James Stephenson

What a wonderful phrase, Hakuna MAtata, Aint no passing craze, It means no worries for the rest of your days! – Timone and Pumba, The Lion King. Well, we saw a Pumba today. He wasn’t a very big warthog, but a real one none-the-less, with big tusks and all. Running along in the scrub next to the road.

12 Hours 17 minutes, 1045km and 3 police stops to check licenses, 2pee stops 1 fuel stop, 1 border crossing and a partridge in a pear tree later we have made it. Today was long, not terribly difficult as such but just ridiculously long. For the entirety of the day i turned 3 intersections and i was hanging out for tiny kink’s in the never ending road just for something to do. As an Australian i thought i knew what long straight roads were like, wrong! There was a section today which was just under 200k’s long without a single undulation, kink, bend, bump, hole, wind, rise, dip, bridge or tunnel. Just straight, scrub’s and bushland on either side. Tomorrow would be a good day for another rest day… But not long now, only a 600, 800, 600 and 350km day remains between us and Table Mountain Bay Hotel.

We also saw an Elephant!!! He was just chilling on his own, right next to the road amongst some trees (he was probably about to push one over). And he has massive long tusks! It was awesome! Seeing him made the massively boring drive seem totally Irrelephant (see what i did there? Ahahaha).

Patrick and Christine in the Karmann Ghai had some problems this morning. I feel for them a bit, they have been having a constant stream of minor/medium issues that force them to be late in all the time (after midnight sometimes). But they keep on trooping, and this morning everything was looking good, they were about to start on time and slog out today with ease….. but that wasn’t to be. Patrick opened the boot of his Vee Dub and saw petrol leaking out of his carby. Me and dad come over to help investigate as Patrick isn’t a big Karmann (see what i did there? Car-man! Hahaha i’m on fire!) and it looks like overnight the carby float in the bowl didn’t seat correctly, and it was gravity dripping all night from the fuel tank. We wipe up all the excess fuel and tell him to start it, but it goes Whurrrp and it doesn’t turn over. Because the Vee Dub’s have a downdraft carby, situated above the flat-4 engine, the dripping fuel has filled his pistons and the liquid compression won’t let it turn over. He ended up getting towed to a local mechanics place for someone to take his plugs out to drain the engine and change the oil for him. But he still isn’t at the hotel yet, hopefully see him at breakfast.

Still no problems for us 😀

James

Livingstone I Presume?? We are at the infamous Victoria Falls….. And it is amazing. The size of these falls is incredible, 1.7km long!!! We are only 5 minutes walk to the top of the falls and the it is just spectacular. I have been to Niagra Falls but this is a whole another scale of big. No footpaths or anything, just tracks through the forest that lead you to a little bridge that is immersed in a forever cloud of mist/spray. The flow is at about 50% and the sound is already booming/deafening when you’re close. The Zambezi Sun Hotel (where we staying) has a beautiful lawn all around the place, and animals roam around! So far i have only seen zebras but apparently there are some regular elephants and giraffes that sometimes choose to make themselves seen. No luck yet  But you can definitely see giraffe and elephant poo on the edges of the forest.

The bungee-jump is temporarily suspended because about a month ago the rope snapped and a chick plummeted into the water, luckily surviving.

Today was just another transit day, no timing. But on the road we saw a tortoise crossing it! He was a bit cute. And at a local cafe we pulled up to for about 45minutes, Matt and Owen (MG) pulled up and said they saw the same tortoise but about 30cm further away from where we saw him. Little trooper! Hahaha.

Tomorrow is the dreaded 1050km day, including a border crossing. It will be lonnnngggggggg.

On another front, the father/son beard growing is hilarious. Dad now succsessfully looks homeless, and i look like a ruffian. hahaha.

James

Dunstan Checks In is the coolest movie made about a chimpanzee. Well, i thought of that when we saw a chimp (it could have been something slightly different but i don’t care) running along the side of the road picking things up and investigating them. Deciding whether he can eat it, hit something with it, or scratch his butt with it.

All i can say about last nights accommodation is that it was interesting, and an experience. In the buffet style dinner they had for us; whole fish heads to chose from (obviously i tried some, you can guess that it is not on the list of things to do again). Cold water shower has been the norm for quite a while so that wasn’t unexpected. There was also a massive thunderstorm that rolled through at about 4 in the morning, woke everyone up with really really close lightning strikes. Well i slept through it.

There was a few crews that actually arrived at this place and decided to drive the next 600k’s to Lusaka (an intercontinental Hotel) to skip out the dodgy night. I reckon these are the times that you remember, to total shotty-ness of it all is great!

The world cup stage today was fantastic!!! Best short stage so far. Only 9km’s but it was on an old farm, amongst some buslands. Very narrow and fairly straight aside from a few bends and kinks now and then. It was only 2 wheel tracks, thick grass either side and a ribbon of thick grass in the middle (lapping at the undercarriages). Just so much fun.

James

The border today from Tanzania into Zambia was total chaos. Thousands and thousands and thousands of people in this little town. The queue of trucks down the road trying to cross the border would have been at least 2k’s long. We cut our way through to the border-propper and all the fun started. Dad had the documents and i stayed at the car, some local guy pointed us where we needed to go and was our personal fixer. The disorganisation and how much of a shambles was incredible. I stayed in the car slowing pushing/making my way through the border (about 500meters) without getting out. And dad walked from immigration to customs to police to immigration again. People could walk from one country to another no problems, just like i drove my way through the whole process and pulled up at a petrol station on the other side and not a single person looked at me or my car or rego. Dad popped out and said “let’s go, all done.”

Today was just a transit day, Mbeya to Mpika, Zambia. A nice tarmac road was very welcomed as we pulled out of the border, albeit it was riddled with trucks. Slow trucks are fine though, easy to recklessly overtake without any bad reproductions. But my god, the buses that come down this road! Big giant Coaches that fit like 60 people or whatever, they recklessly overtake ME! And i’m already doing 110kph. But every now and then we have to stomp on the anchors because a cluster of potholes pops up. I swear to god, if some of the little MG’s or Porsche’s stopped at the bottom of these potholes, and you took a picture you wouldn’t be able to see the wheels. These potholes can eat things, never to surface again.

One thing Zambia is better than any other country so far at: wrecking trucks. I can’t drive more than 50k’s and NOT see at least one tuck on its side. In the middle of a town, on a flat bit of road, with no potholes/speed bumps, there is a truck…. on its side. Sometimes it would just be a trailer on its side. And you can tell how long its been over for by the degree of how much has been stripped off. If the cargo is gone then it has been 1 day. If the wiring, wheels, breaks, and hubs are gone then it has been 2 days. If the only thing that remains is the chassis rails, then probably 4 days…. Maximum

James