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Cost of Diesel: Er, what diesel?
Currency: Zim Dollars, anything between 500 to the pound or 25000. Depends which market you use!
24th March
Getting into Zim was surprisingly easy. You fill in the forms, pay your money and off you go. It wasn’t the easiest border but certainly wasn’t the hardest by a long shot. We did see some amusing posters at the border post. The Zimbabwean government have worked out how to solve their horrific inflation (currently running at 1500%) problems. Simply knock of the end 2 zeros from all the notes. They call it the “Zeroes to Heroes” campaign. Apparently this will solve all their worries. It is really rather scary how some people can be this ignorant yet still be in power. A can of coke costs 4000 Zim dollars. At the official exchange rate this is about £2. At the unofficial (although this is the rate that everyone uses) rate 4000 zim dollars is about 15p! The government forces all foreign investors to use the official rate when bringing in goods or forex. Once the money is in the government re-sell it at the unofficial rate, thus making themselves huge sums of money. Noczim is the official fuel company of Zim. Unfortunately they have no fuel because the official responsible for procuring and providing it simply sell it on the black market, again making huge sums of money.
The National Bank of Zim will give you 500 Zim dollars to the £. The guy on the street will give you 25000, which pretty much says it all. Even the immigration official told me to use the black market because he didn’t want me to get ripped of by the bank!!
Here’s the thing though. All the Zimbabweans we have met have been really friendly. We thought there might be some animosity to us as we are British. This hasn’t been the case at all. The officials, police, locals are all really friendly. No-one shakes there fist at you as you drive around and to be honest life here seems pretty normal. Obviously it isn’t and I sure once you dig a little deeper you’d see what it rally going on. However, the sad thing is that the people are great, the country is beautiful and the future should be bright. It seems to be the same here as in most African countries, vampire politicians are bleeding the country dry to the detriment of the people. Mugabe can say all he wants about Blair this and Bush that. However, it is through his ineptitude that the country is starving and that foreign investors are staying away.
We are now staying at a lovely campsite in Bulawayo. It is set in about 12 acres of landscaped garden and also normal bush. It is a really nice setting. They also have a huge pond / stream system that winds around the garden. This has got to be one of the nicest campsites we’ve been to.
Our campsite in Bulawayo
26th March
We left Bulawayo and headed to a place called Antelope Park. This is a lion breeding program that you are allowed to look around. We camped in a lovely campsite on the shore a lake and this morning we went out with the researchers as they fed the lion cubs. You are allowed to come into the enclosures as they are feeding and it was really cool. The cubs get really close to you and look very cute, although they’d probably remove your hand if you tried to stroke them.
After this we headed to the Great Zimbabwean Monument and this is where we started to have problems.
We had discovered that as foreigners you are allowed to spend any currency except USD. You are allowed to spend Zim dollars, however you must have a bank receipt to show that you got the money legally. Now seeing as the official rate is about a 60th of the black market rate this isn’t an option. So we are left in Zim with enough local currency to pay for things but not being able to. Therefore we have decided to head south and into SA. It is a shame because we both really like Zim and will definitely come back. Hopefully when Mugabe leaves the country will get back on its feet. It has so much to offer that I really hope it does.
