A Hippo Adventure
20th October 2025
The flight from Lusaka to Busanga Plains was in a really small aircraft – something I really enjoy. It feels like an adventure – a proper way to go into the wilderness. But if you have never travelled in a small 4 seater be warned it is really noisy. You need earplugs… which were provided. Looking down at the miles and miles of empty countryside you are increasingly aware of the vastness of the country. There are tiny dirt tracks visible across the tops of the hills and they are all that join tiny settlements. What I am going to is a holiday destination and so different from living in the wild. I wonder what it would be like if if your whole life was in one of these remote settlements.
The camp (Ntemwa-Busanga) is on the Southern edge of the Busanga Plains. It is small with just 5 thatched chalets and surrounded with wide open views. You can see wild life from your veranda … if it is in the area of course!! On the first day I arrived in time to have the safety and general camp briefing, have lunch, and unpack before we set out on our first game drive.
These are blue wildebeest together with Puku and Lechwe but this is the typical view – far away and hard to identify. The plain is vast. Miles and miles of flat open grass land. The closest I have experienced is the Mara but this is different – hard to put your finger on. It is quiet – no where for birds to perch – and, since everywhere looks similar, it is hard to keep sense of direction.
I was looking forward to seeing Lechwe as the last time I had seen them was a trip many years ago in Botswana. But a treat on the first afternoon was Reedbuck. In Kafue they are Southern Reedbuck. In previous safaris I had seen reedbuck but they were fleeting glimpses and usually they were very skittish but here they were regularly out in the open and prepared to stand – at least while I got a picture or two.
A little later as we made our way to water we came across a male reedbuck. Until these sightings I had never noticed their fluffy tails!
As we reached the almost dry but still muddy channel there were crowned cranes and wattled cranes but too distant to get a good photograph. The wattled cranes were also a rare sighting for me. Saddle-billed storks and a fish eagle were a little more obliging. The mud on their beaks almost obscured the striking colours.
Going along exploring the water channel we came across a hippo lying on its side. Its head was in the shallow water and our arrival did not disturb it. We sat and watch and the lack of movement – no ear flicking or tail flicking – made us curious. After a while we started looking to see if it was breathing. Since it was facing away from us we couldn’t see the nostrils but there was no apparent movement of the rib cage. So we started discussing how it had died. Binos did not show any marks that indicated predator activity so we moved closer. Still no response. The consensus was that it was dead of natural causes. The guide hopped out of the vehicle gathered a fist of wet soil and lobbed it into the water ahead of the hippo…
it reared up from the water with fierce energy! The guide climbed rapidly in to the vehicle and we delicately reversed and speedily moved away!!
Unexpected encounters are one of the joys of a drive. Earlier in the afternoon we had stopped to view a herd of antelope on our left and as we settled to move off there on our right, right next to the road but shrouded by the long grass, was a lioness! You can see the grab bar of the vehicle bottom left.
After the hippo encounter we headed back to camp. The light was fading but our final treat was Wild Dogs.
This photo can be adjusted to improve the colours and exposure and elicit more details and I do know how to do that. But for me this is an accurate representation of what we actually saw. The slightly murky light was made pink by the last rays of the sun and the ground was muddy and very damp. You can feel its eyes earnestly on you even though they are not clear.
