Bells Point on Wonder Gorge Lunsemfwa River

June 1976, in the coldest days of the cold season, the Stovring Family, Anderson Family and the Cheeseman family decided to go on a camping trip to a place called Bell's Point. None of us had been there before. I think, Jan Stovring had heard about it from some other Danish volunteers. Bell's Point was a promenade jutting out over a deep canyon wall of the Lunsemfwa River's North side.

Anderson family had a big new Volvo station wagon. The Stovring family had a new small Peugeot and we had a tiny Fiat 900 all packed ready for the trip.

We went south from Kitwe to Kapiri Mposhi. There we joined the Cape to Cairo Road. We swung north on the Great North Road. Zambia called this portion of the Cape to Cairo Road the Great North Road when it was the only road of significance in the country. Now it was not so great with large rough breaks in the bitumen, where one was wise to slow down and pick a path through the holes to minimize possible damage to any vehicle.

The weather was wonderfully clear and cool. Many regal fish eagles could be seen circling high in the sky above the redden dusty Savannah. Near Tanemeka, a narrow dirt side-road cut east towards the Mufulwe Hills. We followed this road until we cut south near Old Mkushi to come as close to the North edge of the Muchinga Escarpment. Below this Escarpment the Mulingushi River came from the west. The Lunsemfwa River came from the north. The Lukusashi from the northeast and the Luangwa River joined from the east. These four rivers joined and dropped south to join the mighty Zambezi at the Zambian border with Mozambique. Here the escarpment dropped over two thousand feet within a kilometre. The Lunsemfwa River formed Wonder Gorge as it cut out a path down through the escarpment. Bells Point stuck out of the high ground between Muchinga Escarpment and Wonder Gorge.

The road deteriorated to merely two parallel tracks of worn vegetation trying to live on the sharp outcropping of rocks. We proceeded down very slowly to the point where the escarpment started to drop off very sharply. The trail appeared to end and we call this our camp on the edge of the escarpment. Each family found a bit of near-flat land and put up their tents. We had our nine-by-nine-foot square tourist-tent that we had brought from Canada. It had seen about thirty years of service as the Cheeseman's tent as I had grown up. It had mildewed here in Zambia and was rotten to the touch. We handled it very carefully so as not to rip it any more.

From our campsite we could look into and across the gorge, but we could not see the bottom that was below the curve of the drop off. We made a common fire and the Anderson family prepared Bannock on sticks for us all. It looked like pale snakes wrapped about the green sticks as it cooked and browned in the radiant heat of the fire. We cooked and sang campfire songs as the sun set. The night was cold with a cold wind. We could not keep warm by the fire for very long

so, we all went to bed early. We got up and found the fire had still got some coals in it and I started the fire to take the chill off our cold bodies. After breakfast the families all when exploring. We walked down to see if we could see the river. As we walked down the curve continued to get steeper. We scrambled thorough dry scrub brush on the steep hillside. We found a small canyon cut by a steam running down into the gorge. We decided not to go down any further down as it was dangerously steep and we could see that it was almost a sheer cliff that we were approaching. We turned back to explore up the dry canyon bed. I was very nervous about snakes as the dry leaves covering the ground were perfect cover for Gabon Vipers and Puff Adders. We did not see anything of real interest in the canyon and got back to camp after a long hike back steeply up hillside we had climbed down.

We had lunch and lazed about in the sun and prepared to get the cars back up the hundred metre hill behind us to more level roads. Anderson's powerful Volvo station wagon went up first fully loaded with gear and family. With all it's power, it ripped open one of it tyres on the sharp rock. It had to slid back all the way down to unload everything out to get at the spare tyre to exchange for the flat one. Next went the small Peugeot and it powered out. We all ran up and with all of us pushing got it to the top of the steep part.

Given the previous two bad occurrences, the steepness of hill ahead of me, and that my Fiat has an old 900 cc engine, I unloaded some of the stuff out of my Fiat to make it lighter and with engine roaring and loose rocks flying, crept up without incident. Then we had to walk down and pack the camping gear up to the car in a couple of very strenuous trips. The Andersen family, wisely chose to do the same as me. They too unloaded some of their camping stuff and family to take the hill with a bit less powers and reached the top in a more conservative manner. As Dennis Andersen's car now had no spare-tyre we felt it best to let him go in the middle of our small convoy to make sure he was with OK. The trip back was without incident, through the south route. We went over the Mulingushi River at the dam at the town of small Mulingushi and came out of the bush through farmland at Kabwe and then north again on the "Great North Road" to Kitwe.

Bells Point on Wonder Gorge Lunsemfwa River

June 1976, in the coldest days of the cold season, the Stovring Family, Anderson Family and the Cheeseman family decided to go on a camping trip to a place called Bell's Point. None of us had been there before. I think, Jan Stovring had heard about it from some other Danish volunteers. Bell's Point was a promenade jutting out over a deep canyon wall of the Lunsemfwa River's North side.

Anderson family had a big new Volvo station wagon. The Stovring family had a new small Peugeot and we had a tiny Fiat 900 all packed ready for the trip.

We went south from Kitwe to Kapiri Mposhi. There we joined the Cape to Cairo Road. We swung north on the Great North Road. Zambia called this portion of the Cape to Cairo Road the Great North Road when it was the only road of significance in the country. Now it was not so great with large rough breaks in the bitumen, where one was wise to slow down and pick a path through the holes to minimize possible damage to any vehicle.

The weather was wonderfully clear and cool. Many regal fish eagles could be seen circling high in the sky above the redden dusty Savannah. Near Tanemeka, a narrow dirt side-road cut east towards the Mufulwe Hills. We followed this road until we cut south near Old Mkushi to come as close to the North edge of the Muchinga Escarpment. Below this Escarpment the Mulingushi River came from the west. The Lunsemfwa River came from the north. The Lukusashi from the northeast and the Luangwa River joined from the east. These four rivers joined and dropped south to join the mighty Zambezi at the Zambian border with Mozambique. Here the escarpment dropped over two thousand feet within a kilometre. The Lunsemfwa River formed Wonder Gorge as it cut out a path down through the escarpment. Bells Point stuck out of the high ground between Muchinga Escarpment and Wonder Gorge.

The road deteriorated to merely two parallel tracks of worn vegetation trying to live on the sharp outcropping of rocks. We proceeded down very slowly to the point where the escarpment started to drop off very sharply. The trail appeared to end and we call this our camp on the edge of the escarpment. Each family found a bit of near-flat land and put up their tents. We had our nine-by-nine-foot square tourist-tent that we had brought from Canada. It had seen about thirty years of service as the Cheeseman's tent as I had grown up. It had mildewed here in Zambia and was rotten to the touch. We handled it very carefully so as not to rip it any more.

From our campsite we could look into and across the gorge, but we could not see the bottom that was below the curve of the drop off. We made a common fire and the Anderson family prepared Bannock on sticks for us all. It looked like pale snakes wrapped about the green sticks as it cooked and browned in the radiant heat of the fire. We cooked and sang campfire songs as the sun set. The night was cold with a cold wind. We could not keep warm by the fire for very long

so, we all went to bed early. We got up and found the fire had still got some coals in it and I started the fire to take the chill off our cold bodies. After breakfast the families all when exploring. We walked down to see if we could see the river. As we walked down the curve continued to get steeper. We scrambled thorough dry scrub brush on the steep hillside. We found a small canyon cut by a steam running down into the gorge. We decided not to go down any further down as it was dangerously steep and we could see that it was almost a sheer cliff that we were approaching. We turned back to explore up the dry canyon bed. I was very nervous about snakes as the dry leaves covering the ground were perfect cover for Gabon Vipers and Puff Adders. We did not see anything of real interest in the canyon and got back to camp after a long hike back steeply up hillside we had climbed down.

We had lunch and lazed about in the sun and prepared to get the cars back up the hundred metre hill behind us to more level roads. Anderson's powerful Volvo station wagon went up first fully loaded with gear and family. With all it's power, it ripped open one of it tyres on the sharp rock. It had to slid back all the way down to unload everything out to get at the spare tyre to exchange for the flat one. Next went the small Peugeot and it powered out. We all ran up and with all of us pushing got it to the top of the steep part.

Given the previous two bad occurrences, the steepness of hill ahead of me, and that my Fiat has an old 900 cc engine, I unloaded some of the stuff out of my Fiat to make it lighter and with engine roaring and loose rocks flying, crept up without incident. Then we had to walk down and pack the camping gear up to the car in a couple of very strenuous trips. The Andersen family, wisely chose to do the same as me. They too unloaded some of their camping stuff and family to take the hill with a bit less powers and reached the top in a more conservative manner. As Dennis Andersen's car now had no spare-tyre we felt it best to let him go in the middle of our small convoy to make sure he was with OK. The trip back was without incident, through the south route. We went over the Mulingushi River at the dam at the town of small Mulingushi and came out of the bush through farmland at Kabwe and then north again on the "Great North Road" to Kitwe.