The Rhythm of My Story: I Might Be Too Old for This Much Adventure -- Part 2

Back in the car we headed to Zambia, which meant going through the border crossing exercise again. It was more grueling this time because we had to stand in line for much longer in the hot sun. We were the last to arrive for our Livingstone Island tour. After signing a waiver they put us on a speed boat for an 8 minute ride to Livingstone Island.

It is thus named because it is where David Livingstone was taken by canoe to see the falls for the first time. Once on the island we changed into our swimming suits and then swam out to some rocks and waited our turn to jump into the Devil's Pool. I had seen it from the other side this morning.

Then we swam to the edge of the falls

And had our photo taken in numerous poses

Before getting out and taking even more photos.

I'm not sure the last time I felt that frightened or fragile. Then we sat down for a gourmet two-hour lunch with seven strangers. We were all from the US. Gayle and I were by far the oldest people there. There were two Peace Corp volunteers in the group. We had the most wonderful conversation over lunch. They thought Gayle and I were badasses for being our age and jumping into the water right above the largest falls in the world. I agree with them.

We returned to our driver by 3 pm and headed for our next adventure. We had made reservations to ride microlights. I went first with Heiko as the pilot. After I quit being terrified it was exhilirating. Heiko witnessed to me about Christ until I finally told him I am a pastor. Talk about having a captive audience for your preaching! Why haven't I thought of preaching while flying people over Victoria Falls in a microlight?

I got to see Victoria Falls from on high. It was amazing. Heiko even let me fly the microlight for awhile. I saw elephants getting out from a swim in the Zambezi River. I saw a dozen submerged hippos. We flew over zebras, crocodiles and buffalo. Did I mention it was incredible? A Go Pro was attached to the wing and took photos every 10 seconds. I am bringing home a flash drive with all the photos of this adventure.

Gayle went next and had almost exactly the same experience...down to hearing a witness for Christ.

By now it was 5:30 pm. We went back through the two-step border crossing without too much hassle. I had been asking Dumi about the baobab tree. There is one near our hotel that is 1500 years old. In Nigeria they call the fruit of this tree monkey bread fruit. Dumi went by the tree on our way home.

He found a man there who still had a couple fruit from the baobab. We bought them and brought them back to our hotel. You need a hammer to open them but we didn't think to bring a hammer in our suitcases. So we beat it against the floor of our balcony until we got one open!