Zambesi Moods - “The River of The Jolly God”

The Rhodesian (Central African) Annual, 1962

By Jonah Woods

The mighty Zambezi rises from a black marshy bog in the middle of a dense thicket near Kalene Hill in the very northwest tip of Northern Rhodesia. It very soon flows out of the Territory into Angola and as quickly it becomes a sizeable stream so that by the time it re-enters Northern Rhodesia at Chavuma, some 150 miles along its course, it is already a river of no mean repute.

Balovale, a lovely little village in a park-like setting, is the first place of consequence along the Zambezi’s still well wooded banks. Between Balovale and Lukulu, a big mission station, the Zambezi receives its first big tributary, the palm-studded Kabompo, which acts as the boundary between Northern Rhodesia and Barotseland.

A little lower downstream the Zambezi receives from the west, the strongly flowing wide Lungwebungu, now 400 miles from its source in the highlands of Angola. The Africans who live on the Lungwebungu maintain it is the true mother river and that the Zambezi is but the tributary.

This is the beginning of the vast Barotse plain which stretches for over 100 miles of the Zambezi’s length to Siloti. In the rainy seasons this flat country becomes inundated with flood waters anything up to forty or forty-five miles wide. Between the floods and the very lowest level of the river, the plain is criss-crossed by canals, lagoons and tributaries and could well be called the Venice of Africa as practically all transport is accomplished by craft varying from the humble makorikori (dug-out) to large diesel-driven barges.

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