16 November: Victoria Falls

David Livingstone, the Scottish missionary and explorer, is believed to have been the first European to view Victoria Falls on 16 November 1855. Here are ten things you might not know about Victoria Falls.

1. Victoria Falls is classified as the world's largest waterfall, even though it is not the highest or the widest. Its combined width and height, however, results in the world's largest sheet of falling Water.
2. The falls are 108 metres (354 ft) high and 1,708 metres (5,604 ft) wide.
3. Spray from the falls rises to a height of over 400 metres (1,300 ft), and sometimes even twice that in the flood season, and is visible from up to 48 km (30 mi) away.
4. Victoria Falls is only one of two names recognised by the World Heritage List. The other is the local name, Mosi-oa-Tunya—"the smoke that thunders". Livingstone coined the name Victoria Falls after Queen Victoria.
5. When there is a full Moon, a "moonbow" can be seen in the spray.
6. There are numerous islets on the crest of the falls, but only two are large enough to be seen at full flood. These are Boaruka Island (or Cataract Island) near the western bank, and Livingstone Island near the middle—it is from this one which Livingstone first viewed the falls.
7. Livingstone may have been the first European to discover the falls, but local tribes and the Arabs were aware of them already. The Arabs had a name for them which meant "the end of the world". European explorers were sceptical about the existence of such a large waterfall because there were no mountains and valleys in the area.
8. Livingstone was blown away by the sight of the falls. He wrote, "No one can imagine the beauty of the view from anything witnessed in England. It had never been seen before by European eyes; but scenes so lovely must have been gazed upon by angels in their flight."
9. There is a bridge across the river Zambezi near the falls. The bridge was first envisioned by Cecil Rhodes as part of a Cape-Cairo railway. Rhodes insisted that the bridge be built where the spray from the falls would fall on passing trains. Today, it's a popular bungee jumping location.
10. In the dry season, it is possible, though not necessarily safe (so don't try this at home), to walk or swim across some parts of the river near the crest of the falls.