Vwaza Marsh

"I had only heard my grandmother talk of them. Now I have seen them with my own eyes.”

“I was up for many hours telling my daughter about what I have seen”.

“I thought this was going to be a waste of money and that you should have just given us some kwacha to shop at the market. But now I know that I was wrong.”

Last week the entire Nursery staff went on “safari” to a nearby wildlife refuge (Vwaza Marsh). For most of them this was the trip of their lifetime!

We hired a bus which left the Nursery at 8 am with 17 full time employees in tow. Packed with a picnic lunch and soda, excitement was high. At the end of the day, no one was disappointed. The 1 ½ hour drive over rough roads ended in a real treat for the eyes and the spirit.

Elephant were everywhere—walking across the road, eating tree branches, and caring for their babies. We were surrounded.

And the hippos! Hippos submerging themselves in the marsh doing their mysterious hippo things, making their haunting hippo grunts.

With birds calling from the trees and baboons bouncing through the bush, the feeling of really being out in the wild was thrilling.



What were the nanny’s impressions? What of elephant and hippos? What are they like?

“They are VERY big!” said one nanny. “They eat a lot.” said another, as she observed the giant pachyderm ripping a tree apart and stuffing it in his mouth. Everyone was amazed that hippos actually can and do come out of the water.

The Nursery staff was incredibly grateful for this opportunity. They got to see what we all take for granted as part of Africa but what they had never had an opportunity to observe for themselves. One nanny summed it all up. “If people had not taken care of these animals (in the wildlife preserve) they would not have been there for us to see”.