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| Boabab Tree just outside the Prana Lodge |
We arrived into
Livingstone, Zambia on Monday afternoon and what a difference 1 ½ hours
make! We went from bone-chilling
cold in Joburg to desert hot hot HOT in Livingstone. Whew! Time to
shed the 2 fleeces and long sleeved shirt!!
But anyway,
before I could do that, we had to get through customs, and then collect our
luggage, and then figure out if our friends Ron and Anya were waiting for us at
the airport or if we needed to make our way to the campsite on our own.
Getting through
customs was a breeze; an expensive breeze, but a breeze nonetheless. In fact, it was such a breeze that I’m
pretty sure we got the only breeze we’ll feel in Africa going through customs. Originally we thought we would have to
stand in line for 2 hours (per the opinion of the “lovely” government official
I spoke to at the Zambian Embassy a few weeks prior to our trip), get analyzed
over and over again as they read our application for visas, complete with
passport photos (do you know how silly expensive those photos are these
days???!!) and a promise to offer up our first born for a chance to visit the
country of Zambia. But no, we
waited in line, and after the residents went through the entire customs office
of 5 agents took on us wee visitors.
They didn’t ask or care about a visa application; our printed
application in duplicate, complete with information on our flights, our
intended address in Zambia and letters stating our next destination were of no
concern to these guys. Rather,
they looked at our passports, asked if we were staying for a few days, told us
to cough up $80 each for a visa, and off we went. In about 5 minutes.
WOW. Awesome.
Okay,
great. Next obstacle: hoping our luggage
made it with us. You just never
know how airlines will handle bags anymore, and since I’ve never been to Africa
I’m really not sure of the protocol.
But we needn’t have worried; our bags were waiting for us on the
carousel as we rounded the corner.
Yay!
Easy
peasy! Now, let’s go meet our
friends!!
Except that
they weren’t there. But we did see
several drivers holding cards with people’s names on them, and one happened to
be holding a card named “Burmeister” which is our friend’s last name. I stared at this card for a moment, and
looked around wondering if there happened to be another Burmeister on our
flight. A driver saw our confusion
and asked where we were headed. I
told him Prana Zambia and at that moment, the man holding the Burmeister card
came up and said that we were with him.
What a relief!! ‘Cause I
sure couldn’t tell you how to get where we needed to go!!
As it turns
out, our friends were running late getting into Zambia as they had to drive the
truck from Johannesburg, and had made a few night’s pitstop in Botswana along
the way. Evidently, the roads in
Botswana aren’t exactly what we call “roads” in the US; rather, if you think of
a very fine sandy beach, you’re closer to the mark. So for them to drive 2oo miles would take them 8 hours. A very BUMPY 8 hours. So thank goodness Anya had a little
forethought to ask for a driver to meet us!!
Anyway, they
arrived to the campsite about 2 hours later. Our campsite wasn’t exactly a camping ground; rather, it was
set up with about 8-10 “tents” that were actually more like platformed rooms
that were surrounded by a tent (complete with a proper shower and toilet) which
really added to the safari experience.
We are definitely out in the middle of nowhere though; but what we’ve
learned is that the wildlife in Zambia is rather sparse due to a civil war in
the country some 40 years ago.
Most wildlife either fled or were caught and killed for food. Evidently they haven’t really
returned. And so, for us in this
campsite, the only sounds we could hear were birds. And that’s it.
It was very tranquil. And to top it off, we were the only
guests on the site! Believe me
when I say this was a welcome transition from the chaos and hustle & bustle
of London and Barcelona!
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| Our "tent" at the Prana lodge |
But wildlife
viewing isn’t the reason to come to Zambia. Zambia is the adventure capital of Southern Africa. Anything and almost everything you want
to do is available here: bungee jumping, white water rafting, helicopter rides,
sunset cruises on the Zambezi river, elephant rides, waterfalls, hiking, you
name it.
So what do we
do? Well, after we spent about 2
hours catching up on the latest over the last 2 months, we sat down around the
campfire and Matt and I had our 2nd official braii of the vacation
and talked about what we wanted to do.
White Water Rafting was on the top of that list, as was hiking to
Victoria Falls (the largest waterfall in the world and one of the 7 Wonders of
the World), helicopter ride, walk with the Rhinos, and a trip to Devil’s Pool.
Wow! A lot to do in just 4 days! Can we do it?
Stay
tuned!!
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