Shuttles in Zimbabwe
 

Hello,

What is the best way to make my way from Harare airport to Victoria falls? I am having a hard time finding shuttle service with upfront pricing (instead asking to price a quote.) And the car rentals seem to be high ($100 per day range.)

Should I just fly into Victoria falls? I am booked on Qatar airways flight to HRE using miles. I will probably have to give that up and fly economy into VFA.

Any help appreciated.

Fly from Harare to Vic Falls - Fastjet does this route multiple times a day.

It's been years since I have driven it. You don't want to go by road. It's a long drive/bus or taxi. Apparently there is an airline called Fast Jet that services it nonstop out of Harare. Absolutely no recommendation. I suggest flying to Lusaka and catch Proflight to Livingstone. Taxi to Victoria Falls from the airport. You would need to go through immigration and customs on the Zambia side. The taxi can take you to immigration and customs on the Zimbabwe side. See if the taxi will stop so you get a few pictures. This is where they bungee jump too. Get a Zimbabwe taxi or maybe the same taxi will be able to help you get into town, which right there. Either way, its a bit of a walk to carry luggage. Look on Google Maps. You may want to spend one night on each side of the falls. The Zambian side has arguably the best views anyway. It is not difficult to do this.

Btw, the Vic Falls airport is a bit of ways outside of Vic Falls. So if you aren't going into Hwange NP. my suggestion might prove to be $$ cheaper, less time consuming than what you have planned.

This might be the worst advice I've ever seen on FT in 25 years. The best way to get between two points in Zimbabwe is not by crossing the Zambian border twice.

Fastjet is simply the best option from HRE-VFA. Avoid Air Zim though, although they cancel and rebook pax onto Fastjet regularly enough anyway.

It's not clear to me that bundubasher is suggesting to fly from Harare to Lusaka. Perhaps to change XXX-Harare to XXX-Lusaka and then Lusaka-Livingstone and a single border crossing? And in any case, walking across a border is always a different experience.

The best QR flight to Harare is the flight that stops in Lusaka 1st. Proflight is a very good airline in Africa and I've never heard a bad thing about them, plus I've flown them many times. The reviews for airlines based in Zimbabwe are generally not consistently very good. Can't imagine why. Maintenance or parts maybe? Zimbabwe has a hard currency issue. That could ruin a safari out of the gate, being stuck in Harare. This is only my opinion. Getting to Vic Falls is really easy. An experienced traveller would figure it out. Just go with the flow. Last time I did it was in '18. The link shows where the immigration/customs buildings are in both countries. i've always managed to have my taxi driver wait and then ferry me to next building across the bridge, without taking the luggage out of the taxi. In your case, luggage would come out in the zim side where you would go thru immigration and then grab a Zim taxi to take you to your hotel. I must have crossed both directions 30-40 times in the past. Things change, but the above has been my experience. I know, its not current.

Fastjet are perfectly fine - no drama in using them. I'd certainly prefer to use them via flying via Livingstone and then shuttling back across the border.

Is the train still running between Harare and Victoria Falls (via Bulawayo)?
Quickest, certainly not - best maybe if not time restricted ;).

sarpotd hasn't' revisited the thread, so I made some assumptions earlier. The likely flight schedule, which means the quickest flight, nonstop to Lusaka arriving in the AM and then departing an hour later for Harare. If that is correct then connecting to the Proflight flight out of Lusaka to Livingstone makes sense. sarpotd could make it to Vic Falls for a late lunch, which I have done.

Sadly no. I regret not doing this about 25 years ago when it was still steam powered.

Swanhunter You haven't missed anything yet. Look at the Stimela Star