Rather than cross the bridge to Zimbabwe and deal with a border crossing, I decided to view Victoria Falls from the Zambia side. After paying the entrance fee and getting hiking directions for the rim of the falls, I picked up a local guide – one of the illegal ones for about half the price, or $2 for 3 hours (I talked him down from $10 :- ). Shortly thereafter, we were turned around by a gentleman with an AK-47 who demanded an additional $40 to proceed all the way to the main channel of the falls. The falls were running very low anyways, and I figured my time was better spent elsewhere.
On my way out I swung into some street vendors for a soda and a few souvenir Zimbabwean dollar notes. The Zimbabwean dollar was suspended indefinitely in April, 2009 as a result of hyper inflation and devaluation. Their $100 trillion note can be bought for about US$1.
Mukuni was a beautiful village of a few thousand people, with networks of rusty red trails connecting thatched huts and many large, mature trees. I found Mukuni intriguing so returned the next two days. On the last day I photographed this boy doing laps with his wheel toy. Afterwards, I treated him and his family to sodas and enjoyed observing the intense focus with which he and his sister drank their Sprite, which was clearly a novelty in their lives.
