I was so happy the previous day to have a plan in place, I really didn't spend any time thinking about what this trip might entail. The bus ride from vic falls was over 5 hours. In the scheme of things, I guess this isn't so bad, but it seemed long. Along the way, I was definitely questioning the wisdom of traveling this far for 2 nights. We had traveled 2 hours along the same road on our way out to hwange days before, and I stayed alert the whole ride so as not to "miss" anything.... But it was all pretty much the same until the moment we drove into the city. Flat landscape. Trees. Small villages along the way. Lovely, but fairly monotonous.
After a short wait, we were met at the bus drop off by a guy from the hotel. He walked us the 5 blocks or so down the road to get us checked in. "downtown was a small grid of a city... About 10 blocks wide by maybe 20 blocks long. On the way to the hotel, we passed the open market... Split into 2 sections, clothes and food.
The "Berkeley house" was a clean place, but absolutely deserted! According to the nice lady at the desk, it wasn't travel season. I was also quickly observing that Bulawayo is a town people live in, not go to on vacation. After being the ultimate tourists for 2 weeks, this was both refreshing, and shocking. We joked all day that it was possible we were going to wind up in the local newspaper just for being white tourists in town.
After dropping our bags, and working with the nice lady at the hotel to book our trip to the park the following day... We set off on a mission. Food, find the bus station for Lori to inquire about further travel, groceries for breakfast, and Internet cafe.
And so went the rest of the afternoon. We wandered around. What we learned about Africa on Saturday afternoons is that not much of anything is happening or going on. Ed finally found an open restaurant for a late lunch. Bus station closed till Monday. Internet in the entire town was down for the time being. Found a little cafe where the local were starting to gather for sat night festivities. Made some friends over beers. Hung for a bit, then continued on. Internet finally up and running. Spent a hour or so online, then made our way back to the hotel shortly after sundown. Everyone we chatted with in town to ask direction was really helpful and nice. We stood our like sore thumbs, but no one seemed to care. The last few blocks close to our hotel were by far the sketchiest we encountered, but all in all... Not bad. People were pretty content to leave the only 2 tourists in town alone.
No comments:
Post a Comment