Arriving in Zimbabwe

It was a busy couple of weeks pre-departure for Zimbabwe: attending pre-departure training and meeting most of my volunteers, attending my last Guide camp with 1^st Riverside Guides (for a while anyway!), handing over all my work to colleagues, handing over leadership of 2^nd Riverside Rainbows to two fantastic new leaders, a last minute visit home to Northern Ireland to see family and then packing up my life and room in London.

I probably have far too much stuff packed (although I am sure I will use everything – especially the 10 bottle of suncream!!) which made me rather unpopular on the rush hour tube to Heathrow! So arriving at Heathrow Airport and checking my bags the biggest feeling was relief that everything had fallen into place, and here I was about to board a flight to a whole new adventure in Zimbabwe!

Our flights had us flying for 11 hours and 15 minutes from LHR to Johannesburg, and then 2 hours from Johannesburg to Harare. Thankfully the first flight was less than half full, so we were able to spread ourselves out and get a bit of sleep.

We arrived in Harare, a bit travel weary to be welcomed by the smiling faces of the Progressio staff and to be whisked off to our hostel where we will be staying for the next 10 days until our volunteers arrive.

The strangest thing so far is that the sun sets at about 6 and then it is pitch dark, so everyone goes to bed quite early and gets up early to work during day light. As I am a night owl and enjoy a lie in this is going to take a bit of getting used to!!