Juliasdale

  Nyanga, Zimbabwe
Saturday, October 25, 2008

Christian on his seat in "Little Red"

Next morning the world champion of car packing Amy made Little Red ready for the trip to Zimbabwe. Cecilie and I each had plenty of room in back even though we could not actually see eachother. After a good breakfast we were on the road - for about 100 meters. Here we met a couple of Germans who had gotten their (unloaded) rental car stuck in the sand. Amy drove expertly through the sand and parked the car and we all got out to help the poor couple. They had dug themselves in quite deep and even managed to bank the left side of the car on some concrete and therefore had no traction on the front left tyre. Amy quickly took control of the situation and with

Beer and Popcorn - it can't get much better :)

the help of the jack, big rocks and Cecilie and I on the back of the car we got it free. Finally we were on our way to Zimbabwe. It took most of the day to get to Amy's family home in Juliasdale not far from the border. On the way we stopped once for lunch at a nice lodge. They had a pool and we had a dip and a cold drink before continuing to the border post at Mutare. It only took about an hour to get through the border even though it was slightly chaotic - a Zimbabwean visa is only $30; cheapest so far.

Amy's family home - Juliasdale

After crossing the border we made our way to Juliasdale and to Amy's family home. No one lives there permantly so it is mostly used as a holiday home now. It was dark at the time we got to Juliasdale, and we drove up and down dirt roads to get to the house. We parked the car and got out and saw this really beautiful stone built house with a thatched roof. We got the grand tour and got allocated the master bedroom with a huge balcony. It was difficult to see the surroundings as it was dark so we had to wait until morning. Paul and Christian did a braai (barbeque) and we all had a nice dinner and a few beers before heading to bed after a long day. The next morning we woke up to a beautiful view over the valley and after breakfast Amy took us for a nice walk around the valley/reserve. They had bought plains animals and released in the

Amy showing us the farm

reserve, but unfortunately poachers had taken a lot of it, but we did see a few guinee fowls.

After the walk we went to visit Amy's grandfather who lives nearby. He is running a farm shop on the old family farm. He is a great guy and very funny and was telling us about all the hoops he had to jump through during these economically turbulent times. Amy also took us up to her old lookout point, where she used to play as a child. Here we had a good overview of the farm while Amy explained how it worked.

The view from Rupurara

For lunch we went to a place call Inn on Rupurara, which was a really nice old colonial style inn, with beautiful lounges, bar and dining areas. Here we had a very nice lunch and played scrabble before having tea.

We relaxed at the house for the rest of the day and got our bags ready for the next day's travel to Harare.