Zambia Packages, Chimfule Lodge, South Luangwa, Cape Town

SOUTH LUANGWA NATIONAL PARK

Experts have dubbed South Luangwa as one of the greatest wildlife sanctuaries in the world, and not without reason. The concentration of game around the Luangwa River and its ox bow lagoons is among the most intense in Africa. The Luangwa River is the most intact major river system in Africa and is the life blood of the park's 9050km2. The Park hosts a wide variety of wildlife birds and vegetation. The now famous ‘walking safari’ originated in this park and is still one of the finest ways to experience this pristine wilderness first hand. The changing seasons add to the Park’s richness ranging from dry, bare bushveld in the winter to a lush green wonderland in the summer months. There are 60 different animal species and over 400 different bird species. The only notable exception is the rhino, sadly poached to extinction.

If you’re staying at Chimfule Lodge, the guides will ensure you have every opportunity to see all that the valley has to offer of its wildlife, birds and varying vegetation and habitats. They will make sure to take you to the Crocodile Farm at the park entrance and follow the loop roads graded in the park, past dambos bursting with hippos, crowned cranes, grazing antelope and scurrying baboons. Further out on the plains you’re bound to see the large elephant herds, reaching up to 70 in number. Buffalo are abundant and spread throughout the valley.

The hippopotamus is one animal you won’t miss. As you cross over the bridge into the park there are usually between 30 and 70 hippos lounging in the river below and most of the dambos and lagoons will reveal many. There is estimated to be at least 50 hippos per kilometer of the Luangwa River!

Zebra can be seen running in small herds of about a dozen. The difference between Zambia’s zebras and those in the south and east of Africa are in the stripes. Here they are evenly spaced as opposed to broad light stripes with a faint shadow stripe in-between. A unique type of Zebra in Africa.

The tallest animal in the world with long neck, long legs and long sloping back. They are gregarious mammals and move in herds of up to 20.

Ancient cultures in Africa revered the giraffe, as some modern cultures do today, and commonly depicted it in prehistoric rock and cave paintings. Unknown outside of Africa, this animal so excited man's curiosity that it was sometimes sent as a diplomatic gift to other countries; one of the earliest records tells of a giraffe going from "Melinda" (presumably Malindi) in Kenya to China in 1415.

The giraffe (as well as its short-necked relative the okapi from Central African forests) has a distinctive walking gait, moving both legs on one side forward at the same time. At a gallop, however, the gait changes, and the giraffe simultaneously swings the hind legs ahead of and outside the front legs, reaching speeds of 35 miles an hour. Its heavy head moves forward with each powerful stride, then swings back to stay balanced.

They browse on a great variety of trees using their prehensile upper lip and long tongue to grasp the vegetation. Their average height is over four and a half meters and they often weigh over 1200kg.

They breed at any time but usually at the end of the rains having a gestation period of 15 months and only one offspring per birth.

Giraffes have a highly efficient blood circulation system. Their heart beat is 150 times/min as compared to an elephant at 25 times. This prevents dizziness when they move their heads up and down on average through 18 feet when drinking water.

Bulls fight one another by necking, testing their strength by pushing like human arm wrestlers. In Luangwa Valley, there is an endemic subspecies called Thornicrofts Giraffe with slightly different markings.

Giraffe tails were highly prized by the ancient Egyptians, and still are in many African cultures. The desire for good-luck bracelets, fly whisks and thread for sewing or stringing beads have led people to kill the giraffe for its tail alone. Giraffes are easily killed and poaching (now more often for their meat and hide) continues today.

Perhaps the most beautiful is the Kudu, with its majestic spiral horns and delicate face. Although fairly common, they’re not always easy to find due to their retiring habits and preference for dense bush. Reedbuck, roan, sable, hartebeest, grysbok, klipspringer and oribi are all here but not prolific in the central tourist area of the Park. They tend to stay deeper in the remote parts towards the Muchinga escarpment.

Hyenas are fairly common throughout the valley and their plaintive, eerie cry, so characteristic of the African bush can be heard on most nights.

South Luangwa has a good population of leopard but they are not that easy to spot and tend to retreat when they hear vehicles. Many of the Lodge’s game trackers are skilled in finding leopards on night drives however, and often visitors are rewarded with a full view of a kill.

Most cat species live a fundamentally solitary existence, but the lion is an exception. It has developed a social system based on teamwork and a division of labor within the pride, and an extended but closed family unit centered on a group of related females. The average pride consists of about 15 individuals, including five to 10 females with their young and two or three territorial males that are usually brothers or pride mates.

Lion are plentiful in the bigger national parks but will often tend to stay in the remote parts for long periods at a time. They are the only cats moving in family groups and normally occupy a well defined territory.

In the southern part of South Luangwa the territories are quite small and the numbers in the groups quite large, some over twenty. Typically, two or more dominant males protect the territory against intruders. Several lionesses may produce cubs at one time and share the feeding. Eighty percent of the cubs will not survive to maturity.

Within the pride, the territorial males are the fathers of all the cubs. When a lioness is in heat, a male will join her, staying with her constantly. The pair usually mates for less than a minute, but it does so about every 15 to 30 minutes over a period of four to five days.

Before maturity at four years, young males are evicted from the group to live a nomadic existence unwanted in any other lion territory. Many don’t survive as they are not yet efficient hunters, and if one cannot fend for itself, it starves. The lion is an ambush rather than a chase killer. With its heavy body it can only reach speeds of about (35 miles) an hour, often much slower than the animals it pursues, so it requires much stealth and surprise to catch them. As a group, they will circle the animal, one will attack and knock it to the ground with a heavy blow, seize it by the throat or mouth and suffocate it. Although not as efficient at hunting as leopard or wild dog, their communal hunting methods ensure the survival of the group.

After some years the dominant males of the group are replaced by more powerful contenders, thus ensuring the introduction of new genetic material into the pride gene pool. The new leaders may kill and eat the cubs of other males. The impact of this seems to bring the females into heat again and soon produce cubs from the new dominant males.

The mating behavior of lions is a painful process for the female. The penis is barbed and its withdrawal hurts the female who may twist around and attack the dismounting male. The pain is necessary for feline mating as it is the shock to her system that induces ovulation and permits fertilization. Lionesses have a gestation period of three and a half months. Lions live up to about 18 years in the wild.

Lions have long been killed in rituals of bravery, as hunting trophies and for their medicinal and magical powers. Although lions are now protected in many parts of Africa, they were once considered to be stock-raiding vermin and were killed on sight. In some areas, livestock predation remains a severe problem.

Lions are found in all the major parks in Zambia. South Luangwa, Kafue, North Luangwa and Lower Zambezi.

Getting there; let My South African tour do the arrangements for you.

Mfuwe Airport recently achieved international status and various airlines were looking at scheduled flights from abroad

Domestic flights: Proflight Zambia is the only scheduled airline flying in Zambia now. Proflight Zambia fly daily to South Luangwa and Livingstone from Lusaka all year (frequencies increase in high season)

Fly In, Chimfule Lodge, South Luangwa National Park, Zambia, Cape Town, Cape Winelands

The goal of life is living in agreement with nature - Good wine, good food and nature around you.

10 days - African Decadence Tour .........................................................$4145-00

South Luangwa National Park, Zambia Packages, Chimfule Lodge, South Luanga, Cape Town, Zambia Safari, Zambia Holidays, Holidays, Safari, Tour, Vacation