A Victoria Falls Travel Story: How I Traveled Across the World for Coffee, Baboons, and Perspective

Water folding over itself at Victoria Falls—endless motion, impossible force, and no interest in being photographed politely.

How a Victoria Falls Travel Story Begins With Coffee and Quiet

It’s August. Summer back home in California, but winter here in southern Africa. I’m jet-lagged and somehow staying in what might be the nicest hotel I’ve ever booked without accidentally choosing the wrong dates or a room facing a parking lot.

The bed alone at Ilala Lodge feels specifically engineered to forgive both travel fatigue and existential uncertainty. It’s the type of mattress that doesn’t just support you—it negotiates with your spine. The linens are soft without being slippery, warm without trapping heat, and the pillows have that rare, diplomatic firmness: not too plush, not too stubborn. After hopping across three continents and ten time zones, it feels like the hospitality version of a deep breath. If every hotel bed slept like this, people might travel just to sleep better. (I would.)

Morning here doesn’t burst awake. The sun rises politely over Victoria Falls, like a guest who shows up early but waits quietly by the door. Light slides through the branches of the crooked little tree outside my balcony, stretching over seed pods that hang like mismatched earrings. The air still holds the remnants of nighttime humidity, cool and soft, and the birds start their morning chatter without rushing—an alarm clock with manners.

I drink my coffee and watch the tree the way you study someone across a café: pretending not to stare, but curious. It leans slightly toward the earth as if gossiping, its shadow longer and more dramatic than its modest height deserves. I wonder how long it’s been rooted there, witnessing travelers come and go with their cameras, their itineraries, their elaborate plans to feel something new.

Morning light through the leaning tree outside my balcony at Ilala Lodge—quiet, unhurried, and already older than my plans for the day.

I wait for wildlife to wander through the grounds like the travel guides promised, but all I have so far is coffee, birdsong, and this patient tree. And honestly, it’s calming enough. The world doesn’t need to perform for this morning to matter.

This Victoria Falls Travel Story Isn't Just About the Waterfall

A short walk later, I’m watching warthogs doing what I can only assume is their daily landscaping shift. It’s one of the most adorable scenes I’ve ever witnessed at a hotel. I'm not sure whether to run away or stand there in awe—my only frame of reference for warthogs comes from The Lion King.

Local residents appear unfazed by the “Fire Emergency Assembly Point.” Priorities: grass first, safety later.

They drop to their little front knees to graze, saving themselves from constantly bowing their heads, and the sight brings me inexplicable joy. Their soft snuffling and the occasional tug of roots somehow lowers my blood pressure. I only have a few minutes before I need to meet my driver, so I reluctantly leave the Pumbas behind.

At the lobby, a driver confirms I’m the correct person, and I climb into a van destined for the falls. I buckle up, fully prepared for polite, forgettable group-tour chatter.

Instead, I meet two women who are, essentially, my neighbors.

We live in the same county—not region, not time zone, not even a broad area—the same government-defined patch of land, nearly halfway around the world from where we’re sitting. We puzzle this out the way distant cousins test whether they might actually share DNA:

“Where exactly?”

“Oh, near there!”

“There has to be someone we both know.”

And we do. We all work in the nonprofit world; they’re in Africa to assist with vision surgeries. Proximity suddenly becomes a personality trait we share. If this were a movie, a whimsical little score would start up—something that suggests fate has a quirky sense of humor.

The van bumps along past hotels, grazing goats, and stalls selling carved wooden animals. The three of us talk like we’re on a long school field trip, triangulating our connections while the landscape blurs by.

I realize how quickly strangers can become anchors. Not permanent ones, not deep ones—just temporary stabilizers in unfamiliar places. You don’t need a past to feel kinship. Sometimes all it takes is two hours and a shared area code.

The Smoke That Thunders, Starring Baboons and a Bronze Celebrity

Our guide leads us through the entrance of Victoria Falls National Park, and it feels like stepping into a secret ecosystem. Dense green vegetation rises out of southern Africa’s dry landscape, fed by the constant rain of mist dropping from somewhere we can’t yet see.

We walk a curving path. The vegetation thickens—strange plants and flowers adapted to this pocket of micro-weather—and gradually there’s a bass note in the air. It’s not sound as much as vibration, rumbling up through the ground into our shoes like a drumbeat beneath the earth. The falls are ahead, invisible but undeniable. The Tonga name, Mosi-oa-Tunya—The Smoke That Thunders—isn't poetic exaggeration. It’s instruction.

Mist blasts upward like a second waterfall made of clouds. And then, the drop: water throwing itself into a gorge so deep the plunge and the impact are indistinguishable. It looks as if the earth has been split open and left to leak.

Proof that you can travel halfway around the world… and still end up hanging out with people from your own backyard.

Even in the dry season—during a drought that’s stretched on for years, with the Zambezi River dammed for hydroelectric power—the falls still rage. I can only imagine what they were like before humans tried to harness them.

Steps away from an overlook stands a statue of David Livingstone, hand resting on a walking stick, staring into the canyon as though he authored it. Somewhere in textbooks and cartoons, he carries the line, “Dr. Livingstone, I presume?”—the world’s most polite greeting for a man who looked like a Victorian ghost near collapse.

Standing with a statue of David Livingstone, at a waterfall he introduced to the West but did not find first.

The line supposedly came from Henry Morton Stanley, sent to track down the missing explorer and, after months of brutal travel, allegedly greeted him with that absurdly formal introduction. Whether he actually said it is questionable, but accuracy rarely stands a chance against a dramatic story. The locals already knew exactly what the falls were and where they were. It wasn’t a discovery—it was simply one outsider finally catching up to a story that had been unfolding with or without him.

History is arranged by whoever holds the pen. Queen Victoria, whose name the falls carry in Western histories, may never have set foot here. If she didn’t, she should have. It’s worth the journey but perhaps without the wide puffy dress.

Trying to look casual next to one of the loudest miracles on Earth.

We continue down the path to a panoramic viewpoint. While we gape, trying to photograph the un-photographable, the locals are unmoved: baboons. Entire families of them—mothers with clinging infants, moody adolescents with the entitlement of teenagers everywhere. They forage along the trail, rummaging for snacks, occasionally pausing to stare down the tourists as if we are the attraction.

Baby baboon enjoying the view like it ordered the morning sunshine.

A pair of baboons sits at an overlook, watching the cascade. They’re not begging, not hiding, not alert—just watching. Their posture says, we’ve seen this before, but we still enjoy it. They look like an old married couple contemplating existence over the roar of the world.

Knowing how to look at the world together might be its own kind of wisdom.

Dinner with a Story You Can Taste

By nightfall I’m tucked in at the bar in the garden-lit dining area at Ilala Lodge. Candlelight flickers softly from table to table, the gentle clinking of glassware accompanies low conversation, and the warm air carries the distant rumble of the falls. It’s quiet luxury — a calm, soothing contrast to the day’s adventures. I didn't realize I was getting so much luxury when I booked this last-minute accommodation.

They set down my plate — a pan-seared venison fillet, made with locally sourced game, paired with roasted root vegetables and a rich wine reduction so deep it tastes like an old secret. Two golden polenta cakes flank the meat like miniature architectural columns elegant, precise, waiting to be conquered.

I break into the warm roll at my side. The butter arrives in near-perfect little orbs, smooth, gleaming, and creamily spreadable. They look like something sculpted, not served. I eat them anyway, fully aware I’ve destroyed something beautiful. Victory tastes like salt, yeast, and total satisfaction.

The dining experience is both fine cuisine and welcoming atmosphere. The bar staff is incredible and kept my glass filled with South African wine.

Not every travel memory comes from a camera. Some you taste. Ilala Lodge makes those ones easier to remember.

Later, I stroll to my room admiring the art and baskets hanging on the wall along the hallways, luxuriating in the knowledge that comfort doesn’t end at dinner. The bed is everything a weary traveler might hope for after long flights and bumpy roads: soft linens, a mattress that cradles rather than sags, and just enough firmness to make your body sigh in relief.

From my balcony, the garden lawns stretch out under the soft glow of lanterns. I look for any animals that may wander close — warthogs, impala, even the occasional elephant according to reviews. No dice. But the tree still stands, consistent and sturdy.

At Ilala Lodge, it feels like the world slows down to match the rhythm of the falls: calm, generous, alive. And after a day of travel, sightseeing, and heart-pounding beauty, I’m glad this is where I get to rest.

A hotel that treats art like part of the experience, not just decoration.

Where the Lesson Hides (and It Isn’t About Travel but It Helped)

Back in my room, the falls continue to rumble, mist rising into the dark sky, indifferent to whether anyone is watching. They keep moving without applause, thundering even when no one lifts a camera. They don’t shrink for those who ignore them or grow for those who pay attention. They do what they do because that is what they are.

The tree outside my window does the same. So do the baboons foraging along the trails. So does the woman at the front desk answering the same question twenty times a day. So does the van driver navigating potholes like a surgeon. So do my unexpected fellow Californians, whose lives would have continued with or without this coincidence.

Maybe that’s the point: the world doesn’t perform for us.

It simply persists.

The extraordinary and the ordinary don’t ask to be admired. They just exist. Our job isn’t to discover them, or claim them, or document them. Our job is simply to notice.

Noticing doesn’t change a waterfall.

It changes us.

Noticing doesn’t straighten a leaning tree.

It makes us see the grace in the angle.

Noticing doesn’t turn strangers into lifelong friends.

It simply makes strangers matter.

In the end, Victoria Falls doesn’t teach me about travel.

It reminds me about attention—how the things that shape us most are happening whether we are looking or not.

Don’t rush through life as if it owes you spectacle.

Slow down. Notice it. Let the world exist, and let yourself be changed by seeing it.

Quiet Companions at Victoria Falls – Framed Victoria Falls Baboon Art Print

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Where Art Meets Adventure: Stay, See, and Take Victoria Falls Home

Start your own Victoria Falls travel story here. When you book through my links or purchase artwork from this trip, you directly support a real traveler, writer, and photographer—helping me keep exploring, learning, and sharing places worth noticing.

🏨🌊 Where to Stay & How to See the Falls

If you visit Victoria Falls, I can’t recommend Ilawa Lodge enough. It’s close enough to hear the falls rumbling at night, yet quiet enough to feel like a retreat. Wildlife wanders freely through the grounds, the rooms are warm and elegant without being fussy, and the restaurant delivers meals that feel closer to storytelling than dinner. For seeing the falls themselves, this guided Victoria Falls tour on GetYourGuide is worth it for the local insight alone. You don’t just walk past viewpoints—you learn the history behind them, the meaning of Mosi-oa-Tunya, and why the falls are more than a postcard. It’s the kind of experience that helps you understand what you’re looking at, not just check it off your list.