Missing the Drop

Getting a bus was something of a lottery. I think we ended up with the Anthill Mob's charabanc; either that or it came from the set of Mad Max. Anyway, I'll hit the highlights.....

The day didn't sort of start too well, tailed off a bit in the middle, and the less said about the end the better. The good news was that we got there early enough to claim our (reserved) seats. This was only after having had to argue with the 'conductor' over an extra fee for our bags. Needless to say these fees don't actually exist, but we managed to come to an 'agreement'. A few minutes prior to departure there was an almighty scramble as people looked to secure a last minute seat at a knockdown price. Anyone would have thought a British department store had gone in to administration on something. However, as soon as the clock ticked round to 6am, the bussie was on his way, regardless of who and what was in/on the vehicle.

As the day wore on it became increasingly obvious that we were falling behind schedule, in part due to the four fatal-looking crashes that we passed in transit. So much so in fact that we didn't arrive at the border town until two hours late. This meant that we couldn't make it to the border before it closed - not that this deterred anyone in the one horse town that we'd terminated at of offering us a (vastly over-priced) taxi. The 'conductor' was in on the game too, as he kept trying to push us towards someone who was offering 'best price'. To cut a long story short, after we'd manage to establish that we weren't interested in a taxi due to the border being closed, we ended up getting over-charged for something that was allegedly an hotel room. It was late, dark and we'd both had enough and I have to admit that I couldn't be bothered to argue the last GBP2.50 that we were getting fleeced. (Which is quite a lot compared to the 80 pence I refused to pay in Morocco, but that's another story.......). Oh the fun of it all.

Not too surprisingly, we were up extremely early the next morning to get the short cab ride down to the border, and walked over the bridge into Malawi.....................