We just returned from a fantastic week in the Lower Zambezi National Park. It’s a 4,000 sq km park on the northern side of the Zambezi, opposite Mana Pools National Park in Zimbabwe.
We enjoyed game drives and canoeing, but the best way to see this park is from a boat. Drifting down the river, with hippos on all sides, elephants coming to drink along the banks and waterbirds scattering in all directions was a considerable contrast from the dry, brown trickle that the Luangwa River becomes in the dry season.
All around, hippos make their presence known with guttural grunts, and the males often stand up out of the water as you pass.
One of the small sandbars was populated by a large group of White-faced Whistling Ducks.
As we approached this Goliath Heron, it shuffled nervously before taking off and flying low over the water to another feeding site.
As dusk fell on the first evening we enjoyed watching hippos bob up and down in the shallow water.
And on our last morning we found a group of Crested Guineafowl, a species not found in the Luangwa and disappearing from most of their geographic range.
