Sid Read

it's a common theme, Zimbabweans are too relaxed for revolution. The Bush War kinda put paid to that theme I thought...

I see Mugabe as the single biggest impediment to the country's recovery, as shown by the 10% growth rate through the GNU period. The economic success of the GNU period from about 2009 shows that even just an increased sharing of power by ZANU-PF produced an almost immediate turn-around in the economy. Then Mugabe "won" an electin outright & outside investment has dried up & sanctions were strengthened & better enforced. Couple that with a US dollar economy that encourages the exportation of cash by the wealthy, & you can see from where the countrys problems stem.

Things do change fast when the enviroment is right. So I remain optimistic.

Sid Read

Just a quick update on costs. I expected day-to-day costs in Zimbabwe to be about a 5th of that in the UK. This is the case but only when eating at cheap local restaurants & camping or self-catering. Eating at fancy restaurants, staying in nice hotels like the Legacy Hotel Monomatapa & renting a car proved expensive, but still very good value compared to the UK.

It would be extremely good value to back-pack around Zimbabwe like I did back in my 20's. Local bus transport between cities & towns is cheap & reliable. Camping & caravan sites & other cheap back-packer joints appear all over the countries tourists spots. Cheap, plentiful & good food abound everywhere, as does fruit & vegetables!

Maize now grows on road verges all over the edge of Harare. Talking to the locals suggests this maize is free for anyone who wants it. There is certainly a lot of poverty in Harare but there is very little hunger.

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How did you organise your camping?

(Coronation site in Harare? Just Byo?)

Costs?

Hire camper van/tent?

Any suggested cheap air ticket sources?

Sid Read

Basically drove around with a tent in case anywhere we hoped to stay was busy. We did not visit Coronation Park but would do next time because good food & high speed wi-fi is now available at the Cresta Lodge hotel very near to Coronation Park.

Camping was US$10 a night for two at Bulawayo, something similar at Great Zimbabwe. A cottage at Great Zimbabwe cost US$60 per night with room for at least 2 couples. As well as a night in the tent we used a bungalow at Bulawayo for US$40 which was the most comfortable night we spent for such a small expense A cottage at Matopos cost US$100 but we got a discount for having to move away from some vile, drunken boers.

Most of the best hotels will offer a discount for anything more than a single night. We got discounts at both Monomatapa & at the Cresta Sprayview in Vic Falls but were asked not to publicise the prices. Suffice to say you can save at least 10% on every advertised pricing.

We hired a 4x4 which was the single most expensive endevour because on some days the car sat outside our lodge or campsite costing us US$100 per day. There is no way I'd pay this in future & I'd prefer actually buy a car then sell it at the ends of the trip than pay US$100 a day for a car that isn't being used!

Flights are a drag now. We need direct, Air-Zimbabwe flights resumed urgently! We flew with Kenya Airways via Nairobi. The flights are awkwardy timed with a long 4 hour lay over in Nairobi. But the only full flight was the one out to Nairobi, all the others had plenty of space to stretch out or grab a window seat. Flights were about £600.

Hope that helps.

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Glad you had a nice time.
Many thanks for the info Sid.

Sid Read

Sorry if I didn't make it clear, we had an absolutely fantastic time! But in four weeks & with only ten days travelling round, we barely scratched the surface of what Zimbabwe has to offer the traveller!

Things would be different living there & I guess I'd have to admit that I'd be more eager to head down permanently if the economy were doing better.

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Currently, life is difficult for most Zimbabweans, but an eventual change of govt might be beneficial.
If you want to know about the state of the UK economy, try this 40 minute presentation by a Cambridge professor. (Zim might be worth risking - timing!)

uk_grenada

Can i as someone with definite knowledge of the area, but all of it theorhetical add a few pence worth? Im white, born in britain, married for decades to a lady from the caribbean, with grown up mixed children, and i now spend time living in the tropics, with times in the uk and elsewhere. Britain is racist, Zimbabwe is racist, everywhere is flipping racist but its pretty generic, i work on the basis that a proportion of any race hates other races, and typically hates one or 2 more than the others eg indian vs african. Actually i find the caribbean the least racist of anywhere so far. IMHO Zimbabwes problem is it has mad leadership, it has repeatedly thrown out the baby with the bathwater, losing expertise and knowledge for the sake of mad politics, and while it may evade the downward spiral, its going to need regime change and an anti corruption agenda.

scot47

The LEAST racist place I have lived and worked in was Zambia - at the time of the "Chimurenga" South of the Zambezi. My experience with those from south of the great river was that both blacks and whites were racist and hostile to strangers. That was definitely NOT the case with the majority of Zambians who were open and friendly.

Gordon Barlow

Me too. We came to this Island with a two-year-old son, intending to stay the standard three years; but the mixture of races and nationalities was so stress-free that we stayed. The Caribbean is the perfect place for racially-mixed families, from my observation. Of course race is only one of several exclusivity hang-ups; even the Caribbean has some hang-ups in respect of nationality and (in some places) religion. In Cayman, a "mixed marriage" is between a family-bloodline Caymanian and a foreigner. Colour is not a factor. I wonder if it's the same in Grenada.

I have cousins in Zimbabwe - white people - who have never (to me) voiced any racial prejudice. The government confiscated their farm, and they're naturally made about that, but they don't seem to make a racial issue out of it, I'm glad to say.

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Seem to be protests in Zim recently.

dfjordan

That's normal, isn't it ?