JodockWorldTravel

December 25, 2024

Another perfect morning here in Botswana, and none of us is anxious to leave.  We’re wondering why we can’t just fly home from here tomorrow instead of Johannesburg.  The staff have been fantastic, the food is delicious, and the location is picture perfect.

Pam, Ken, and Karen soak up as much of the beautiful backyard slope as we can while Aunt Dori finishes up her packing. An impala has breached security and a couple of kudu graze outside the fence adding to the ambiance. Before we know it, it’s time to say good-bye to the wonderful staff at Chobe Chilwero and head to the airport.

It’s less than a ten-minute drive to the Kasane International Airport. Aunt Dori is shocked there could be an international airport smaller than her own Dayton Airport, but it is.  When we check in our ticket says we’re leaving out of Gate 4, but when we look at the leader board it shows every single flight leaving out of Gate 6.

Not to worry!  We clear securityand discover all of the gates are the same exact place anyway!  There are no agent counters, no coffee shops, no TV monitors; just an old vending machine that doesn’t take credit cards.  It’s very “Joe Vs. the Volano-“esque.

When the plane arrives, there is no formal announcement, no boarding call, no lining up by zones.  Everyone in the place just quietly gets up, makes their way to the door and quietly walk the tarmac to find their seat on the plane.  You can see what kind of chaos that must have created! Being the good sheep we are, we follow suit.  There’s just the slightest amount of anxiety about what awaits us.  A storm has been brewing while we waited, the pilot warns of a “rough” ride and worse weather in Johannesburg, we’re told someone will meet us there, but we have no idea who or where.  We’re hoping the luggage we left behind will find us, but the confusion of the hotel staff when we left it has not instilled confidence, and we’re very curious about our Christmas dinner – one document says we’ll be treated to something special; another says we’re on our own.

Paul meets us on the other side of baggage claim, grabs a luggage trolly and escorts across the airport’s driveway to the Intercontinental Hotel situated on the other side.  Check-in is a breeze, but there is initial confusion over our bags and dinner.  Paul doesn’t believe the bags have been delivered and when we express concern that they need to find us before our planes leave tomorrow, Paul has the not-so-good sense to tell us “Good luck getting them delivered today, and on Christmas no less!” He also knows nothing about our dinner arrangements.  After some back and forth he agrees to call Regence (the cruise company responsible for our bags) and Karen and I check our “Find My” app to see where the bag tags we’ve inserted in our suitcases say they are.  

Hmmm…interesting…both of our apps say our bags are with us.  This tells us they are somewhere in this building.  We share the news with a clearly flustered Paul who checks with the Porter who knows exactly where our bags are.  We are reunited minutes later.  Dinner’s a different story.  Paul gets through to Regence, but is speaking completely incoherent sentences (he blames it on a chiropractic treatment he received recently) and says he can’t understand a thing the person on the other end of the line is saying, so he hands the phone to Pam.  The Regence rep is certain plans have been made for us.  He will check with his colleague and get back to the hotel and they will let us know where to be when.

When the clock is inching towards 6:30 p.m. and there’s still no word, Pam calls downstairs.  Oh yea!, they say, you’re dining with us tonight.  Just call down and make a reservation. Not what we’d hoped for or expected on this Christmas night, but ok.  And it ended up being one of the best meals of the trip.

Ken ordered Ostrich (he’s also had impala and kudu this week), the hotel provided party favors and party hats, and a good time was had by all. No one leaves until late tomorrow night, so we’re all looking forward to sleeping in and taking our time getting out of here.