Thursday 24^th June

Today is the day we reach our final destination, our Son’s place in Stellenbosch where we will stay for a while until we settle in and find a place of our own. We wake up in a sort of confused and  enthusiastic daze if you know what I mean as a lot of different emotions are taking place all at the same time. Yes, of course we’re looking forward to seeing our son, our daughter-in-law and our dog; on the other-hand, our journey, no, let’s call it our trip here, will be over. Breakfast is served from 6.30 so at 6.28 we’re at our table along with most of the other guests. This isn’t a hotel you’d have your honeymoon in, it’s just a bed for the night so everyone’s in the same frame of mind, ‘come on let’s get going’. We aim to be at Gareth’s at about lunch time so we ring and tell him. We came to SA last year for 3 months, and although we haven’t seen his new house, the area is familiar to us and so by the time we get to Worcester we are on roads we have driven on before. The finishing line so to speak has been coming in drips and drabs; crossing the border into SA and getting that final stamp was a poignant moment as is the sight of Table Mountain that has just come into view. There it is says Jan, The red tractor perched on a wall signifying that we are at his house, in the grounds to the rear of the restaurant called ‘The Antique Tractor’. As we drive in, people in the grounds smile and wave as if they’d been expecting us for the last 3 months. Murray, the owner comes out to congratulate us and then shows us where to go. While Jan and Gareth are having a hug, Charlie licked my hand; that’s it, the trip may be over, but the journey has just begun.       

                                                                     I feel very privileged to have witnessed first hand

                                                                       the sheer diversity of this, our beautiful planet,

                                                                        as 11,579 miles, 15 countries and 3 continents

                                                                                  have passed beneath our wheels

This blog though is not over; when the dust has settled I will inflict upon you a summary of the trip.

See the full gallery on Posterous

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

Wednesday 23^rd June

Breakfast is on par with this woman’s housework. The eggs are floating in the brown grease which was used to fry the boerewors and the toast just shattered in an explosion of black charcoal upon the pressure of my knife. It’s a 350 mile run down to Beaufort West, our next intended stop. Again there’s not much in-between apart from the town of Kimberly to break up the long journey. One small place we did go through though has a speed restriction (as most of them do) but neither Jan nor I saw the sign. There’s a policeman standing in the road with his hand up; it’s the usual ‘do you know how fast you were going’ etc, and ‘can I see your licence, oh you’re from England (please don’t start) carry on Sir, have a nice day’. To have gotten away with doing 84k in a 60k limit was unbelievable really; I suspect it’s got something to do with The World Cup, who knows, I’m sure I’ll find out in a couple of months.  Beaufort West is not a bad place to stop, it has hundreds lodges, hotels, B&B’s and so on, so we cruise up and down looking for a suitable place rest our heads. In the end we plump for a room in a Formula One, a sort of bottom of the scale Travel Lodge but at least it will be clean and we know what we’re getting as we have stayed in them before in France. After settling in we go out to buy a sim card for our phone. The woman wants to see a passport but we have left them  in the safe in the landrover; no problem;  much to her bemusement I give her all the details of mine as I’m now able to recite them off by heart. Apart from that it’s back to the hotel to watch the England game on the telly.  

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

Tuesday 22^nd June

Mokolodi is not that far from the South African border. It’s our last, and therefore quite a ceremonious one. It goes without a hitch apart from forgetting that we had some firewood strapped to the roof which the customs guy spots and it needs to be confiscated. Fair enough, we have (or Jan should I say) has done her home work and we knew about it but just forgot. The other restrictions are red meat which we don’t have as we’d planned it that way. ‘Sorry sir, but we are taking it away to be incinerated’; ‘of course you are, underneath that nice thick juicy bit of steak you just took of the last bloke’. Still, we got our final stamp and we’re on our way. Jan has found a bed and breakfast on the GPS in Warrenton and has phoned the woman and booked us in. It’s a bit of a dump but it’s cheap enough so we decide to stay. We have to share a bathroom which is a bath and no shower. Jan has a bath and goes to let the bath water out but it won’t run away. I have to use her water which isn’t a problem except it’s filthy, I can’t believe she was that dirty; what she didn’t tell me till afterwards is that when she pulled out the plug it just glugged up what must of been left in the pipe. Yeaks! A big spider in the bath; I’ll just take a closer look, no it’s ok it’s a false eye lash (Jan doesn’t wear them, well not to my knowledge anyway). Time for bed.

See the full gallery on Posterous

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

Monday 21^st June

Yusus (Afrikaans for Blimey) it’s cold.  Our sleeping bags are so warm but put a body part outside and it nearly snaps off. If only we could lay here till about ten then the sun would have warmed it up and all would be fine; we can’t though as we have to press on. A film of frost has enveloped the outside of the tent. Brushing your teeth is a novel experience as you can just hold your brush still and let your chattering teeth do all the work, just like an electric one. Next stop Gaborone (the capital). Botswana is a clean, modern and vibrant country and thus far the nicest country to date; I’d easily move here tomorrow. There are signs on the road apologising for the potholes; ‘potholes! - potholes!’ there just dimples, they need to go further north to see real potholes. Our chosen place is a lodge that does camping called Mokolodi Nature reserve. There is camping available but it’s so cold now so we ask for a room but they’re full up. We then try the backpackers called funnily enough Mokolodi Backpackers. They have one lodge left so we take it, it’s lovely. There is wifi available so I can catch up with the blog. That’s about as exciting as it gets today; good night.

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

Sunday 20^th June

It’s another early one as  according to the GPS our next stop in Francistown is 312 mile away and if we are to stand any chance of finding a campsite that’s got space let alone a choice of a space when we get there then we’re going to need to be there just after lunch at the latest. We’d been on the road about ten minutes when I notice a Landrover discovery stopped on the side of the road. At first I was going to go around him till I see why he’s stopped; he is letting a herd of Elephants cross the road. What a lovely sight, about ten of them completely in the wild just majestically sauntering across in their own time thank you very much. After they’d crossed I drove round him and we carried on our way. It’s a dead straight road for about 150 miles and there’s nothing in between. I stopped on a number of occasions to take photos of other animals we saw; each time the discovery would stop behind us and wait till we’d finished and then follow. I wasn’t certain if he was taking photos too, or whether it was a case of he didn’t want to get between photographer and object, you know what I mean, we’ve all done it, ‘opps sorry’ then bend your head and scuttle through. He needn’t have bothered though as the exodus of South African registered 4x4’s coming the other way soon put pay to that.  After stopping for a bite to eat and do some shopping we make the site by 2.30. The Tati River lodge (unfortunate name) is a lovely place and a very big one at that, so we were a bit surprised to find only one two man tent, and they were out for the day. Mind you, it’s still early; you mark my words by 5.30 this place is going to be heaving. 5.30 came and went and not a soul to be seen, and even the owners of the tent didn’t pitch up (sorry) till gone nine. We’re just completely miffed. Still, it was nice to have a braai and smoke out the entire site and not have one single complaint.

See the full gallery on Posterous

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

Saturday 19^th June

Ok, technically this is isn’t the nicest place we’ve stayed at but it’s great in its own sort of way. The only place left when we arrived is in the corner and under a tree. Due the unevenness of the ground and the fact that we have a roof tent means we have to face the other way ‘so to speak’ and so our table and seating area are facing into the corner. We now have our own back garden and are isolated from everyone else. This is in-fact a welcome relief as nobody keeps stopping us to chat about our adventure. Don’t get me wrong here, we’re delighted people have shown an interest and it’s a great way of meeting people, but sometimes it can be a bit overwhelming and you never have time to get anything done. As it happens though everyone goes out for the day to visit the falls so we have the place to ourselves and so we can get on with all the chores. Jan has a ton and a half of washing and I need to do an oil and filter change on the good old landy. After mending a chair and catching up with a load of other stuff that’s far too insignificant to mention but important all the same, it’s time to get the braai going and eat some meat. After smoking out the neighbours, one of them is forced to come over and complain. ‘Oh, you’re English, that explains it - you haven’t driven all the way have you? About half an hour later his wife comes over to fetch him as his food is ready. ‘Oh your English, you haven’t driven --- ‘here we go’; our foods burnt and theirs is cold but never mind they were nice people and we had a good laugh.     

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

Friday 18^th June

Read that, sign this, put on this helmet and fasten your seat belt- woo hoo we’re airborne.  Totally awesome; this is the first time I’d seen the falls so I couldn’t even compare it with the view from the ground. I didn’t really know what to expect. I’d always imagined that the ground was on two different levels and that the water just gushed from the top of a mountain and down to the ground below and that’s where you stood and looked up. Not the case; it just flows down a ravine it has created and just throws up a huge mist high in to the sky. The rainbows it creates are just amazing and from up there they create complete circles; my German pilot flew straight through the centre like hitting a bull’s-eye; then descending into the mist and out again for a flight over the Elephants, Hippos and crocodiles; then it my was my turn to take the controls, He said I was quite a natural but then I suppose he says that to everyone. He then took control before landing back on the airstrip and all within the 15 minutes allotted time. To be honest it was all a bit much to take in all at once, I’ve never been in a microlite before and so I didn’t quite know where to direct my excitement. We were already packed up and ready to hit the falls. I, of course, will never find the words that will ever do this experience justice. Once again Mother Nature has thrown up something that will just stop you in your tracks; the noise is unbelievable, as is the sight of sun shining through the mist creating perfect rainbows everywhere you look, it’s quite an emotional experience, this is planet Earth, it’s alive and it moves, big time. We will be going into Botswana in about half an hour and Jan didn’t want to draw any more money and loose it on the exchange rate so we have very little Zambian kwacha left and we still want to buy some curios for our new home. Our self appointed guide is going to need a tip, this will leave even less; his brother owns curio shop number 33 and we are instructed to keep it in the family and go there where we will ‘get a good deal’. Jan’s seen something she really likes so some hard negotiating is in order, it’s more than we’ve got but he takes any currency so he clears us out of all the odd bits of change we’ve had left over from the trip down. We need to keep 50 US dollars for the ferry across the river and for the road permit we need to buy at the Botswana border so we don’t tell them about those. As we leave the car park we are stopped at the entrance and asked for our car parking receipt, something that we managed to over look. We turn around and go back and pay 5 dollars at the kiosk, now were really skint. Fortunately, we’ve made some bacon sandwiches for the trip so we’re alright on that score, or at least we were; as Jan is paying she leaves the passenger door open; all of a sudden, the biggest baboon you’ve ever seen leaps in and grabs the sandwiches; wait for this though, Jan doesn’t believe me, she thinks I’ve eaten them all myself and made the story up. We’ve been driving for about 10 minutes when we are stopped by a council office control point. Where are you going? ‘Botswana’ ‘you will need to pay 20,000 Kwacha for leaving our district’ ‘do you take dollars’ ‘yes, five’. We reach the border and as per usual about 10 blokes converge on our car all trying to change money. ‘After paying for the ferry in dollars, we now only have 20 left. Everyone wants to change money as the road permit will need to be paid in Pula’s. Jan just digs her heals in and says she’ll change it the other side thank you very much, they though insist the bank is shut, ‘what on a Friday, don’t be stupid’. On reaching the other side we find that the bank isn’t shut, it don’t exist, and it never has. The road permit is 120 Pula or 180 South African Rand Rand. Jan remembers she has an emergency stash of Rand in the depths of the safe but it’s only 130. A lorry driver eventually gives us 100 Pula for our 20 Dollars and the road permits gets paid for and we’re on our way. Next stop, the nearest cash point. Ten miles later we reach the town of Kasane where we want to camp the night. After a bit of a struggle we find a campsite that actually has space as all the South Africans are here, hoards of them.          

See the full gallery on Posterous

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

Thursday 17^th June

Today is blog writing day. You pay for Wifi by the day here so we sit upstairs in the internet cafe   overlooking the river and write away; like all masterpieces it can’t be rushed so it takes most of the day. In the late afternoon we’re sitting at the landrover when an English registered Discovery goes past, it stops and reverses back; it’s Frank and Wanita, the couple with their 3 year old daughter we last met in Nairobi. Frank you will probably remember is the chap who fixed our GPS and is largely responsible for why we’ve managed to keep some of our sanity (not that we had a lot in the first place, and I did say some). It sounds like they’ve had a right old adventure, but that’s another story. Apart from that it’s an early night as I have a microlite flight booked for 8am in the morning and we want to be packed up before that so we can get away as soon as I get back.  

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

Tuesday 15^th -  Wednesday 16^th June

Today’s journey will take us to Livingstone and Vic Falls. The roads are now very busy with South African 4x4’s nearly all towing trailer tents and heading north to escape the football. It’s winter in SA at the moment so under normal circumstances they would only have a fortnight’s school holiday; however because of the football the South African government don’t want the roads to be congested and have given the schools a five week holiday instead. This has meant that everyone has the time to head north for the better climate. Although it’s warm during the day it is getting cold at night and we are expecting minus degree temperatures as we head further south. We have found a great site on the Zambezi river; busy as hell but nice all the same. The South African people are struggling with the fact that we have driven from the UK. They ask where we’re from, can see it say’s GB on the number plate but are still a bit puzzled as to how we got here. There is shock and almost total disbelieve that we have driven all the way, and now word has spread and everyone wants to come and chat about our adventure. One chap, whom I’ve never met before is leaving and he came over and gave me his name and address and phone number and said if we ever need a place to stay or indeed anything at all, give him a call. This it seems is the nature of the Afrikaners. We have paid to stay here for three nights as we have loads of washing to catch up on and naturally we want to see the falls. It is a taxi ride from here to do this, or we would have to pack up the tent and take the landrover which we don’t want to do, and in any case we would almost certainly loose the great spot that we have. The plan is to pack up early on Friday morning and drive there, then head off over the border into a Botswana and to a site there. At night we fall asleep to rumbling of the falls.         

See the full gallery on Posterous

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

Monday 14^th June

Everyone’s up early and is busy packing away ready for the off. There are two young boys on the other side of the stone wall that surrounds the site and they are standing by a small section that has been damaged and is high enough for them to see over and look in. I’m busy looking into the back of the land rover and I hear the dustbin lid behind me being taken off and something being dropped into it and the lid being replaced; not an uncommon noise so I have no reason to look round. All of a sudden the two boys (one is about 8 and the other about 6) leap over the wall and open the bin. They pull out a new unopened loaf of bread and an unopened carton of fruit drink. It was such as shame to watch, I nearly cried; it was such a lovely looking loaf too and I haven’t had a good fruit drink in ages. The journey to our next stop just 10miles south of Lusaka seems to drag on forever, Lusaka is a modern fairly clean ‘ish’ sort of place but we haven’t got the need to stop and so we drive straight through and check in at the Eureka camp site. It’s massive, and has loads of space as we are again the only ones here. By about 4.30 the whole world and his dog arrive and just fill the place. These places are just stopovers as there is nothing of interest to keep any here unlike a beach or some other sightseeing attraction. Apart from that I’m struggling to find anything else to report.

See the full gallery on Posterous

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

Sunday 13^th June

We are about to leave for our intended destination of The New Bridge inn about half way between here and Lusaka. Andrea, (Mama Rula) was standing by the gate; where are you going   she said, so we told her.  ‘Oh, you don’t want to stay there’. Why not? you’ll come back covered in flees, it’s a horrible place, you should go straight to Lusaka’. We said Ok just to shut her up and drove out of the gate. We made The New Bridge in by mid afternoon and drove in rather apprehensively. What a lovely place, great view across the river and we had a lovely lunch, sorry but you couldn’t fault the place. Again we were the only ones. After lunch we were relaxing upstairs in the viewing lounge come restaurant; Are you up there Les say’s the owner, there’s someone to see you.  Who could this be I thought, ‘don’t tell me the Taxman’s finally tracked us down’. No, it’s John and Liz, the couple we met in Kande Beach. After dinner another couple turn up in a discovery and caravan, Paul and Beryl. We all sit round out table and by the conversations John and Paul were having it was clear they were both keen ornithologists. ‘So Les said Paul, where have you been lately’, we’ve been up at South Lewanga National Park’ I said, did you see anything interesting’, ‘Oh yes, we saw some Knysner Lowrys.  

See the full gallery on Posterous

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

Saturday 12^th June

After a good hearty breakfast we make our way back to Mama Rula’s. First we go to see Marcel to see if he has anything he would like us to take to his aunt; he hasn’t so we go on our way. The journey was long and uneventful and we arrived there at about 3.00pm after going into Chipata for some shopping. To our relief we are the only ones here as sometimes it’s nice to just sit down and do something like read a book. Most of the time has been just speaking to other people which and don’t get me wrong here is nice, but sometimes it’s nice just to sit back and relax. ‘Hark, can you hear an overland truck’. This was soon followed by a group of 7 South African 4x4’s and another overland truck all within the space of 20 minutes. On the last overland truck, the vast majority were American, and there was great excitement as The USA were playing England in The World Cup and it was on the telly in the bar. After eating the nicest T bone I’ve had in years the telly was duly turned up and so it began ‘SHOWTIME’. All the girls started there cheerleading routine leaving Jan and I in the corner to shout ‘come on England’. I’m sorry but I couldn’t help thinking they actually didn’t have a clue as to what was going on, and this was to be confirmed when Green made the most unforgettable mistake of the tournament so far and let the ball into the back of our net. The excitement from them was not so much they had scored but more at me banging my head on the table in utter disbelief. When the game was over Jan and I skulked out of the bar and went to bed.      

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

Friday 11^th June

The two people who arrived yesterday would like also to do a game drive with us tonight which is great news; we will meet in the bar at 3.30 and go from there. Before though, it’s still blog time and we will need to find some internet access in order to post it on the site. This can only be done in the office and to use our own computer will mean plugging ours directly into one of theirs as they don’t have wifi and we don’t have a usb stick. This is seen as a major inconvenience by the owner as the manager spends about an hour trying to work out the relevant codes and in the end he has to force the owner of the site to take an early lunch so we can use his computer connection as it’s the only one the manager knows the code to. We meet in the bar as agreed and introduce ourselves to Martin and Ruth; oh dear, I thought, they look like Phillias and Phyllis fogg. They are Swiss, or at least she is and although Martin lives there and has a Swiss passport he was in fact was born and raised in Cheddar. The trouble is that when you think of Swiss people you tend to think of cheese and so when Martin told me this it threw me completely. Anyhow, we get into the Toyota open back safari truck with the driver and a spotter whose job it is to be the eyes and ears and to swing the spotlight when it gets dark. Jan and I are in the front row and Martin and Ruth are in the row behind so as not to miss the commentary given by our Guide and driver. We’d only been out the campsite about 2 minutes when the driver stopped and we were told to look up into a tree on our left at some twigs and bits of grass; ‘this is the nest of a bird called (forgive me as I have forgotten, but is something like the useless nest building bird) as it can’t weave to save its life and its eggs keep falling out the bottom’, (I’m sure he was making it up as he went along). We were told to be as vigilant as possible and tell the driver if we saw anything ourselves. It became apparent that Martin and Ruth were keen ornithologists as was the driver, and each of them have their own particular favourite they would like to see, (I’m a big Tit fan myself), and this theme continued throughout the rest of the daylight hours and would result in them continually shouting out what they seen; ‘One o’clock, Lesser spotted grebe warbler’, and 3 o’clock, Hammerhead hornbill. There was a noticeable silence from the front row, not that we hadn’t seen anything, to the contrary’ we’d seen loads, we just didn’t know what to say when we did; ‘2 o’clock, a big fat one with long legs or look 5 o’clock a purple one with a blue head’. All of a sudden Ruth was to say something that was to shatter an illusion I have held about the two wooden carving’s we have had on our mantelpiece at home for the last sixteen years, Martin she said, ‘is that a Knysner Lowry’; please dear reader let me explain. On the day that Jan and I moved in together she unpacked and placed on our mantelpiece two wooden painted carvings of some lovely looking birds. They’re Knysner Lowry’s she explained, and by the tone of her voice I was supposed to have heard the name; I hadn’t of course and from that day to this I have been under the illusion that it was the name of a famous sculptor and I started to rank him alongside people like Carl Fabergé and thus they were in my eyes at least worth a small fortune. Thanks’ to Ruth I can now see them for what they really are, just some bit’s of badly painted balsa wood and will probably end up being left unsold at our next car boot sale.

See the full gallery on Posterous

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

Thursday 10^th June

We want to book ourselves on to an evening game drive but as it stands at the moment we are the only ones so unless we share we will be paying a premium. Tomorrow though some other guests are arriving and we can hopefully share with them. For now though I have to keep writing the blog as it’s a good chance to get right up to date. There are other guests here who are staying in the lodges and tents but are part of larger groups from holiday companies as far as we can make out. Still, it’s nice to be by the river and watch the hippos, you just can’t imagine the speed they move in the water when they fight with each other. We have had to hand in all of our fruit and vegetables to the office here for safe keeping or the elephants will apparently smell them, even in your fridge and cause you big trouble.    

See the full gallery on Posterous

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

Wednesday 9^th June

We were talking with the owner of the site this morning about our intended next site today called Croc Valley Lodge in Mfuwe in the South Luangwa National Park. The site next door called Track and Trail is nicer she said, I would try there if I were you. ‘Great, thanks for the information perhaps we will’. ‘Good’ she says, ‘perhaps you’d be kind enough and drop off some tablets I want to give to the manager’. We take the envelope and make our way there. The road there though is 130k of corrugations. No problem, I’ve been talking to people about the Moyale road and all the problems associated with it. The locals have given me a tip, it’s embarrassingly simple really, it just comes down to tyre pressures, and with so much weight on board our pressures are far too high. When we get to the road we stop to deflate them and are surrounded by people and children. We reduce them by 20psi, wow, what a difference. When we arrive at the site we are greeted by a heard of about 10 elephants crossing the road in front of us, Jan starts to panic as we are really close. We find the manager and give him his tablets, ‘thanks, how is my aunt’ he says. The site is beautiful and we have a pitch right on the river from where we can see hippos and crocodiles. Baboons and monkeys are also here in large numbers as well as other creepy crawlies like snakes and so on. Jan has just come back from the shower saying she’s just had a shower with a prince with a ‘prince’ (frog).

See the full gallery on Posterous

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

Tuesday 8^th June

It’s another early start as we want to go into the Capital Lilongwe to do some shopping and then make our way into Zambia. Blimey, this is a refreshing change; you could be in any major town in America. Fantastic, a real supermarket with real shopping trolleys, and look, they even pull to the left. We run round grabbing everything like we’ve won the supermarket dash, bumping into (literally) Heidi and the others doing the same. Our aim though was quite simple, we have to be at the border before the overlanders or we will be stuck behind them in immigration. We’re too late though as when we leave the car park the Truck has already gone. About an hour later we come across them having been pulled over for speeding. We creep past them at 49 kph trying not to laugh as we waved. The border crossing was simple enough (well, in comparison to others, or perhaps have we just got used to it). Our site for tonight is Mama Rula’s, at a place called Chipata, where it will also be home for the overland truck. We park up in between the other two campers here, Neil and Catherine from the UK and Rudolph and Anna Marie a couple from Somerset west which is the next town to Stellenbosch where we intend to settle. We smoke them out with our briaa and then invite them over for drinks and a chat. Neil and Catherine will also be settling in Cape Town so another briaa is on the cards when we all arrive (only if Rudolph can make the fire though by all accounts). 

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

Monday 7^th June

It’s about 8.30am and time to hit the road and make our way to Sunbird Resort in Senga bay. As we say goodbye to Brant everyone exercises amnesia and we get on our way. I’m now starting to see what other people mean now by ‘we wanted to get away from the lake’. It drags on a bit I must say and you feel you need to be getting on with the rest of your journey. On the other hand if don’t do the Mozambique route and go inland, you won’t see the water for ages so it’s a bit of a  mixed feeling. Still, we here now and it’s a really nice place too; mind you at £10 per night per person it needs to be. Hello, it’s Heidi and gang from the overland truck. The resort hotel and the camping ground are a good 250 yard apart so Jan sent me off on a recognisance mission to check out the facilities. I take my small digital camera and take photos of everything including the pages of the entire menu from the restaurant and then report back. It was too expensive as we didn’t have enough Malawian Kwature left in the budget. While Jan was over at the loos one of the Kiwi girls from the overland truck came running up to me and ask me if she could go and lie down in the roof tent, be my guest I thought, ‘we’re playing hide and seek’ she said. It turned out be the longest game in history and in the end they had to give up and she emerged victorious. The camping ground, oddly enough, had a huge outdoor TV screen which was clearly visible and very audible from our tent. We watched a preview program to world cup which was nice as we haven’t seen a telly in ages, honest; we haven’t got a clue what’s going on in the world (‘you never have had’ I hear you all shout at once).   

See the full gallery on Posterous

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

Sunday 6^th June

I don’t feel well and I’m about to die. Jan does all the washing and other chores, while I go back to bed and sleep it off. It turns out in the end not to be malaria or any other tropical decease for that matter but just a simple head cold and is soon cured with a hot Lemsip. I wake again up around 3.00pm to the now familiar sound of an old land cruiser and the unmistakable sound of a squeaking banging and clattering caravan. It’s Brant, He’s made it; not without incident though I hasten to add, he caught a rock on one of the roads to his last site and has to spend the next 3 hours underneath the caravan repairing the rear stabilising legs that have been torn off.  We smoke him out with another briaa and he came over to sit with us around our fire for the rest of the evening. Quite late into the evening I just happen to say in conversation ‘nothing beats a real fire’; he though decided it was time to voice his opinion. ‘What, in this heat’ it’s far too hot, all you’re doing is adding to global warming!’ the tone of his voice indicating why he’s not been his usual self. Oh dear I thought, Jan’s been on the gin, time for me to lean forward, bury my head in my hands,  part two fingers slightly and observe this one through the tiny gap. Jan though didn’t say anything (I can only assume it was in the interest of Anglo German relations); in fact she continued not to say anything. I just sat there hoping I’ve disappeared off the radar and in the end Brant figured it out and bid us good night; night-night Brant.        

See the full gallery on Posterous

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

Saturday 5^th June

We get up and get going as we have decided on a campsite recommended to us by one of the overland trucks called Kande Beach Resort, which as the name suggests is still on the side of the lake. We stop on the way at Mzuzu to do some food shopping. There’s not a lot in the shops and so we end up buying one bit here and another bit there until we end up with enough stuff to cobble something together that might eventually resemble a meal. When we arrive we discover the same overland trucks that have been at Chitimba and so our new Danish friend Heidi comes to greet us. Apart from the overland trucks the only people camping are John and Liz, a South African couple in their Land cruiser. We smoke them out with our barbeque (sorry, Briaa) of beef sausage and chicken a la’ Jan and in the end we invite them over and ply them with beer in the way of an apology.

See the full gallery on Posterous

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

Friday 4^th June

Brandt gets going early, as he usually does, but is not going very far so we say our goodbyes as we might not see him again. Jan and I though have decided to stay for another night as we need to catch up on the blog. Internet access here is quite intermittent, and you have to be sitting at the bar to get it, and with so many people around just lately it’s almost been almost impossible. The overland trucks have also gone so it’s nice and quiet for a change. Outside the entrance to the site are some wooden curio shops (this is meant both ways, as they make and sell wooden things and the shops are also made of wood). Great, when we left, our friends Kim and Trish, gave as us beautiful axe and this is a perfect opportunity to get the handle engraved as a reminder of our friendship. We watched the young chap for a while before being pulled into the other shops to buy some of their handmade curios. All of their stuff is excellent quality and if you haggle you’ll get about 80% knocked off, this make everything they have worth buying; ‘what a shame we don’t have the space’. We ate in the restaurant this evening; food is served at 7.00pm so everyone eats together. There are only the four of us, Jan and I, the Ambassador and his driver, so it was a bit like being at the Captains table; I wanted to buy his wife some Ferero Roche’s but was worried he either wouldn’t get the joke, or more likely, it’s happened to him a thousand times and she’s now about 30 stone. Still, it’s another box ticked I suppose, and in any case it was a nice evening as we (or should I say Jan) chatted to them for hours.    

See the full gallery on Posterous

Permalink | Leave a comment  »