2023-08-19: Safari Day 5 (Zungulila/Mfuwe)

It was another wake up call at 5:30am this morning. We got ourselves dressed and ready for the morning safari. We grabbed breakfast in the dining area with Alec.. We noticed a couple of bird nests in the roof of the meal area. We watched a couple of birds flying in/out of them while enjoying our breakfast. Alec identified them as wire-tailed swallows. Once we were done breakfast, we headed out of the camp. Michael has been struggling with the heat by mid-day the last couple of days so we asked if we could cut the walk short this morning. Alec was fine with that.

Alec drove us to where he wanted to do the walk. Along the way he noticed some crocodile tracks in the sand. He stopped and pointed them out to us. We could see the footprints of a large crocodile as well as the drag marks from it’s tail. It was pretty interesting to see.

We continued on to our walk location and started the walk. We found some hippo droppings. We could see the difference between the male and female droppings. The males spread their droppings all over the place with their tail to mark their territory and the path to the water. Females don’t do that. Alec dug up an ant lion out of it’s hole in the ground to show Michael. It was a tiny little creature. It’s amazing they can make such a big hole in the ground. We talked about the small five which the ant lion is a member of. It consists of the ant lion, buffalo weaver, elephant shrew, leopard tortoise, and the rhino beetle. We also saw various birds such as storks and ibis. We came across a troop of vervet monkeys. They were very curious about us and were goofing around with each other. Alec started making side to side movements which intrigued the monkeys. A couple of them kinda danced with him which was fun.

As the temperature started to rise, we made our way back to the vehicle. We spent the rest of the morning driving around the area. We found a dazzle of zebra and watched them for a few minutes. We learned that the last time they did a count of the elephants in the Luangwa area, which was a few years ago, they estimated there were between 20,000 and 21,000 elephants. We also learned that female leopards will patrol an area of around 2.5 to 3.0 square kilometers. We returned to camp around 10:00am. We were transferring to Mfuwe Lodge after lunch so we returned to our tents, got cleaned up, and finished packing our bags.

We had some lunch at 11:00am. It was another server yourself type of lunch. They had tortillas with your choice of vegetables and fish, chicken, or beef. We enjoyed our lunch. After lunch, we said our goodbyes to Alec and met Mabel. Mabel was the guide who would be driving us to Mfuwe Lodge.

The drive to Mfuwe Lodge was about 3 hours long. We saw a few animals along the way even though it was in the heat of the day. We saw Zebras, giraffes, elephants, warthogs, and various antelopes. We saw some cape buffalo up close for the first time. Some of the elephants were playing in a pond and the surrounding mud to keep themselves cool. It was fun to watch. We also ran into Mishta from Chamilandu camp along the way. He said hi and fist bumped the kids as we passed.

We arrived at Mfuwe Lodge at 3:00pm. It was nice to see it in the light. They welcomed us and gave us a quick introduction to the lodge before showing us to our rooms. There are more amenities at the lodge than at the bushcamps. Internet access and power outlets in the room are nice to have. We refreshed ourselves quickly then went to the dining area for our afternoon snack. After the snack, we met up with our guide for the next day and half. It was Fenwell! He was the guide for Peter and Davis back at Chamilandu camp. So, we were already familiar with him which was nice.

We loaded into his vehicle and set out for our afternoon/evening drive. He warned us that the area around Mfuwe Lodge was much busier. Instead of being the only vehicle or one of a couple vehicles at an animal sighting at the bushcamps, there could be a number of vehicles at important sightings here. He told us he’d try to avoid the crowds, but it may be unavoidable at times. There was a lion sighting nearby. He didn’t want to head over right away as it would be a traffic jam to see them. He took us to a wetland nearby where we saw some cape buffalo, hippos and a few large birds. When we moved along, he noticed a bunch of vehicles leaving the area of the lion sighting so he decided we should go check it out. When we arrived, there were about five vehicles trying to catch a glimpse of the pride. We waited our turn and were able to view them. They were about half a dozen lions just relaxing under a couple of trees. One of them was a male. We took a few photos and then carried on. We passed numerous vehicles on their way to see the lions as we were leaving the area. It’s definitely a busier place!

We continued our drive and saw another lilac-breasted roller, zebra, and some giraffes. We pulled up beside a large pond in view of the giraffes in the distance for our sundowner drink. We watched the hippos in the pond while enjoying our beverage and the sunset.

We loaded into the vehicle again and started our night drive. Fenwell offered to let the boys try spotting with the spotlight. They both jumped at that opportunity. We had another guide, Chadwick, with us for spotting. He started spotting this evening. He managed to find us some elephants, a genet, our first civet, and a Pel’s fishing owl which is apparently very rare. As we got close to the lodge, we pulled over and Michael took over the spotlight. He was able to spot some impala, a genet, and some hippos. He was pretty excited.

We returned to the lodge around 7:00pm. Dinner is usually served at 7:30pm but they had arranged a show for us this evening at 7:30pm. A local theatre group was putting on a play for us about the importance of animals in the bush. We watched the show which was pretty entertaining. Dinner was served after the show at 8:00pm. We had a nice discussion with Fenwell over a dinner of roast beef.

It had been a long day, so we said goodnight to Fenwell and returned to our room to get some sleep.