Life at the Luangwa North camp

I arrived at the Luangwa North camp on June 7th. My friends Merche, Myriam originally from Spain, and Marie from France, owners of the travel agency Feeling Africa, have this safari lodge in the middle of the North Luangwa National Park in northern east Zambia, 5 hours drive from Mpika, the closest town.

The place is wonderful. One of the best times of the day is the sunrise. The camp´s dining and bar area has a deck overlooking the river and is facing to the east. These days the sunrise occurs a few minutes after 6 am. Just moments before, the horizon starts to be painted with the typical orange and pink colours that announce that the sun´s about to rise above the trees at the far end of the river. It then shows itself and iluminates the river with its blinding rays. It´s an amazing spectacle.

The camp lies on the shores of the Luangwa, where hippos and cocodriles abound. It´s environmental friendly. It functions with solar energy 100% of the time. The river is the source of all the water needs. It has 4 en-suite bungalows that serve as accommodation for customers. They stand at some 4 meters above ground level. They were built using local materials such as ebony wood, bamboo canopy and straw from the bush. The furniture such as bed frames, shelves, tables and sofa-chairs in the bungalows are beautifully designed with typical African and bush themes. They look astounding.



Two of the camp´s en-suite bungalows

Due to the expansion of the business, a new area comprised of 3 more basic bungalows and shared bathroom and shower facilities are being built at one of the far ends of the camp. The local staff are really skillful when it comes to working with wood. I´m amazed with the speed at which they´re expanding the camp´s facilities.

There´s always work to do at the camp. Maintenance of the premises and the surroundings is an ongoing activity. Two French friends of Marie are here as well. Their help's proving to be fundamental. Erik's a reputed professional in the field of tag measurement systems with great knowledge of electricity. Lillian is a diesel engines professional and world traveller. They are both making a huge a difference to get the camp ready for this season. There are also 7 employees, all employed from the local communities that surround the camp. Their names are Isaac, Brighton, Boston, Kennedy, Derek, Ibean and Alfred. There´s an 8th member of the crew named Jackson, who´s currently on vacation.

 

Without their hard work, I think this camp couldn´t exist. The days start very early, normally at 6 am, or even 5 am when we need to have breakfast ready for the customers to go on a morning sunrise safari. I´m responsible for the kitchen as the camp´s cook. I´ve always enjoyed cooking so I thought that this was the best way I could help my friends out this season. I´m happy with the daily cooking duties, although I must confess that doing it for 10-12 customers is pretty challenging. I´m also training one of the staff members. He wants to become a chef one day.

Brighton´s showing a great deal of interest in cuisine. He´s a 41-year old Zambian originally from Chifunda, a village one-hour drive from the camp, on the other sie of the river Luangwa. He´s father to 5 children, 3 boys and 2 girls, who live with his wife in Mabamba, another village 2 hours and a half drive away. He used to be a safari guide until he was in a pretty serious car crash 3 years ago. His uncle, who was drunk driving, was the one to blame for the accident. Since then, Brighton has a handicapped leg and had to give up his original profession.

Brighton´s especially good at baking bread and cake.
Every time he bakes bread, which he does in the wood oven that we have outside the kitchen, he tells me: 'Enrique, this is bush bread'. I have a lot of fun with Brighton. We listen to music while we cook or talk about random topics of Zambian life and their traditions. I sometimes hear him hum songs. On day I asked him about the song he had in between his throat and teeth. He told me that it was the Zambian National anthem. 'Stand and Sing of Zambia, Proud and Free'. A few days later he had its lyrics written down for me in both English and Nsenga, his mother tongue.

I normally prepare a dish having Brighton to observe me. If the dish is good enough, I write down the recipe for him. He told me that this helps him remember what he saw so that he can try one or two days later.  One evening, I asked him to please prepare dinner. The menu was onion soup as the starter and croquettes as the main course. I had made the mass of the croquettes a couple of days earlier; aubergine and onion. They just had to be rolled up, dipped in beaten egg and covered with breadcrumbs before being deep fried. I explained everything, prepared all the ingredients for him on the chopping board and left him on his own in the kitchen. One hour later, he called me to go check. He showed me the soup and asked me to try. It was good but had an odd taste, not the onion soup that I remembered. I then asked him where the croquettes were. He told me that he had put the mass of the croquettes in the soup. Obviously he had misunderstood or I hadn´t explained myself properly, or he pretended that he didn´t understand correctly so that he could go join his work mates to have their own dinner at the staff's premises.

I couldn´t believe it. I swallowed the sudden and slight frustration and smiled at him and said not to worry. After all it didn´t taste so bad.

That night we had soup and mass of croquettes all in one dish. Merche, Marie, Erik, Lillian and myself joked about over dinner. Anecdotes like this happens almost every day at the camp, it´s great fun, and make the days go by very fast. It´s been over two weeks since I arrived here. The first customers of the season have already being arriving. It´s becoming quite busy. And all in all a very enjoyable experience so far.

We´ve finally been able to connect to the Internet via satellite. I hope it´ll last so that I can keep feeding the blog. Enjoy for now and thanks very much for reading!