Chris Breen Zambia March 2007

One of the truly great things about the Luangwa Valley is that it is full of surprises. I travelled out to Zambia in mid-March 2007 with a friend to enjoy it in the emerald season. This is a beautiful time of year in which it rains occasionally but during which the river is full to bursting, the resident birds are in their vibrant and highly distinctive breeding colours and the land is a rich and spectacular mix of greens - hence the season's name.

I began my trip with a short stay at Kapani Lodge just outside South Luangwa National Park where I enjoyed morning, afternoon and night-time game-drives and saw Burchell's Zebra, Impala (though not too many), Puku, Elephant, Common Waterbuck, and two large and well-maned male Lions.

The birds were excellent too - Red, and Fire-crowned Bishops, Paradise Whydahs, Abdim's and Woolly-necked Storks, European Bee-eaters, Emerald, Striped and African Grey Cuckoos, Woodland Kingfishers and very obviously swollen populations of egrets, herons, Open-billed Storks and other more common species. This is the time of year when the Fish Eagles and Hammerkops are nesting and the young Carmine Bee-eaters are still getting their tail-streamers and full colours.

One of the really exciting things about being here in the 'emerald season' is that you can get out on the river (something that is really restricted to the months of February, March and early April when the river is swollen following the rains). This year (2007) has seen the river at its highest level for many years and it took most of the residents of the Luangwa Valley by surprise. 1979 was the last time that the river reached these heights. So, from a small jetty a kilometre or so downstream from Kapani, I boarded a boat and headed upstream. On the way we caught a brief glimpse of a Cape Clawless Otter, something rarely seen in the dry season, and followed the river's twists and turns until we reached Mchenja, a small bush camp in the heart of the national park. I have been to Mchenja many times (in fact some years back I ran the camp) but I haven't stayed here at this time of year and I have to say that for anyone who has been to the Luangwa before in the dry season, it is a real treat. At Mchenja at this time of year the river is probably 250 metres wide and is virtually touching the tops of the river bank... in fact four weeks ago (when they were trying to prepare the camp for its first visitors) the water was so high that the bar area was almost underwater.

It is quite a peculiar experience boating through beautiful ebony groves hearing the sounds of hippos echoing off the trees, when I am more used to walking through them and enjoying bush breakfasts and picnic lunches overlooking an almost empty, but vital, water course. We went by boat up to and into Fish Eagle Lagoon and boated across the river to take some wonderful walking safaris in the Nsefu area of the park around Baka-Baka and Lunga Lagoons where we saw herds of Elephants and even a large male Lion.

This is the time of year though when the seasons are changing - and it really feels like it. In the short time that I was there I watched the river level drop by over a metre, I saw huge numbers of European Swallows early in the week, and none by the end, I saw few waders at the beginning of the week (there weren't any sandbanks for them!), and bucket loads of them by the end, I even saw a plume of over 800 Collared Pratincoles - what a spectacle!

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