Grace's Game Viewing Opportunities

During their 12 days in Zambia, the party from Grace Academy had several opportunities to view African game.

The first, which was not strictly 'Game Viewing' was at Kalimba Reptile Park. Besides lots of snakes, there are enormous breeding crocodiles:

On this trip we took the children who live in the houses near to where the students stayed - a housing area on the site called Delta, so they are known as the 'Delta kids' and they really enjoyed having new neighbours. In the build up to Grace's arrival they helped make their beds and afterwards, helped to clean the houses and move furniture. Here are two of them near to a big female crocodile:

The reptile park is also a fish farm, so quite a few of them fished with African rods:

We caught five bream, which were cooked alongside sausages, which we had brought with us:

'Hedge' found a crocodile tail...

...others swam in the pool...

...but all had a great time!

An unexpected game viewing opportunity, happened when we visited the Zambian Parliament. Within the grounds are a herd of impala and we saw them leaping and running through the manicured gardens...

...before we went into the chamber, where the game was of the stuffed variety!

This is the closest I'll ever get to a leopard:

The hour journey into Lusaka passes close to a small game park called Parays. We had a school trip with Grade 10 class and saw Buffalo...

...zebra...

...and several kinds of antelope, like impala and bushbuck.

Another unexpected and rather unwelcome game encounter happened on the day we travelled to a village called Mukobela. During the football game, a boy brought a snake he had just caught - it was still alive, but stunned:

The final opportunity for game viewing happened in Livingstone, right at the end of the trip. It was a very cold morning, so Sarah and Katie, teachers at Grace Academy were trying to keep warm:

Here we saw warthog...

... and lots of giraffe...

...including some baby giraffe...

The national park at Victoria Falls only has one rhino, which is guarded all the time:

The only elephant we saw was drinking beside the Zambezi River...

...but while we were watching him, he decided to move onto the road we were on. We travelled behind him and then he suddenly turned and started to come towards us, trumpetting, with ears flared:

This photo shows how close he was, but doesn't convey the speed of the elephant, the truck reversing, the fear of everyone on board, or the screams!

It was a scary moment, which everyone enjoyed - after the elephant had moved on, of course!