The Devil's Pool - This should be on everyone's bucket list!

Livingstone Island was the first spot that David Livingstone viewed the Mosi-oa-tunya (the local name for the Falls, meaning The Smoke That Thunders). He obviously was then so gobsmacked at the beauty (and perhaps cursing the portage he now faced) that he named them after Queen Victoria.

Apparently, you should do one thing every day that scares you.

I’m not sure where that saying comes from but that’s certainly the mantra that goes through my head every time I jump – or rather clumsily fall – into the Devil’s Pool. This is one of the most amazing things to do on Earth, and it’s not just because we live here or because we sell the tour – we’re pretty sure that you’ll say the exact same thing once you try it!

The Devil’s Pool is located right on the edge of the Victoria Falls, beside Livingstone Island, where a rock lip of about a meter holds back a naturally forming bowl of water. Now remember – the Victoria Falls is 110 meters high! The cascades of water crash down onto large expanses of basalt rock below. Beside the rocks are the minus rapids – rapids so big and continuous that even some of the best white water kayakers on Earth quake at the knees about running them.

Now you’d think this would be an activity for dare devil’s and crazy folks - right? Maybe some teenagers out to prove their invincibility? Nope - this place is 5 star luxury!

The Devil’s Pool and Livingstone Island are only accessible from Zambia. Plus, the pool is only accessible in the dry season (around September to January) which makes for a pretty good reason to see this spectacle outside of the busy tourist season. Then there are a few options of trips:

Breakfast Breezer – 1 ½ hours departing at either 730am, 9am or 1030am. If you’re on a tight schedule, or a tight budget, this is your best bet. You can even sneak it in before you hop on the plane to fly home (what a thing to remember!). Lovely eggs Benedict and the best homemade (or rather island-made) scones with cream and strawberry jam await you when you get out of the pool.

Lunch – 3 hours departing at 1230. If you’ve got the time, splash out – soooo worth it (in our humble opinion). You’ll have way more time to just chill out in the pool, have some drinks (they make excellent G&Ts or Pimms cocktails!) and sit down to a FAB-U-LOUS fresh and uniquely Zambian lunch.

High Tea – 2 hours departing at 330pm. OK, now this is my favourite trip – but then I do like to take advantage of the almost-but-not-quite-sundowner-drinks options (refer to the above, and there awesome Pimms). Fingers sandwiches and fresh baked goods. Yum. You’ll be back on the deck at the Royal Livingstone Hotel by 530, right in time to enjoy another cocktail and take advantage of one of the most spectacular sunsets in Africa. Now THAT is one amazing way to finish a day!

The Livingstone Island walk is for those amongst us that are more adventurous (or are light in the pockets as it’s the cheapest trip). You’ll depart right from the Victoria Falls park and walk along the lip of the Victoria Falls (yep, you read that right folks!), before plunging into the Devil’s Pool for a quick dunk.

Now that you’ve seen the Victoria Falls from above – check them out from below! We’re off to do the Under the Spray Tour tomorrow!

OK - First off, we need to appologize to anyone out there that was keen to see that we have a blog. Looking at the dates, it's pretty obvious that we haven't really been keeping up to date with it!

According to marketing gurus, we should have a blog - it's great for increasing your SEO rankings (whatever they are), it's great for steering business to your website (are we really that hard to find?), you can keep your guests up to date on what's going on etc. etc. We certainly agree with the last comment, and we're getting into the 2010 crazy of social networking but we're just a bit behind the times (it is December already after all!).

We've started on the Social Networking journey... our Facebook page has a lot of people that 'like' it. We've been following the blog www.socialmediaexaminer.com for the last few months and it's got great tidbits of information if you're into that kind of stuff.

Facebook - DONE (said like Gordon Ramsey)

Now there's the whole Twitter phenom. Just don't get it to be fair. Anyone out there that does get it, and wants to shed some light on why the rest of the world seems to be tweeting every thought and step they take, please tell us why. For now, we've cheated and linked our Facebook page to Twitter. Apologies if this offends anyone but hey, apparently you aren't a somebody until somebody is Tweeting about you.

Twitter - DONE (not said with quite so much Ramsey determination though)

Then we've got Youtube. We have a youtube channel - and we have a great Jollyboys video to Kim's boyfriend Tony Barnett of Third Eye Xposure (oh yes there are some advantages!).

So - Youtube - DONE

But that's the thing, we can't really say it with Gordon Ramsey determination can we, as we need to keep going... keep finding new and interesting things to say. It's more like the whole clique of Life is a Journey, not a destination. So from now on we're on the road, we're zipping along the social media highway and the destination is Livingstone.

This place really is an amazing destination by the way... but we've got to have something to tell you next time!

World Cup Fever in Livingstone

Africa has been gearing up for the World Cup since the second that FIFA (perhaps with trepedation) granted South Africa the games for 2010 - jobs were created, construction of massive infrastructure went underway and cityscapes were changed forever. Even more importantly though, was the fact that those in Africa were finally given the opportunity to proove to the world that this continent is overflowing with amazingly hospitable people, spellbinding scenery, world class restaurants and venues and... well... Africa is just an all around good time!

They might have had better beer in Germany (though I'm sure the Germans felt bad about having to serve Budweiser too!), but Africa can showcase elephants, lions, giraffes, biltong, boerwors, Table Mountain, bunny chow, kwato, Victoria Falls, two oceans and amazing wine for less than a fiver!

With 1Time now flying into Livingstone, it's cheaper than ever to add on a side trip to The Victoria Falls - one of the Seven Natural Wonders of the World. And since Jollyboys picks up for free from Livingstone Airport, it's a pretty sweet deal!

This blog is obviously about the goings on at Jollyboys Backpackers and Camp - and we've got a lot going on! Our aim is to hopefully offer advice to the techy generation that is finished with looking at outdated guidebooks and instead look to their online social network for assistance. Then again, this might just be a good opportunity for us to vent.

And if Africa is going to vent about anything right now (or maybe for the next few generations), it is going to be about the disappointing, unsportmanlike and shameful behaviour of Mr. cheater-cheater-Suarez! The owners of Jollyboys are Canadian, so football/soccer isn't generally a big deal (waking up for a hockey match at 3am Zambian time, however, is a perfectly acceptable reason to take the next day off). When Ghana was playing Uruguay, there must have been at least 70 people at Jollyboys Backpackers watching the game on our new flatscreen TV. Cheering was not only for Ghana, but for the whole African continent. Every cheer, every silence, every vuvuzella brrrrrzzzzzzzz was backing up the Black Stars... even though there wasn't one Ghanian in the house.

Zambians are some of the friendliest, hospitabile and generous nationalities on Earth, but one things for sure, Suarez is not welcome in this hostel anytime soon!