Ready, steady ...

The warmer weather has been very welcome after such a cold wet April. But our Yorkshire base can be a bit of a greenhouse at times. The temperature in our bedroom can get as high as 30 degrees Celsius when the sun shines from dawn to dusk. Clearly this can make for steamy nights! All good acclimatisation for our impending mission.

We are in the last throes of trip preparation. The jobs list is getting longer. One of the most involved tasks is to write down instructions for our house sitters. Sue and Andy have valiantly volunteered to move in. They will “run” our new modern house, managing the heating system, the lights, the hot tub and the kitchen gadgets in our absence. We are more than a little nervous that they will have changed the locks and claimed squatters’ rights by the time we return!

So, what do we need to take for 6 months away? There are 3 distinct seasons to cope with. We start with an appetiser of warm and pleasant weather. The main course will be hot, humid and unpleasant. The culmination is a dessert of heavy rains combined with more hot and humid air.

This is not a holiday, so 3 swimsuits and a few pairs of shorts will not do. We need work clothes, clothes to repel midges and tsetse flies and some bush clothes for safari outings. We hope to include some workout gear to give us a chance of staying fit. Our airline weight limit may put a serious squeeze on our unnecessaries. We also need a bit of medical kit. We had a long WhatsApp call with Dr Caroline this weekend. Caroline is doing the job right now. Her insights have led to some last-minute shopping. White needles and scalpel blades for Keith, who loves to incise and drain abscesses. Ginny gets a new otoscope. We are expecting Zambian ears to be either gummed up, or perhaps the converse!

Ginny with some of the kit

Our WhatsApp video call with Dr Caroline was great for visualising our future theatre of action. Our Zambian house looks comfortable. We are relieved to hear that electricity is available, most of the time. Our water comes from a well, and is safe to drink, straight from the tap. This contrasts with our former Zanzibar experience. In Zanzibar all of our water had to be boiled and then filtered. Our Zanzibar electric supply was rationed at times to 3 hours per day. In Zambia we will be living in relative luxury. We will even have a version of wi-fi. But, judging from the number of times it dropped out during our short WhatsApp call, we won’t be streaming any films, or playing Grand Theft Auto too often.

Our last significant task is to sort out pre-flight COVID-19 PCR tests. These must be done within 72 hours of our departure. This is obviously something new for us all. We have heard of many travellers failing to negotiate the complexities of testing and certification. The costs vary from £60 to more than £200. It can be done in-store, or at home. Can we fully trust the Royal Mail? Our nearest testing site is in the middle of York. Each company has a disclaimer saying that there is no guarantee of getting a result within 72 hours. You might get an indeterminate result and have to repeat the test. Gulp! We can’t board our flight without a negative test and the appropriate email certificate. I think this process will lead to a fairly stressful last few days in the UK.

We are trying to see as many friends and family as possible before we set off. The “North Yorkshire Spa” is fully booked – but we are staying the right side of COVID regulations. The 21st June had been pivotal for so many peoples’ future plans. A little more freedom would have been lovely for everyone wouldn’t it? We anticipate that after flying a quarter of the way around the world that we will be pinned down by 24/7 responsibility: Our contract limits us to being on-call and available within one hour’s journey time from the primary care clinic in Kakumbi, Mfuwe.

We gather that COVID is present in the South Luangwa Valley. More of this in further blog postings…..