the professionals apparently knew when discretion was the better part of valour.
Our first major rapid was called Stairway to Heaven.
Personally, I thought Free Fall to Hell would have been more appropriate. You could hear the rapid long before you could properly see it. Then suddenly the raft tipped forward and we were looking almost straight down into a massive wall of white water. At that moment I was extremely pleased that somebody else was doing the steering.We waited.Then came the command:
“NOWWW!”
Six people threw their weight forward. We hit the wave screaming.For a moment there was nothing but whiteness, water and an enormous roar. Time seemed to stop. Then suddenly the raft burst through the wave and rose back towards the surface as though emerging from some impossible depth. We were through. Within seconds everybody was cheering and laughing, the guide’s expression relaxed — slightly — and the bail buckets were passed around.
And that was only the beginning. Ahead of us were rapids with names such as The Devil’s Bowl, Midnight Diner, Overland Truck Eater, The Mother and, appropriately enough, The Washing Machine.The names were beginning to make sense.
Oblivion
Then came Rapid No. 18: Oblivion. Our guide stopped the raft in an eddy and gave us another briefing. There were three successive waves, each worse than the one before, together with whirlpools and some smaller waves. The third wave, he explained, was the one most likely to overturn us. We all had to throw our weight forward and punch through it. And if we didn’t? We would probably all be swimming. He added reassuringly that few rafts made it through Oblivion intact, but that they wouldn’t take us through it if it were dangerous. Well, that was encouraging.
Off we went. As we accelerated towards what looked like the most monumental wave I had ever seen, the whole thing suddenly seemed like a joke in very poor taste. The raft climbed the first enormous wall of water and for a moment balanced on its crest. From there we could look down into a deep valley of churning water — with an even larger wave waiting on the other side. Then we disappeared into it. At first I thought we had made it. We hadn’t. The standing wave seemed simply to swallow the raft. Hélène was swept from her position and a moment later I was thrown clean out of the back. The water drove me down beneath the raft and for a few moments I had absolutely no idea which way was up. Eventually my life jacket did what it had been designed to do and hauled me back towards the surface.
I managed one quick breath. Then down I went again. And once more. When I finally bobbed back to the surface — laughing, coughing and spluttering — another raft was already waiting to pull me aboard. The rafts ahead of us had stopped like vultures to watch the spectacle and collect whatever human flotsam came floating past.Only two passengers and our guide had managed to remain in our raft. Hélène was already safely aboard another one and helped haul me in.Apparently we had just received a practical demonstration of the difference between a short swimmer and a long swimmer.
And On We Went…
Around midday we stopped for lunch, and SafPar produced some excellent sandwiches. Sitting beside the river in the gorge, wet, tired and exhilarated, it was difficult to believe that we still had an afternoon of rafting ahead of us. But back into the boats we went. We tackled the remaining rapids and, on one of the last ones, managed to overturn yet again — our third swim of the day. Fortunately, the water temperature wasn’t too bad. And as long as the crocodiles stayed somewhere else, everything was fine. By then we had even become rather accomplished at progressing from long swimmer to short swimmer.
What Goes Down Must Go Up
At around four o’clock we finally reached the end of our 28-kilometre journey. We were exhausted, soaked and extremely pleased with ourselves. Then came SafPar’s final surprise. Everyone knows the saying: What goes up must come down. Unfortunately, in the Batoka Gorge the reverse also applies: What goes down must go up.We now had to climb approximately 700 feet — 220 metres — out of the gorge.
After a full day fighting the Zambezi, that climb felt almost as challenging as some of the rapids. Eventually we reached the top. The guides arrived somewhat later — understandably, because in addition to climbing out themselves, they also had to carry the rafts. SafPar was waiting with drinks, and after we had recovered sufficiently, a large truck carried a very tired but extremely cheerful group back to Victoria Falls. What a day. Hélène and I had rafted before, but nothing compared with the Zambezi: the noise, the enormous waves, the moments underwater when you had no idea which way was up, and that wonderful mixture of excitement and sheer disbelief when you realised you had actually made it through.
WE HAD A GREAT DAY.
DO IT!!
Cees
P.S. And while you’re in Victoria Falls, allow yourself a few days to recover. There is plenty more to do: horse riding, flying above the falls — or, if rafting the Zambezi hasn’t provided quite enough excitement, bungee jumping from the bridge.
Source Graphics
Rafting photo (Sascha Grabow www.saschagrabow.com Wikipedia, licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license.
Map Zambezi River: Wikipedia: This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported license.
