Fishing trip, Shamashanga, Zimbabwe

David, arriving at Chikwenya airstrip

While I was at Mana Pools, David spent the week further downstream on the Zambezi River, catching tiger fish. Here is his account of the trip.

"We flew into the airstrip at Chikwenya early on Monday morning, and within two hours of leaving Harare we were on our fishing boat on the Zambezi river.

Our team for the week was Tim, Dan, me, and Terry.

It was not long before I made my first catch. The aim is to catch and release.

Tim's catch

Daniel's Catch

Terry weighing his catch, while Dan captures the moment, as

there is just enough time to weigh the catch and take a photo before returning the fish to the river.

Drifting silently downstream in the current makes it possible to approach game 

on the many islands, at sometimes very close range. We surprised this elephant.

...and these…

More surprisingly we got this close to a very large crocodile.

Lunch time!

We spent the whole day on the river from first until last light. We took brunch with us, and this was always a full fry up on some shady spot on an island, which we first checked for game.

Sunsets on the river are magical.

Here Terry and Ernest, our boat driver, enjoy a magical moment

Farewell, until next year!

We spent four nights at the Shamashanga fishing camp. It is a tented camp nestled on river bank.

All too soon the week was over. On Friday we drifted down stream, fishing as we went, to Chiwore. And in the early afternoon noon, our plane arrived to fly us back to Harare."

David Coughlan