Zambezi Queen

We spent two nights aboard te Zambezi Queen on the Zambezi/Chobe River. We each had our own suite.  It was very nice to be able to spread out and have our own space.

The first and second night, we did game viewing from a small motor boat with the other 8 people on board. The crocodiles we saw along the river were huge! They were probably about 9-12 feet in length. We also saw large amounts of hippos some along the river banks or lying in the river.  There were also tons of elephants that lived in the area. The most exciting thing was seeing them cross the river. When they swim across, all you can see is their trunk sticking out of the water.  The sunsets over the river had beautiful colors that were difficult to capture in pictures. 

We also went into Chobe National Park on a 4x4 during the day. We saw tons of giraffes and elephants in larger herds than we had previously seen. Of course we saw lots of impala and kudu, but we were lucky to see a rarer antelope called a sable. Additionally, we saw a large group of banded mongoose for the first time.

On our second night, we had dinner on shore and they called it a Boma Dinner.  From what I understand it is a traditional African style dinner. They had a fire lit and a lantern on each table. Dinner was served on a hot plate like fajitas and was delicious. After dinner, some of the local people came and sang and dance. They then invited us to get up and join. We joined and danced with them going around the fire. I felt pretty ridiculous and probably looked ridiculous also, but everyone else did as well so I didn't care too much. Following the festivities, we did some stargazing. The stars were so clear out there on the riverbank, so clear that we could see the Milky Way. It reminded me of being at camp because every night I would look up at the stars since they were so much brighter there than at home. The stars here were even more visible than at camp.