Elephant Cafe

A truly unforgettable day. We were driven to The David Livingstone Centre where we boarded a speedboat to go up the Zambezi to Elephant Cafe. As we left we could see the ‘steam’ from the falls behind us. I had mentioned I liked Hippos so the driver/guide took us along the Zimbabwean side where we saw many in various shallows. Highlight was seeing a mother with her baby, out of the water, we also saw giraffes and elephants in the bush after which we went through a section of rapids where the driver had great fun giving us a thrilling ride!

After about 50 minutes we arrived at the Elephant Cafe where a group of elephants were enjoying the shade. After a quick briefing we were taken over to meet Muyun, a young elephant. It was quite nerve racking as they are so very big, but we were given bags of food (horse pellets) and shown how to feed them, although the elephant soon showed us how, shoving the open end of his trunk at us to put a handful of food in which he quickly ‘blows’ into his mouth. He was just like Cere, nudging for more and more. Then we were taken over to meet Mandinda, at 47 he’s the oldest elephant there and has formidable tusks.

It was awesome to stand by such a large creature, stroke and feed him. Their skin and strength are indescribable. All the time the keepers were telling us about them and their histories. An unforgettable, mind blowing experience.

Afterwords we were escorted to the ‘Cafe’ a beautiful open air restaurant overlooking the Zambezi where we had a three course gourmet meal with wine and champagne.

An unexpected appearance of ‘Socks’, a 3 year old Hhippo, so called because he has a pink foot and leg. Evidently he had been thrown out of his birth Pod (family) and adopted the River Cafe as his home, no doubt because of the lush watered grass there for him to graze on. Although we had to keep a safe distance, we watched him graze all through lunch. Such a privilege again to see such a huge creature in its natural environment

Exhausted…back for an hours sleep. Saw two River Monitor Lizards from our veranda, then went on another sunset boat ride and saw lots more Hippos, birds including: Great Egrets, a Hadada Ibis, a Water Thick-Knee and a Pied Kingfisher and a 4/5 metre long crocodile, which Charles had pointed out as a ‘log’ imagine his surprise when he was told it actually was a Crocodile!

Dinner then an early night. We leave for the airport at 10:00 tomorrow. Waterberry Lodge has been exceptional in every way and we’ve had the most wonderful experiences.En savoir plus