Departure (or nearly not!)

After the traumas of the previous six months, where Sue unexpectedly lost both her parents within the space of two months, it was hard to believe that at long last we were about to depart for Africa.

We delivered Rupert to Foleys on the 16th November for packing into his container before he left for Cape Town on the 21st Nov. He was due to arrive on the 9th Dec so we needed to time our arrival to ensure we met him.

However, getting single flights to Cape Town at this time of year is not easy as it is the peak season. We wanted to use our British Airways (BA) air miles and fly direct but frustratingly BA were holding off opening the seats in the expectation they could sell them to full fare customers. Their only option on offer was to buy a normal single trip economy airfare @ £645 p.p

However, after a bit of surfing we found Qatar Airways (QA) had flights in December for just £372 p.p,  the only drawback we would need to change planes at Doha and have a stop at Joburg but at a joint saving of £546 this was a no brainer so we booked with QA.

The drawback was the only flight we could get was on the 7th December arriving Cape Town on the 8th, a little tight for meeting Rupert on the 9th but it would have to do.

Our last week in the UK was really hectic as we rushed around sorting out last minute issues and saying farewell to family and friends.

One important task was to make a will, we had been meaning  to do this for years but like a lot of people we kept putting it off, however the recent experience with Sue's parents had really brought home the importance of ensuring all was in order before we left.

We also needed to finalise a clearing agent in Cape Town to help get Rupert through customs. Foley normally ship vehicles to Walvis Bay in Namibia so they had no contacts in Cape Town. Again after a bit of surfing and some emails to Cape Town we finally settled on a company called Rohlig Grindrod, more of them in week 2 & 3.

No departure is complete without a last minute panic and ours came on our penultimate day when we suddenly realised the MOT had expired on our Citroen, which had been completely overlooked in all the turmoil of packing! Richard my oldest friend and golfing mate was going to use it and look after it, but even he would require it be legal! Needless to say getting an MOT done at very short notice is not easy but Ken's backstreet garage did the trick even though Sue's brother Mike had to take it in to fix a couple of faults on the following Monday (Thanks Mike). We even managed to get a dentist appointment for a last quick clean and brush up before a year of abuse

So nashers in tip top condition we ended the week with an early Christmas dinner in Wales with Mike and his wife Liz. It was a poignant occasion as Sue & Mike when kids had often spent holiday's here with their parents and where over the years we had often driven all the Mums & Dads out on a summer night for a meal.

This time though the weather was freezing and pouring with rain so it was very strange to think our next Christmas dinner would be in sunny Cape Town.

After this all that remained was for Mike & Liz to take us to Manchester Airport to catch our flight at 6am the next morning. After tearful goodbyes it was something of a relief to stroll into departures where we expected a quick check in but no even now we had one last hurdle to cross.

At the QA check in desk the guy asked to see our passports but when he couldn't find a visa he then asked to see our return Air tickets! Suddenly I had a sinking feeling! We explained we didn't have return air tickets as we had already shipped a vehicle to Cape Town and we would eventually be leaving South Africa (SA) by road.

This completely threw him as he insisted he could only allow us to travel providing we could demonstrate we had a return ticket in our possession otherwise we needed to get a visa! After some debate two supervisors were called and each heard our story about us shipping a vehicle and looked quizzically at our Carnet document (a sort of passport for the Landrover) which had been recently stamped by UK customs to prove we had a vehicle which had left the UK, however my worry was it didn't show it was on its way to SA so they would just have to take us at face value on that.

For a moment I was convinced that after all our hard work we were going to fall at the last hurdle and they would not let us fly, but after much whisperings and searching looks up and down they convinced themselves we were not international fugitives but just two slightly mad scousers who were going to live in a Landrover for a year and the ok was given to let us board.

At last,  Africa here we come......whether you like it or not!