Actually this wasn’t the whole ‘Calgary Crowd’ who’d been staying at Chanters Lodge, Livingstone, Zambia, there were a couple more back at the lodge! They are big people and it’s quite a small studio! Meet (left to right) Julie and Dallas Mauck with Hobie Schmautz. All hail from Alberta, Canada and were visiting Zambia – and for that matter Africa – for the first time. They were a little hesitant about appearing on our regular Sunday evening radio show on Zambezi 107.7 fm – The Chanters Lodge Experience with the Milli Jam Ingredient, featuring George da Soulchild Kaufela – but I twisted their arms and I believe they enjoyed ‘The Experience’ – though it was, perhaps, one of the last things they expected to do while they were visiting Livingstone and Victoria Falls!
During their visit to Zambia, apart from appearing on the radio, Julie and Dallas, married for 20 years this year and celebrating the anniversary with their stunning trip to Africa, as well as Hobie and the rest of the crowd, had taken a 30 minute helicopter flight over the Falls which they described as ‘amazing’. On their second day they’d rafted the famous Zambezi white water rapids – numbers 14-25 which are those open while there’s ‘high water’ – as it is at the moment. I asked Hobie on air if he’d enjoyed the ride and he said ‘well, yes, I did seeing I can’t swim’! The group had also ‘zip lined’ from the famous railway bridge between Zambia and Zimbabwe but had, apparently, drawn the line at bungee jumping!
The music on the show was good, we dropped Cheryl Cole’s UK number one hit ‘Call My Name’ back to back with Flo Rida’s ‘Whistle’ at the top of the show. For the Zambian part of our play list we chose Dandy Krazy’s ‘Dangana Nkupule’ as well as B’Flow’s ‘Efyo Waba featuring P-Jay. Jennifer Hudson’s ‘Spotlight’ was our ‘oldie of the week’ – listeners have to text us telling us who’s singing the track if they want to win a dinner for two with drinks at Chanters Lodge – they do and they did, so the prize was quickly won. Milli Jam featured Camp Mulla’s ‘Party Don’t Stop’ – they’re a Kenyan outfit – and for our Canadian Guests we played ‘As Long As You Love Me’ Justin Bieber’s dubstep smash, featuring Big Sean.
Julie and Dallas told listeners that they run their own business back in Calgary – it’s a quick service garage that offers complete oil and filter changes in 20 minutes for US$60. We believed them!! And so too did we believe that you can get used to -45C degree temperatures though I’m not sure I’d want to! The group also told us they’d had a great time in South Africa on safari for almost three weeks before they arrived in Zambia, and that they would be headed back for Canada the day after the show. Asked where they would like to be and what they would like to be doing in ten years’ time Julie said she and Dallas would like still to be healthy, wealthy and travelling! Hobie was ‘hoping for the best’.
Great show!
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