Zambia World Wide

None of the villagers spoke English, then we realized they were speaking French. We had missed Sumbu completely and were well into Zaire. The village was on a lee-shore and the boat was taking a pounding on the rocky shore. The villagers helped us pull the boat onto solid ground after which we sat round their fire and had a good warm up. They also cooked fish for us and somehow we managed to communicate. During the night we heard the sound of a boat, one of the villagers ran over to us and signaled us to make no sound. It was apparently a border patrol boat, we got behind one of the huts and prayed they would not see the boat with their searchlight, they didn’t. Next morning the lake was as calm as a mill pond. They helped put the boat back in the water, I gave them a carton of cigarettes and we waved them goodbye. We came back into Zambian waters and finally got to Sumbu, we had missed it by about 20miles. It appears the generator had broken down which is why we could not find it in the dark. The rest of the trip went smoothly and we all had a great time. On our return to Kitwe we went nowhere really apart from Mindola Dam, Tinker’s Claim and other local places we enjoyed going to. Our main concern was to sell the stuff we would not take with us. This proved to be quite easy and took very little time.

Time is getting short, Gary is already at boarding school and Craig will have to start next year. This we don’t want as it will be a family apart, so we have made the decision and will return to the UK so that we can be a family once again. There is little left to say, it is now time to start selling up ready for the move. One thing we have always wanted to do is go to Luangwe Game Park, why not do it now, it will be our last memory of Zambia. The best years of our lives have been spent here, lets leave on a good note. Why not do the one thing we have always wanted to do. One thing I have not mentioned is that we got caught in a bush fire some time back and I still find walking really hard, in fact I still need the use of sticks to get about, no problem I can manage. We booked a week in south Luangwe and off we went. What a great trip, one we would never forget. It is really hard to describe that trip as it was early morning and late evening game viewing and the time in between was spent lazing around but we saw so much wildlife that, it was unbelievable! We arrived back from an early morning tour and were told to keep away from our rondavale as there was a hippo sleeping on the doorstep and he might be upset were to disturb him. Sure enough he was there, so we went away and waited till he moved. As I have said we always wanted to go there and we have. It was really great but it is now time to return home and do our final packing. Most of our stuff we have already sold, so we are ready to leave. We decided for tax reason’s to stop over in Cyprus for two weeks before returning to UK. It was so built up since we were last there, over the years it had become a tourist attraction, nothing like the place we had visited in the past but it was still nice and gave us the chance to chill out before our return. We then left and returned to the UK. We went to Zambia for three years and have stayed for twelve, it really was and is a beautiful country, a time in our lives we won’t ever forget