Lake Kariba is full and its spilling floodgates are a magnificent tourism site as the dam celebrates its 50th year. On 16th May 1960, Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth the British Queen Mother switched on the first electricity generators at Kariba Power Station and officially opened Africa s biggest (at the time) hydro power generation project...

Protea Hotels has bowed to public pressure and withdrawn its application to build an ultra-modern 144-bed conference hotel on the banks of the Zambezi River in Zambia right opposite Mana Pools National Park and World Heritage Site. In a press statement released on 13th April 2010, Protea s Cape Town-based Director of Revenue Management, Sa...

A cheetah in the Matusadona: where there were none before. This cheetah pictured on its impala kill by lucky photographer, Derek Smith, in December 2009, is a descendant of a small population of 14 of these lovely animals re-introduced into the Matusadona National Park in the1990s by conservation organization, The Zambezi Society. Cheetah are...

News from Goliath Safaris - Jan 2010 As the sun set on the year 2009, the blue moon rose in all its solar-reflected glory in the east. Its spectacular and partially eclipsed appearance on New Year s Eve did much to silence some of the lingering and discordant notes of the year past. Global warming, financial crises and fallen golf idols were re...

The Zambezi Valley has won the Wonderful Places to Visit 2009 competition held by Travel Informed (SA) www.travel-informed.co.za. It was voted this year s Best Destination outside South Africa! Thank you to all Zambezi Valley fans (including Wild Zambezi) who voted. We each received a free listing on the Travel Informed website! Ca...

I have just returned from a week-long fishing trip to Mana Pools. We were one of the first parties allowed into the park under the new boating proposals. Our group consisted of four people, two vehicles and two boats. We stayed at the National Parks self-catering Nyati Lodge. I would classify myself as an outdoor enthusiast - I love outd...

Bumi Hills has been a star of Kariba s tourism stage for most of the lake s 50-year-old history - and like all great ladies of the theatre, her career has been chequered, her fortunes various and her facelifts numerous. Her latest come-back is a triumph. Perched magnificently on top of a hill right above the southern shore of Lake Kariba,...

News from Goliath Safaris - Sept 2009 Every year towards the end of August, the winds of change sweep through Mana Pools. At around noon the wind picks up and then in the late afternoon, thankfully carries itself away again. It s a very necessary part of the season, helping to shed old leaves and spread dry seed pods and its arrival this ...

Travel advice is all very useful and important, especially the stuff about what to do in the event of an accident or a medical emergency. Usually the advice is: get decent International Insurance that will get you admitted into a decent medical facility. What is missed, though, is that the most exciting destinations, the get-away-from-it-all ...

In January 2009, at the height of the rainy season, I was investigating one of the more exciting stretches of flooded black cotton soil in Zimbabwe s Mana Pools National Park. I had a good vantage-point, since I was up to the knees in the stuff. We ll give it a go, I called to Sally, my wife, who - wisely - was sitting in the comfort of our 80 Se...