Teeming with a variety of animals, 4,613 acre Lake Chivero National Park had every
kind of African animal imaginable, minus the wild elephants we are still
eagerly awaiting... The national park is a quick 40 minute drive from our
capital city, and sits on the shores of the dammed Lake Chivero, water source
to the same city. Here are some overdue pictures from an October summer day
spent finding animals in the park with some friends...
We first visited the dam, where we were each charged two dollars, by a man who may or may not have been a park ranger, to walk across the top.
The lake is home to oodles of crocodiles. The men in these pictures are taking huge risks to catch a few fish, presumably to feed their families. The weed is supposedly an illegally-introduced, invasive species that has been sprayed repeatedly throughout the city's water source in an attempt to eradicate it... Between that and the typhoid, you will not be seeing us drink any of this water anytime soon!
Surrounding the dam were a crazy new (to us) species of locust we have not seen before... each giant and striped like a pair of socks.
We saw kudu, sable, giraffe, a variety of monkey, rhino, warthog, tsesebe, wildebeest,
zebra, and ostrich in addition to a variety of birds and colorful lizards
These white rhinos have been recently de-horned by the park service to deter poachers. This is typical of many of the rhinos in the country.
On the shore of the other side of Lake Chivero... here beautiful rock formations scatter the landscape.
Next to the water sits Bushman's Point, a beautiful example of the cave paintings found throughout the country.
Rickety barbed wire is the only thing protecting these treasures.
We enjoyed a picnic lunch with friends Kohl, Kalla, and Karyn before an
abrupt ending caused by wild vervit monkeys. They like their chicken legs....