In Zambia!

After Bertha’s day we felt ready to go! The journey would take us to Flatdogs Camp (www.flatdogscamp.com)in Zambia…hopefully!

The day didn’t start very well…the radio is not working. After checking all the cables, we could not figure out what the problem was. So until now…no music!
She started right away…but when we got to the exit gate of Mabuya Camp, she switched off. It took a good 5 minutes for her to start again and all that time we held in our breath!

Ok, next challenge…to get diesel! We stand in line behind a big Overland Truck and wait patiently…when it is our turn, the guy at the pump shakes his head…sorry boss, no diesel!
Oops. What now? We try and look everywhere. We see a bus getting diesel and go there. The guy at the pump says, no sir, no diesel. Specially reserved for buses. Sorry?
Soon it turns out the guy is just making the most out of it…he wants money. Although we are totally against it, we also really want diesel…so we get 120 liters and off we go…passing a big bill-board with malawi’s president making a statement against corruption. Yeah right!

The rest of the road in Malawi everything is fine. We get to the border without any problems. Even at the border everything went smooth. Okay, it’s still Africa, so first all the guys jump on you to change your dollars in Zambian Kwacha. No thank you. We check out in Malawi and continue to the immigration office of Zambia. Here we have to pay for a visa for ourselves and a Temporary Import Permit, 3rd party insurance and Carbon Tax for Bertha. It sets us back another $ 200, just to enter the country! Funny detail is that you can pay the visa in USD, but for the carbon tax you have to pay in Kwacha. Ah, those guys come in handy after all!

Wahoeee!!! We’re in a different country!

How little did we know this was only the smooth part of the journey. Ahead of us lay 120 kilometers of dirt road. The road itself is not even that bad, comparable to the Majete-Chikwawa road at Majete, but Bertha bumps and shakes like a Polaroid picture!
After a few kilometers the odo-meter (speed and mileage) stop all together. So we don’t know how fast we’re going or how many kilometers we have driven. Great! In the meantime all sorts of things start faling down and off…my door is almost impossible to open or close. And after about 20 km the back doors keep swinging open and close. We tried to keep them closed with a tie-wrap…plan failed. Tried it with a iron wire…plan failed. In the end I spend a few hours in the back of the car keeping the doors closed, while Martin is trying to keep her steady! I keep on singing songs to myself (martin can’t her me anyway)and picturing myself with a cold beer in my hand…

After some time we suddenly stop. I think…Ow my G…what’s wrong now??? But it’s just Martin who sees another car stranded and thought…let’s see if we can help them.
It turns out to be a Zambian of whose car the starting engine is broken. He thought: ‘let’s push it up a hill and then I can quickly bump start it in reverse and then at the same time push it back in the first gear.”
Okay, even I can reason that’s not going to work. And it didn’t. So here he was, on the side of the road in the bushes. But Martin and Bertha to the rescue! They pulled him out and the car started again.
Hmmm, our tire looks a little bit flat…we try to pump it…and the pump breaks. Great!
Hello universe…we just helped somebody…how about some good karma here! It’s not entirely flat though, and we continue…

Are we there yet? Nope. Are we there yet? Nope. Are we there yet??? Almost. *sigh*. Then we see a sign…Flatdogs 24 km. Almost there. And from here the road is tarred again.
When we are almost there, we see elephants next to the road. And a giraffe! We suddenly forget all the trouble we went through to get to this point…although Martin has 3 big blisters on his hands of driving Bertha today to remind him for a while!!!

At Flatdogs we are welcomed with a big smile and we feel so happy to be there! Then we see a big puddle of diesel under our car…noooooo! Okay, let’s first have a cold beer and save our problems for tomorrow…when we walk back to our car in the dark, we see a hippo grazing in front of our car (which we parked in a way it looks out over the river, very beautiful). When we are almost asleep, an elephant walks past…aaaah. The bush, it’s so good to be home!!!

It’s been a tough day, but it’s easy to forgive and forget, especially when we sleep sound and safe in Bertha’s big belly.

The next day (this morning actually) we woke up with the car slightly tilted to one side. Yep, the tire is flat flat. But we manage to change it and there’s a workshop here which has the tire fixed in no time. The diesel tank is not leaking after all, it was just too full!! My door is fixed as well. The back doors look okay, but we still have to think of a way to tighten them on bumpy roads.

The radio remains a problem. Everything seems okay, all wires connected and all fuses okay…what else could be the problem? Well, nothing we can do about that. Just leave it for now.

We meet some other travelers (Amsterdammers) who are so enthusiastic about our car they make a movie about it. Yep…we have a pretty damn cool car!!! If only people would know the trouble we go through to be that cool ;)

We just chilled a little bit today. On the other side of the river is South Luangwa National Park, but there are enough animals in the camp to entertain us. I’m typing this on my laptop plugged in near the river, with left of me at about 15 meters a giraffe is eating, in front of me a mountain of hippo’s is relaxing and above me vervet monkeys are playing!

Martin has just hung up my hammock, so I gotta go!

The next few days we will stay here and do some game drives and night drives, hopefully to see some leopards and lions!!!

With love,
Amy and Tinus