The 260 km into Lusaka was along a tarred road, in good condition. Oddly, the main mode of transport along the road, was by foot. Schools holidays must be over, as there were hundreds of school kids, in their school uniforms making their way to school. The ladies were dressed in wonderful and vibrantly coloured fabrics. We were stopped in 3 road blocks along the way; one was the immigration department wanting to check our passports and the other two wanted to see our insurance papers (the ones we obtained in the horrible dirty caravan at Katima). We also stopped in some dorp for diesel, they were running out and had some stashed away in jerry cans, but diesel is diesel. After a funnel had been fashioned out of an old Fanta bottle and diesel deposited in our tank, we were on our way.
We arrived on the outskirts of Lusaka around 11:30 and hit a traffic jam of note, their minibus drivers are worse than ours (is that possible?). The sides of the roads were littered with stalls, where you could buy anything from sunglasses, to motor spares parts, to chicken feed. It had a real squatter camp feel to it.
After fighting our way through the traffic, we arrived in the city centre with office blocks and shopping centres. We chose Manda Hill, a newly built centre; it was Sandton City, Gateway or Cavendish Square in the middle of Zambia (Kirst and Al, you would be in heaven). All the S.A. shops were here, including a Mugg & Bean, where we had lunch. We had heard that this was the first shopping centre to boast having an escalator in Zambia. The day the centre opened, the crowds arrived, not to visit Truworths, Total Sports or Game but to ride the escalators.
Provisions bought at Checkers, again well stocked but unfortunately with a leaking sewer system, so the floors were wet and smelly – wished I had worn takkies and not slops. The locals in the centre were all dressed very smartly and I felt kind of out of place in my bush clothes. We then went to the second major shopping centre because the book shop at Manda Hill only had maps of Pretoria and funny enough; we were looking for ones of Zambia (more detailed than we were able to obtain in S.A.). Maps and a bird book of birds South of the Saraha bought (we were coming across birds that were not found in our S.A. bird books) and we were back into the traffic.
The Great North Road from Lusaka to the North is reported to be the best in the country, as it serves as the main link to the Copper Belt. Good road but full of trucks and road blocks, although we were not stopped, others were and we could have up to a 15 minute wait at a road block. At Kapiri Mposhi we turned right and headed for Forest Inn. The day’s journey, with traffic and spending longer in Lusaka than we should have, had us way behind schedule. We broke our golden rule of vowing not to travel in the dark. We eventually arrived at Forest Inn at 6:30, 20 minutes after sun set. Nick and Sally were also spending the night there and had very kindly booked us in. Two other couples that they were due to meet later in their trip had arrived unexpectedly and it was nice to receive a warm welcome and some help to set up in the dark.
Forest Inn is a camp in the middle of Miombo trees, with nice ablutions and the only small complaint is that it is close to the road, so you can hear the noise of the trucks barrelling past during the night.
We had been told there flying squirrels in the camp that came out around 7:00 and were there for a few minutes only. We were fortunate enough to see this face (like a bush baby) peek out of a hole in a tree, then the squirrel, a lot larger than I expected, ran along a branch and the it flew off into the darkness, like a bird – it was an amazing sight to witness
We are so privileged to be able witness and experience such interesting places and wonders of nature.
Manda Hill Shopping Centre
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