Local village walk

Arrival at the first village

We left with Shadreck at 9am on the boat, heading up river through a series of rapids to get to the village, passing locals in their dugout canoes checking their fishing nets.
A guy called Gift was our guide. He lives in the first of the three villages we visited which seemed to us to also be the poorest. A collection of mud houses which need to be remade every 8/9 years on account of the termites that eat their way through the wooden uprights holding it together.

Stick walls are filled with mud and clay

The village had collective cattle and pig pens and a lady who grew (and sometimes sold) potted plants. We were discussing the cattle and the wealth they represent when Gift told us that they would only sell them if they needed to send a child to school, or they needed to pay a dowry (to buy one of the men a wife). The bride's family set the price and it may be 4 or 5 cows for the girl depending on her status and purity.  Gift then turned to Tracey and I and asked how much a bride would cost in England - when we told him they were free he immediately declared that he wanted to move to England.   Songiso wants to marry Katherine at the farm, but he cannot get together the 17,000 Kwacha needed for her dowry (about £1,700); What a way to start married life... with a man who is completely broke on account of the dowry!

Stilted food store in second village

The second village was clearly richer, having both a bar and a food store on stilts.
The third village was where the brand new school and church are located. Tracey and I were blown away by the sheer size of the school - compared to everything else we had seen in Zambia, it was a giant. Brightly painted and inviting, it is built on land purchased by Waterberry and funded by the guests and local projects, sales of craft items in the gift shop and of course overseas donations.
We were back from the village tour shortly before lunch and so spent some time on the terrace watching the monkeys and me re-boodling my camera case as I had to pick it apart to use the yarn to teach with last week.

Newly finished Tukongote Community Primary School

All our washing came back late afternoon in pristine condition, with the exception of about 8 pairs of socks. All our new and borrowed hiking socks; the one item I had completely run out of was socks, and so I wandered over to the reception desk to ask if they could check the laundry… nothing there, since we were about to head out onto the river again, we left Kelly going from room to room asking each of the guests if they had received our socks by mistake and promising she would track them down. She was very surprised as they have a pretty good system for laundry and it’s quite rare to lose a guests washing.

Definitely Tracey's shot of the day! Dust bath baby.

Today's river cruise was just a good as the last... eles, crocs, hippos, kingfishers and a race up river chasing sunset for a chance to see river otters again.

When we returned, the missing socks had become a complete mystery to the staff, as they had now checked every guest at both the lodge and the River Farmhouse down the road and still no sign.

They provide snacks on board the boat and so by the time Tracey and I had stuffed ourselves with peanuts, mini pasties and crisps, followed by a 3 course dinner, beer and wine, we could only waddle to the campfire and plonk ourselves down for a while. Stuffed and with trousers no longer able to do up, Tracey suddenly asked me if I had checked the inside pocket of the case when I emptied the laundry out? No I hadn't. So many people had been out looking for our socks and it turns out they had not even made it into the laundry basket in the first place. I felt awful. Reception was shut already and so a very apologetic note was called for, which I left wedged underneath an ornamental crocodile.  We couldn't stay up late as we were leaving for Botswana early in the morning to spend the day at the Chobe National Park.