Monday, May 18, 2015

trip to zambia...

Lots of things to write about and lots of photos to post, so I'll do it in waves..

First off, we are back in Malawi safe and sound. No one was eaten and we all have our limbs. We had a wonderful few days on safari and relaxing at our home on the edge of the bush. I thought I would post photos of the house today and post the animals tomorrow.. Too many photos to upload and it takes way to long to do here.

We had some problems getting across the border though.. Long story short, all of our paperwork for working in Malawi is not fully processed (go figure) so there were some issues getting through to Zambia and getting back into the country.. We made a phone call, the people at the border control seemed happy so we were able to go through....  Traveling from country to country can get a bit stressful here as you never know what kind of hassle you are going to encounter. But once we went through the border post, things were great.

The home we stayed in was a private home on a beautiful plot of land that overlooked a wide open space. There was elephant dung scattered across the lawn and baboons jumped all over the top of the house and in the ebony trees near the home. Rabsom, our night watchman told us it was ok to use the pool, "but elephants walk up to the pool to drink. If you see one, don't be alarmed, just go into the pool house and wait they are finished. We also have lion and antelope and baboons.. " The first night we were there we were trying to braai and the baboons came up and surrounded the property and were fighting 20-30 feet from our braai stand. Rabsom appears with a slingshot and some rocks and starts shooting at them...  Just like your Holiday Inn.

As we lounged by the pool, we could spot giraffe, families of elephants and lots of antelope grazing in the distance. Not a bad way to spend the day.
The home itself was gorgeous.. .very open, well decorated.. Felt very African while having all the amenities of a nice place back home.. It was great to get out into the bush for a few days...
Below is a video from our pool.. You can see the elephants walking across the bush in front of us.. Pretty amazing to be sitting on a lawn chair watching elephants ... Tomorrow I'll post more.. Hope all is well back home.



Elephants from the backyard

view from dining room

animal viewing deck (kate took a nap here)

Pool 

the mess that is the corder checkpoint.. Michelle in line

Maura and Jude with friends

one of the hallways of the hallways

master bedroom

frog on the handle of the door.. It is a real frog and I almost crushed it grabbing for the handle