cave paintings [kasungu national park]

We woke up that second day in Kasungu National Park to a delicious breakfast and a beautiful sunrise. I had worked out a trip for that morning/early afternoon with the manager the day before. We would be going to see some ancient cave paintings (about 1.5 hours out) and then hit up Black Rock on the way back.

Matt and Kevin (who head up the Anti-poaching unit here in Kasungu) drove us in the land rover, and we picked up a scout (also involved with anti-poaching) who could show us exactly where the cave paintings were. Matt and Kevin were both such interesting people, but I'll write about them more in another post. We took the land rover over some of the bumpiest roads I have ever been on in Africa for an hour and a half. Sometimes I wasn't even sure if there was a road because it was so hidden by grass. We stopped when trees and logs made it impossible to go further. Then we got out and started hiking to the caves.

This hike--it was incredible! We hiked up mountains and down mountains, over huge slants of black rock, through enormous boulders, beautiful fields of waving grass. You know that scene in Lord of the Rings when Pippin and Merry are kidnapped by orcs? And then Aragorn, Legolas, and Gimli start running to catch up with them and they run through the most incredible landscapes? I felt like I was in that scene of Lord of the Rings. The scenery was entirely different, but it was still so epic.

Post breakfast. Enjoying the sunshine.
Repping BYU!

In the land rover, on one of the smoother stretches of road. 

Making our way up to the first set of cave paintings.

The cave paintings themselves.
Crazy that they've lasted for so long!

The incredible landscape. 

More land. 

Making our way to the second set of paintings.

Hiking up rocks to get to the second set of paintings.

Second set of paintings. 

The view from where the second set of cave paintings were. 

Making our way back.

 The paintings were cool, even though they were faded. Thinking about it, it's really neat that they've survived so many rainy seasons. Here's what's really obnoxious though. Poachers don't want tourists around the area, since anytime there are tourists, there are increased patrols and activity close to where they might want to do their business. So they built fires close to the paintings, hoping that it would ruin them. It's really quite sad, but they were unsuccessful.

After we made it back to the land rover, we took off to Black Rock. I'll write about that in another post, as this one is quite long enough already.

The manager of Lifupa talked to me about going camping in the area. Not too long ago, she took a group of people to Miwonde (area where the paintings are) for the night. If we've got time, we'd love to go back and do that! Fingers are crossed.