Day 50: Roy's Camp – Kafue National Park – Musungwa Lodge Campsite

After traveling through the northern Kafue and the Busanga Plains last year, we now want to head to the southern Kafue. The so-called "Spinal Road" is accessible year-round, and even if our navigation system says it's not continuous (an error in the OSM data), you can drive to the southwestern Musa Gate and then continue to Itezhi-Tezhi.

There are only a few loops you can take off the Spinal Road. It's nice how varied the landscape is. We don't see many animals, which is due to the tall grass, forests, and bushes. They're quite safe there.

For example, we see a lot of elephant tracks (footprints and droppings), but only once did a group of about a dozen animals cross our path. And then, whoosh, they disappeared back into the forest. Phenomenal.

What else? A few warthogs, some buffalo, zebras by the lake in the evening. Lots of impala and puku, some waterbuck. A colony of 10 fish eagles! A hippo that we initially thought was a rock :-)

Staying overnight in the park would be too expensive for us. Here, the entrance fee doesn't cover the entire two-day overnight stay like in the Liuwa Plains, but only until 11:00 AM – so we would have had to pay for another day (2 x 20 USD). Furthermore, African Parks also wants 40 USD per person per night for the bush camp. We just take a quick look at the Masala Wilderness Camp because it's actually perfectly located about halfway along the route: nicely laid out, with a view of the lake in the distance. Large sites with new sanitary blocks. Lots of tsetse flies. Not a worthwhile stop, then.

And so we have to hurry a bit, because we have a total of 234 km to drive.

In the south, we have a fantastic view of the reservoir in the late afternoon.

We spend the night at Musungwa Lodge, and since the small campsite is already full with three vehicles (a group of South Africans and Namibians), we're offered the bathroom of a chalet. We pay 1,360 ZMW (45 euros) and once again realize that it's a bit cheaper to pay in kwacha than in the often-used US currency.

It's pretty here, and for a good 10 euros per person, we get a delicious meal and, finally, some fish.

And we had another great day.