I often tell people not to worry too much about things going wrong on their trips: after all, those make the best stories. Not that this is much comfort at the time. Three years after one of my worse treks, I still groan as I remember some of the worse parts of our overland camping trip from Zimbabwe to Kenya. We met wonderful people and observed truly amazing wildlife but we have yet to forget (or forgive) the tour operator that provided the Safari from Hell.

Making an overland journey to Africa can be accomplished, for most people, only with the assistance of tour operators. And so, it was with great expectations of a trouble-free trip that we purchased a three-week overland tour of East Africa from Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe to Nairobi, Kenya in 2007. The most important reasons for choosing an overland tour was to have a knowledgeable guide, safe and reliable transportation, and someone to arrange game drives and tours.

An overland tour is simply a tour in a truck outfitted with passenger seats, a camp kitchen and storage space for weeks of food, water, tents, mattresses and everyone’s gear. The great thing about this type of rig is that it doesn’t need to stay on marked highways or roads and so can go off to where villages and game preserves are located.

This was our second such overland trip in Africa so we had a pretty good idea of what to expect: long drives on back roads, usually unpaved and consisting of washboard gravel; bush camps with no facilities; limited access to modern conveniences such as communications, media and western toilets/showers; but also visits to villages untouched by modern life; and more wild animals than you have the right to hope for.

We booked our two overland trips one after the other for a total of five weeks but, fearing that it might be too much with one company, we decided to hedge our bets by changing tour provider after two weeks with the first. We paid more for the second and what we got for our extra money was: 1. a guide so unprepared and inexperienced that, if this hadn’t been Africa, it would have been laughable, 2. a whole new standard of horrid transportation, and 3. a lot more danger as our tour sub-contracted with an unfit safari provider.

Clueless Charles, Our Guide

We hadn’t left our group’s meeting place when Charles first demonstrated his talents. On our first morning, our departure was delayed because someone had misplaced the keys to the passenger area of the truck. But, because this would be too embarrassing to admit, no one told us what was going on. The hours dragged on while the dozen or so tour clients sat around drinking coffee wondering what had happened to our early departure time.

Our first stop that day took place half an hour after we’d left the campground: across the border in Zambia at a grocery store to stock up for the first week. Two hours later, we were finally rolling on the highway towards our first destination. We had to make a campground some seven or eight hours away and we only had five hours of daylight left meaning we’d be setting up camp in the dark.

Overland trucks, I may have failed to mention, aren’t really retrofitted with passenger comfort in mind: the shocks aren’t great, the seats are just okay, and there weren’t seat belts so people were being bounced two, three feet up into the air with every major bump.

And just to add to our sense of discomfort about our guide’s knowledge, Charles asked to borrow our guide books “just to see what they say about the area we’re in.”

Read more about Charles and all the fun we had on our three-week overland tour in next week’s Baby Boomers Traveling.

[View with PicLens]

You can get daily Travel News and Tips and Baby Boomer Fast Facts through your Facebook page by going to dorisgallan. You may also follow on Twitter by clicking here: BoomerTraveling.

If you would like to subscribe to this blog, click on the envelope next to the word ‘subscribe’ at the top of the left-hand menu. You will receive notification by e-mail every time this blog is updated. I solemnly swear to never sell, trade or give away your information to anyone!