Off to Edinburgh... and beyond

The east of Scotland has been in the grip of snow for some time now. Flights to Edinburgh airport have sometimes been cancelled (fortunately my flights are to and from Glasgow this time) and my mother hasn't taken her car out of the garage since back in November. But things have been slowly thawing a bit since Christmas, and most of the roads are clear now - even though there's still snow lying on the fields and on the footpaths. The car will be coming out of hibernation this morning, as I need to drive through to Edinburgh to get a yellow fever vaccination for the trip I'll be making to West Africa at the end of January.

Our more local travel clinics are closed over the Christmas and New Year holidays, so that's why I'm having to go through to the Western General Hospital in Edinburgh. (That's the hospital where my Dad twice had brain surgery after a brain haemorrhage just two Christmases ago. We drove there every day during Christmas 2008, so we won't have any trouble finding our way there!)

Seems like travelling to Africa has become an expensive business: I couldn't believe it when they told me that the yellow fever vaccination would cost £55... and the prescription for malaria tablets will also cost more than £60. More than a hundred pounds for medication, and that's before I even leave for my one-week trip to Senegal! The good news is that a Christian businessman has paid for our plane tickets for this trip, which is for the purpose of investigating some future outreach possibilities. So, apart from paying for the yellow fever vaccination and malaria pills, I'll only need to pay for my visa, as well as for my food and housing in Africa, and not for the cost of actually getting there. Four or five of us will be making the trip together. (I'll write more about this next week... and in my January newsletter. Or, if you're too curious to wait, you can check the latest post on my barbinafrica blog.) For today, though, I only need to travel as far as Edinburgh...