It was planned, but we changed our minds.
Advice was an 8 hour drive (only 158km!) to Shoebill country. The Shoebill Stork is found here and we wanted to see him.
As we would have had an 8 hour drive out and a further 6 hour drive south for Conny and Chantal to make Livingstone we decided to bypass and leave it for another time.
The extra day we used in North Luangwa meant we were a day behind.
A simple drive of 300km on the main north/south tar road awaited us. What could be simpler? For the first half the road was a pothole hell. Potholes that a person standing in them you could see them from the thigh up. These required extra slow negotiating.
There are very few cars on the roads, only hundreds of trucks. These trucks also battle with the potholes and take them dead slow.
A lovely newly built farm stall was a welcome respite on the road. A wide variety of meats, coffees, honey etc were available. We enjoyed a welcome pit stop from this place not yet on the map.
The late lunch stop here was very welcome. Very few places exist for a stopover in Zambia. Judging by the farmers here it was the local meeting place, the farmers we guessed all from Zimbabwe making a new life for themselves as cattle ranchers in Zambia.
We had to push on and our planned stop was at a place called Forrest Inn. A working farm on the road, but offering lovely camping and chalets. A bonus was the restaurant where had a good supper. Camping under some nice trees, we were alone. A very comfortable stopover.
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Interesting; had not seen that before. Instructions are to add slowly to your diet.
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Always make a grab to read your blogs Piet and I am sending them on to Trevor - hope this okay? Interested to know about the Zambian villages and people.
Awesome so far... looking forward to the next installment! Go well.
Thinking of you guys as you plan you next steps. Safe travels🤗