Bird Watchers Paradise

Trip Start Aug 31, 2009

Trip End Feb 14, 2010

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Where I stayed

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(Mutare hotels)

Flag of Zimbabwe Mutare, Zimbabwe
Wednesday, September 16, 2009

We headed off from Gorongosa towards the Zimbabwe border crossing with a little in-trepidation based on the earlier media reports in Australia.. we got to Chimonio to fill up and get supplies as we were under the impression things are had to get in Zim, however we had not planned on the only supermakardo ( Portuguese for super market) not having power thus no food was to be purchased.. so we reluctantly headed to Zim and thought we will have to sort it out there..

Arrived in Mutare and all was good, shops open lots of food and happy people.. sometimes the media really does bugger up ones perception of a country!! The funny thing is Zim now uses the US dollar as their dollar has no real value anymore. The only problem with this process is that noone has brought in American coins hence there is no change. In the supermarket if they owe you coins change they just tell you to pick some more goods

Oh look at the Birds

. The cash register is surrounded by small lollies and stuff that they just keep putting in your bag. We finished up with an assortment of flavoured bubble gum and sweets that then made for excellent beggar kid food so all was good I guess.

We packed up and headed towards the National Park camping ground.. after finally arriving well after dark the chap at the gate informed us we could camp in the caravan section (I do not know how a caravan would get down the track) for $10US per person to get past the gate + $10US for the car + $10US per person to camp.. yep $50US for us to stay one night in our tent.. bugger that.. I told the chap to pretty well shove it and told him I would prefer to set up camp on the side of the road.. Any body heading to this camp sight do not bother going down the track it just is not worth it. We turned tail and picked a lodge $25US per person. Now by this time it was pitch black and there was no power, we were issued with candles at reception and told the power should be on about 8.30pm so we made some tea and really had no idea where we were or what we were staying in. Turned out to be fantastic, unbeknown to us it was set up as a secluded bird watching lodge, self contained, with the most magnificent floral garden obviously designed to attract the illusive "twittering thingy", and complete with bird identification manuals. I think Lisa is going to turn in to one of those weird people who sits and listen to the birds then scramble though the book trying to figure out which type it is..She was loving it way too much!!