Flying to the Zambezi

[Lancs_lad]

Options please!!

We are hoping to go out next August for 3 ish weeks. We have looked at flying to Lusaka with ethiopian and Kenyan. The flights have just been released and the cheapest is £1000. Has anyone flown recently at this time ish? What did you pay? Will the prices come down? What other options (we want to take our boats)?

Cheers

Edit: Just done another search and Lufthansa are coming in at £890. Anyone experience kayaks with these?

[eview]

You should definitely be able to get flights for cheaper than that, some of the comparison sites, like lastminute or skyscanner are often better than going direct to the airline. I've spent quite a lot of time over the last few months looking for flights to Livingstone and Lusaka and the cheapest I found a while back was about £550 to Lusaka with Ethiopean. I know it's not the time you're going, but there are still flights with Kenyan for £600 on lastminute leaving next week for the Zambezi Festival (Plug Plug! https://www.facebook.com/#!/event.php?eid=182503965118057), it's not normally the way, but it looks like waiting until a bit closer to the time could be the answer for getting good deals.

Those airlines both have good baggage limits and we managed to get some huge oars on a flight recently with Ethiopian no worries, so I'm pretty sure you'd be ok with boats, or another good option is waiting until Virgin have a sale, you can get a flight to Joburg for about £500 when they do, then up to Livingstone with 1time for about £100, you're guaranteed no hassle with boats then and nicer than a 5 hour bus journey from Lusaka!

Happy searching!

Evie

[KenHy]

That time last year Ethiopian were about £400 cheaper then that. They did manage to mislay my boat and paddles for about a week though. (It was the fault of the luggage handlers in Heathrow, they wouldn't let me bring it to oversized luggage myself and they left it just inside the door into the luggage handling area :/ )

If I was going again I'd go through J'burg, even if it costs more. Seems more reliable for gear and much less hassle. You'd end up spending a good bit between bus tickets, taxis and accommodation in Lusaka.

[Elements]

Hi
Last time I flew out to the Zam, I went with Emirates to Jo'burg (Emirates takes kayaks less than 3m) then got a internal flight to Victoria falls with South African Airways http://www.flysaa.com

Other option if you can find a decent priced flight is to fly Virgin to Jo'burg as they take kayaks then do the short hop up, or fly http://www.flysaa.com the entire way.

Benefit of going via Jo'burg then to Vic Falls is not having to do the bus journey from Lusaka. Last time I did that one it was a journey for the brave but that was 6 years ago and it may have got better.

Hope that helps

Rob

[sarajames]

Just bought a pretty last minute ticket for £620 with Kenya Airways. Heading out for the festival. Pretty fricking excited.

[raffanjr]

Been going there the last three seasons or so... And Ethiopian airlines is definitely the way forwards never paid more than £600 though, however this is pretty last minute being that its less than a month away and have always booked much further in advance so maybe it's more now.

Have fun out there it's going to be epic fun

if you need any advice/ travel tips let me know

jack

[SwamP]

Air France???....oh wait that from NZ to England....

[Lancs_lad]

It looks like we will just have to wait. Ill have to have the discipline not to spend the money that is burning a hole in my pocket!!

[MattC]

Sorry to hijack this a little... I'm heading out at Christmas and hope to spend a week or so on the river.

But does anyone know much about hiring boats out there and more specifically boats for tall people...e.g. Project 64, Orbit Fish, Monstar, big Rockstar etc.

Secondly, does anyone have experience take paddles on a BA flight since their new policy?

Cheers,
Matt

[raffanjr]

thezambezi.com is pretty much your only option now, but they have loads of boats so they should have something to fit you

[Scumbag_Scout]

Booked my flights for the festival, can't wait now!

[Lancs_lad]

Thanks for the advice. The favourable option (least stressfull) looks like virgin to Jo'Burg then 1time to Livingstone. I cant find any baggage policy on the 1time website. What are peoples experiences with boats with 1time?

Thanks

[eview]

I'm pretty sure that 1time are ok, you'll just have to pay a bit extra, but it's not too expensive, R25 (about £2) per extra KG, so £30 if you've got a boat that weighs 15kg on top of your regular 20 kg allowance. I'll be able to let you know for certain in a couple of weeks though!

[Lancs_lad]

How did it go with 1time and a kayak?

[Scumbag_Scout]

Emirates now fly from Dubai to Lusaka. They give you 32kg limit and will definetly take boat.

I flew with Ethiopean Airlines and they give you 2 x 23kg bags! Loads of space! I would fly Emirates though... much better service.

[Lancs_lad]

Ive looked into that route, how was the bus journey?

Ideally I would prefer the via south africa route.

[Scumbag_Scout]

When I was out there a bunch of South Africans who flew up and their journey wasn't incident free, can't remember who they flew with.

The bus journey is 'interesting', you can try get a stand-by flight from Lusaka to Livingstone which is about $50 and a lot quicker than the bus, but depends on how much luggage you've got, if no boat do it, if boat you might have to blag it.

I took a late night bus, it's quite expensive to get the taxi to the bus station, haggle it down as much as you can. The bus is cheap so pay for 'Business Class' if there is one... this is a bus of almost European standards but I wouldn't want to use the toilet! If you take the standard one, there is no toilet and it's a 7 hour journey! On the way back I had no option but to take the standard one with africa-belly, was not a pleasant journey. Don't expect much sleep, no AC, dusty roads and their horns (which they use a lot!) are extremely loud. Ear plugs would be a good idea!

[raffanjr]

In the past I have taken both the bus and flown with due consideration I prefer to fly and this is why: The bus option is good and technically cheaper and the first time I enjoyed how "african" it was however it is also very uncomfortable and after a 14 hour flight not ideal. Also money wise it is not *that* much cheaper the bus ticket generally costs in region of K100,000 (approx $20) and the taxi from the bus to the airport will cost you at least K100,000 if not more, so by that point you are looking at $40 to take the bus. You can get a pro flight standby for around $50 and departure tax which works out at about $11, it is worth noting that the standby flight prices are not fixed and you talk these down too last year I paid $20 (super lucky one off blag).

This year I will personally be paying the extra 20 bucks to avoid taking the bus