Path less travelled — go excitedly chase waterfalls in Zambia, just don’t let your car battery die

A roadside in Lusaka, the confusing hub through which all traffic passes. (Photos: Bridget Hilton-Barber)

By Bridget Hilton-Barber

5 Sep 2023

The Zambian leg of their Epic Road Trip gives Bridget Hilton-Barber and colleague Hugh Fraser an afternoon and night of pure bliss at the Kundalila Falls. Alas, the next morning, their 13th day on the road, turns unlucky.

We were 15km into the bush, several thousand kilometres from home, almost two weeks into our trip and completely blissed out on the edge of a pretty part of Zambia indeed — the Kundalila Falls near Serenje in Central Province.

This evocative-sounding waterfall (the name means “cooing dove” in local Bemba) is where the Kaombe River hurtles dramatically over the Machinga escarpment for almost 100m. From above the falls was the most amazing view of the distant and flat Luangwa Valley, Zambia’s most famous wilderness area.

Apart from Teddy, chief in charge of the campsite, we had the whole place to ourselves. Soon enough he moseyed off, leaving two dear old friends in a slice of Zambian paradise. Talk about happy cooing epic road trip doves. We set up camp beneath a comforting old tree.

Kundalila Campsite is fully rustic. There is no running water, apart from the river, obviously, so no showers and just basic toilets. We did the views, we did the clamber down to the pools at the bottom — gorgeous and way too cold to swim in — we did the reclamber and more views.

The gorgeous Kundalila Falls near Serenje in Central Province, Zambia. (Photos: Bridget Hilton-Barber)

We were extremely pleased with ourselves. We’d made it this far, from Botswana to Namibia to Zimbabwe and here we were in Zambia, having a camp-out at Kundalila Falls. It was all so glorious and perfect, so the cooing doves immediately had a party.

We polished off some gin and tonic, squeezed out the last of the box wine (yes, standards had slipped to box wine somewhere after Lusaka) and we set ourselves on the whisky. We put on some music and Hugh excelled himself with a very fine version of Come Dine with Me, Zambian outdoor style, with a spicy chicken in coconut milk.

Then we took a sunset stagger to the cliff’s edge to witness once more the majesty of Kundalila Falls. The light was heavenly and the water rushed in our ears. The cooing doves were now baying and singing. We had some deeply philosophical conversations, sang more songs, drank more whisky.

Kundalila Campsite is truly rustic. (Photos: Bridget Hilton-Barber)

I remember hearing the sound of insects as my head hit the pillow: “Beep, beep, happy little insects in the wild, so glad they’re outside the tent,” I muttered. “Those aren’t insects,” said Hugh, “that’s the sound of my car battery dying…”

Day 13 was terrible. We woke up to a flat car battery. We’d spent all our cash on paying for the campsite the day before, and we didn’t know it yet, but we were about to drive north on the worst bit of road we have ever experienced: the terror drive from Serenje to Shiwa Ngamu on the T2, Zambia’s alleged Great North Road.

First, we had to get ourselves unstuck. Hugh went for a walk and sent up the drone, which nearly disappeared, so he had a panic attack until Teddy arrived. There was a lot of sympathetic hand-wringing and head-shaking and then Teddy sent for someone who pitched up a short while later, with a very small battery.

It was going to be a long morning.

Aloes above Kundalila Falls Aloes in bloom above the falls. (Photos: Bridget Hilton-Barber)

The battery wasn’t strong enough to charge the car, so another battery was sent for. This time Teddy sent a young boy off on Hugh’s bike. Different battery, same story.

Then Teddy sent the boy off to find a shifting spanner to see if perhaps taking off the cover and plugging the jumper cables directly onto the terminals would work. Not. Then Samuel arrived on a motorbike.

It’s the village ripple. First someone comes on foot, then someone comes on a bicycle, then someone comes on a motorbike and then eventually a car arrives. By and by, Harrison, wearing a Chicago Bulls T-shirt, arrived in an old Toyota whose back windscreen was held together with plastic and duct tape, and whose battery was secured down with a flip-flop.

Teddy and Samuel, Zambia Teddy and Samuel to the rescue.(Photos: Bridget Hilton-Barber)

We hooked up the jumper cables and Hugh turned the key. Click. Nothing. There was a very long unhappy silence and then, miraculously, the car started.

There followed a payment arrangement that involved following Harrison, stopping next to Harrison at the junction 15km later, reconfirming the arrangement, starting to drive in search of an ATM, then realising aha! instant money, then turning around, rearranging the arrangement and finally heading where we were supposed to be going about five hours earlier.

Then we hit Zambia’s T2 road from Serenje to Shiwa Ngamu. Or should I say, it hit us? It was worse than the other Zambian roads we’d already travelled — and they were pretty bad. Making it in and out of Lusaka was hair-raising. The city is a hub through which all traffic passes. There are more trucks than you can imagine; the roads are folded, ridged, potholed and cratered. A day of hell will get you to Kapiri Mposhi, where one way heads for the Copper Belt and the other northwards to Tanzania.

T2 road, Zambia At the worst traffic gridlocks on the T2 road, where everything basically slowed to a standstill, women flocked to the many trucks and few SUVs to ply their edible wares. (Photo: Photos: Bridget Hilton-Barber)

That’s the one we were on. We jiggled and bounced, shrieked and shook and it took us more than seven bone-jarring, teeth-grinding, spleen-splitting hours to drive 400km.

The road was barely wide enough for two vehicles, with no shoulders, and the potholes out-potholed even the worst of South Africa’s potholes. These roads were car-nivores. Hugh’s joke. It was like a real-time horror video game filled with dust in which you have to brake, accelerate, dodge, swerve and zigzag wildly.

Trucks on the T2 Many of the trucks on the terrible T2 between Serenje and Shiwa Ngamu have names. (Photos: Bridget Hilton-Barber)

There were a few light vehicles and some SUVs, but the traffic consisted mainly of a heavy volume of trucks headed in both directions, many of which were oil and petrol tankers coming from Dar es Salaam in Tanzania. Apparently, there can be more than 800 trucks travelling along here in a day. The trucks have names. “Oft Forgiving”, “Originator”, “Dollybird”, “Powered by Indian Muscles”. It’s easy to see why one must invoke the gods to make it safely on this journey.

At the worst traffic gridlocks, where everything basically slowed to a standstill, women flocked to the trucks and SUVs, plying cassava and beans and peanuts. Houses lined the road, with tethered goats and schoolchildren who made the odd death-defying dash in front of big trucks.

Lusaka A roadside in Lusaka, the confusing hub through which all traffic passes. (Photos: Bridget Hilton-Barber)

On the sandy verges, women walked with baskets on their heads, people cycled with bags of wood, charcoal, thatching grass and plastic buckets. It wore on and on and on as we travelled around 40km per hour…

Just as light and hope were fading, we arrived in the town of Shiwa Ngamu and turned off on the last stretch to Kapishya Hot Springs Lodge.

We did the last 30km in the dark, in gloomy silence, through an old manor estate with ancient blue gums and a mournful eeriness. The story ends happily, with us immersed in a hot spring alongside a lazy river in deepest, most delicious Zambia. A little parenthesis in eternity. We sent Harrison instant money a few days later from a place called Kahama. DM

This story first appeared in our weekly Daily Maverick 168 newspaper, which is available countrywide for R29.

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