Sunday morning at 4am, the “Damn kids knocking on all the doors” turned out to be the game ranger informing us that and the crackling noise we could hear was actually the hotels thatched roof on fire.
Now, the same as most nights when I’m away from home, before I went to bed I checked my torch on the bedstand, shoes and clothes at the end of the bed and the bag of valuables in case we need to leave the room in a hurry, and I had already checked the muster point label on the back of the bedroom door. So why was it that at 4:15 I found myself huddling with my family in the car park, half naked and without my passport.
Several things struck me as odd. First, having been though some tough challenges in the past, why did I not put my trousers on like I had been trained to do. Second, on our way to the car park an oldish lady was struggling with her suitcases (plural) that she had managed to pack and was aking for help carrying them. Gasping for breath due to altitude and carrying my half asleep daughter my only offering to her was “Lady there is a fire, you should leave your bags and get up here”. The third thing to strike me as odd was that I was standing in the car park half naked and couldn’t sit down in case my giblets fell out of my strides.
The wind, the fire brigade, and karma were all on our side and after 2 hours we were cleared to go get our stuff from a largely untouched room. Everyone made it out as far as we know but 30 or so familes lost their posessions before the fire was contained.
In case you are wondering, of course I took photos. As we came out of our room and headed up the hill, the main block and reception of the hotel was on fire.
Looking up into the sky you could see all the lit thatch flying off in the wind
After an hour or so the majority of the blaze was under control. Here is a closer look at the main reception when we could get a little closer.
Well OMG! A bit of a pant-cacker.
Wow, that is one way to cook the local meat. Probably a little too well done