Into town after breakfast to buy stores with Nikki - I bought a delicious red apple (had almost forgotten what they taste like) - and search for fabrics, Kelvin explained that our new itinerary would take us straight to Victoria Falls and then give us more time in Chobe National Park in Botswana.
Very mixed emotions about Lusaka, which feels neither African nor western. Frustrated by huge shops with little in them, and then mostly South African products, shops owned by Indian Africans but worked by black Africans, who are not their own bosses despite President Kenneth Kaunda being dedicated to Africa for Africans. (The founding president of Zambia, and its subsequent dictator, Kaunda ruled for 27 years from Zambia's independence from the British Empire in 1964 until 1991, when he lost power in a landslide election.) Frustrated too by the roaming hands in the streets, dipping into pockets. But laughable African too: the Rooster Bar doesn't have chicken, and you can't take soft drink bottles out of the shop or drink them at the counter!
I have no right to criticise how the people dress, and if they want to adopt western dress, but I find the women far less attractive wearing "our" clothes than the colourful curves of women in West Africa. Printed cottons emphasize their sensual carriage while western clothes detract from them.
Having left Markus and Myrta to catch the train, and enjoy a break from us, we drove out of Lusaka, journeying west and south on undulating roads through expanses of yellow flowering pyrethrum, and sunflowers.
Brief but heavy rain forced us to batten down the canvas. Made an early camp and everyone fed with hamburgers by 6.50pm.
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