THE ULTIMATE SAFARI II

BOTSWANA

There were several interesting items on the bulletin board in the entrance foyer of the Victoria Falls Hotel. One announced the acquiescence of the Hotel staff to a City Council request that the trail from the Hotel lawn to the Falls entrance, a route I had used several times only three months earlier, be closed; no reasons were given. The alternative route, down the town's main street, was only a little longer, so this was no problem. It was after dark when I took a taxi to the Falls entrance in response to a second announcement informing me that the National Park would be open on the evening of the full moon, weather permitting; since it is considered a bit foolhardy, because of the wild animals, even to walk down the main road to the Falls at night, again the path's closure was irrelevant. And by the time I acted on the third posting, an invitation to attend an Easter Sunrise service near the Livingstone statue, I had already moved to the Ilala Lodge, located right on the main road to the Falls, to join the other four members of a Botswana safari group leaving the next morning, so yet again the path's closure was of no significance.

Even before seeing that third notice I had recalled a previous Sunrise service, forty-one years before, that had been an event of special significance to me, but why it should have come to mind on this occasion remains something of a mystery. To be sure this particular celebration of Easter is of crucial significance to Christianity, and those many years ago I was an active member of my father's Baptist congregation. The fact that this was to be a Baptist service, and the added attraction of associating Livingstone’s name to it both appealed to me, I suppose, and I hoped, although I didn't expect, that Africans as well as Caucasians might participate. They didn't, but it was interesting, and the Baptist missionary-pastor who led the service was adequate to his task but no match for my father, or my grandfather either, according to the recollections of him my mother has conveyed. But then they weren't competing with Victoria Falls.

I hurried back to the Lodge just in time to catch a van to the airport where I was booked on a five-passenger plane flight over the Falls. That view is superb. The pilot first makes three circuits with the plane banked to one side, and then he repeats this procedure banked to the other side, so everyone can see everything; flying is the only way to get a perspective of the entire structure, and in the early morning the rainbows are superb. I particularly enjoyed the approach to the Falls, since we came from the downstream side, and many dry gorges that had in millennia past supported these cataracts were clearly evident. The strata here alternate between basalt and Kalahari sandstone, the latter being considerably softer, and they appear to be tilted somewhat vertically. Sometime in the future I'll read the book about the Zambezi River that I bought two days ago in Nairobi and give you the whole truth, but for now what I could hear of the pilot's summary must suffice. The softer sandstone washes out, forming a gorge some one hundred meters deep, and the water pours over the basalt into that gorge. In its weaker regions the basalt also erodes, allowing the water to reach into the next sandstone layer, which ultimately washes out and provides a new gorge. So in due course the Falls has retreated another pair of strata upstream, and yet another dry gorge has been formed, or so I think.

After a late breakfast and an interesting visit to the nearby game reserve, which is really the crocodile farm renamed, I wandered back to the Falls to take some pictures. I had noticed when I first arrived on this second visit that the beautiful rainbows I had so enjoyed in the early mornings in January were not to be seen; the sun had moved far enough north in its annual journey that the angles were no longer right. It occurred to me then that crossing to the Zambian side would provide the necessary orientation, but I didn't act on that thought until later. The afternoon rainbows were in fact quite splendid, but to see the best of them one has to walk downstream a ways, along the rim of course, and in this season of the year the mist gets heavier and heavier in that direction and becomes a downpour at Danger Point, the most spectacular spot on the rim. In January I had stood there by the hour, but on this visit I approached it just once, when the breeze was in my favor, and even then I only got within about fifty feet before the deluge of spray resumed.

And so it was on this Easter Sunday afternoon, still wearing a white shirt although I had doubtless doffed my necktie, that I didn't venture far downstream from the Devil's Cataract, the western end of the Falls, in my attempts to photograph rainbows; I just didn't feel like getting these clothes drenched. In fact I hung back under the shelter of a tree until the mist receded and then quickly moved out for a shot; I noticed another obvious tourist, a young, probably American woman, doing the same thing. We struck up a conversation, and then she suddenly asked, “By the way, aren't you Vance Johnson?” Stunned at first, I quickly realized that if she knew my name, I knew hers: Elizabeth Schreiner, or Libby as she preferred to be called; Mountain Travel had only two clients on the tour, and if I was one, Libby was the other.

An anesthesiologist, married to a cardiologist on the Dartmouth faculty, she prefers to pursue her practice in the Mountain West and was just now preparing to move from Billings to Laramie–for readers unfamiliar with these cities, it really doesn't matter. She often takes temporary positions in exotic parts of the world in order to explore them more fully and so has been everywhere. Incredibly bright–straight-A valedictorian at Renssalaer Polytechnic Institute in civil engineering, a field her grandfather also studied there, MD from Duke, special research in hyperbarics, and possessed of a very quick and competitive mind–she is also an amazing athlete, being skilled in diving, rock climbing, swimming, bicycling, skiing, white-water rafting, camping, well, you name it. Her stories of adventure are barely credible: bicycling alone 100 miles into Denali Park, where at one point she stood motionless for 45 minutes in the midst of a mother grizzly bear and her two cubs; after ejection from a raft on the Middle Fork of the Salmon River, she was caught in a whirlpool that repeatedly brought her to the surface for a short breath and then sucked her down again, and on what she thought, as a doctor, was surely the last cycle she could survive, finally rejected her; and walking 38 miles up the Hoh River to the base of Mt. Olympus and back all in one day are but three that come to mind. At five feet nine, lithe and of negligible weight, with dark hair and blue eyes, she must be what every young man dreams of but can't attain; happily, I'm too old to be affected. Still, the presence of people like her, and I'll describe the others later, should help answer the question: “Why do you go on tours with Mountain Travel?”

Later that afternoon, before dinner time at the Lodge, we were introduced to our guides, Angie and Jock, and to the other three safarists: Robyn, fiftyish, from Victoria, Australia, and two brothers, Michael and Lee, born and raised on Manhattan, but now living in New England. Robyn and I were the oldsters; our three companions pretty well span the decade of the thirties, and our guides are just nearing that barrier. We constituted a totally professional group–two doctors, a dentist, and two educators–and among us we had been absolutely everywhere and done just about everything. Although many fewer in number, this group rivaled, but did not quite match, that superb boatload of fascinating people with whom I had shared Antarctica a few months earlier. I recall very little of the orientation meeting itself except for our guides' assurance that we need expect little rain; certainly none would fall during the first week of our safari, but we might see a little toward journey's end, in the Delta.

And so it came to pass the next morning, right after breakfast, that the rain began to fall. Our vehicle was built to ride high off the ground, and its extra-large tires ensured that it could really move about in the bush. Brackets were available in which to insert two-by-fours that in turn supported pieces of canvas to act as a roof and sides; the arrangement was considerably less than watertight. At first the rain was light enough that we stood beside the vehicle while it was being loaded, but when its intensity increased substantially, we retreated to the shelter of the Lodge entrance. By the time we left enough water had collected in pools of sagging canvas to pose a threat to dryness. Each time driver Jock made a sudden move, which he did quite often, someone was doused. Little by little we discovered the relatively safe regions, which is how I came to be sitting more or less in the middle of the vehicle looking out through the windshield when we all saw something lying in the middle of the road.

“Road kill,” I thought to myself, and then Jock yelled, “Lion!” That seemed preposterous, but his follow-up, “No, it's a leopard!” seemed beyond belief. But sure enough, he was right the second time, and we were treated to a fabulous sight of that most elegant of predators. She strolled off the road into the edge of the forest, but we still had very good views. We watched for fifteen or twenty minutes, with Jock moving the vehicle occasionally to prevent her crossing the road to the other side where she obviously wished to go. Ultimately, he allowed her to cross, and she soon disappeared into the forest. After congratulating themselves on such good fortune, my colleagues immediately began clamoring for something else exciting, a lion perhaps. Little did they appreciate how rare it is to sight a leopard, particularly so close and in the open. This was only my fifth, and I saw the first three in 1986 in Kenya's Masai Mara.

Our first campsite was in the Serondella section of Chobe National Park, where we made camp–well actually everything was in place when we arrived, sleeping tents, a dining tent, a shower tent, and a toilet tent–far enough from the public area to feel really alone. Our staff worked from a vehicle that contained all sorts of cooking facilities and was stocked with basic essentials; one eats well on safari, and this company even provides a daily ration of wine. Our palates ranged from omnivorous to strict vegetarian, and our throats from teetotaler to “it's better if you don't hear the lion that gets you.” I remain very impressed at how well the staff handled such a range of requirements with only seven diners, and also at our guides' personal policy of drinking nothing alcoholic while conducting a safari. And since they will be married in September, only a cad could object to their sharing a tent. After dinner we typically sat around a campfire and “went to school”; Jock and Angie alternated in discussing one animal species with us each night. I think that first night we had a fire but no school. I was more than a little chagrined the next morning, however, to learn that the huge, roaring animal that kept charging back and forth among our tents, terrorizing me, was nothing more than a Chacma baboon.

Those who wanted lions got them with a vengeance on the second morning, a pride of fifteen, six females and nine youngsters. A big advantage of going on safari with guides who work in one area throughout the year is that they know where the animals are. A big disadvantage of going on safari with guides who work in one area throughout the year is that they know where the animals are. My friend, you are going to see every female and young lion that is there, not once, but over and over again, and you will learn who begat whom, even if you hate lions, which I honestly think I now do. They are of tawny color, which is condemnation enough among cats; they are lazy, covered with flies, and overly amorous; and because they're big, they bully everything else. But, I've yet to meet a driver, even when in my sole employ, who can ignore the lion in quest for something truly interesting.

Our school topic that second night was, you guessed it, the lion. I remember little, having long since disavowed the lecture system as anything other than a source of propaganda, but I do recall lionesses being described as especially virtuous in that they nurse one another's young, a task many other species cannot handle. Our teacher that night, Jock, was just finishing his talk when a lion roared. “Far, far, away,” he said, “just a special effect I arranged.” Then it roared again, ten times louder, and we all stood up; it was close. Then it roared a third time, and Jock said, “Let's go.” We all ran for the vehicle, I thought at first for safety, but not so, we were going to follow the rascal, illegal to drive after dark or not. In a very short time we overtook two males, lumbering along the road, and we followed along for perhaps a half hour until they went into rough terrain. The next day when park officials came to query the staff on this illegal night driving, they stoutly denied it; I've always admired Mountain Travel's skill at making under-the-table payments. That was a lion activity I could enjoy, and I must confess I lay awake for quite some time that night trying to reassure myself that their roars really were getting farther from camp.

True to form, Jock set out at first light the next morning to find those lions. He and Angie tracked their footprints–“spoor” they called it–for hours without success. I was delighted to be on the move through varied terrain and lesser life forms. Finally, even Jock grew weary of lion spoor, and we stopped to enjoy a marvelous pod of hippopotamuses cavorting in a sizable pool; they came in all sizes and ages, and especially the young were enjoying a spring-like vigor. I found it very refreshing to sit atop the roof admiring not only the hippos but also the varied bird populations that came and went. That afternoon was dedicated to elephants, and we found them. After a fruitless search in the woods, we parked beside some pools of water, and in a very short time substantial herds came charging down to enjoy the water. They must have been as dry as an enophile after a year in East Africa, for they continued right into the pond, drank, and then sprayed themselves with mud and water; it was a heart-warming sight. That evening, our last in the area, we took a boat ride on the Chobe River just before sunset. Once our driver-guide realized we were interested in birds, he took us to the nesting grounds, first of white-fronted bee-eaters, and then of pied kingfishers; he also provided my first sighting of a blue-breasted bee-eater.

The next morning we drove south to the Savuti section of the park, where we stayed two nights in a permanent tented camp, Allan's Camp. The public campground was in a bit of disarray because the local elephants had sensed there was water in those pipes; it must be quite a sensation in the midst of a morning shower to have the pipes ripped out from overhead by an enormous trunk. In the afternoon we saw tsessebes, which seem to me to be chocolate-coated topis, for the first time. The most unusual sighting, however, in my opinion, was of a young raptor, a hawk with the surprising name “gymnogene,” that was busily raiding the nests of other birds. It made its meal despite continuous and vicious attacks by the parents. We continued in the direction of a rainstorm and were rewarded with a very nice double rainbow, and then just before sunset we paused beside a hyena den to see what might emerge. And just as it began to get dark, we observed enough to persuade us to return early the next day.

We were there well before sunrise and found an amazing range of activity. In all we observed fifteen residents of the den, nine adults and six young, the latter being distributed one, two, and three, from the second to the fourth generations, respectively. The three youngest were still essentially all black in color, while the rest displayed the typical spotted coat. They were amazingly curious and approached the vehicle closely, sometimes actually chewing, or at least licking the tires. On several occasions I looked down and saw a hyena only an arm's length away, literally. I wondered, a bit uneasily, if it, like a puppy dog, might simply jump in. None did of course, and it only took a small sudden movement to send the pack flying. They were surprisingly fresh and clean looking compared to what I have seen in the Serengeti and vicinity.

The afternoon feature that day was to visit a nearby pool and watch the bird and animal life there. Our typical day began well before daylight with a quick cup of something and just a little to eat, and we were off well before sunrise; in privately owned areas we were permitted to us a spotlight to search for game. We came back before noon for a quick shower, a major meal, and then a nap or a walk around the camp area. We reassembled around 3:00 for tea, and then we were off driving until dark, or if in a private game area, until 8:00 or 9:00, depending on what was seen. On this afternoon, Jock and Angie hoped we might see the beginning of a local migration of zebras, and their timing was perfect. Although quiet at first, the pond–pan it's called here–was soon awash in black and white stripes. Those among us who counted agreed conservatively on a final total number of 400. They were fascinating to watch as they cavorted in and near the water. The only other mammals in evidence were three impalas that seemed clearly out of their element. On the way home we thoroughly enjoyed a substantial herd of elephants thoroughly enjoying their turn in the waters, and on turning around to look the other way we saw a lone sable antelope, a rather rare sighting in this area.

But it was the next morning, Saturday, after our second night at Allan's, that blew my mind and made me realize this was truly a privileged safari, and it all happened in four or five hours. Our first objective was, what else, a lion, but today we were lucky and quickly came across a black-maned male lying in the middle of the road. Our driver was greedy, however, and when he tried to get closer, the old male strolled off into the bush and concealed himself. To save face the driver must now relocate his quarry, which is almost impossible, but we tried anyway. Fortunately someone soon spotted a large bird perched atop a tree, and even in the darkness before sunrise it was identified as a giant eagle owl. He was signaling his mate in a rather distant tree, but we could only see her silhouette off to the east. He moved to a tree nearer her, and after a few more minutes of entertaining us, they flew together into a densely foliaged tree to pursue their destinies out of our view. It was a very interesting, and in its way, exciting interlude.

And so it was back to the world of predators. We had driven only a short way when another vehicle stopped beside the road indicated a find. Sure enough, there was our old lion but now accompanied by a younger male companion. The latter was in a rather frisky mood, and he charged right into a nearby pond with pressed duck clearly on his mind; he missed, but only narrowly. After disappearing into the bush for a few minutes, he reappeared, this time with a young duck, probably a red-billed, in his mouth. It was clearly still alive when he dropped into a depression, too deep to be seen by most of us, and when he came out it was no longer clear if the duck was dead or alive. We continued to follow the two, ad nauseam by my standards, and with some rather careless driving by Jock. Once his sudden stop propelled me into the seat ahead with sufficient force that I sat down awhile to regain my breath and composure. And then at last we left the road to be free of other vehicles. Alas, we found another vehicle and the lions again. But then the track became too rough even for Jock, and by unanimous vote we agreed to desist.

Now occurred the most amazing event I have ever witnessed in the wild. We had progressed only a few hundred meters when everyone yelled in unison, “cheetahs!” Lying in the grass beside the road were two beautiful young males looking back in the direction from which we had just come. And then the first of our lions appeared; I think it was the younger. The cheetahs certainly saw him; their hindquarters were tense and ready to spring. I'm convinced the lion saw and chose to ignore them, but some of my companions disagree, and doctors hold firmly to their positions. I barely breathed wondering what the second lion would do when he came on the scene. He appeared quite soon and came directly at the cheetahs, running full speed I suspect. They loped off in opposite directions, running just fast enough to say a little ahead of him. The one being chased would bring the lion in a circle near the other, which by spitting and hissing at him would cause him to change his objective. After several minutes of this alternation, the cheetahs had rather tired the lion, or perhaps convinced him of the futility of his quest, and he departed after defiantly marking his territory. The cheetahs ambled over to a nearby bush and rested in the shade, or at least they tried to; Jock and the driver of the other vehicle on the scene kept moving so close to them that they would get up and move off. And both drivers had moved their vehicles several times during the chase in order to stay closer to the animals.

To me it was a scene of almost terrible emotional intensity. It transcended the opening note of Rheingold and the closing curtain of Götterdämmerung. It was far more than a kill. This was essential, primordial, three animals contending for their rights to an existence in their own territories. We humans had no right to be there, and certainly not in noisy smelly vehicles. And once there through good fortune, could we not have remained stationary and allowed the animals the full arena for their ritual? Even the whirring sounds of the rewinding automatic camera, the click of shutters, and the moving around of the video-cam operator seemed very obtrusive to me. We showed little respect for the significance of what passed before us. I muttered a sigh of relief when we finally agreed to leave these magnificent animals to themselves; God knows they had earned their peace. But the morning was not ended. We were barely out of sight of the cheetahs when we saw a tawny eagle perched on a branch of a dead tree voraciously tearing away at the flesh of some creature clutched in its claw. On getting closer we recognized its prey: a young red-billed duck.

The flight to Jedibe later that morning, the first of three in small planes on this safari, was most remarkable for the views it afforded of the Okavongo Delta. Shortly after landing, we were poled to Makoro Trails Camp, operated by the tour company exclusively for its guests, in makoros, the traditional dugout canoes widely used in the Delta; it was during this pole that I saw the first of three daily malachite kingfishers. At first glance our private island looked like something out of South Pacific. It was fully staffed, of course, and since it was about a two-hour makoro ride back to Jedibe, our polers remained on the island with us. The jubilation of our isolation was very short-lived among the thirties generation, however; even before lunch the brothers had circumnavigated our new world and were wondering how they could get their daily exercise. Libby was not long in joining the move to evacuate the island early, and our guides also expressed the opinion that we were staying there too many nights. I alone remained enthusiastic at doing and seeing what had been outlined in the trip timetable.

The younger of the two brothers, Lee, a dentist, is a very quiet man, which is fortunate, because Michael, a gastroenterologist, is decidedly not. Lee's sport is marathon running, and he is extremely fit, watching very carefully what he eats and drinks and how he lives. Michael, on the other hand, looks about as inactive as I do after a year of sitting around in Arusha. He often speaks of mountain climbing, hiking, and camping, however, so I imagine he was very fit in younger years. Another early passion was flying, and he seems to know much about every kind of plane ever built; part of this stems from his work as a doctor with the FAA. Three traits will dominate my memory of him: his inability to sleep, which resulted in overheard conversations between the brothers at all hours of the night; his large store of well-told, but otherwise thoroughly lousy anecdotes, and his video-cam, which often dominated my view from the rear of the van and also the guides' choice of destination and duration of stay. Despite the presence of three dominant personalities, we got along very well; the only obvious spats were between our guides, as she struggled for a share of the leadership that he was still a bit too chauvinistic to relinquish.

I discovered a few new, to me, bird species on the island, but the biggest find occurred after lunch the second day when I was walking along the marsh, turned a corner, and saw four red lechwes at a distance of perhaps twenty meters. I was clearly downwind and watched them for several minutes until one happened to raise its head and look in my direction; they immediately took off at full speed through the marsh and didn't pause to look back until several hundred meters separated us. This was the first lechwe sighting for us, but we saw hundreds more on later outings. It had been a good day; we spent quite a few minutes watching two Pel's fishing owls from our makoros that morning, and just as they disappeared from sight, we spotted a plum-colored starling to fill the void.

Our last day on the island began very early as we were poling to a distant island for a picnic lunch. The Okavongo waters were just beginning to rise, and so in places our polers were forced to get out and push and pull us across essentially dry ground; they worked very hard that morning, but found a more aqueous route home. It was fairly early still when they asked for silence and began stalking something they sensed was ahead of us. From a seated position in the makoro, a rider sees little but the reeds around the canoe. Suddenly the poler stopped the boat and whispered the order, “Okay, stand up.” I did so quickly and was rewarded with the sight, still some distance ahead, of a magnificent male sitatunga, that most elusive of antelopes. Later we successfully approached an island where wattled cranes nest and watched three for several minutes–magnificent birds.

Our final campsite was at Mombo, a private concession adjacent to the Moremi Game Reserve. The new element here was night and early morning drives that allowed us to spot nocturnal game and birds. Bushbabies and springhares were the most interesting animals seen in this light, but a civet and a fleeing serval were also exciting. The best bird sightings were of nightjars, which essentially freeze in the light and can occasionally even be grabbed in the hands for closer identification–Jock failed, although narrowly, on his sole attempt. We were thrilled as we approached camp each night, to observe a pair of wattled cranes strolling majestically through the shallow waters of a nearby pond; one evening they were joined by a pair of saddlebilled storks. Another bird-watching high came when we encountered Ken Newman, the author of many books on the birds of Southern Africa, who was conducting a tour based in the nearby lodge, and heard him identify a mystery bird as an immature bat hawk. That identification met with total skepticism in our group, since what we observed looked nothing at all like his own drawing in his own book. I did add it to my list, however, and I now claim to have seen about 375 different bird species in Africa.

Another pride of lions was located, I think mainly by the smell of its kill, a buffalo, on which the two females and eight young continued feeding all three days we were in the area. Our first visit was at night, and I had mixed feelings about it; to me it seemed somehow rather tasteless to sit there within arm's length of the animals for an hour or two shining a bright light into their faces. My feeling was a little different three mornings later when the two vehicles we tried using produced a total of three flat tires; Jock continued driving on the third, which didn't go completely flat, because another lion had been spotted. Our happiest moments were spent at a hippo pool where four tourists did their best at grunting and yawning hoping to produce a similar response in the animals; it was hard for me to decide which group was more amused at the antics of the other. On our third and last visit the waters beside the pool had risen so much that we could not have returned the next afternoon, even if our safari were not at an end.

The brothers were flying home via Harrare, so the other three of us were to take the first flight to Maun, the Delta's principal town. The plane was late in arriving, and Libby and I spent some time discussing just what concessions we would demand from the company if we missed our Air Botswana flight from Maun to Victoria Falls. Robyn seemed not to care about that; she had recently accepted an attractive early retirement offer from teaching and administration near Melbourne under condition that she not seek other government employment for three years; she was off to Paris for a few days and then on to Florence, I think she said, to continue her study of Italian for a few months. But the plane did arrive and exchanged its load of fresh vegetables and tinned goods for three very satisfied safarists. I insisted that Robyn take the copilot's seat, since she too was a pilot, but the animated discussion between the pilot and her almost made me regret that decision; I was convinced that nobody was flying our plane. The commercial flight was loaded but still standing by the terminal building, and two pilots agreed by radio that it would wait for us, which is why my only recollection of Maun is of its runway.

We said goodbye to Robyn at the Victoria Falls airport, but I met her at the Ibis Grill the next night where I reaffirmed that her vegetarianism did not include a distaste for wine, particularly not Champagne. After a brief pause for unpacking, Libby and I made the walk upstream along the riverbank as Lee and Michael had recommended. The only game we encountered were a warthog, very fresh elephant dung, and the grunts of hippos in the nearby river. It was good exercise, and the afternoon heat made us more than ready for a refreshing drink at an outdoor bar in the huge Elephant Hill's Hotel, an all-purpose resort with hundreds of rooms. After watching the ethnic dance performance and then dining in the Livingstone Room, both at the Victoria Falls Hotel, we parted, with plans to cross over that marvelous bridge to Zambia before sunrise the next morning.

I thought about the moonbow that night, as I'm certain I will every time I'm at the Falls, or whenever I see a rainbow for that matter. It was the first night of this, my second visit to the area, the night of the April full moon, and I had come three or four days early specifically to look again for this elusive phenomenon. I had failed totally three months earlier; it had poured rain all three evenings I was there. The park ranger that morning had insisted that I not walk down, so I ordered a cab at the hotel. It was late, and I feared for a moment I might not even get into the park, but it got there just as the last of the early arrivers were entering; I think the gates are left open for an hour, so one can come anytime during that period, but I'm not at all certain. We were directed to one of the standard viewing spots and left to care for ourselves in the shrouded moonlight and swirling mists. I was mentally extrapolating the motion of the clouds under the path of the moon, first with considerable optimism and then with almost total despair, but occasionally I glanced over at the water, and finally I realized where we were.

We were looking over at the Main Falls, and although they provided us a beautiful aspect in their reflected moonlight, we would never see a moonbow in that direction. I understand the geometry of rainbow formation to a considerable extent, and I also recalled very clearly where I had seen rainbows on several January mornings. If ever one needed proof that the full moon and the sun inhabit opposite positions on the ecliptic, tonight was the night to obtain it. Finally someone suggested moving to a different viewpoint, and a few people did, at least temporarily. I was quite pleased when I found the new spot, because it satisfied the required geometry, and I remembered it from those January mornings. Still, looking around ten minutes later and seeing only five or so others out of maybe fifty people, I wondered what was so fascinating at the original site and went back to discover everyone still admiring the moonlit Main Falls.

After returning to the more sensible position, I was soon rewarded with a slight glimpse of color at the base of the Falls on the Zambian side, and after relaxing my eyes a bit I could just make out that ghostly apparition, a rainbow in moonlight. It formed nearly a full semicircle and remained surprisingly constant; its intensity varied a little, but I could see it all for the better part of half an hour. The red and violet edges were quite evident, but the basic appearance was a ghostly white; I may have seen green inside, but I may just as easily have imagined it. When I was sufficiently satisfied to relinquish my favored position to the others who had found their way to this spot, I moved to a place where I could look down to the bottom on the Zimbabwean side; here the moonbow became vertical, and one could even see it curve inward to begin forming the lower half of the circle. To me it was an exhilarating spectacle, perhaps less for its intrinsic beauty than for its rarity, I'm not certain. But I've seen the moonbow.

We left the Lodge that last morning in Victoria Falls well before sunrise, but the eastern sky was beginning to brighten. The rising spray scattered away most of the sunlight reaching it and appeared like a big column of black smoke. After exiting Zimbabwe we entered a no-country area, always a peculiar sensation for me, and approached that beautiful bridge; just to think of walking on it was exciting. “Libby, which side shall we take?” I queried. “One side going over, the other coming back,” she replied, and her tone implied that mine had not been a particularly bright question. We walked on the upstream side, looking into the Falls and taking its spray full in the face. We did manage a few photos each, however, without getting cameras and ourselves too wet. We hurried over to the Zambian side, re-entered the world of the United Nations, and were very pleased at the organization we found: well-paved and signed trails, steps down to selected viewing points, unobtrusive but effective fences–it's amazing how close to disaster you're allowed to come on both sides of the border–and a nice building, a short distance from the River, where dozens of craftsmen gathered to display and sell a plethora of tourist items.

The rainbows were spectacular, and here and there a transitory secondary partially appeared. But the real glory was the power and magnificence of the Eastern Cataract, right there, one short step in front of us. It's a sight that conveys the true meaning of the overused word “awesome.” And then Libby yelled, “There goes a giant kingfisher,” a bird she knew I'd been trying to sight for six months; it was worth the wait. And a little later we simultaneously spotted another. When I reminded her that a free breakfast awaited us at the Lodge if we got there by 9:30, she was ready to leave, as was I, but this time to cross the bridge on the downstream side.

I suppose two or more hours had passed since we started out, and even during our short stay in Zambia the sun had risen enough to change the orientation of the rainbows; they were not nearly so exciting now. The bridge itself, when we neared it, was in full sunlight, and Libby paused near its end to take some pictures. I continued on until I was stopped in my tracks by something I had not seen before and certainly was not expecting, although in retrospect I realized I definitely should have: the complete circle of a rainbow, with some of the secondary showing near the bottom. “Hey Libby, come here and look at this,” I ordered. And as she arrived a third giant kingfisher flew right through its center. We tried to take pictures, but it was much too big, even for my widest lens, one of 24 mm. Enough spray was drifting under the bridge to form a bow, and since the sun was still fairly low, so was the rainbow, and the depth of the gorge was more than enough to provide space for the bow's lower half. What an incredible sight. “Surely there's enough gold at the center of that rainbow to satisfy all our dreams,” I murmured. “I certainly hope so,” she responded quietly and somewhat sadly, doubtless thinking of decisions and problems that faced her at home in a very few days.

After breakfast we said our farewells, and I hurriedly packed, showered, and dressed. I still had an hour to kill before leaving for the airport, so I strolled down to the Park again and walked up near the Livingstone statue. I halfheartedly looked for more kingfishers, but there was no way to equal what I had seen earlier, so I mainly watched tourists. The wind had freshened, and there was more spray in the area than usual, so I stayed cool. Once I took a picture of a passing couple at their request. And then just as it was time to leave, a bird flashed across the Western Cataract. “Taita falcon, that rarest of birds,” I thought. But of course it couldn't have been; it was most likely a fairly common kestrel.

On the other hand, with all that gold in the center of the rainbow, any dream was possible.

W. Vance Johnson

23 May 93