“Many guests say it feels almost spiritual standing in the darkness, hearing the falls, feeling them and suddenly seeing a rainbow created by moonlight,” said Omen Mudenda, a tour guide with Victoria Falls Expeditions. “It is a memory that stays with people for life.”
I spent more than two hours watching the moonbow, moving between viewpoints and footbridges, trying to find the best angle and take in the scale of what I was seeing.
By 22:30, the cold had begun to settle in. My clothes, long since soaked through, clung heavily to my skin as the arc started to dissolve back into the cloudy spray, leaving nothing but darkness and the constant rush of water in its wake.
Back at camp, under the same full Moon, the world felt unusually still. I cooked in the dark, piecing together a makeshift meal, still damp and slightly disoriented from the experience.
Later, lying awake, I thought about how easily I could have missed it. A different turn at the border. A longer delay. A decision to skip the night visit altogether.
“Optical phenomena like moonbows are captivating because they are so beautiful but also so fleeting,” Strong said. “You have to be in the right place at exactly the right time, making it a magical experience when you do see them.”
The moonbow is not usually something most travellers simply stumble upon. It requires timing, patience and a willingness to wait without certainty – qualities that today feel almost as rare as the phenomenon itself.
