Zambezi Rafting (1)

Victoria Falls is quite impressive by itself, but I really went there for the whitewater rafting, which is amazing, thrilling, exciting stuff. You start just after the Waterfall itself, 9 people in a big rubber raft, paddling along the Zambezi, at the bottom of a huge gorge. The rapids are really violent and loads of times, the whole boat flipped over, throwing everybody into the fast flowing water. It's a real adrenalin rush. Lots of holes, huge waves and stoppers. Mostly grade 5 drops, some grade 4 and one grade 6, which was just scary to look at! We watched it for a while before walking around it. A couple of the guides paddled through it, 1 per raft - it was pretty impressive watching them handle it.You should have seen the safety kayakers - they sure could paddle. They rode the canoe like a BMX. That's me at the top-left of the first picture, leaning to balance the boat as I see a huge standing wave ahead. In the 2nd photo, the folks at the back of the raft are well under water as we hit another wave. I think we lost a few paddlers that time!

In this photo sequence, everybody dropped out of the boat except the river guide, Warren and myself. From the front, I could see a huge force coming at us, so I quit paddling and grabbed the rope with one hand, keeping my paddle in the other (top left). The raft angled to 90 degrees and everybody slid out, leaving only 2 of us hanging on. Then suddenly, the raft fell back down, right-side-up, with us in it. Then it was straight to rescuing the gasping men overboard, and onwards to the next rapid of the day.

Here's a couple of the group photos taken on a calm stretch in the morning before we set out for the day. The guide spends half an hour getting the paddling team coordinated, shouting "LEFT!", "HARD RIGHT!", "BACKPADDLE!" etc. The last pic is the view at the end of the day, after making the steep ascent up the side of the gorge. It's some climb, carrying your paddle, lifejacket and helmet. Just when you think you're beat tired, a local kid carrying a canoe twice as big as him and a bottle of water passes you by on a corner. Every day, the climb got easier though - and the reward for reaching the top was a cool drink and the spectacular view of the river winding through the gorge far below.