Oh poor ol' me and my traveller problems... I've nearly been in South Africa for 3 months now and my little visitor visa is going to run out soon.
We've had a lot of faffing around about visas - trying to work out which is the best one to get, how long it will take and how best to hurry it along. We got as far as getting the correct forms (and reading them) but sadly the visa rules have since been changed.
Now I can't just happily apply to upgrade my visa to a partner visa (which would give me 3 whole years), now I have to leave the country to do this. It is unclear if I need to go back to my original country, or to any other country of my choosing?
So, after a lot of wondering what to do we've decided it's probably best if we have a cheap holiday to Zambia, then renew the 3 month tourist visa - this should hopefully give the SA government some time to work out what the new rules really are concerning my visa. Then we'll go back to the UK (I guess in another 3 months time) to upgrade to a partner visa. Boring, but important stuff!
Anyway, I'm very happy about this. Before we left London I was very excited about visiting Zambia. Now I think we'll actually go and we can stay at Faulty Towers!!!
It looks like we'll be doing this trip on an actual budget (unlike all of our other travelling where we flash packed the hell out of SE Asia). We're being very mature now and will totally be budgeting this trip... so let's see how that actually goes.
Wooo-hooo!!! Zambia!!!!!
You will love Vic Falls! Mike and I visited there from the Zambian side a few years ago. It was great fun and quite beautiful. Don't budget yourselves too tightly. You need to do a few exciting excursions like "Flight of the Angels" etc. I'll give you a call later today! Lotsaluv xxx
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