On the 19th June Will Jones, Caspar Raworth, Max Meyrick, Jack Burnand, Rafa Teniente, Jack Cleverly and myself will be embarking on a week’s long walk through the Zambezi Valley on behalf of the brilliant Zambezi Elephant Fund. Whilst this walk promises to be beautiful, the walk will be tough, walking 20-30kms a day, carrying our own food and water before setting up camp, and sleeping under the stars for the night. This area borders the famous World Heritage Site, Mana Pools National Park and therefore there should be some fantastic wildlife viewing opportunities. As we are unsure what we might encounter on foot or what might be lurking out of sight whilst we sit around the fire at night, we will have a park’s ranger to accompany us and hopefully I can offer some insight as a guide too.

However, the reason we are doing this walk is for the Zambezi Elephant Fund, a fantastic charity set up by some great friends of ours, John and Nicci Stevens. The charity aims to uphold the healthy elephant population of the Zambezi Valley, having had a huge poaching issue resulting in the black rhino becoming locally extinct in recent years. Their aim was to ensure that this didn’t happen to Africa’s most iconic animal, The African elephant. The elephant poaching a few years ago was appalling and surveys suggested that 50% of the elephant population in the Upper and Lower Zambezi had been poached, shot, snared, or poisoned with an impact on, not only the elephant population itself, but other animals too. It was assumed that the poaching was from across the river in Zambia only to discover that it was in fact from within Zimbabwe itself. National Parks was in a dreadful state. The rangers were unpaid, under resourced and vulnerable to bribes and profiteering from the very animals they were employed to protect. The local communities were ignorant, starving and without healthcare or education and very open to back handers to facilitate the poachers’ activities.

Whilst many may feel very removed from the elephants in the Zambezi Valley, I ensure that the money donated will go directly into conservation and protection of these fantastic animals and the ecosystem which they inhabit. Their work also helps the communities in the valley, funding important educational opportunities so more people become aware that protecting these areas begins by preventing illegal elephant poaching. In doing so there have been employment opportunities, providing a vital income to local people resulting in less need for illegal activities. They also aim towards the reintroduction of black rhino, a species on the brink of extinction across the continent.

After our week walking through Rifa and Nyakasanga and finishing in Mana Pools, I will continue for another two weeks walking through the National Park and finishing by canoeing for three days to Kanyemba on the border of Mozambique. For those who know me well this is something I am very passionate about and definitely something I’d like to get more involved with in the future. Any help would be hugely appreciated, and I hope it will inspire you to also visit the beautiful Mana Pools in Zimbabwe yourselves.

Many thanks from the team,

Jack B, Will, Max, Caspar, Rafa, Jack C and Wilf