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Hi everyone,
Amy here. Sorry, we only have a few minutes for an update because we are off to Kruger National Park in South Africa in ten minutes, but I'll try to give you a very quick summary of our time in Zimbabwe and Botswana...oh, and this is a friendly reminder to check out our photos on photobucket.com. We posted some new ones last night.
We have had a wonderful last week with a combination of relaxing and doing exciting activities. We stayed with our friend Woody's parents (thanks Marlane and Dave!!) here in Johannesburg after arriving from Sydney and headed out the next morning for our flight to Vic Falls. The flight was uneventful and we were picked up by our hostel. The hostel truly looked like it belonged in Africa, with thatched-roof huts and greenery everywhere. We booked a dorm room because it was the cheapest and there were five beds in our room, but during four nights, no one else ever stayed in our room, so we ended up with a private room which was a nice surprise! We knew Zimbabwe was having lots of trouble thanks to Mugabe's lack of economic knowledge, but we really had no idea how bad it would be. There was no violence or anything like that in Vic Falls, but we didn't expect too many problems because it is the most touristy town in the country (only 10,000 people!!). However, we were shocked at the lack of...everything!...in Zimbabwe. The stores looked like they were selling shelves! There was just nothing around to buy, even if you had money. And thanks to the 16,000 percent inflation over the last year, no one could afford to buy anything. The prices of things doubled in the four days we were there. To give you an idea, the US dollar is equal to 90 billion Zim dollars. We took some funny photos of the prices of things written out with all the zeros. All of the tour companies and major restaurants will only take US dollars, but the supermarket and convenience store use Zim dollars. What an experience. We have a few 50,000,000,000 notes from there (equal to less than a dollar!).
Uh oh, my ten minutes are up and I haven't even scratched the surface. :( I will be sure to post more once we get back from Kruger. More soon-for now, enjoy the photos. :)
amy & simon
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