Today was an unusually complex day of motion. We met for breakfast at 8 am in the hotel restaurant, then Jennifer and the kids took the 8:45 am shuttle to the airport with all of the bags to check into the 11 am British Airways flight to Livingstone, Zambia. Meanwhile, the hotel's travel desk arranged for a driver to take me to the East Rand Mall, where last week we had left Spencer's glasses to be repaired. The plan was for me to arrive at the mall at 9 am when the optical store opened, have the driver wait while I ran in and got the new glasses, go to the airport, check in, then meet up with everyone else at the gate. Jennifer was concerned about this plan; she didn't want to fly to Zambia without me. I assured her that I would not miss the plane. The plan worked, except for the fact that the optical shop did not have Spencer's glasses. After a flurry of calls, they found them at another location. They promised to have someone drive over to the airport and hand them off. So I was off to the airport and met the family in the check-in line. After we dropped our bags, I sent everyone else to the gate while I waited for the driver. About 20 minutes later he showed up and handed me the new glasses. Success!
Unfortunately, Garrett belatedly realized that he had left his dental retainers and case in the hotel gym. We called the hotel and they sent someone to look for it, but nothing was found. They promised to mail it to us if it later turned up. Garrett wanted to go back to the hotel and look himself, but there just wasn't enough time. Except that our flight was delayed for more than an hour, so we would have had time had we known.
Taking the BA flight to Livingstone, Zambia was not our first choice, as our lodging was across the river in Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe. I had booked a nonstop flight from JNB to Victoria Falls on Fly Africa Zimbabwe (FAZ), but did not realize that FAZ flew only at night and under the radar. About a month ago, FAZ sent me an email saying that they had cancelled the flight on August 3 (with no additional explanation), and did I wish to change the day of travel to August 2 or August 4. Neither worked for us. They then offered a flight from JNB to Harare, the capital of Zimbabwe, then with an overnight in that garden spot before continuing on to Vic Falls. That also was not acceptable. I did some research and learned that British Airways had a nonstop from JNB to Livingstone for about $50 more per person, which was considerably cheaper than the $350/pp requested by SAA for a flight from JNB to Vic Falls. So I told FAZ that I wanted a refund. After some hemming and hawing, I was told that the ticket was nonrefundable. In one of those rare occasions that having been a lawyer was actually personally useful, I requested to speak with a manager while I pulled up FAZ's contract of carriage. After less than 30 seconds of my quoting their own requirements to refund in full for cancelled flights, the manager promised that the refund would be issued within 24 hours, and it was.
That still left us with the problem of getting from the airport in Livingstone, Zambia to our B&B in Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe. The distance is less than 20 km by road, but in the long-standing African tradition of erecting as many barriers as possible so many hands can be greased, here's what we had to do: 1. After landing at LFA, walk down the stairs and across an active tarmac into immigration control. A visa to enter both Zambia and Zimbabwe was $50 US per person, cash only. 2. Claim our bags, pass though customs, which randomly select passengers to search their bags, unless a preemptive payment is made ($20 USD cash seemed to help end the search with alacrity). 3. Find a taxi willing to take 5 people and their luggage to the international border with Zimbabwe. We ended up taking 2 taxis, at $25 each. 4. At the border post, the Zambian official seemed offended that you are not staying longer in his country. Hope he is only in a bad mood and will not want to search your bags. Instead, he stamps your visa and passes you on your way. 5. Between the Zambian post and the Zimbabwean post is a road and bridge that is a 1.5 km no-mans land, mostly inhabited by 18 wheel trucks impatiently waiting for the appearance of the next official who can collect a bribe. We hapless tourists are directed to the "in between taxi" - a driver who thrives on this inefficiency by hauling people and their stuff the 1.5 miles to the Zimbabwe border checkpoint. The driver plus 5 people, 6 large bags and 5 backpacks, all in a car designed to carry 5 people and maybe 4 bags. We did it by having Kirsten lay across Jennifer and the boys in the back seat, me holding a bunch of bags in the front seat, and hoping that none of the other bags would fall out of the back hatch. We survive the trip over the river Styx, pay the in between driver (Charon) his fee of two silver coins ($5 US). 6. We are turned over to the next bureaucrat: the Zimbabwean border official. Already upset that we have paid $250 to the Zambians, we are told to start filling out forms. Another official overrules her, grabs our passports and stamps them, all the time smiling at my beautiful 20-year-old daughter. Unnerved by this courtship ritual, I grab our passports and usher my family out to the friendly confines of the next round of extortionate taxi drivers. 7. We commandeer 2 cabs for our persons and effects, and 4.2 km later we are at Lorrie's B&B. That leg cost only $5 per car. As we unloaded, a strange man started grabbing our bags and offering to help. Jennifer kept taking the bags away, saying "no thank you!" After the third attempt, the taxi driver mentioned that the man works for Lorrie, and really is here to help you. Well why didn't he say so? Welcome to Zimbabwe.
So we stumbled into Lorrie's a couple of hours later than planned, but little worse for the wear. Lorrie's B&B is a couple of kilometers away from the 4 block radius that comprises the Vic Falls downtown, and is set off in a quiet cul-de-sac. Lorrie's was the highest rated place to stay on TripAdvisor that had vacancies, was not a hostel, and for which the cost was less than $200 per person per night. (Vic Falls is a surprisingly expensive place.) We had reserved a 3 bedroom cottage, which turned out to be a 2 bedroom and another set of beds in the former dining room. The cottage was showing its age: the ceilings were peeling with evidence of water leaks; the furniture was ratty; the water heater was solar powered (great for the evening, not so much for the morning); there was no air conditioning (not that it was needed, as the high temperature was only in the mid 70's), however, an added benefit of a/c is that it creates a positive air pressure and makes it harder for mosquitos to get inside. Each bed had mosquito nets around it, and while the kids' beds had high rails allowing the net to hang like curtains, the bed for Jennifer and me had a single round hoop with a net that was supposed to be tucked around the mattress. For two nights Jennifer and I fought with the netting - it would come untucked and we'd find it draped across our faces, or one of us would go to the bathroom in the middle of the night and not be able to get out, or back in. On the third night we swapped beds with Kirsten and that was much better for us.
I had intended Vic Falls in general, and Lorrie's specifically, to be a place to rest and recharge - no schedule to keep, just touring one of the Seven Wonders of the World, doing some shopping, and eating good food. On those points, Vic Falls and Lorrie's exceeded our expectations. After our arrival on Monday afternoon, we dropped our bags, got situated, and then went into town for a couple of hours. Vic Falls is a tourism town, and the many shops are filled with a wide mix of stuff ranging from the high-end art to the routine tourist schlockenjunken. We were accosted at every step by street hawkers for hand carved wooden pieces, bracelets and other cheap jewelry, and Zimbabwean currency. My friend, my friend . . .
To understand why people were selling Zimbabwean currency, one needs to understand the recent history of this sorry country. The British colony of Rhodesia was economically dominated by whites, which refused to grant voting rights to the black majority. The white minority government unilaterally declared its independence from Britain in 1965, but because it refused to grant suffrage to all, no countries recognized its independence, and for 15 years it was a pariah, fighting an insurgent guerrilla war with blacks agitating for power. In 1980, the white government finally ceded power, universal suffrage was granted, and the political party run by Robert Mugabe won the majority. Mugabe has turned into one of Africa's worst dictators, ruining the economy of what was one of the great African agricultural exporters. The Mugabe government’s response was to print more money, leading to one of the worst periods of hyperinflation in world history. In the early 2000s annual inflation was well over one million percent, and by the middle of 2008 the prices of goods doubled daily. The government resorted to printing bank notes of one million dollars, 10 million, 50 million, 100 million, 500 million, one billion, then 5, 10, 20, 50, 100, 200, and 500 billion dollars. It then started printing trillion dollar notes, in values of 1, 5, 10, 20, 50, and 100 trillion dollars. The economy crashed and a huge black market was created for goods and services in hard currencies. Meanwhile, the Mugabe government was manipulating elections and was under broad worldwide economic sanctions. In 2009, the Mugabe government finally abandoned the Zimbabwean dollar, adopting the U.S. dollar as its standard currency. The economy slowly has been improving since then, although it is still managed by incompetent and corrupt officials.
The worthless Zimbabwean million, billion and trillion dollar bank notes are now souvenirs of that period of economic insanity. Even before we crossed into Zimbabwe, I was approached by a hawker with 10, 20, and 50 billion dollar notes. I bought them for $1 (US) each, and gave one to each of my children, along with a brief lesson in macroeconomics and inflation. For the next two days, we constantly were approached by men seeking to sell these worthless notes, and it became a game of finding the highest value notes we could. I eventually purchased a 50 trillion note and a full set of the billion and million dollar notes for $13. I told the kids they could use that as gifts to their friends: presto, you're a billionaire!
Jennifer and the kids were shopping for more prosaic gifts, however. On the first afternoon in town, we fought through a scrum of street vendors and shop owners simply trying to approximate the goods and relative values. Even Kirsten, who loves to shop, was overwhelmed by how in-your-face the hawkers were. One guy was pushing bracelets as she and I stood beside a shop, waiting for the others to emerge. Despite our repeated "no thank yous" and turning away, he kept repeating "good price" in a quieter and quieter voice, until he was whispering. Kirsten finally burst out laughing and we walked away. For the next few days, every now and then one of the kids would walk up to another and whisper "good price" as a laugh line. Garrett got into full bargaining mode, and assumed the role of negotiator in chief. He later calculated that he had achieved a discount of 41% from the asking price of the $160 of goods that we eventually acquired.
We retreated from our initial reconnaissance mission back to Lorrie's, where she had prepared a 3 course dinner for us. We then relaxed and, for the first time on this trip, had the time and energy to play some family card games.
Tuesday, August 4
I awoke before all the others, got breakfast, then set off in search of a place to do our accumulated laundry. I was advised that there were no Laundromats in Victoria Falls, and was taken to a commercial laundry facility run by a retired immigration official who had a large washer and dryer. I sorted our family's dirty clothes into machine dry and line dry, and asked how much to do it all. He said that he needed to weigh it and would tell me after. Sucker. Our bill was $100! I should have recognized the scam once I learned he had abandoned taking bribes in the Mugabe government for something that was more lucrative. Oh well, I'm doing my part to raise Zimbabwe's economy.
The only must-do thing while at Victoria Falls is to actually see the waterfall. We caught a glimpse of it as we crossed the bridge from Zambia to Zimbabwe, but today we were going to spend the morning exploring the park. Victoria Falls, as I'm sure you remember, was "discovered" by Stanley Livingstone, the Scottish missionary, in 1855. Of course, the locals knew about the falls for centuries, but Livingstone's fervent description of the mile-long waterfall electrified the rest of the world. For tens of thousands of years, the Zambezi River had cut a series of gorges as it tumbles more than 100 meters. The current falls are the sixth gorge, and a seventh is slowly forming. Come back in 10,000 years to see it better. The water levels of the Zambezi in August are at the middle of the range, with the lowest being in November just before the rains begin, and the peak being in April.
The falls live up to all the florid descriptions given to it over the years. The Zambezi spreads out a mile wide, and then abruptly tumbles over the edge into a narrow chasm. The Zimbabwean park parallels most of the cliffs on the opposite side of the falls, and in places tourists (including yours truly) can stand or sit on the edge of the rocks and gaze more than 350 feet into the swirling torrents. It does give a sense of vertigo. We were constantly misted by the spray of the falls. It rebounded high above the gorge. In high waters, the mist and clouds of the falls can be seen for miles.
One of the activities that we had planned was visiting the Devil's Pool - a small and relatively calm body of water at the edge of Livingstone Island in the center of the falls, where foolhardy folk can sit or lay in the water inches from the point where it tumbles off the precipice. Unfortunately, all the slots for the three days that we were here had been booked (although I think Jennifer was secretly relieved to hear of this development). So instead, we watched from across the chasm as a group of a dozen fat white tourists were ushered into the pool by daring guides standing at the edge of waterfall.
After spending a couple of hours walking back and forth across the park, we returned to the park entrance and decided to have lunch at the cafe. It was an inspired choice, as we had one of the best meals of our vacation. We relaxed and visited and watched as a vervet monkey stole another diner's sandwich off his plate, and later, fries from another diner. We considered shopping, and decided that a nap was a better idea. We returned to Lorrie's and everyone promptly conked out. Now that's what I call a vacation!
At 4:30 pm, a shuttle bus picked us up for our next activity - a dinner cruise on the Zambezi River. We boarded a 50-foot one level boat and puttered around the wide river a couple of miles above the falls. A total of 11 diners, including our family of 5, saw elephants, hippo, and numerous birds. The sun slowly set, beautifully reflected off the river, and quickly plunging into night. A remarkably delicious dinner was served by candlelight, consisting of a spicy chicken compote appetizer, a choice of beef tenderloin or fish fillet, and for dessert, a sweet cake drenched in warm white sauce. That set the standard for the best meal so far. As an unexpected bonus, on the way home from the boat tour, the shuttle bus driver spotted an adult leopard sitting by a bush just off the road, not far from where people were walking along the road in the dark. Wow! We returned to the B&B sated, played games for a while, then turned in.
Wednesday, August 5
Today we had nothing scheduled for the day. We slept in, had a late breakfast, and headed into town at 10:30 for some shopping. I accompanied Kirsten and Spencer as they swooped into one shop, made their purchases, then called it quits. We relaxed in a local cafe (the "Chicken Inn") while Jenifer and Garrett bargained, cajoled, and eventually completed their transactions. We had a light lunch, then headed back to the B&B for R&R. More games, reading, napping, and researching about the souqs of Dubai, where we'll be in 5 days.
For dinner, we went to the Victoria Falls Hotel, the classic colonial-era edifice where British royalty, MPs, governors, bureaucrats, and members of the upper class stayed and dined. Things are much different today. A nearly all-white crowd of diners was served a sumptuous buffet by the natives, and a group of drummers, singers, and dancers presented a program showing the traditional dances of the indigenous people. It was a fascinating presentation and the food was wonderful, but I was painfully aware of the racial divisions perpetuated by economic disparity.
Thursday, August 6
After one last breakfast courtesy of Lorrie and her staff, at 7:30 am we were met by a van and driver sent by Steenbok Safaris, our host for the next four days and three nights. Twenty miles west of Vic Falls, we crossed the border into Botswana. We had to pass through immigration control for both countries. Botswana's visas were at no charge, unlike the univisa for Zimbabwe and Zambia. At the Botswana border, were met by Moabi, the owner of Steenbok Safaris. The Toyota van that he was driving was loaded with four tires in the back, and fitting in our bags was a challenge. As we loaded in, we noticed that the inside handle of the sliding door was broken, and most of the seat belts were missing. Jennifer, Kirsten and Garrett were immediately dubious, repeatedly asking me how I heard about Steenbok and was I sure. Spencer was ready to roll with it, and I just shrugged and said everything would be okay. As we drove towards Kasane, the city that acts as the gateway to Chobe National Park, Moabi told us a little about himself and his company. He was born and raised in Kasane, had worked for other safari companies, and in 2006 started his own operation.
Moabi asked if we had towels for the bucket showers. I must have missed that, I said. He took us into Kasane and we bought some towels for 150 Botswanian dollars, which he said traded at about 10:1 to the dollar. Next to the shopping center was a trailer that acted as his operation base, and we met several of his employees, including a woman named Neo, with whom I had been exchanging emails. (I had assumed that Neo was male, based on nothing more than the Keanu Reeves character in the Matrix.) Moabi then stopped by his house - a humble cinder block structure with two warthogs rooting in the back yard. In the front yard was an old Steenbok Safaris truck, a dust covered Kia station wagon with no wheels or rear window, and various piles of stuff in the yard. I was reminded of my dad's various compounds in the 1970s as he was starting his rural telephone company, and was discomforted by the thought.
Moabi drove us up the hill and to the Chobe park entrance. The park was founded in 1960, people who lived along the Chobe River were relocated to Kasane, and the old dwellings demolished. There are no paved roads in the park - just a series of sandy dirt roads that might have been graded when the park was set up, but had not seen a blade since. At the entrance, we transferred to Steenbok's safari truck, a well-used Toyota pickup that had been heavily modified: the roof and rear of the cab had been cut off, bolted to the truck bed was a standard 3x3 set of safari seats with canopy, a diesel engine replaced the original gas engine; a home-made snorkel ran to the top of the windshield; a second fuel tank had been added; and when Moabi released the clutch, the transmission shuddered, reflecting the replacement of the clutch but not replacing or refinishing the flywheel. With more raised eyebrows from the kids, we clambered in as our bags were added to an already fully loaded trailer. It soon became clear that there was not enough room for us, our stuff, all the camping gear and food, and Moabi's two employees who would be responsible for running the camp. Moabi called for another truck, our load was redistributed, and off we went.
It soon became clear why the trailer could not be overloaded. In some places the roads were so deeply rutted that the trailer axle, even with its lighter load, was high centered. The soil in Chobe is very sandy, and sometimes the truck seemed to be swimming in the thick sand. Moabi would occasionally stop and shift his transfer case into low and we would crawl along. Third gear in low would move us at perhaps 10 mph. Once the ground got a bit more solid, Moabi would shift the transfer case into high. But I don't think that we ever went over 20 mph while in Chobe.
The winter landscape in Chobe is predominantly brown. This part of Africa has been in a three-year drought, and the rainy season ended four months ago. Parts of the land looked like the lunar surface, with scattered rocks standing on bare soil. Only the constant patches of the wooly capper bush -- the food of last resort for the herbivores -- showed evidence of life. In other places, many of the tall trees were dead from elephants removing all of the bark around their trunks, their branches like crooked fingers grasping at the sky.
Dinner was salad, pasta, and thick sausages. No braais in the park, apparently - everything was cooked over a propane stove. Weary from a day of travel, we soon turned to our three tents. Kirsten was nervous about sleeping by herself, and the boys weren't that excited about it either, so I volunteered to take the solo tent. Moabi had provided thin foam mattresses made up with sheets and a blanket, and laying down I remembered why I don't go camping more often. I do like a real mattress. I slept hard for 5 or 6 hours, then woke up at 2 am and could not go back to sleep. In that half-awake state of trying to go back to sleep, I listened to elephants talking, hyenas calling, and other sounds I could not identify. At 5 am, Moabi called for us to get up. The boys reported that they had heard sniffing around their tent, and Jennifer swore that she had heard an animal repeatedly spraying around her tent. We had barely managed to survive the night, apparently.
Friday, August 7
Moabi woke us up at 5 am for breakfast. Sunrise was just before 6 am, and he wanted to be on the road by then. We moved more slowly than usual, perhaps because we all were adjusting to sleeping on the ground. I did not feel particularly well-rested. The morning temperature was in the high 50s - warmer by 10-15 degrees than Kruger, but still chilly. I had neglected to tell Neo that we did not drink coffee or tea, so we did not have hot chocolate to warm our bodies. And a morning shower was simply not available - the camp bucket shower had not yet been set up. Breakfast was corn flakes or bran flakes, and bread with honey or peanut butter (or both).
We finally rolled out of camp at 6:45 am, blankets helping keep us warm in the open-sided safari truck. Moabi drove us east along the Chobe River. We saw plenty of elephants, giraffes, impalas, and baboons, as well as numerous fish eagles, the cousin of the bald eagle.
Moabi took us to a watering hole up a valley, but there was nothing happening there. It was a strangely monotonous game drive as Moabi circled back along the same route we had taken yesterday and earlier this morning. At one stretch stop, Garrett asked Moabi why we were taking the same roads, and he replied that we would be taking different roads later in the day.
After our 5-hour morning drive, we came back to the Boga camp no. 6 at 11:45 am and found that another safari company was already setting up where our tents had been. Moabi's assistants had struck camp after we left, and were setting up in Boga camp no. 4. Moabi hooked up his trailer and we made our way to our new camp. Our butts were sore from all of the bouncing around on the bumpy dirt roads. We dozed around the fire while our tents were set up, then we all laid down for naps while lunch was prepared.
During our afternoon game drive, we had an elephant encounter to rival our being surrounded by elephants in Kruger. Just below the Ihaha camp, we started descending to the river when we saw a large group of elephants approaching. Moabi shut off the engine and we sat for nearly half an hour as more than 50 elephants passed in front, behind, and beside us, some no more than 10 feet from the car. Most of the elephants paused to study us briefly before deciding that we posed no threat. It was another magical time with those great creatures.
After a dinner of salad, chicken, and pasta topped with minestrone soup (!), we went to bed. Once again, the kids reported sniffing sounds and various animal calls, and once again we lived to tell the tale.
Saturday, August 8
Moabi woke us up at 5:30 am. We ate our cereal half asleep. As the sun broke over the horizon, we saddled up for our morning game drive. Today he headed west along the Chobe River towards the Ngoma gate. The waterfront was quiet, with little game. We stopped and watched a baboon troop soak in the morning rays, grooming each other, the babies nursing, and the juveniles jumping on each other, then running away. We also saw more of the usual game - elephants, giraffes, kudus, impalas, mongeese, and lots of birds.
Upon return to camp for lunch, we saw that Moabi had set up the bucket shower. It was just what it sounds like: a silver tin bucket with a showerhead coming out of the bottom. There was a hose valve that you turned to allow the water to flow (more like trickle) out of the showerhead. A six-foot tall 4' square canvas enclosure provided privacy, and a small doormat kept some of the sand off your feet. For each shower, water was warmed on the fire, and then poured into the bucket along with some cold water to make for a pleasingly warm experience. It was nice to wash off two days worth of safari grit.
For the afternoon drive, we took the westbound river route again - it was never the same two times in a row. We saw some elephants coming down to the water and Moabi stopped and waited for them to come to us. After a few minutes, they passed within a few feet in front and behind us. One young bull stopped about 30 feet away from the side of the truck, studied us, and shook his head and flapped his ears - the first elephant warning. Elephants always give three warnings before they charge, so Moabi stayed put. After another moment or so, the bull shook his head again and charged towards us. Our heart rates surged and we were whispering "go, go," but Moabi made no motion to leave. About 10 feet away from us, the elephant stopped, stared at us for a while, then snorted and abruptly turned away and walked off. We let out our collective breath and smiled. Moabi knew his elephant signs. Later, we compared Neil's style with Moabi's, and Moabi said that the elephants in Kruger tend to be a bit more aggressive around humans, because they encounter so many more people, which means they encounter more stupid people. Most people in Chobe are either experienced game drivers or experienced self-drivers, and know how to respect elephants.
That night, Jennifer and the kids reported hearing more lion roars, elephant calls, hyena barking, as well as more sniffing around our tents. Camping in the bush is an adventure, but I slept through it all.
Sunday, August 9
Our last day in Africa. I woke up at 3 am, as I have each day while camping, tossed and turned until 5 am, then decided I might as well get up. I dressed, packed my bag, and went out by the fire. By 5:30 am Moabi was ready to start taking down the tents and breaking camp, so I woke up the others and they joined me by the fire as Moabi took down the tents and his helpers set out a breakfast of the left over food: scrambled eggs, some lunch meat, the last of the cold cereal, bread, peanut butter, honey, and a box of juice. By 7 am, we were ready to roll - our bags and Moabi's assistants, as well as some additional equipment, would be met by a second vehicle. Moabi hooked up the trailer and we rolled back out of the park, taking a couple of diversions to see some more game. At the park gate, Moabi met Neo and learned that she had not arranged for a vehicle to pick up the others and our bags. It was the only time we saw Moabi upset - "Leaving those kids in the bush!"
We arrived at Kasane just before 9 am. We were booked for a boat tour of the Chobe River at 9:30 am. I logged on to confirm that Fly By Night Air had not cancelled our flight from VFA to JNB, and was relieved to see that it was still on. Speaking of being relieved, the rest of the family walked over to the public toilets in the shopping center, only to learn that it cost 2 Kuna to get access, so they walked back and were given the coins by Moabi.
For our boat tour, we walked down to the river and boarded an 18' aluminum skiff with four rows of seats, and not a life vest in sight. A group of three Swedes joined us. It turned out to be an awesome ride. The captain brought us close to a wide variety of water birds, Cape buffaloes, waterbucks, a pod of hippos, and several crocodiles. One 12 footer was soaking in the sun as the captain slowly pulled forward. At about 5 feet, Kirsten and Garrett started saying "stop" but the captain kept going forward until he nudged the croc in the nose, making it jump up and splash into the water. "I thought it was plastic!" the captain exclaimed. Watching Kirsten, Garrett, and Jennifer jump away from the side of the boat was good for a nice laugh by Spencer and me. I decided then the captain was getting a good tip.
Soon thereafter, we stopped to watch a family of elephants work up their courage to cross the river, with some infants noticeably reluctant to proceed. Eventually they all forded the river, the adults up to their eyes and the juveniles and infants swimming hard. By the time they reached the other bank, the infant was so tired it could hardly walk, and could not climb a two-foot rise. One of the adults - not its mother, who had been nursing it before the crossing, and was leading the way - came back, wrapped her trunk around the infant and guided it to a less steep way up the bank. We were touched by that display of caring. The kids remarked that the boat tour was as good as the game drives for animal sightings, and better yet, there were no bumpy roads to endure. It was a great way to end our African tour.
We returned to the dock and walked back to Steenbok's office to see Moabi unloading our bags and his two helpers. As soon as he had dropped us off, he had turned around to get them from the bush. He had told us that he was leading another game drive at 1:30 pm, so by the end of the day he will have spent nearly 12 hours behind the wheel. After a group photo and goodbyes, we grabbed some KFC to go and ate as we were driven to the Botswana/Zimbabwe border, where we would meet our van to take us to VFA. Clearing Botswana immigration was easy - 5 minutes, stamped passports, and we were on our way to the Zimbabwe post. We walked in to find it a madhouse - people crammed inside pushing and shoving, no order to the lines, no forms available. Eventually I got the forms and filled them out while being jostled in line, Kirsten reading the passport info to me. When I arrived at the immigration agent, he looked at our passports and said that, by leaving Zimbabwe for more than a day, our prior ($50) visas had expired, and we had to buy new visas. Because it was a single entry visa, however, he could sell them to us for $30 each, cash please. In all our travels, Zimbabwe is the only country we've encountered that charges for tourist visas. I handed over the cash and waited as he laboriously hand-wrote each visa and stuck it to our passports.
After nearly an hour, we were off to the airport. We arrived at 2:45 pm for our 4 pm flight, only to encounter a line snaking around the departure area to check bags. A sign announced that all passengers must check in 45 minutes before or their reservations would be cancelled. At 3:45, we finally got to the desk, and the agent took our bags, giving us hand-written boarding passes. We passed through the most cursory airport security I have ever seen - the bins were on top of the x-ray machine, and the agent was barely looking at the carry-on bag x-ray screen. I could have put a gun in a bin, put it on top of the x-ray machine, passed through, grabbed the bin, and no one would have noticed. No one cared that I had a full water bottle in my bag. I was selected to answer a tourist satisfaction survey for our most recent trip to Zimbabwe (about 90 minutes in all), and gave the country low marks for its extortionate visa fees and poorly-run airport, not to mention the ongoing evil of Mugabe's presence.
We boarded the aircraft, and only then did I learn that we were flying Fly Africa, a new low-cost airline like Spirit in the US, or Ryan Air or several others in Europe. Supposedly, Fly Africa charges for checked bags and more than one carry on, but we were not charged anything, probably because the queue was so long and the gate agents so harried. The Diet Coke on board cost $2, but since it was the first one I'd had since South Africa, it was (as my mom would sometimes employ a colorful Dutch phrase), "als een engel plassen op mijn tong" (like an angel peeing on my tongue).
We arrived at JNB at 6 pm. My itinerary said that our Emirates flight to Dubai left at 8:20 pm. That gave us 2:20 to clear immigration and customs, claim our bags from Fly Africa, rearrange our bags so we just had the stuff we needed for an 18-hour layover in Dubai, check in with Emirates Airlines, drop off our bags, clear immigration and customs, and get to our gate. As it turned out, it wasn't enough time. In particular, the Emirates line was moving at a glacial pace. I checked in using my iPhone while standing in line, allowing us to use the pre-checked in queue, but it made little difference. We got to the gate at 7:45 pm and by this time I was concerned that we would miss our flight. That's when it the agent said that our flight left at 22:20 (10:20 pm), not 20:20. I had made the mistake of mistranslating military time when I first booked the flight, had repeatedly written and remembered the time as 8:20, and had disregarded all later information about the actual flight time because I already knew when it left. At least my error worked in our favor.
But our adventure with Emirates was just beginning. Unlike our flight to South Africa, where I used miles for the whole family, I had to purchase the return flight tickets. I had shopped around, and found that the lowest prices meant that we could route either through Dubai, or London, or Rio de Janerio. Rio gave us no layover; London was a mandatory 15-hour layover, and Dubai gave us the option of no layover or an 18-hour layover. I polled the family, and all agreed that we might as well see Dubai, as long as we were there. Plus Emirates was the least expensive option by far.
But before we could see Dubai, we had to get our boarding passes. And before we get our boarding passes, Emirates requires that I show them the credit card that I used to purchase the tickets. I pulled out the three cards I brought with me on the trip, but none were the right card. Then I remembered that I had opened a Chase Sapphire Card to get the 70,000 bonus points to be used for the flights from South Africa, and after meeting the bonus threshold, put the card away with a note to cancel it before the first anniversary. The gate agent explained that, without the card, she could not issue our boarding passes. Perhaps we could call home and have someone find the card? No, I said, no one was at home. She then said that my only option was to cancel the tickets and buy new ones, and by the way, the price for each ticket had risen from $555 each to about $5000 each. I declined her reasonable suggestions and asked to speak with a supervisor. She said that a supervisor could do nothing more. I asked if she was refusing to call a supervisor. She paused, picked up the phone, and made several calls. She then said that she was going to go to the ticketing desk and see what she could do. I sent Jennifer to follow her, and soon she came back to get the passports. The agent soon returned and said that she had found a way around the requirement that she actually fondle the credit card used to buy the tickets, but it involved answering some more questions. Ask me your questions, bridge keeper, I’m not afraid, I thought. Q: what is your home address? Q: what is your first name? Q: what is your favorite color? I barely passed this rigorous security examination, avoided being blasted into the Gorge of Eternal Peril, and at 8:30 pm finally was issued our boarding passes. (Just kidding on the last question, by the way.) Moral: Never fly Emirates again.
We passed through South African immigration one last time. We showed Garrett's birth certificate one last time. We had time to get a real meal instead of whatever gruel they served the peasants in Economy. We had an 8-hour redeye to Dubai, plus a 2 hour time zone east, so we would land at 8:20 am. Our flight to DC left at 2:20 am the next morning, so we had 18 hours to explore how the fiefdom was spending its petrodollars. I had booked a room at the Hyatt Regency in Deira, near the souqs, so we first went there, showered, got breakfast, and reconnoitered. Spencer had not slept on the first leg of the flight, and opted to sleep. The rest of us set out on an Arab shopping adventure.
At 11 am, the temperature was already over 100 degrees, and the humidity was about 60%. We were soaked within minutes. Our goal was to wander through the souqs, the traditional Arab markets: the gold, spice, and textile markets on the Deira side, and the smorgasbord on the Jumeriah side, divided by the Dubai canal. We were not looking for anything in particular, just looking. The good news is that we made more than a thousand friends. The bad new is that our new friends would not leave us alone. "My friend, come! Pashmina scarves! High quality silks! Watches! Rolex, Oyster, Tag, more! Come, look!" They were aggressive, incessant, and endless. Meanwhile we were sweating and getting increasingly weary of their hawking. Jennifer stopped to look at magnets, and we're swarmed liked hornbills on fresh elephant dung. Peck! Peck! Peck!
Garrett stop to look at t-shirts. The initial asking price was 160 AED - about $45 dollars. I laughed out loud and told Garrett that we were not buying that cheap shirt, let's go. But Garrett loves to bargain, and they engaged in warfare while I stepped away (I had the money, after all.) The merchant kept lowering his price, and Garrett kept saying how this was a cheap cotton shirt that was not worth that much. At 70 AED, Garrett walked out, and we headed to the canal. The merchant kept following, dropping his price: 60, then 50, then 40. He finally stomped back to his shop. Unknown to me, Garrett had been shooting for 40, and really wanted to get the shirt. I didn’t think that it was worth it, just wanted to find something cold to drink, so I churlishly gave Garrett 40 AED and he went back to do the deal. I'm not a fan of haggling. Not in my cultural blood. Give me fixed prices, Internet access, and Amazon Prime any day.
We took the water taxi across the canal (1 AED each), and saw the dhows moored 5 deep where goods were being unloaded 24/7. The city has been transformed in the past few decades, but in some places the old ways remain. The style of attire also varied widely: about 10% of the women were in full burqa, black, as if the Taliban were in control. Another 15-20% were in chadors, black, naturally. Of the rest, perhaps half had a scarf on or near their hair. The rest varied, from spaghetti straps to short shorts to t-shirts and knee length dresses or pants. The males had less variation -- 15-20% in traditional head to toe robes and headdresses (white, unlike their suffering wives), while everyone else was in traditional western attire. I have little patience for fundamental Muslim inequality, and all of the blathering about modesty is just another way of subjugating women.
In Jumeriah, we stumbled into a shop filled with a delightful hodgepodge of secondhand items: Mongol helmets, Arab swords, display cases filled with rings the size of a fist, hookahs, genie lamps, and all sorts of tarnished things to lift up and admire. Garrett found a box of obsolete coins and amused himself with trying to identify them (the price was based upon the size of the coin). Kirsten found some smaller rings. Jennifer browsed through small beaded bags and the like, and I would pick up various things and comment on them: a flaking leather Mongol g-string; wondering if airline security would have a problem with a two-headed battle axe; seeing which of the canes actually contained swords or daggers, etc. The shop owner was in no mood to bargain, and was actually trying to shoo us out so she could close for her afternoon siesta. We paid 40 AED for some assorted treasures, then headed back to the hotel for some air-conditioned rest.
We had tickets for the 6 pm admission to the Burj Khalifa, the world's tallest structure, completed in 2010.
The building won best actor in one of the Mission Impossible films. It is connected to the Dubai Mall, an orgy of commercialism with over 1200 stores. Between the two is a huge fountain display, designed by the same people who did the Las Vagas Bellagio fountains. We walked passed a photo of an Emirate leader (Muhammed Ali Kileem dar Merkins) who envisioned this edifice, pictured gazing modestly into the future, near an inscription, "glory be to those who built it." Subtle. Look how we can spend our oil money! We took the impressively smooth elevator to the lower observation deck on the 124th floor - going to the 148th floor cost an extra $30/pp each, and the visibility due to the blowing sand was limited to about 4 miles, so it wasn't worth it. We looked over the Emirate with its glut of high rises and architecture, and realized that Dubai was little more than Las Vegas east. We watched the fountain show from 1200 feet high, saw the sun set into the sandy haze, and I thanked God that I did not live here.
I think the rest of the family also was feeling ready to go home, because of the 160 eateries in the Mall, they chose California Pizza Kitchen. We had a relaxing meal, then bought a pack of Uno cards because we had packed our other cards in our checked luggage, went back to the hotel and played an Uno variation called Mao where the winner of the prior round gets to make a new rule that remains unknown are until it is broken. The more random the rule (e.g, make an animal sound when playing an odd red), the better. Keeping track of the rules (and enforcing them when someone else forgets) is the point of the game; winning the Uno game is incidental. Our games frequently were interrupted by people in the room next door playing loud music with the bass notes vibrating everything in our room. Calls to the front desk brought occasional quiet, but 5 minutes later it started back up. I was glad we were not staying the night.
Tuesday, August 11
We checked out at midnight -- the hotel comped the cost of the car to the airport as an apology for the loud guests in room 2012 -- and our departure was uncomplicated. Garrett had fun spending the remaining AED, returning with massive bars of gold (actually chocolate, although gold bars were sold at the Dubai Mall). I passed out Ambien and Lunesta, and everyone in the family managed to sleep for at least 8 hours on the 14-hour flight. We landed at Dulles just before 9 am, passed US immigration and customs, claimed our bags and took a Suburban home. It's always good to come home.
This afternoon I'm headed up to Hopkins for lab work and a CT scan. On Thursday I'll have my next nivolumab infusion. I'll also talk to Dr. Hahn about the marked increase in gross hematuria in the past week. Ever since we entered Botswana and started bumping around a lot, I've had lots of bright red blood in my urine. I stopped taking the Xarelto for a couple of days, and it seemed to decrease a bit, but last night I resumed the Xarelto and the gross hematuria is back. Xarelto can increase the chances of bleeding - it is a blood thinner designed to decrease the risk of pulmonary embolism - and on these long flights I wanted to do what I could to avoid DVT and PE by wearing compression stockings, walking around and getting the blood moving, and drinking lots of fluids. I'll also email Dr. Aragon Ching at GW to get her thoughts. Assuming the CT scan shows no PE (as it has since the start of this year), then perhaps I can discontinue the Xarelto.
Traveling has helped increase my gratitude for my access to high-quality medical care. In Kasane, Botswana there was only a small clinic. In South Africa, Neil spoke about how his mother was dying of metastatic breast cancer, that the chemo and radiation treatments had not worked (and cost lots of money), and there were no clinical trials available in the country. In Dubai, we saw multiple high-end clinics (including an entire section of the Dubai Mall) for the well-to-do from throughout the region, but strictly on a cash basis. I am grateful that I have high quality insurance through my law firm; that I can be treated by some of the best doctors in the world; and that I have access to clinical trials testing the newest and most innovative immunotherapies available anywhere in the world. This trip was made possible by nivolumab reversing my metastatic tumors; here's hoping that I can take many more family trips in the years to come.
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