Route Markers

Previously I wrote about how I walked just about everywhere in Zambia, including to and from the school where I was working. But I didn’t include the photos of that route, so this post will give you an idea of what that daily walk was like.

Since school started at 8:30, and the walk could take up to an hour, this meant that it was necessary to be out the door around 7:30. The good part about that was that it was still fairly cool as the sun was just starting to heat things up for the day.

The first part of the journey was down this sandy side road, until reaching the corner where this partially completed house was a guide guidepost for finding the turn back later in the day.

Upon turning onto the main road, the surface changed dramatically, as did the traffic, as large trucks would come whizzing past often. Thankfully, normally we walked on the other side of the drainage ditch, only vying for space with the trucks when we wanted to hail a taxi.

And, for the trip to school, we were only on this road for about 10 minutes (when going to town we stayed on it all the way there). The next step was to take a right, and cross the road (nowhere near as daunting as in India) at the aforementioned water tank.

We then were on a quieter road, though it did have its traffic, including folks who liked to go very fast, thus getting slowed down on various speed bumps along the way. And our next right turn could easily be identified by the car wash on the corner.

After this, we had another decent walk before coming to our next right turn at a corner that for some reason that we never discovered, could be flooded by running water despite it being dry season. Of course, both of these last two roads, not being main roads, were not quite as well paved as this shot close to that sometimes water turn shows.

We then had a short jog before a left turn that was just before the sign above the road that sent folks on their way as they headed to the airport hopefully after a wonderful stay.

At this point, we had another good walk before getting to the final stages of the trip. And this turn was marked with a sign for Gloria’s Bed and Breakfast, easy to remember things that have the same name as a friend.

Although, by turning right again, we headed on the opposite direction. And here things changed again as there as a little bridge that went over a swampy area where by then end of my stay had me being accompanied by a chorus of frogs. They were singing so much, they almost sounded like woodpeckers sometimes.

At this point, we just had to head past the barbershop to our next right which was onto the road where the school was located.

So, while maybe not as memorable as “turning left at oblivion and right at the cow” in India, but noting the route markers during the walk to the school on first day proved to be helpful in the coming weeks.