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In Conversation with Cath Brink & Bobo Camp: Part 3
18 September 2024
Bobo Camp: A ‘Picnic’ at the foot of the Falls
The Victoria Falls are nothing new. That’s not to take away from this remarkable wonder of the natural world, but they’ve been knocking around for some time – 5 million years, in one shape or another. That was when there was a geological shift that shunted a huge area of central Botswana upwards, in the process blocking the course of the Upper Zambezi and creating a massive lake.
That lake then overflowed, forming the first falls and paving the way for the water that flowed from it to cut a gorge into the land below. That was – and still is – the Batoka Gorge and, over time, the zigzagging river that had formed it created more overflows and, with them, new falls. To be precise, 8 new falls since that first, 5-million-year-old one, the current iteration of which straddles the Zambia / Zimbabwe border, stretches over a mile across and is the largest falling sheet of water on Earth.
And that water is powerful. As it flows down the gorge after plunging off the falls, it shifts rock, erodes cliff edges and re-sculps the landscape. Eventually, the site of the falls will move again; that shouldn’t be for another 10,000 years, though, so our guest today can sleep safely. She is Cath Brink and her destination management company, Tusks and Trails, operates tours to Bobo Camp, a remarkable place not far from the foot of the falls.
As the river narrows and flows over shallow areas, white water rapids form. It’s at rapid #21 that Bobo Camp can be found, ‘which is essentially a white sand beach with bush behind and cliffs surrounding it’, Cath says. It’s virtually impossible to access, having previously been used by rafters as a stop off area. In fact, for a long time, a raft was the only way to actually get there – the beach is flooded during the rainy season – and this little slice of natural magic was destined to remain unappreciated.
That was until Cath’s dad had the idea – ‘not sure when, he has a lot’ – to do something with the space. Cath’s parents set up Livingstone’s Adventure, one of Zambia’s premier tour operators and a veteran in the falls region. But transforming the beach by rapid #21 into a real, visit-able location was no mean feat. ‘In Zambia’, says Cath, ‘you have to get permission from the chief of the area to acquire land. Their word is final.’ Fortunately for Cath and her family, they had a long-standing and positive relationship with the chief, whose word was positive.
And so began the family’s quest to turn the beach ‘into something more’. They built a helipad from hand that would enable access for a small helicopter, they flew in – literally – a loo, a shower, and a kitchen, and they set about transforming Bobo Camp into the place that it is today.
Bobo means baboon in the local language and the camp is so named because of the mischievous troop that would regularly pilfer Cath and her family’s picnic lunches. Nowadays, the camp offers a picnic of its own – although perhaps not as you know it. ‘We’ve partnered with the Royal Livingstone Hotel and offer a picnic, where guests fly down from Livingstone, over the falls, land at Bobo and have an incredible spread on a white sand beach for 4 hours.’ When Cath says incredible spread, she means ‘a 5 course lunch with courses like beetroot carpaccio and grilled tiger prawns, a bar set up with whatever tipple you need to wash it down, volleyball, river paddling and deck chairs to soak in the extraordinary sights and sounds around you. So, yeah, a ‘picnic’.
She shows me a load of photos of Bobo and it looks as good as she’s described. There are countless shots of couples on the beach, in various guises: mid-volleyball rally, mid-champagne sip, mid-river paddle, mid-view admiring. The picnic food is plated up in designs that wouldn’t be out of place in Michelin-starred eateries, all carefully-drizzled jus and succulent prawns. And all of this in the most incongruous – and I mean that positively – setting. The cliffs that rise up and form the gorge are sheer and rocky, the river looks like it flows in fast, loud torrents and there’s not another person in sight. God, I doubt there’s another person within miles.
The feedback Cath and the Tusks and Trails team have received is, unsurprisingly, top notch. Most people who visit the falls want to ride in a helicopter, and a trip to Bobo includes that – and a whole heap more. They’ve had proposals, families, friends and more and it’s clear that Cath delights in sharing this special place with her clients. ‘I’ve had birthdays here growing up and have visited the camp since I was a child, so it’s always been a special place to me’. Her mother in law to be turns 60 a couple of weeks after we chat and, despite being a veteran Zambian traveller, her one birthday request? A trip to Bobo Camp.
Picnicking here is a seasonal affair – usually from May-October – and dictated by Zambia’s cyclical rains. Cath says they may, at some point in the future, look at extending the spot so that it’s accessible year-round, but they’re not rushing to have guests there during the rainy season. With 10,000 years of site access ahead of them, there’s no rush and, for now, the plan is to keep ferrying their lucky guests to and from this amazing place.
We finish up our chat and slideshow with a snap of the helicopter landing at Bobo, its frame a small dot against the massive gorge behind it. It seems an apt image: us mere mortals can come and visit, but this is very much the wild’s terrain.