Due to Lufthansa's incredible incompentence and inconsistency, we were delayed for 25 hours and had to spend a whole day in Frankfurt. When we eventually arrived in Johannesburg, the Drifters tour had been unable to wait for us, forcing us to fly to Hoedspruit to catch up with the tour group. We were then taken to the Drifters Bushveld camp deep inside the African bush, where accommodation was in small tents. Our guide Kurt and the nine other people in our group arrived later in the evening and we enjoyed a great meal in front of the fire.

Day 1 - June 27

To be on the safe side, we left early for Gardermoen and checked in quite early. Our Lufthansa flight to Frankfurt was supposed to leave at 1850, which would give us around one hour in Frankfurt to change to the Johannesburg plane, leaving at 2200.

About one hour before departure, however, we were informed that our plane would not be leaving until 1925. This made us slightly nervous, although, there should still be sufficient time to catch the Johannesburg plane. Unfortunately, our plane was further delayed, and in the end it didn't leave until 1945. The captain announced that we would land in Frankfurt around 2140, and the airhostesses also assured us that we would reach our plane, so we were slightly relieved by that.

We did land in Frankfurt around 2140, but it seemed to take ages before we were let out of the plane. Never has departure from a plane felt slower! We were finally inside the terminal at 2150, and fortunately our flight was only a few gates away, so we ran as fast as we could over there.

The gate seemed very quiet so we ran straight to the desk to ask the woman whether we were in the right place. "Johannesburg?", I said. "I'm sorry, it left five minutes ago", she replied. We were stunned. We couldn't believe what we were hearing. According to our tickets, the plane should depart at 2200, and we thought it was standard policy to wait for passengers that were a little bit late. Obviously not so at Lufthansa. They knew we were coming, and still they left 15 minutes early!

The woman told us to go to a socalled "Travel center" at the airport where we would receive help. We did this and our tickets were rebooked on the next plane bound for Johannesburg. However, there was one problem. A rather big problem. The next plane was actually in 24 hours and it would not arrive in Johannesburg until 0750 on June 29. This was a problem because our tour of South Africa were to depart from a Johannesburg suburb at 0630, so we were bound to miss it!

It was therefore necessary for us to get in contact with the tour operator Drifters as soon as possible to explain our situation and ask whether it was possible for them to delay the tour a little bit to pick us up from Johannesburg airport. Maybe Lufthansa could assist us with this, perhaps by letting us send a telefax to Drifters? After all, this whole mess was Lufthansa's fault.

Unfortunately, this was not possible. But Lufthansa had an ingenious system to help us! Just listen to this: What they could do was to send a telex (yes, a telex - I'm not kidding!) to Lufthansa in Johannesburg. The guys in Johannesburg would then send the contents of the telex as a telefax to Drifters. Drifters could then reply by sending a telefax to Lufthansa Johannesburg, which would then send a telex to Lufthansa in Frankfurt, which would then be given to us! Simple and efficient, isn't it!?

I was really surprised that the telex was still being used. I thought it only existed in museums and antique shops. However, it appears that Lufthansa really relies on this thing for sending important messages! In retrospect I sort of wonder what the reply would have been if we had asked to make a phone call to Drifters. Maybe something like: "No, that's not possible. But, we can send morse signals to Lufthansa in Johannesburg, which will then light a fire at the airport and use smoke signals to send the message to Drifters...."? Or maybe rather: "No, we don't use telephones at Lufthansa, but our letter pigeons are expected back in a few days, and then....."?

Anyway, to be fair, the guy was quite helpful and I certainly don't blame on him that Lufthansa are living in the past. He booked us a room at the Steigenberger Hotel near the airport and said that we would also be given free meals tonight and tomorrow. The hotel would have a fax machine, but we would have to pay for the fax ourselves, he explained.

Finally, Lufthansa would take care of our baggage, unless there was something in it we wanted, in which case we would have access to it. They also gave away a socalled "Overnight kit" which contained everything we needed for one night (toothbrush, toothpaste, deodorant, shirt, socks, razor etc.) We found this very useful.

We arrived at the hotel around 2300 and checked in. However, the girl in the reception was not aware of the fact that we were entitled to a free meal tonight. We told her to phone Lufthansa and have it confirmed, but for some reason this was not possible. Anyway, I was now getting slightly angry with this treatment, and was about to demand getting to speak with the hotel manager when she finally backed down and gave us the necessary vouchers for the hotel restaurant.

It appeared that we could eat for 40DM each, which although the restaurant was not cheap, was more than sufficient. As a dessert we ordered almost more icecream than we could eat, just to make sure that Lufthansa would have to pay the maximum amount. Also, during the dinner we composed a teardripping fax to Drifters where we explained our current situation and our proposed solution. Now we had done everything we could and the matter was all in Drifters hands. Our only hope was that they were more flexible than Lufthansa. Time to go to bed.

Day 2 - June 28

I hardly slept at all that night, probably because I was so worried about the response of Drifters. At 0900 there was no point in staying in bed anymore, so we got up, got dressed and went down to eat some breakfast. However, first we checked whether there was a fax from Drifters for us, which there wasn't. After breakfast, the fax still had not arrived, so we went back to our room. We decided that we should go back to the airport and find an ATM machine to withdraw money from, just to do something, because sitting in the room would drive us crazy. On our way out, we once again checked if a reply had arrived. Yes, there was a fax for us! I was very nervous when the lady handed it over to us, but we were quickly relieved because the first sentences were:

Dear Jan, I am very sorry to hear about your problem, but I have very good news for you. We will wait for you at the airport tomorrow morning for your arrival at 7.50 am...

We were so happy we virtually danced around the reception! Claire at Drifters had sorted it all out for us. Thank god Drifters were not like Lufthansa! We would be touring South Africa after all, and even got a day in Frankfurt as a bonus!

After we calmed down, we read the fax more carefully. There was one sentence which was a bit worrying, but it didn't bother us too much at that moment:

If for any reason your flight is delayed and you will only arrive later we will not be able to wait for you but will have to go.

Surely we couldn't be that unlucky two times in a row. And, at least, we knew that we would not have to wait for passengers arriving late because of delays, so we should be relatively safe.

We faxed a reply back to Claire thanking her for everything and also suggested that our guide should bring the sleeping bags we had ordered with him, as we would obviously not be able to pick them up ourselves. (Incidentially, it cost us 19.50DM to send these two faxes, both of only one page. I'm sure the hotel made a reasonable profit!) Now it was time to check out Frankfurt.

There was an S-Bahn line (S8) running from the airport to downtown Frankfurt, and it turned out to only be a very short ride of about 15 minutes. We then walked around the downtown area a couple of hours, pausing only to eat some lunch at a cafe. To be honest, Frankfurt was not all that interesting. It is a financial center of Germany, which was quite easy to see from all the high office buildings. None of us were feeling very well either, maybe due to side effects of the malaria tablets, or perhaps just due to general fatigue.

Just by accident we passed a cinema which showed movies in their original language, i.e. without using German voices. Since we were pretty bored with Frankfurt we went inside and decided to see "Entrapment" as it was just starting. After the movie, we walked back to the Hauptbahnhof and took the S-Bahn back to the airport. We ate dinner at the hotel, making sure we spent as much money as we were allowed to. Then we packed our bags and went to the airport, arriving early, just in case Lufthansa would decide to leave an hour or two ahead of schedule.

When we arrived at the gate after a very long walk through the airport corridors (Frankfurt Airport is not an easy place to find your way around), we saw that our plane was already there! This could only mean one thing: We would make it! Nothing could stop us from arriving on time now! When we also started boarding on schedule, half an hour before departure, I felt so relieved and happy inside, a feeling which remained until it was time for departure.

As departure time arrived, something unexpected happened, or rather did not happen. Because the plane did not move! What was going on? Ten more minutes passed, and then we got the explanation as the captain made approximately this announcement:

As you all see we are still at the gate. This is because we are waiting for passengers from a delayed plane. It probably won't take very long before we are underway....

To say I was angry would be an understatement. I was furious and really felt the urge to go and tell someone my opinion of Lufthansa, but I knew it wouldn't have helped. So we just sat there and waited... And waited.... And waited.... When we finally left, we were approximately an hour late.

I am sure it wasn't really a conspiracy against us, but it sure felt that way! Yesterday they left early, even though they knew we would have made it if they had stuck to their schedule, and today they are suddenly waiting almost an hour for delayed passengers! Where is the consistency? What sort of people are in charge of Lufthansa?

Day 3 - June 29

The flight was not really a pleasant experience. For some reason I couldn't fall asleep, so this was my second night without sleeping. One good thing about Lufthansa was that during the flight they showed a map with our position, speed, height etc. on the TV-screen, so that we always knew where we were. Actually, I thought this was much more fun to watch than the two movies they showed!

As we approached Johannesburg, May Tina became quite sick and eventually had to throw up in a plastic bag. She was not feeling well at all (obviously!), so she asked one of the air hostesses to take away the plastic bag and bring her a new one. Although the air hostess was just hanging around doing nothing, she was not willing to help. "It's not my job. Do it yourself!" was her reply before walking away. We were really shocked by her behaviour. I couldn't see any valid reason for refusing to help. May Tina was sick, and was not sitting near the aisle, so it was very inconvenient for her to get up.

The plastic bag was totally clean on the outside, so there were no hygenic reasons for not helping. And the air hostess was obviously not doing any important work at the moment either. On other airlines, the air hostesses have always been very helpful in situations like this, but it was now becoming quite clear to us that Lufthansa was not "just another airline".

What also annoyed me was that she walked away so quickly that I didn't see her name, thus making it difficult to write a complaint. I looked for her when we walked out of the plane, but she was nowhere to be seen. Perhaps I am naive, but I thought the air hostesses were there to assist the passengers. Not so at Lufthansa, it seems! For people that might have potensially serious problems during a flight, I must strongly advice against flying Lufthansa, because it apparently is their policy not to help you. It appears that they would rather let you die than lift a finger to help.

Around 0845 we were let out of the plane, 55 minutes too late. We had a small hope that Drifters could still be waiting for us so we ran as fast as could through to Immigration. We had decided that May Tina should collect our baggage and I should run through as fast as possible to see if I could catch the tour group, as we figured they probably wouldn't leave if one of us had arrived. So, on completing the formalities with the authorities, I ran straight into the arrival hall. The time was then approximately 0900. There were a lot of people waiting there, but unfortunately none of them were from Drifters. The tour had left without us.

I had more or less expected this, so it was not such a big blow as it might have been. May Tina arrived with our baggage around 0930, so at least Lufthansa hadn't managed to lose them. (I was almost expecting this since everything seemed to go wrong.) What now? After obtaining some South African money we went to phone Drifters to ask whether there was anything that could be done to save the situation. Fortunately, there was! I spoke to Claire and she told us just to wait at the airport as there was already someone from Drifters on the way to pick us up. She told us not to worry, as they would "make a plan" to enable us to catch up with the group!

This was very relieving! It was so nice that Drifters had such a different attitude than Lufthansa. Unlike Lufthansa, who didn't seem to care one bit about their paying customers, Drifters were more than willing to help.

It was not long before the guy (Clive?) from Drifters arrived. He also told us not to worry as they would find a way to get us underway. We were shown to the Drifters minibus and were told to wait there while he picked up some other guy at the airport. The car appeared to be full of Scandinavians: Two danes and three Norwegian girls who were going on the Drifters Johannesburg-Nairobi tour.

After a little while, Clive came back and this time he had "some good news and some bad news" for us. The good news was that we would catch up with our group already tonight, but the bad news was that we would have to fly there. He explained that we would fly to Hoedspruit, where we would be picked up by another Drifters guy and taken us to the camp where we eventually would meet the others. Clive then helped us to buy the correct ticket and wished us good luck with the rest of our trip.

The plane ticket cost 672 Rands (about 110US$) which I thought wasn't too bad, considering it was purchased only two hours in advance. Besides, the price didn't matter as we would be reclaiming it on our travel insurance anyway. The plane didn't leave until 1230 so we had about two more hours to spend at the airport. We bought a sandwich each at a cafe but none of us had any appetite, and May Tina was still feeling very sick, so we didn't eat much of it.

Before leaving home I had studied the map of South Africa quite a lot. Therefore I was a bit puzzled that I had never heard of the name Hoedspruit. I figured that, having an airport, it had to be a city of some size.

The plane was quite small, and was run by South African Airways. It left on schedule and the food and service was excellent. Such a nice change after having had to endure Lufthansa's incompetence and hostility for a long time! We had a nice view out of the window. The landscape was mostly farmland in red/brown colours and after a while there were also some mountains. It was almost difficult to believe that this was Africa, and we were there.

As we started descending at Hoedspruit I immediately realised why I hadn't noticed this place on the map. It was NOT a big city, in fact it was not a city at all! All we could see was the landing strip, the airport terminal and bush, bush and bush all around! This was the real Africa!

We were met at the airport by a man and a woman from Drifters, and after we had paid the airport tax of 60R each, they drove us to our camp. It was a 45 minute drive and all most of it was on a straight tarred road through the bush. In the end we left the main road and drove on a dust road through the wilderness to the Drifters Bushveld Camp.

On the way we saw our first giraff. It was standing peacefully near the road, eating from the top of a tree. We thought it was incredibly exciting, almost unreal! Yesterday we had been in Frankfurt, and now we were in the wild African bush, only a few meters from a real giraffe! Soon we spotted a warthog as well, making our excitement rise even further.

Arriving at the camp, the time was around 1430 so the others had not arrived yet. We were assigned a tent and told that for safety reasons we should not walk around outside the camp area. However, there was no fence around the camp, so wild animals could in principle come and go as they liked. The Drifters people left, leaving us alone in the camp except for two trackers. Since I hadn't slept properly for two nights it was very nice to have some time on our own to relax.

While waiting for the others to arrive, we talked with the tracker Edward who had a lot of interesting things to tell. He explained that after the abolition of Apartheid it had been very difficult for blacks to find permanent jobs, while during Apartheid it was actually much easier. He considered himself very lucky to have gotten this job at Drifters, because although it was a lot of work, it was the right job for him as he had always loved nature.

During the day the temperature had been really pleasant, probably around 23-25 degrees, but when the sun went down around 1730, it very quickly became colder, making it necessary to put on proper clothes and sit close to the fire. I guess the temperature must have gone down to about 5-6 degrees at night.

Finally, at around 1830 the Drifters minibus arrived with the other tour members. It appeared that there were 9 other people in the group, in addition to the Drifters guide. Our guide's name was Kurt, and the other people were Stijn, Enzo and Anja from Belgium, Lisa and Lone from Denmark, Sandra from Scotland, Claire from Canada (living in Hong Kong), Julie from Australia and Iain from New Zealand.

The others had driven around 600 kilometers that day, and although they had seen the three Rondavels and some other nice stuff, we were starting to think that maybe we hadn't got such a bad deal after all. Kurt said that they had been waiting for us at the airport until 0900, when he had been ordered by the Drifters management to get underway. Since I came into the arrival terminal around 0900, I probably missed him by only a few minutes, maybe even a few seconds!

All our stuff was taken inside the main house and we immediately started making dinner. Kurt was supervising and doing most of the work, while some of us helped him. Around 2000 dinner was ready and we all sat outside around the fire eating Spaghetti with meat and Kurt's special cabbage salad (made from a very secret recipe!). The food was excellent, and after eating there was an introduction round where everybody said a little bit about themselves.

When we finally went to sleep at 2200, I was dead tired after not having slept for two nights. Still, it took me a little while to fall asleep, but it was quite exciting just lying there, listening to some animals (probably giraffes) roaming around not far away.

May Tina, on the other hand did not fall asleep until very late. She lay for a while there listening to sounds of the wild animals, gathering enough courage to get up and go to the toilet, rather far away in complete darkness. Eventually she had to go, and scared away some animals (probably giraffes) on her way there. On returning to the tent, she was feeling quite anxious by all this, but eventually she fell asleep as well.