Balancing, Balancing Rocks!!

Zimbabwe's Matopos area is famous for its balancing rocks!

This one made me think of someone kneeling to pray.

Matobo National Park, an UNESCO world heritage site, is absolutely breathtaking, with granite scenery like I've never seen before.

It was a beautiful place simultaneously so desolate and so alive with life.

One of Matobo's dams--I think it's Togwana Dam.

One of the lakes formed by the dam.

Fishermen rest near a stork at the dam's lake.

More balancing rocks on a dwala ("whalebacks"...the gray granite hills rising above the landscape.)!
One writer wrote that to describe Matobos as "a place of natural beauty is something of an understatement."

A teaser for the next post,

we climbed one of the most beautiful granite hills to Malindidzimu ("Place of Benevolent Spirits") or the View of the World.

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Nswatugi: Ancient Cave Paintings

While staying at Camp Amalinda in the Matobo National Park (UNESCO World Heritage site), Zimbabwe, we hiked up to Nswatugi Cave.

The unassuming entrance to Nswatugi Cave.

The cave paintings are between six and ten thousand years old.  That's right: 6,000 - 10,000, as in the Late Stone Age.  Insane.

Here's a scene that includes giraffes, hunters, and kudu.

Ancient cave paintings in Africa very, very rarely include images of women.  Many believe this woman is a healer or rare female leader.

This is a close up of a scene of men, some with bows, hunting.

Kudus and a man.  In 1975, excavations found the oldest known skeleton in Zimbabwe:

a bushwoman, dated 9,500 years ago,

A better image of a man carrying a bow, just to the center of the image.

The view of Matopos from the entrance of the cave.  Nswatugi means "place of jumping" because according to legend

God made his earthly home in Matopos at Njelele Hill, landing from His first leap at Nswatugi hill, leaving a footprint in the hill's granite.

The footprint is a natural mark in the hill that has sadly been slowly destroyed by individuals.
And anyone who knows me in person knows I have a slight obsession with jumping photos.
Seems the perfect cave for me to have visited.

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Camp Amalinda

On a road trip throughout Zimbabwe, we stayed at Camp Amalinda in Matopos, Zimbabwe.

How awesome is this bathroom?

Camp Amalinda is so well designed that everything blends so well into the surrounding landscape.

Some of the rooms are built into caves with ancient paintings.

This pool was built into the rock and was so amazingly serene.

I want a library like this.

One of the lounges.

Another lounge with the remnants of the previous night's camp fire.

The pool.

The camp and its balancing rocks for which Matopos is famous.

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