Victoria Falls

Like the Grand Canyon, or the Taj Mahal, Victoria Falls is one of those earthly sights that surpass the eagerest of expectations. Far and away the world’s most massive cataract, Mosi-oa-Tunya, the Smoke that Thunders, flings “a large lakesworth of water 360 feet straight down every minute of every day, right before our delighted eyes”.

Some of our Classic luxury Safaris—Botswana’s Timeless Wilderness; African Splendour, and The Jewels of Southern Africa—include a visit to the Falls, but this quick extension can be added to any of our trips; the earthshaking marvel is easy to get to, and impossible not to be impressed by.

Itinerary

DAY 1 & 2 Victoria Falls

On arrival our Micato Travel Director and driver will take us to one of a couple of hotels we’ve chosen for their ambience and proximity to the Falls. Either the elegant Royal Livingstone, one of Travel + Leisure’s Best Hotels in the World, or the elegant, colonial era Victoria Falls Hotel, in a pacific little corner of Zimbabwe; an “incredible hotel,” one visitor called it, “with stunning views and just a 10-minute walk to the Falls.”

In the evening, we’ll take a sundowner cruise on the lushly banked Zambezi, a normally easy-going river that enjoys a madcap escapade at the Falls before dutifully heading to its outlet in the Indian Ocean.

The next day we’ll helicopter over the Falls, an experience it’s impossible to describe without harkening back to something David Livingstone—the first, albeit earthbound Westerner to see the Falls—wrote in 1855: “A scene so lovely [it] must have been gazed upon by angels in their flight.” And in the afternoon we’ll take a walking tour of the Falls from a variety of vantage points, getting close to its endless but untroubling thunder, watching “the snow-white sheet [which] seemed like myriads of small comets rushing on in one direction, each of which left behind its nucleus rays of foam.” gleefully wonderstruck by one of the most stupendous sights we humans are privileged to see.

DAY 3

Depart Victoria Falls, for home, or onward in Africa or the world.