Sunday starts relatively early for us, but leisurely, because we are supposed to be picked up at 8 a.m. for our trip to Victoria Falls. This works out with a slight delay, which is, however, very moderate in the African context.

We drive through the cool morning in an open safari vehicle towards the border, where we arrive after about 10 km. Now the stamp marathon begins again and I am glad that I have a new passport. There would have been no room in my old one for all the stamps and temporary visas. Otherwise, entry and exit are quick and 30 minutes and 30 US dollars later we are in crisis-ridden Zimbabwe.

Victoria Falls certainly has nothing to do with the rest of Zimbabwe and the residents of this area are doing relatively well economically. Otherwise, the country is desperately poor - it hasn't had its own currency for a few years and everything is paid for in US dollars - and is plagued by mismanagement and corruption. Robert Mugabe has been in power for 36 years and has prevented any meaningful reforms; escalating protests are the order of the day in the capital Harare.

However, we don't notice anything and drive with our driver George from the border for about an hour to Victoria Falls, a small town on the edge of the famous waterfalls. The scenery is dominated by small souvenir shops and an intact infrastructure. The Tourism Police ensure safety and they also speak to us in a friendly manner along the way and ask if they can help.

We decide to ignore George's friendly recommendation of other, far too expensive attractions and first visit the park itself. After paying the extremely high entrance fee of 30 US dollars per person, we take a walk along the 1.7 km wide waterfalls, the widest in the world. The volume of water is overwhelming and we learn that because of the dry season, the floods pouring into the more than 100 m deep gorge are not even the biggest at the moment.

Victoria Falls from Joerg on Video.

We don't need the rain capes we brought with us, even if it gets wet in some places. The dry heat of the day always dries us quickly, so the only protection we have is for our cameras. The sprinkling has led to the development of a fantastic fauna that looks like a rainforest and doesn't fit into the savannah at all.

After we've had our fill of the sights, we go to the adjacent Lookout Café, where we enjoy crocodile kebab with local beer from Harare. The view into the gorge is phenomenal and we amusedly watch a few daredevils who are being lowered into the gorge on wire ropes.

Later we meet George again, who picks us up at the post office. As so often on our tour, we are lucky in the wild and on the way we see warthogs and hornbills (giant birds that only fly in an emergency), a giraffe and a small elephant standing right next to the road. Here every trip becomes a game drive.

When we re-enter Botswana, we don't have to fill out any forms for the first time in Africa. This may be because George is with us and seems to know everyone at the border station. We wait a short while surrounded by a few monkeys and are taken over by another driver on the Botswana side. Everything goes smoothly and we still have time to freshen up before the sundowner.

Tomorrow we will leave Botswana and, after crossing the Chobe National Park, we will re-enter Namibia via the transit route. We were very impressed by the country and you can feel the pride that its inhabitants have in what they have achieved. Most people seem to be doing quite well, you are greeted and welcomed very friendly everywhere and we never felt unsafe.