Welcome back!

Well, we have finally got back to Zim to start up more fun and exciting adventures for ’08 … but there are some changes that we are excited to tell you all about. This will be the LAST post on zimbabwebound.blogspot.com. The month of January has been a time of GREAT change for zimbabwebound.com; instead of having a website and a blogsite we have combined them both on zimbabwebound.com. Here you can explore all our blogs from the past as well as all our new adventures; you can also see the things that interest us in Zim and you even get a chance to chip in no matter where you are in the world. We look forward to seeing you all on zimbabebound.com

Wow … it’s been a LONG time

I write a sincere apology to our blogger friends for not updating you for soooooo long. Please let me explain … Jodi, Gabi and I have been VERY busy trying to get back to OZ for Christmas. To cut a long and VERY painful story short, we arrived back in Brisbane last Saturday night and we have been having an absolute blast catching up with all of our friends and family back in Brisbane. My goodness, the effort it took to get to OZ even after getting Gabi’s holiday visa and tickets was mindblogging; but I don’t have the space on this blog to tell you all about it … shame hey????

Anyway, thank you so much for the time we have spent together blogging this year; I have really enjoyed sharing our experiences with you … Unfortunately there is a lot on the plate here in OZ, so I don’t think I will get much of a chance to update until the new year … I hope you all have a VERY Merry Christmas, and an absolutely sensational New Years Eve … look forward to blogging again in the new year.

We now have sprinklers

What a great day it was when we finally got the sprinklers up and running. Unfortunately, the funding going to Willow Park staff has stopped and YFC need to find ways in which to utilize the staff they have more effectively ... one way was with the watering of all the vegetable patches. Previously, four women would spend 4 days per week watering the vegetable patches; they can be used in other areas now that the sprinklers are in action.

Speaking at Falcon College

The other Wednesday night I was invited to speak at an evening Praise and Worship service at one of the most hosh posh private boys’ boarding schools in Zimbabwe. Falcon College is about 30 minutes past the Willow Park turn-off heading south towards the border. It was a great turnout from the boys … there is about 350 boys who board at Falcon and about 150 turned up for the service. It was a great night to spend with the boys and being able to share a few words with them. I think one of the things that stuck out to me the most was how polite these guys were, after the service a majority of them came up and thanked me and shook my hand … I don’t think that would happen back in OZ. Sorry I don’t have any picci’s of this event … you will just have to trust me.

Because Falcon is so far out of Bulawayo, Jodi, Gabi, Heather (a friend of ours) and I decided to spend the night at Willow Park and do just a little bit more work the following morning. Our task was to fit 20 mattress covers to 20 foam mattresses that were donated by an Ozzie couple earlier this year. These beds are looking fantastic now; when we first arrived the campers slept in a “W” position because the framework of the beds weren’t done properly and a lot of the mattress’s were old and waterlogged because of the leaks in the thatching. They look a million buck’s now (not using Zim currency), and once we are finish they will look even better (the only thing to do now is to repaint where we have welded extra supports on the base of the beds and buy some more wood for the bed heads).

Milking Willow Park Dry

It’s not what you think … I promise!!!!! I have the pictures to prove it.


I know this seems a little weird … having a couple of bottles of milk pictured on the blog … what does milk have to do with Willow Park????? But I promise you, this is no ordinary milk … this is Willow Park milk.

Let me tell you the story … Willow Park has had a couple of dairy cows for a few years and until just last week, all the milk was being turned into sour milk and then the curds where collected to make a side dish for the mealie meal. This side dish was produced for the girls’ who live at Samkele, which is a short term orphanage for abused girls, that is run at Willow Park. Unfortunately, the product used to help stimulate the cow to produce milk is getting REALLY REALLY expensive and YFC were finding it hard to continue to fund this milking project … until the other week.

Now, people who know me, know that I have a little thing for excel spreadsheets and after creating a few worksheets and looking at the stats derived from some pretty complex formula and algorithms we were able to work out that it would be cheaper and more economical to start to sell the milk. So that is what we are now doing … this “milk project” is now a self funding project and it creates enough revenue to purchase it’s own milk stimulant, cover the veterinary bills as well as purchase kapenta (really small and really smelly dried fish), which is used instead of the curds as a side dish for the girls mealie meal.

Who would have ever thought that milk could be soooooooo exciting!!!!!!!!!

More Work at Willow Park

Yes, that is right … believe it or not Jodi and I have been doing more work at Willow Park. We packed our bags and ventured out for a night where we were able to help with the final touches of painting the dorms. It is great to finally have all the dorms painted and looking just soopa. We are hoping that next year we will be able to get all the asbestos roofs off and re-roof with thatch; then that will be about it for the dorms … except for building more … maybe having each dorm with viabrating massage beds … what about ensuites with private sauna’s and spa’s … I am sure we could add an extra couple of levels so that each dorm has it’s own entertaining area with pool table and plasma TV. There is so much is planned for this place … I look forward to sharing some more ventures in the near future.

Hotel Muller now has vacancies

Yes this is true, we are now have vacancies at Hotel Muller … I am thinking of making it easier for people to book and start selling the room on wotif.com??????

Not long after Robert and Elizabeth had left, we had just enough time to remake the bed before more friends checked in. Stacie and Adrian visited us for a couple on nights on their way from the UK back to OZ. It was great to catch up with them and find out about their time spent working in the UK and all the traveling they did around Europe and other places. To be honest I don’t have enough room on this blog site or quite enough time to mention all the places they have visited … I think the only place they haven’t ventured to is a 1 x 1 metre patch of sand in the middle of the Mediterranean which is only accessible during low tide and when the moon is full.