A new era

I hope I’m able to say it now, that I’m not tempting fate. But no, I can’t help it, it has to come out: we’ve bought our new lodge! We still need to sort out the last details with the government, but we now have a contract with the current owner of Ntchisi Forest Lodge.

Signing the agreement was a rather ‘African’ experience. After five months of negotiating (and waiting!), we met with the owner at another lodge by Lake Malawi and were seated in a cozy little grove of lemon trees with views over the lake in beautiful hand-carved chief’s chairs (a specialty of Malawi), and surrounded by noisy and curious – and increasingly daring (scarily so, considering the size of their canines) – baboons, who seemed quite interested in the negotiations taking place below them.

Even more social was the resident pet vervet monkey, who evidently aspired to become a lawyer as he tried to govern the proceedings. While the rest of us could finally begin to relax and feel satisfied with reaching an agreement, the vervet got so excited about the contract we were about to sign that he jumped onto the laptop and nearly deleted the whole thing! A bit too interfering for my liking, that monkey.

But, though it’s still hard to believe, we are now lodge owners! We officially take over Ntchisi Forest Lodge in October but will be spending a fair bit of time there in the meantime, starting renovations (which are sorely needed), replacing the roof and building a new house for ourselves, amongst other bits and bobs that need doing. And of course we’ll be doing trail clearing in the forest to create walking and mountain biking tracks. Oh, what a drag! (sense the sarcasm there?)

And so all the uncertainty and frustration comes to an end. Well, that is probably incredibly naïve, but at least we’ll now be faced with a different set of challenges, such as the green mambas we’ll find when removing the old roof, the termite-infested wood that most likely carries the building, and the bureaucracy involved in getting the final details settled about the necessary permits and licences to operate the lodge. But all that seems like a laugh now that we’ve got our lodge; it’s the fun bit ahead now.