Chirundu

Yesterday I arrived back from four days in Chirundu, the small border town between Zambia and Zimbabwe. On the southern side of the Zambezi river, it connects with Zambia via two large modern bridges which are used for commercial truck and freight crossings. The town consists of one main road lined with a diesel station, a petrol station, and a hang of a lot of Baboons indifferently running in between the trucks. Throw in two derelict buildings which now house bars and heaven knows what else, and you have the “Downtown”.

Further up the road, adjacent to the bridge lies the stately gated border station which controls the bridge traffic. Pulling off of the main stretch is a road that winds up the top of bluff overlooking the Zambezi. Along this road are several thatched cottages and small houses which are rented out to game fisherman who come to fish along the Zambezi. Go 10 meters in any direction off of any road in Chirundu, and you find your self thick in the bush surrounded by hauntingly bare baobab trees.

Go 65 Km upstream the Zambezi (to the south) and you eventually hit the visible Kariba gorge which contains the Kariba dam. Behind the dam is the largest lake in Zimbabwe, lake Kariba, and beyond that for a few hundred miles you come to Victoria Falls: close to the 4 way border point between Zambia, Botswana, Namibia and Zimbabwe. Chirundu essentially lies at the heart of what Zimbabweans call “the Valley” of the Zambezi which holds some of the most magnificent wildlife on earth. 40 Kilometers across (from where we were) the Valley winds up the spine of Zimbabwe until it goes through Mozambique, and from there to the Indian ocean.

There is one problem, however: the dam is going to break. . . soon. Evidently the architect who designed the dam killed himself because the other three dams he built all collapsed killing thousands. Kariba is the last one standing, and judging the Zimbabwe government’s ability to upkeep pre-existing structures, no one is optimistic.