Another early morning as we headed to the Dubai airport for our 13 hour flight home.

We left Dubai just after 8:30 am local time with a view of the city.

We tried to get some sleep to help us with the jet lag, but found it challenging and instead enjoyed checking out the land we were flying over.

We landed back in Boston just after 1:30pm local time.

What an amazing journey it was.  We were grateful to met so many interesting people, experience and learn about a variety of cultures, countries and wildlife, but most importantly to be able to enjoy it together as a family.

We let the boys sleep in while Charlie and I went to the Jumeirah Mosque for a tour and information session on religion and local culture hosted by the Sheikh Mohammed Centre for Cultural Understanding.  While the boys had learned about the Islamic religion in their 9th grade history class, we did not know that much and found it fascinating and enlightening.  Since we both had shorts on (the temperature was over 100 degrees with high humidity even at 10am), we had to dress appropriately to enter the mosque.

Later that day we went on a desert safari in the Dubai Desert Conservation Reserve.  After a 45 minute drive, we stopped in the parking lot to deflate the tires on our Toyota SUV so we could drive more easily though the dunes.  We set off with a caravan of other SUVs from Arabian Adventures and drove through the dunes.  It felt as though we were surfing through them.  Our driver was excellent.

 

Along the way we saw some of the wildlife …

And stopped for some photos and to watch the sun go down.  It was very windy which was hard for any of us with contact lenses.

We then arrived at a bedouin camp where the boys tried snowboarding down the dunes (hard to buckle in with flip flops), we all road camels and then dressed up in traditional bedouin attire.  Another fun adventure.

Our last stop for the evening was to watch the fountain show in front of the Berg Al Khalifa  (at the moment the tallest building in the world).

Now that we have better internet connection, here are a couple links to some video footage.

Click below to see a few of the clips from our day rafting on the Zambezi River below Victoria Falls on 8/9/16.

Click on the link below to see footage of some of our encounters with the wildlife on the Upper Zambezi river (above Victoria Falls) as well as during day and night drives in South Luangwa National Park outside Mfuwe.

https://vimeo.com/album/4104769

We arrived in Dubai just after 6am as the sun was coming up.

We checked back into the Jumeirah Dar Al Masef (the hotel we stayed out previously along the beach).  We hadn’t gotten that much sleep on the plane so we had a pretty lazy day at the resort.  In the evening, Charlie and I went the Berg Al Arab, one of the most luxurious hotels in the world that was at our resort.  We needed a reservation just to get on the property and could only get one at the bar up in the Skybox so the boys didn’t join us.

It was our last morning at Puku Ridge.  After another beautiful sunrise, we headed out for a walking safari with Alick (our guide) and Simon who had a gun just in case.

Alick showed us lots of different animal tracks and their poops.  Who knew that elephants only digest 40% of their food leaving plenty of seeds, nuts and other goodies for baboons and monkeys to pick through.  We learned about some of the vegetation and the smaller animals while we watched the larger ones from a distance.

Having survived our walking safari, we piled back in the truck for one last game drive.  The night before there had been a lot of lion roaring.  We found them not too far from the camp.  Three male lions (brothers) who are occasional visitors to the area.

As we left them, we startled an elephant who went running off the other way.  He looked very agile as he made the turn.

After returning to camp, we had a little time to relax before heading back to Mfuwe for our flight to Lusaka and then to Dubai.

Zambia had held elections on the previous Thursday.  While there are 9 parties on the ballot there were 2 that dominated.  The incumbent and his main opponent who was from the Southern region (where Victoria Falls is).  The winner had to get over 50% of the vote and it looked to be a close race.  The Wall Street Journal had written a story indicating that there might be some unrest.  As we drove through the streets in Mfuwe the announcement had just been made that the current president had been re elected.  He was a favorite in the area, so there was a lot of green (the color for his party) and celebrating.  Given his popularity, we were happy it hadn’t gone the other way.

Around 5:30pm we boarded our small plane for Lusaka where we would have a couple hours to layover before boarding for our overnight flight for Dubai.  We were a little sad to be leaving Africa.  Hoping it won’t be another 20+ years before we return.

The boys decided they needed to sleep in, so just Charlie and I headed out with Alick for the morning game drive after enjoying a small breakfast with the sunrise.

We went searching for the wild dog but they eluded us.  However, we did find the same lions we had seen the day before.  Garlic and his mate put on a show for us.

We found Ginger and his mate, but they were sleeping again so we set off to see what else we could find.

We headed back to camp to find the boys who were enjoying some breakfast.

We had a restful afternoon at camp before heading out for an afternoon/night game drive.

We are back from the bush which was an oasis in the park but had very limited wifi.  So, time to catch up with the rest of our safari adventures.

Saturday August 13th was our last day at Flatdogs Camp before we moved to a smaller camp (Puku Ridge) in the park.  We had heard lions during the night and were hoping we would find some on our morning drive. We headed out just before 6am with Wallia (our guide aka Wally) and Susan and Brian (the retired school teachers from Melbourne who had joined our safari car).

After a delicious brunch we headed off with Wally for the 45 minute drive to Puku Ridge.  We hated to leave Flatdogs as we loved the camp, all the people running it and the way they work with the local community and are so mindful of preserving the wildlife.  It is a fairly large camp by local standards with a maximum of 40 people but it spreads out so you never feel it.  But, we were also excited to see what it was like to sleep in the park.

There are supposedly only two entrances to S Luangwa Park on the east side.  One was the main gate near Flatdogs.  The second one was several miles south and was accessed by a truck ferry.

After a short drive, we arrived at Puku Ridge and were greeted by Leve (the manager) and several others.  It is run by Sanctuary Retreats which has properties around the world.  They also had a larger camp up the road which was formerly the vacation home of a previous Zambian president.  But Puku is more intimate with only 7 “tents” at the camp which each slept 2 people.  On the first night, it was just us and an American woman (who was working for a local organization) with two local Zambian kids who were traveling with her.  The “tents” were spacious and a slight step up from Flatdogs without being over the top.  We had a great view out to the waterhole which was pretty dry as the recent rainy season hadn’t been very wet.  But we saw lots of animals come through.  There was a main gathering point for the camp which had a large sitting area as well as a deck with comfortable chairs and swings as well as several tables for eating.  An oasis in the middle of the park.  

After an enjoyable rest, we had a delicious late lunch before heading out with Alick (our guide) for an afternoon/night drive.

She’s a little calmer here.

When we returned to camp, we had a great dinner on the deck listening to all the animal sounds.  And later after relaxing on the deck, we had our watchman walk us back to the tents and listened to lots of animal sounds throughout the night.  Another incredible day.

It was another early morning.  5am wake up and headed out to the park just before 6am.  A couple (Brian and Susan) from Melbourne, Australia joined us.  We went in search of wild dogs.  So after a few hippo stops.  We headed to an area where it was a bit cooler (we were all wrapped up in blankets and lots of layers) in search of the dogs.

Unfortunately we did not have any success finding the dogs but we did see a bunch of other animals.

But, the highlight was seeing a buffalo carcus which a pair of hyenas was feasting on while a mother leopard and her cub watched.  The leopard could take down the hyena but won’t risk being injured so she let the hyena have the meal.

On the way back to camp, we saw this hippo sunbathing near the river.

 

We arrived back at Flatdogs just after 10am and had a delicious breakfast.  No one is loosing weight on safari!  We then headed into Mfuwe to see some of the initiatives that Project Luangwa has been working on.  Flatdogs and several other camps contribute a portion of the money they make towards the organization.  The program works with the local community to determine areas of need and then helps them to build and support these areas.  They have built several new school buildings for the area.  The latest is a secondary school (high school) which we toured.  They are just waiting for furniture. They also support a medical clinic, a girls club with programs, and a women’s craft market to sell their goods.  They would like to create a boys club as well.

It was wonderful to get a sense of the local community and nice to know that some of our tourist dollars are going towards the community.  We then headed back to Flatdogs to enjoy some quiet time before our 4pm game drive.

We started our afternoon game drive with a hippo chase.  An older male was chasing a younger male out of his territory.  They actually run pretty fast.  This is the older male after he chased the younger one away.

We were trying to find some lions but didn’t have much success.  We did find a lot of zebra and especially enjoyed this pair.

After a evening break by the Luangwa River with the hippos and crocodiles, we began our night drive searching for some cats.  We heard some lion roaring but they were on the other side of the river.  We did however, came across a leopard who was feasting on an impala under a bush.

The alarm clock went off at 5am.  We gathered by 5:30 am (dressed in layers so we could peel them off as the sun got higher) for coffee and a little pre breakfast snack.  We were off by 6am for our morning game drive.  

Around 8am we took a break by the river to enjoy some more coffee, tea and biscuits as we watched the crocodile and hippos.

We finished around 10am and returned to Crocs Nest (our room on the first night) to find elephants in the front yard.

After a delicious breakfast we moved over to our other accommodations in the safari tents.    They were spacious with bathrooms attached and overlooked the river (providing hippo calls as evening background noise).  After a nap and some afternoon tea, we headed back out for an afternoon/night game drive.

As the sun went down around 6pm, we took a break along the river to enjoy a refreshment and some snacks before our night game drive.

We began the day in Livingstone.  Casey went early to see the falls and ended up taking an excursion above the falls which included enjoying a view from the top of the falls (not something we would have advised), a jump into Angel Pool which is right before the falls and a swim in the river above.

Click on this link to see a video of Casey swimming above the falls.  https://vimeo.com/178442361

Charlie and I walked on the other side for one last view of the falls.

We then took two flights to get to Mfuwe which is northeast of Lusaka.

From there we drove to S Luangwa Park for a night drive.  We saw several lionesses, a male lion on the prowl, a leopard, buffalo, hippo, and some other wildlife.  A great way to start our safari time.

Click on this link for some video footage of a male lion as well as a leopard.  https://vimeo.com/album/4089409

After our game drive, we head to Flatdogs Camp for a delicious dinner and night in the Crocs Nest (a 2 bedroom bungalow that had it’s own pool).  The elephants paid us a visit as they grazed by the pool.  We fell asleep to the sounds of hippo, hyena, elephants and lots of other creatures calling out in the night.  A great day!

Wifi is very limited and very slow here so the posts may take a while longer.