Different country, different rules. That is our motto. This is especially true when flying within other countries. Flying to Africa and flying within Africa are two very different things. The stereotype I’m sure we all have is of these little airplanes held together with duct tape, seats without seatbelts, chickens in the cabin and people still smoking on board. Luckily, that wasn’t even close to our experience. Every airport, however, has their own rules and quirks. The norms and standards of customer experience vary wildly. Our modus operandi is to just go with the flow. There is zero advantage to getting frustrated. Slap a smile on your face, get a positive attitude and carry on.

All of our internal flights were booked well in advance. What we did not anticipate was how often these flights would get changed on us. Every few weeks we would get an email update with changes. Sometimes it was just a slight time change or an airplane change, sometimes it was a whole connecting flight change. It was enough to cause a bit of panic, but we eventually got used to the uncertainty and just went with it. It always worked out, just not always as we had planned.

Be prepared for extra security measures upon arrival at most of the airports. Our transport vehicle always had a cursory once over – mirror under the carriage, a brief look inside the vehicle before being allowed entrance to the departures line. Sometimes, we had to completely empty the vehicle of all our luggage for the drug dogs to investigate and then walk through a separate scanner. All this before getting close to the building itself!

Starting right at the doors of the airport, get ready to reenact the multiple airport security montage scene from that George Clooney movie, “Up In the Air”, but all in one airport. Shoes off, belts off, electronics out, empty pockets, scan all bags and jackets, show boarding pass and ID. Pass the first check point and enter into the airport terminal. Rinse and repeat.

Most of these national airports are about as small as you’d imagine– a counter with a few airlines and you can actually see from one security check point to the next, to the next. Yep. Yet still, you can expect to do this drill at least twice, often three or four times before you are safely at your gate. Pro tip: Don’t wear hikers. Or jewelry.

Some noteworthy experiences we had:

1. Have you ever had an airline try to get a hold of you personally? Like, not with a mass email, but a personal text direct to you from an actual person working the gate? Neither had we, so imagine our surprise and trepidation when we arrived to check in and had the agent say to us, “Hey, I’ve been trying to get a hold of you all day!” Uhm, what?

Apparently, our flight that day had been changed…again! Originally our flight was from Stone Town to Kilimanjaro, via Dar Es Salem. But now, it will be Stone Town -> Dar Es Salem -> (long layover then back to) -> Stone Town -> Kilimanjaro. We are given the option of skipping the first two legs and leaving instead, five whole hours later, on the flight going directly to Kilimanjaro. Sounds great, right? Except…we now have all of our luggage with us, our driver is long gone and there isn’t anything else we really need to see/do in Stone Town. Also, this airport is teeny tiny without a restaurant or lounge so staying here for the next 5 hours doesn’t sound too appealing.  Sigh. If only I had received those texts. Oh well, looking on the bright side, we will now be able to experience a new airport! The ‘big’ one in the capital, Dar Es Salem.

2. Timing our airport arrival is not a new thing for us – we are well versed in getting there early. Sometimes we even get there earlier than is necessary because we like to enjoy the lounge, or the actual airport before leaving. Don’t judge – we like airports! On one of our legs, after going through the endless security checks, we were really looking forward to sitting down in the restaurant and having a bite to eat while catching up on some correspondence. We double check our boarding time, making sure everything is still on schedule. Yep. We still have just over an hour before the plane leaves, almost an hour before boarding starts. Lots of time. We find the restaurant, settle into a booth and get comfortable. Not 10 minutes into our rest, two gate agents come up to us in a bit of a relieved panic and tell us that we must board now, the whole plane is ready to go and they are just waiting for us.Wait.What?

But we still have a good 50 minutes before the plane is even supposed to leave! But that doesn’t matter here, I guess. It was a small-ish plane, a Dash 8 – 400, and since everyone had checked in, they boarded early and decided to take off early too. If this was to happen almost anywhere else it would seriously throw off the logistics everywhere else! Is the ground crew at our arrival destination ready for us? Are they even there? Is there an open gate?

We just had to laugh out loud. Different country, different rules. No time for a potty break now, just get on board.

3. We were travelling with a lot of luggage. A lot. So much luggage. We knew that we would have to pay an extra luggage fee on some of these smaller flights so we were absolutely prepared. What we didn’t expect, and maybe we should have, was the black market pricing. The extra fee was $120 USD. Yikes. Unless…we didn’t need a receipt. Then it was only $100 USD. LOL. I see what is happening here. Wink wink. Some nice guy made an extra $100 that day.

Overall, travelling within these two countries of Africa was a great experience. We felt extremely safe with both the personnel and the equipment. The customer service on the flights was great and even if our flight was a quick 35 minutes, we still got served a drink and a snack. On flights over an hour, in addition to getting a large bag of cashews as a snack, we would also get a snack box with a sandwich and a sweet treat. I don’t know how they managed to serve all of us in such a short period of time, but they did and they always did it with a smile. We can wholeheartedly recommend flying with the local airlines.

Just remember to keep calm, smile and carry on.