Still Tuesday 18th August and just arrived in Toronto
Phew, sitting in lovely Best Western Hotel room in Toronto. In front of air conditioning! Sooooooo hot in last plane, third for 30 hours. Gosh what an adventure and thankfully I took son Dave's advice and slept as much as I could. My book can wait.
once on the first United Airlines plane all good, space, movies ... Watched Disney's Cinderella (naturally) and a show about building treehouses (naturally).
good take off and landing. Then came the second United Airlines flight from Los Angelas to Chicago. Small. Cramped. No food. Terrible turbulence, scarey. Evidently large storm shell. Then the landing ... Well, we basically dropped onto the runway sideways. Everyone made noises. Scarey. Kissed the ground. Third flight was another United Airlines flight. Getting smaller. All in plane. Taxied out then sat on runway for one hour as storm was making all flights leave from one runway and we were like no. 30 waiting for clearance. Up and at em. Slept whole time. Landed. But , oh no, the extendable gate that links to plane was stuck 1 metre away. After one hour in no air conditioning everyone had to sit down and the plane went somewhere else to disembark. Consequently everyone's bags were in a different part of the airport.
What an adventure! I have walked kilometres, sat for hours, and having fun in a funny sort of way.
The icing for tonight is seeing photos of beautiful Grandson Finn. The next icing is that there is a message here for me from the American couple I met at Milton end of 2015 whilst rug making. They are taking me to Niagora Falls tomorrow! AWESOME! Shower and my queen size bed are calling. Nite nite.
The trip was not only memorable for the amount of animals we saw but also for the people and accommodations at the two camps where we stayed. Our first guide, BK, was a wealth of information about the animals, landscape and down to the plants and what they were used for. Everyday out was a learning experience with him. All the people at the camps were gracious and the food was excellent.
Our second camp in the Okavanga was just as good as the first as far as the staff, accommodations, food and animals. After our experience at the first camp we amazed that the high quality remained the same. Our guide, G, made sure we were able to enjoy every experience including a rush through the bush to witness a cheetah and an ensuing hunt that he heard over his radio.
In both camps there were enough guides out that if they saw something the other guides were informed which helped in seeing as much as possible. It was also nice that the concessions were large enough that we did not have vehicles following each other throughout the day.
Normally there is always something in a trip of this length that we think could be improved upon but this is the rare case where we cannot think of anything. From the time we left the States to when we returned it was one of the most hassle free vacations we took.
Perhaps emphasizing the use of the laundry facilities at the camps would be useful because of the luggage restrictions would be the only thing I can think of as an improvement to future clients.
Kenneth Dropek
2 days ago
Mary was so pleasant and professional. She made sure all of our questions were answered.