There’s a place in the heart of Africa where storm clouds fill a gorge, sending rain upwards with a thunderous rumble. This is the Mosi-oa-Tunya, appropriately named by the indigenous people to describe what it is: a “smoke that thunders.” To be more precise, one would describe this smoke as a cloud of mist, perpetually rising from the steaming impact of water on rock. It’s a waterfall—the largest in the world. The waters of the Zambezi River travel a long and winding road before broadening at least a mile and taking a leap of faith into a deep ravine.
The world recognizes this site as Victoria Falls, named by David Livingstone in reference to who he was: a frontiersman for the British crown. In 1855, Livingstone became the first European to see the magnificent natural wonder.
The London Missionary Society had initially sent the young physician to the African continent to extend the Western-held truths of science, technology, and religion. Depending on the perspective, Livingstone epitomizes the forerunner either to developmental outreach in Africa or the thrust of colonial power on a continent caught off-guard. Either way, the travels of the missionary doctor reflect an unexpected dialogue with the African landscape. The Falls alone reveal that Africa held a power of its own.
Today, the Falls continue to rumble through the closed canopy of the surrounding vegetation. An extensive network of paths and trails circle the gorge, leading to various viewpoints to approach the natural wonder.
The Eastern Cataract trail offers access to the banks of the pre-flight Zambezi. Here, the water dances through boulders and small islands strewn throughout the widening river before tumbling over the lip and crashing on the stone below.
Hikers on the Boiling Pot trail scramble down the rocky bank at the bottom of the gorge to wade in the green waters safely downstream from the Falls. The cool of the water offers a necessary replenishment before the tough hike up the ravine in the heat of a Zambian summer.
A third path—the “photographic trail”—leads towards the Zimbabwean side of the gorge, away from crashing thunder and dampening mist. Tourists seeking close proximity to the Falls might consider this path the wrong direction, but this way assures a splendid panorama of both the Falls and its surrounding environment. From this distant view, Victoria Falls appears comfortably situated within the ravine, its magnanimity insignificant in the expansive green of the surrounding landscape. From this approach, what the Falls loses in personal grandeur and power it gains in its perfect placement. The magnificence of the wonder blends into the lush brilliance of the African landscape, finding its significance in the greater whole.
From a small island amid the Zambezi, the nineteenth-century Scottish missionary must have felt at once fear and awe as the water before him seemed to lose itself in the earth below. Staring over the lip of the falls into the fissure of basaltic rock, Livingstone met a white wall of thundering smoke, wetting him to the skin as it does visitors today.
Dr. Livingstone surely stood in reverence to the pillaring mist that filled the gorge and overflowed to the open skies above. The black rock and red soil breathed in its moisture and exhaled life; the bush drips green and wet, and the cliff face dons a blanket of grasses and vines, eternally drenched in a fountain of thundering life. The young doctor no doubt stood in amazement of what he observed: the grandiosity of the basaltic cliff veiled by an opaque mist, or the droning rumble of rushing rapids pouring into a basin that never fills.
But perhaps his wonder hit a much more poignant note. As the mists condensed on the skin of the doctor down to the leather-bound Book he clutched close to his heart, Livingstone sighed with relief. His thirst had been quenched.
On his mission to bring God to Africa, he discovered that God had beat him there.