Weekend Travel Goes Bad.

I thought I would take a lovely weekend holiday to Victoria Falls but unfortunately it didn’t turn out exactly as planned.  I shall try to give a short update.  I started out taking the bus to Lusaka where I was meeting my friend Heather so that we could connect to another bus and go on to Livingstone.  Because my bus from Mongu was delayed (the journey from Mongu to Lusaka should take about 8 hours but it took a bit longer), we didn’t make our connection and ended up leaving from Lusaka about 3 hours later than anticipated.  The bus ride to Livingstone was miserable, 1.) because I was now almost 16 hours into my bus ride journey and 2.) we stopped at every little town/village along the way to pick-up or drop off people.  Anyway, we arrived in Livingstone on Friday evening happy to be there and ready for some dinner.  This is when the “unfortunate event” happened.

We were walking out of my friend, Joel's, gate to get dinner and it was dark (around 7:30PM) and I believe I had just turned to say something to Heather when all of a sudden I was at the bottom of a concrete ditch on my head.  I don’t know exactly how I tripped and fell but all I know is that my face was covered in dirt and my neck was hurting.  I was a bit panicked because the first thing that crossed my mind was that I might be paralyzed for the rest of my life.  Then I made sure my teeth were all still in my mouth.  And then I started crying.  Heather and Joel were now looking for me (because you couldn’t really see into this small ditch) but they realized I wasn’t just playing a game of hide and seek so they got two men from the street to help carry me into Joel's house so my injuries could be assessed.  

The short story is that I am fine.  I am not paralyzed, have all of my teeth and only have bruises and cuts.  Although I landed on my head, I didn’t fall hard enough to do any real damage to my neck.  Thank goodness.  So after a long night of picking sand and rocks out of my face so that the cuts could be cleaned, I slept and we managed to wrap me up like a mummy so that we could go to the falls on Saturday.  It was quite comical though because people would try to avert their eyes yet stare upon seeing me only to say, “Sorry.”  I started feeling bad for people who had to look at me.

After one day in Livingstone (yes, one day...that was crazy planning looking back), we took the bus back to Lusaka (a mere 8 hours) and then I hopped on the bus back to Mongu.  This should have only taken 8 hours but the bus broke down and we had to wait while they fixed it.  So, very late on Sunday I was back in Mongu after my relaxing weekend away.

 

I have put some pictures up of my weekend travels (and, yes, I put one up showing my poor head but it's not too bad, I promise).  I look forward to visiting the majestic Victoria Falls again soon...under better circumstances.  :)