Victoria Falls Hotel - Back in Time

View of the Victoria Falls Bridge 

Victoria Falls Hotel Wart Hogs

We are met by a Wilderness Safari representative, taken to a waiting van and delivered to our hotel. We pass jungle lodges and flashy tourist hotels, but when we drive through the gates of the Victoria Falls Hotel, we know we have arrived. The historical hotel was built in 1905 and is straight out of a movie and we take time to wander the grounds and explore. The hotel’s veranda overlooks an expansive lawn with stunning views of the Victoria Falls Bridge, a haze of mist billowing from the gorge, the spray from the falls. Our room faces the inner garden, overlooking two large and formal lily ponds. It is not one of the more luxurious rooms in the hotel; but it suits our needs, with twin, four-poster, beds, a television that doesn’t work and a vintage bathroom with a tub. John’s priority is to swim in the pool and mine is to take my first bath in over two weeks.

Back Side of the Victoria Falls Hotel

Swimming Pool

30 minutes later, I walk down the elegant curved stairway, through the great room and out onto the veranda. Three wart hogs graze on the hotel’s lawn and I pull out my camera and take the best wart hog photos of to date.  Who needs to go on Safari, when they roam the hotel grounds at large?  When I arrive at the pool, John is just getting out and we share our delight in the wart hog experience watching the male rolling on his back while the female nuzzles his belly. They seem very tame and John wonders if he could pet one and I firmly caution him to stay back. A moment later a young woman, with similar thoughts, reaches towards them, over the low cement wall and jumps backwards as the warthogs snap and grunt their warning.

Spiral Stair Case

Regal Pose

Regal Drawing Room

Its 4:00 P.M. and time to explore the small town of Victoria Falls, just a 5 minute walk from our hotel. We pass along a park where baboons and velvet monkeys roam and rummage in trash cans on our way to the two block strip of tour outfitting offices. John wants to research the bungee jumping options available to him tomorrow and compares prices and options.

Dancing to the Beat 

We return to the hotel at dusk hungry and tired and make a quick turn around and walk back out to dinner. We pay one of the hotel guards $2 to escort us through the park to the recommended restaurant. We sit at an outdoor patio and watch a Zimbabwe Folk Dance. Neither the food or the dance is memorable.