 | | Suddenly The World Stopped...South Africa on 23 March, due to the COVID 19 pandemic, a national lockdown was announced that would start on 27 March 2020. | | 2020-12-08 | 10 min read | |  | |
January 2020: Just a couple months before the lockdown we had been sitting around a campfire at a bush house situated on the Zambezi River near the Zimbabwe/Botswana border. It had been an awesome annual family road trip, this time around we were joined by some good friends. It was a time to rest, go fishing, braai (BBQ) every night, enjoy the game and bush while reflecting on what had been a busy year. On the last night, we had a visitor… a magnificent Pels Fishing Owl arrived and perched in the branches of a massive tree that is a feature of the house, an incredible sighting for any bush trip! Maybe it was a sign… One of our friends commented about what was happening in China regarding this strange virus and that the Chinese were dropping down in the streets, “like flies” he said. He added; “They are building a massive hospital in 3 days” to which another friend said “I wonder if we could ever do that here in Africa?” The comment was followed by “well the virus is in China, we should be OK..” Little did we know... | |
| | " We left Zimbabwe on January the 13th. It would be 11 months before stepping foot into this magnificent country again. The world as we knew it was about to change…." We started our business in 1998. Tourism has its ups and downs and you have to be ready for all eventualities be it weather, politics, terrorism (9/11), bust airlines, Alex Crawford from Sky News telling the world Vic Falls was going to run out of water and the occasional pandemic. We have had a pandemic before and I think we were all thinking that this one was just another version of the SARS Virus. Quick and dirty, nothing really to worry about long term. March 23rd our fears were confirmed, South Africa and the rest of Southern Africa would go into one of the worlds harshest lockdowns mainly brought on by the fear that regional health care facilities would not be able to cope with the health tsunami that was about to hit us. On March 27th I sat outside and served up a brunch for myself and Natalie. You could hear a pin drop. Johannesburg, a metropolis of close to 5.8 million people was suddenly silent - not a plane, not a police siren, no road noise from traffic, not even gun shots! Someone had switched off the “urban volume button”. It was a surreal experience. But it was only going to be for a few weeks and then we would be able to get back to work and life, we hoped…. |  |
| We decided to hunker down and to enjoy the time at home and do some of the things we wanted to do but couldn’t due to our hectic lifestyles. The South African Lockdown was basically a forced incarceration with the exception of being able to shop for groceries only. OK, we could live with that for three weeks. The pandemic had not even really in fact hit us. On March 23rd we had only 38 cases and the first fatality occurred on April 5th, surely we would get over it and get on with our lives in 3 weeks? The rest is history and all of us have the stories of hardship and bear the wounds of having our businesses ended abruptly and our freedoms and pleasure taken away. | |
| Fast forward to December 3rd 2020 – Return to Victoria Falls, ZimbabweWith a COVID-19 negative certificate in hand and breaking news of the roll out of the vaccine foremost on my mind, not to mention the relaxed restrictions and the re-opening of our borders, I decided to get up there to the place we love and promote. On December 3rd I was lucky to be on board the inaugural Joburg to Vic Falls direct flight. The route has re-opened and has been quickly taken up by FastJet. Having been around the block a few times, FastJet have taken the plunge and are the first to schedule this flight and we wanted to be sure that we were the first specialized tour operator to be on that flight and meet with our key partners up in Zimbabwe.
A busy schedule of meetings with the key players in the industry up there followed and I am happy to report that all the stunning properties we recommend are COVID-19 ready, client ready and all looking good. Maintenance teams have been busy keeping everything polished and in full working order. Food is well stocked, beer and wine are chilling, just waiting for thirsty adventurers plus the annual rains have arrived and the game in the area is plentiful. I managed to get some time on the river to throw a fly for tiger but sadly this visit was over a near full moon and a rainy cold front hit the area which does not bode well for luring a tiger fish onto your fly. And as for Victoria Falls, guess what Alex Crawford, it did not dry up it is flowing and rising every day! | | | |
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| The Future Due to the lockdown we had to mothball Maplanga Africa to a level where we retained a few key members of the team. We never closed fully and we were always available to our clients during this period. I am optimistic that we are at last seeing light at the end of the pandemic tunnel. A vaccine is here, and many other vaccines are coming soon including the Russian Sputnik V! (I wonder if this is the one that will be shoved into my arm at minus one million degrees Celsius!) It’s now up to our valued clients to decide to come back to Victoria Falls and the KAZA region as it slowly awakens and shakes off this 10 month hibernation. COVID-19 testing is available, accommodation rates are extremely good and regular flights are happening. As we move into a new post COVID-19 era with approved vaccines that are being rolled out, we really need your support going forward. We are not a faceless Online Travel Agent that fails to respond and support clients during a crisis. We were there for our clients, finding ways to get them back home, deferring bookings and communicating, always. We made things happen when the borders were shutting down and the chaos ensued. We are a “real people business” and we have “been there and definitely done that” when it comes to Southern Africa travel. We are highly experienced in the areas we market to our clients and we can handle the complexities that come with travel in Africa. It’s what we did during the COVID-19 crash and it’s what we will do going forward. | | I would like to thank the following partners that enabled us to make the last three days happen |  | |  |  | |  | |
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