We're up early. Very little sleep: strong winds all night long meant our tent was perpetually leaning, making it's already cramped interior even less spacious. At times I thought it was going to sail away with us in it. It is definitely not a state-of-the-art camping tent. Still, we had it better than the others: Doug calmly informs us that he has sand in bodily orifices he didn't even know he had.

The wind makes paddling difficult, so we push just a kilometer over to the mainland and decide to take a walk, hoping the wind will die down later. We come across a young bull elephant, a sitting on a log, watch him pass within ten meters of us, seemingly oblivious to our presence. On the way back there are more buffalo, baboons, and another elephant.

At 10:15 we are back in the water, and the wind is fierce. It's a strenuous paddle to our lunch stop, but Rosemary and I are getting into a paddling rhythm, and we manage to keep up with the Canadians, who are very experienced canoeists.

There are hippos everywhere in this river. Gary is steering the lead canoe, and we follow him in a strung out line like baby ducklings relying on their mom to keep them out of danger (and we know how well that works - see Day 3). From a distance the hippos look like logs or partially submerged rocks. Then as we approach, they snort noisily and submerge. Sometimes, the "hippo log" doesn't submerge, it merely assumes a less threatening appearance as we approach it.

A two hour lunch break on an island is a welcome relief. To have a meal, we have to set up a metal table and unpack our food supplies. Everyone pitches in to help, and the work goes quickly. Gary is a natural leader, and a real ham as well.


Here he's clowning around in a pool of hyacinth. After eating, everyone attempts a quick nap. At least here on the river it's not quite as hot as it was at Matusadona. Then we push off again, into a strong wind, so we again cross to the Zimbabwe bank and go for a walk.

Walking along single file, we converse in low tones about the day's events. Suddenly Gary freezes, puts out his right hand palm down and goes into a crouch. Everyone goes down. At first I can't see what has caused this change of behavior. Gary raises his arm and points. Directly ahead of us, 10 meters away under a large bush, is a sleeping form. A male lion. He hasn't heard us.

We barely breathe, watching him. Gary motions the photographers in the group to come up to where he is, then turns around and quietly addresses us: "If the lion wakes up, and you get scared and run, I'll shoot you." He looks like he means it. He doesn't have to explain: a lion is like any cat, they are attracted to movement. As humans, lions are scared of us (in general). As a moving object, we're on the menu. If you run from a lion, you stop being a human and become lunch.

After a few minutes, Gary decides to try and rouse the sleeping king of the jungle. He makes a low rumbling sound, imitating a lioness calling. It only takes a few times before the lion lifts his head, looks around, and seeing us sitting there, jumps up and... runs like hell in the opposite direction. King of the jungle my ass. I couldn't even get a photo, he was moving so fast.

Wow! We stand up and burst out laughing and talking. That was a thrill. We move on a bit in the direction the lion took, then circle back and again pass by the bush under which the king was having his snooze. There is a sudden movement in the tall grass off to our left. An adult lioness raises her head above the vegetation, fixes her gaze on me and snarls, then turns and quickly moves off along with another female lion.

Double wow! That growl hit me deep in some primeval spot: for an instant I was not at the top of the food chain, I was just trying to survive another day. The pair of females were probably sitting there in the grass when we first encountered the male. I imagined them watching us while we watched the sleeping male.

Safely back in our canoes surrounded by hippos and crocs, we continue our journey downriver against a moderate breeze. That night the wind dies down and we sleep better. Across the river, lions roar in the darkness.