The Zambesi’s Canyon

Te Aroha News, Volume XXVII, Issue 43339, 18 June 1908, Page 3

The Zambesi’s Canyon

WONDERFUL TRENCH DUG BY A

- GREAT AFRICAN RIYER. • —.- The directors Of *the British-South Africa Company are mow taking steps to have the wonderland .of the Zambesi canyon reserved from settlement or from proprietary rights of any kind, so that it may be kept for the enjoyment of visitors from all over the'world. It will be a long time before this belt of country can all be made accessible to tourists ; ,because it is extremely rugged. But the upper part of the great gorge just below Victoria Falls may be opened without much difficulty, and it soon will be an additional attraction for the tourists who are visiting Victoria Falls in larger numbers every year. It is known on the Zambesi as the Batoka Gorge* The Zambesi, one of the largest rivers in Africa, flows smoothily along almost a mile in width, until in a twinkling, without even > preliminary ruffling of its waters, it pours over the brink and drops 400 ft. Nature • furnishes few spectacles so colossal as the drop of'this river into the abyss below. Tourists are travelling thousands of mile s to see the sight. Then the Zambesi flows out through the Batoka Gorge. The wide river is now only from 100 to 200 feet across. Above its foaming surface rise the black walls of the chasm ; about 500 ft high, that the Zambesi has dug for itself. No one knows the depth of the pent up waters, but it is at least 500 ft in the most contracted parts of the channel. The river drops 400 ft in one ,leap before it enters the gorge, and then 1100 ft more in the gorge. It is a torrent lashed to fury for about 50 miles. The walls of the canyon reverberate with the roar of the rushing flood, and in places where the onflow is broken by cataracts the vegetation that roots in the chinks of the walls is drenched with spray. The falls were discovered by Dr livingstone, but until last year no one had any idea of the length of the gorge that carries the Zambesi to the quiet reaches of its lower Course. Ithas been estimated at from 30 to 40 miles in length, but it is now found to be about 50 miles long. It was partly explored several years ago by Mr Sykes of the British-South Africa Company, but his report is not yet published; and the reason the gorge has not been entirely revealed before this is that the country on either side of it is so rugged that the routes of explorers have been far to the north or south of it. Mr Sykes, Mr Lamplough, and one or two others have now seen the gorge at frequent intervals along its entire length, though there are parts of it that no one has yet seen. , A good general idea of the whole canyon has been obtained. A peculiarity of this rockbound gorge is its extremely tortuous course. It continually doubles and twists on itself, turns sharply at right angles and zigzags in most.mtricate fashion. This trench was dug .by Zambesi,’ and’ wherever it came to a softer bit of rock the flood attacked it, and thus it- was continually changing its course to follow the line of least resistance. •

The explorers toiling along the top of the wall have often been baffled by the abrupt turns in the river. They have Been it glistening far below them and then suddenly it has seemed to plunge into a tangle of rock and disappear. The report that in places the Zambesi flows beneath the rocks is supposed to be based upon these apparent disappearances of the river. It is in-these sinuosities that the sbenery of the gorge attains its diversity and interests At Niagara the ride on the cars along the side of the gorge is regarded as one of the finest experiences at the great falls in America, But the Niagara gorge is after all a small thing in comparison with the canyon of the Zambesi. *