July 3, 2011

PV016: Elephant-Back Safari


Oksana and I spent a week in Livingstone, Zambia, next to Victoria Falls.  We made time to visit both sides of the park – Zambia and Zimbabwe.  Part of the reason we spent so long in the area was that I was trying hard to justify one of the many excursions one can do in the area.  Although Zambia is cheap, the tourism around Victoria Falls isn’t.

Even though we were way over-budget, I so wanted to take a helicopter over the falls or bungee jump off the Victoria Falls Bridge!  I couldn’t see myself leaving this part of Africa without doing something unique.  Well, we got our wish!  On our day-trip to Zimbabwe, we hooked up with a tour agency called Adventure Zone for an Elephant-Back Safari!

Compared to the previous safari video I edited, this one came together so much easier.  (Probably because it recaps a 3-hour tour, rather than a 4-day/3-night one!)  We recorded our voiceovers in the courtyard of our hotel, which was a bit frustrating – if you hear someone sweeping the patio by the pool, try to imagine it’s an elephant swishing his tail as he walks through the bush…

I also want to give a shout out to Bra Tich, our Adventure Zone videographer.  Oksana and I both noticed right away how well-composed and steady his handheld shots were.  We requested his original HD camera files (instead of the edited DVD) for use in our video and got to see the editing room when they copied all 11GBs to our spare flash media.  I’m quite impressed with the operation they run from that small room; 4-6 edited videos a day, duplicated and delivered to any tourist who pays for a copy.  They’ve streamlined the editing process down to a state that I can only dream of…

Notes
Vic Falls Adventure Zone
Elephant-back Safari
Victoria Falls (Wikipedia)
Our tour review of the Elephant-Back Safari

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