Zambia - here we come

Tomorrow we head off to Zambia for the next part of our adventure which we are expecting to involve some tough driving especially in the remote North Luangwa Park.  We are hoping that we stay ahead of the start of the rains as this would make driving interesting!  We are certainly looking forward to lots of wildlife viewing and getting a glimpse of life in another African country.

Days 48-52: South Luangwa Park
Days 53-57: North Luangwa Park
Days 58-59: Shigwa Ngandu
Days 60-61: Mutinondo
Days 62-63: Kasanaka Park
Days 64-68: Livingstone and the Victoria Falls 

Reflections on Malawi

Malawi has been like a holiday within a holiday.  The country has huge variety from the: highlands of Nyika; beachlife around Lake Malawi; wildlife of the National Parks; lushness of the tea plantations through to the hustle and bustle of city life in Blantyre and Lilongwe.  Malawi is one of the world’s poorest countries, and the poverty of families has been quite overwhelming at times, but the people of Malawi have been amazingly open and wonderfully friendly throughout the country.  Deforestation across Malawi is ubiquitous and the continuing pressure for wood to enable house building (brick making) and cooking will continue to drive this.  We did see some small attempts to set up managed forestation and replanting programmes, such as at Ripple Africa – hopefully these will be taken up nationally. Education is also a major focus for the country – the government has stated that all children must be educated at primary level.  Currently, however, there are not the teachers and resources to enable this to happen, and the result is children arriving at school to class sizes way over one hundred. Despite the country’s problems we would definitely recommend anyone wanting to come to Southern Africa to visit Malawi – we have absolutely loved it here. 

Day 47 Heuglins Lodge

The landrover was collected at 8.30 am and taken off to the garage to get some of the snags fixed and we were left to spend time by the pool, washing and afternoon shopping. 

Day 46 Heuglins Lodge

Early morning run to get rid of some of the previous day’s excesses (Ian slept!) – it was already seriously hot and the route I chose was really undulating but I managed a 40 minute run (slow jog!).  Clearly it is not a common sight as I got numerous open-mouthed stares as I went past.

 

We left the luxury of Huntingdon Lodge and headed off on the long drive north to Lilongwe.  We drove right along the Malawi-Mozambique border for miles in places and at times were less than a few hundred yards from Mozambique and could easily have stopped and walked across the unfenced border line. 

We stopped on route at the Dedza Pottery for lunch which was an amazing oasis in the dusty back streets of this small town.  They make an amazing array of pots, dinner services, tiles, bathroom sinks…  We were very tempted to buy a dinner set but finally decided against it and settled for a couple of mugs instead.

For once we made pretty good time and got to Lilongwe by 4 pm.  Arriving at Burley House our planned home for two night in Lilongwe we were told that there was a problem with our room and we had been moved to another lodge, Heuglins, just around the corner complete with swimming pool. Unpacked and the Landrover ready for Safari Drive to get it serviced tomorrow and spent an interesting evening chatting to the other guests who were working for NGOs in education, agriculture and health, and had travelled all over Africa with their work.

Day 45 Huntingdon Lodge

We decided to walk up Thyolo Mountain this morning – it was already hot by the time we set off and the sun was blazing down with little shade.  It took us 1.5 hours to walk up to the estate picnic site which had great views over the whole tea plantation.  We wanted to walk to the mountain top some  200 metres higher up but couldn’t find a path and in the end we decided it best to head back following a somewhat extend route. We were clearly not concentrating enough and managed to miss the correct path twice and had to improvise a route back to the lodge through the tea fields but still managed to make it back inside 3 hours.

We swapped lunch for afternoon tea, expecting a cuppa and a slice of cake, but were astonished to be served up: plates of cucumber sandwiches; scones with strawberry jam and cream; a variety of homemade biscuits and two huge slices of chocolate cake.  The lodge was really busy with loads of local expats also having afternoon tea – we later discovered that it was Mother’s Day (not that there seemed to be any mothers having tea!).  Less than 4 hours later we were being served another 3 course dinner (still with the candle stick, but in the garden now) and were the only people in the lodge so it felt a bit weird.

Day 44 Huntingdon Lodge

Chilled out day around Huntingdon: Early morning alarm call courtesy of bats coming back from a nights hunting to roost in the roof space above our room; tea and coffee at 6:30 followed by leisurely breakfast at 7:00 on the khonde. Plumped for a leisurely walk round the tea and coffee fields (alternative mountain bike option being rejected as Ian’s shoulder is still playing up) the tea fields have been planted over the last 90 years with some dating as far back as 1926 and whilst production isn’t currently very high (it’s the dry season), tea was still being picked.

At one point we ran into the field kitchen for the plantation workers with the cooks busy preparing the 12 noon meal of beans and sema which we were encouraged to try!!

Whilst the sema was nice to try - a more testy lunch at the lodge followed, with a chilled out afternoon watching the world go by and the arrival of the tour group we met at Williams Falls yesterday – it’s a small world!!  3pm and off for tea tasting at the Satemwa tea factory guided by “Mr Custom” the coffee production Manager.  Interesting facts you didn’t know about tea: different tea types (builders, green, earl grey) all originate from the same tea bushes, it’s how they are processed that makes them different. Bulk standard black tea sells at $3/Kilo and is mechanically processed, whist specialist teas such as Oolong are hand rolled and attract a significant premium rising up to $100/Kilo. Your likely to have drunk Malawian (Satemwa) tea in some of favourite UK brands such as PG Tips, Twinings … albeit blended in the UK with tea from other countries.  Finally tea tasting is a difficult business – smell it, taste it and spit it out or swallow it. Swallowing samples of 15 different types of tea was quite enough - Malawian black tea is very strong and even builders would struggle to drink it unblended.  A specialist tea call “satemwa needles” came out top.

Dinner was set up for just the two of us  -  clearly an episode from cluedo, Ian's guess the murder was committed by Dr Nunn on the veranda with the candle stick!

Day 43 Huntingdon Lodge, Satemwa Tea Plantation

After a leisurely breakfast despite a raven trying to steal our bread which resulted in a sprint across the campsite to get it back. 

We walked up to the William’s Waterfall, it was about 25 minutes up the river and we were enjoying a pleasant few minutes photographing the falls when the solitude was interrupted by a large family who appeared from nowhere with a guide having driven rather than walked up. 

On the drive down from the plateau we stopped to buy strawberries – you can buy all sorts of fruit on the mountain, gooseberries, wild raspberries, rhubarb, blackberries as well as strawberries.  Having bought a large bag full, Ian reminded me that he doesn’t actually eat strawberries!

On the way to Satemwa we stopped in Blantyre as we were passing within a few miles.  Blantyre must be the largest place we have been so far on our trip and the contrast between the lives of the population in the country compared to the city was particularly stark here – with huge mansions surrounded by walls and barbed wire.  We ended up having lunch in a Chinese restaurant – we could have been anywhere in the world but it made for a nice change. On the way back out of Blantyre there were road works and no clear diversion so we ended up driving right through the local bustling shoe market.

Arrived at Huntingdon Lodge mid-afternoon. The lodge was built in 1935 in an old colonial style and is set in 11,000 acres of tea and coffee plantation.  The grounds themselves are beautiful and our room, “Father’s Room” is amazing – it opens onto the front lawn with its own khonde (veranda) with sofas and a dining table where we had dinner.

Day 42 Trout Farm Campsite, Zomba Plateau

Up at 5.30 but it still took us till 8 am to leave as we ended up chatting for ages to two other couples.  The plan was to do a game drive on the way out of the park but in the end we cut this short and headed out as we couldn’t get close to the river, and apart from dozens of warthog there was not a huge amount to see.  Also Ian has managed to injured his shoulder so the bulk of the driving would be down to me which meant it would take quite a bit longer to get anywhere.

Having skipped breakfast, we decided to stop in Liwonde for brunch at a little roadside café.  It seemed a bit early for chicken and chips but it was scrummy – even if a bit disconcerting to have your chicken’s brothers and sisters clucking around the floor of the cafe. 

The drive down to Zomba was actually quite short with the last few miles being very steep to get up onto the 1700m high Zomba plateau.  For once not having a map proved a bit tricky and we were for a while slightly misplaced and “teddy bears were thrown out the pram” with Jane driving up a never ending, extremely steep and bumpy forestry track with no idea where it ended - but it was actually the right road and we finally emerged at the top of the plateau. With views across Zomba and the plains below (even if a bit hazy) we checked out both the viewpoints: one named after Emperor Halle Salassie and the other after the Queen Mother – the Emperor’s view was definitely the better one. 

The mountain is essentially an active forestry reserve and with Malawi’s deforestation issues we were shocked by the amount of timber left lying around despite the locals bringing chopped wood down the mountain balanced on pedal bikes – this seemed like a particularly gruelling job. 

We had been warned that the Trout Farm campsite had seen much better days and was over-run with baboons.  However, we thought it was a lovely site, set in the woods, and not a baboon in sight.  The trout farm itself was no longer in operation but we were told that it was planned to restock it with trout in the next couple of months. Ian found a good use for the farm's water channel though to cool the beer!

Day 41 Mvuu Camp

Started the day with a two hour cruise up the Shire River.  Very different scenery to anything we had seen up to now on our trip.  The river is full of pods of hippos with crocodiles of all sizes in the water and out on the river bank.  The bird life is particularly good with African Fish Eagles, kingfishers and cormorants especially common.  We also got to see a very rare species of homo sapiens – The CBBC Film Crew! They told us they were in Malawi filming the local children and animals, and they seemed delighted to have the opportunity to get out of the studio albeit even if they hadn’t acclimatised to the heat yet.

Spent the rest of the day relaxing lazing by the pool, catching up with uploading photos and updating the blog. Tonight’s tea was considerably better than last night’s effort as we managed to cook   chicken peri-peri – with it suitable stewed for two hours to account for cool box storage method for the chicken!! 

Day 40 Mvuu Camp, Liwonde National Park

Had a final swim with the Lake Malawi cichlids before breakfast and boarded the boat back to the mainland at 9.30. 

With plenty of time for once – we looked around the curio stalls of Cape Maclear before heading on the relatively short drive south to Liwonde and managed to stop off a few times en-route to wander around one of the many village markets plus fit in the obligatory supermarket shop.

We arrived at the Liwonde Park gates at about 3.15 pm but got stuck behind a group of 10 teenage volunteers sorting out their entrance paper work – organised chaos!!  The 28km drive from the gate to the camp took about an hour (including delays for “Elephants” crossing the road) - so by the time we actually got to our pitch at Mvuu Camp the sun was about to set. Not ideal when there are hippos and elephants around but got camp set up and started diner. Having had fantastic food for the last few days, it had to be too good to last, tea was a bit of a disappointment having bought old boot disguised as beef!! 

Day 37 – 39 Mumbo Island

Three whole days relaxing on the Mumbo Island – a tropical paradise. 

We walked, kayaked, swam and cruised around the island.  The swim around the island was about 3k and was beautiful if a little tiring as we had done so little exercise recently.  

The bird life was superb with loads of fish eagles, yellow-billed kites, pied kingfishers as well as bright yellow weaver birds, red breasted robin chats and loads of other birds.  We also watched an otter eat a fish just below our chalet before swimming off around the rocks.  

Snorkelling was excellent – Lake Malawi is famed for its cichlids and we got to see loads of different coloured ones around the rocks.  The island has to be the most chilled out place we have ever visited – it was absolutely amazing and it was great just to totally relax for a few days.  

Day 36 Mumbo Island

A very noisy night with repeated bursts of gunfire for several hours, some of which were really close to the campsite.  In the morning we learned that it hadn’t been poachers but rather the naughty elephants had been trying to make a run for it out of the park and the rangers had been firing warning shots to keep them in the reseseve.  Hopefully with African Wildlife Parks having now taken over the running of the park, they will be able to make the park more secure.

We left Bua River at 7 am, heading south to Monkey Bay and Cape Maclear. We managed to go wrong a couple of times but still arrived in plenty of time for the 3 pm ferry across to Mumbo Island.  On arrival we had a message waiting for us from Safari Drive asking us to provide details of the fridge, so at least we knew something was being done to sort out the fridge.

The ferry took 45 minutes over to the island.  Our chalet is perched on the top of a rock with fabulous views across the lake of the sunrise. We went for a quick swim as soon as we arrived before descending on the bar for sundowners and a fantastic three course dinner.

Day 35 Bua River Lodge Campsite

Having survived the medium length walk we decided to go for the long walk today so started an hour earlier at 6.15 am.  Before long we found ourselves following the track of a group of elephants, Kingsley, our ranger believed they had passed through a couple of hours previously.  However, after about an hour, Kingsley suddenly stopped us and pointed in the distance.  We couldn’t see anything but Kingsley rapidly pushed us back up the track we had come down.  He had seen and heard a group of elephants.  We knew he was concerned when he charged his rifle but it was only later that he told us that there were two groups of elephants and we were directly in between them!!

The walk continued to the river where we met three other rangers on patrol at their mobile camp. At this pointed we started to head back to camp but the walk suddenly got even more exciting.  On the other side of the river Kingsley had spotted a couple of poachers.  He asked if we were OK with him firing a couple of shots to scare them off.  As we stayed hidden in the bushes he darted out into the open and started firing (it was like watching a scene from a war movie).  In the end he fired eight shots as there were actually six poachers – luckily they were not armed and they legged it into the bush.  We spent the next half hour helping Kingsley destroy a huge fishing net made of mosquito netting that they were using to catch fish.  

Kingsley then went off in search of their camp and returned with a wire snare.  

He also decided to set fire to their plastic bucket along with half the bush – we assume he was aiming to scare them off even further and the rapidity that the grass on the bank went up certainly scared us.  As we wandered back to the camp we were suddenly met by the 3 rangers we had bumped into earlier – they had been concerned that we had encountered elephants so were on their way to rescue us!! We eventually made it back to camp at 11.45 – it had certainly been an exciting walk!!

We spent the rest of the day relaxing and decided to eat at the lodge instead of cooking – the food was superb.

Day 34 Bua River Lodge Campsite

Set off on a medium length walk at 7.15 am – it was already really warm.  The walk took about 3 hours with an armed ranger but we saw very little wildlife except a bushbuck and a few crocodiles and even they were hiding under water due to the intense heat.  Got back to the lodge for an ice cold drink and promptly both fell asleep for half an hour – it was 33.5 degrees in the shade and even the guys working at the lodge were complaining.  Apparently October is always extremely hot as it build up to the start of the rainy season.

Cooked an early tea – another variation of butternut squash / mushroom curry which turned out to be the best yet.  At dusk a group of elephants appeared up river so we stood and watched from the bar.  We were told by the lodge owner that only 10-15% of guests get to see the elephants so we felt very privileged.

Day 33 Bua River Campsite

Spent the morning at Ripple Africa at Mwaye Beach and were shown around a number of their environmental, educational and health projects by the Assistant manager, Dan.  It was fascinating and inspiring but horrifying and depressing yet at the same time.  For everyone that helped us raise money for Ripple Africa thank you again. Hopefully we can give you some idea of the amazing work that your donation are helping to fund - https://www.justgiving.com/Jane-Nunn1

Dan showed us how to build a Changu Changu Moto stove and we saw in practice the benefit these can bring versus the traditional 3 stone open fires which use huge amounts of wood and are seriously dangerous. Some 40000 make to date and a huge chain of people involved to persuade people to change from their traditional 3 stone fires.

We also got shown around the tree planting nursery in which they grow a variety of trees for distribution to local children (acacia and fruit trees) and families to encourage them to understand the importance of trees – deforestation is a massive issue in Malawi and even the brief time we have been here we have been shocked by the extent of the issue.

From an educational project perspective, we visited one of the pre-schools, a secondary school and the library that Ripple Africa is supporting – they have paid for the buildings and fund the teachers and staff.  We learned that the government is planning to bring in payments for primary school pupils from January – it is currently free so how this can be a positive move forward we cannot comprehend.  Secondary school education already requires a fee and less than 10% of children get such an education. 

Finally we saw a few of the health initiatives, including the dispensary that they have built and we visited two families with disabled children.  The first was a little lad of two who has cerebral palsy – Ripple Africa fund a physiotherapist who visits regularly but it is clear that being disabled is an unbelievably huge challenge here. 

We then visited a family with three children who have polio – the result of no vaccination.  Ripple Africa have provided all three with wheelchairs, this has enabled the two youngest, a 9 year girl and her 13 year old brother to go to school, both are really happy to be able to go to school now.  They are both in primary class one which shows the impact of them not being able to get to school previously.  Their elder sister is now 20 and is too old now to be able to go to school – she makes mats which she sells so she is able to have some independence.  

Visiting these projects really brought home to us, how lucky we are to have the National Health Service and our education system, as millions of people do not have the same opportunities for their health or education which is a complete travesty.

After leaving Ripple Africa we headed south, stopping for what we thought we be a quick lunch stop at the “M5 restaurant”.  We ordered chicken and chips but when we heard the fire being lit we knew we would have a bit of a wait!  After an hour lunch arrived and it was really good – worth the wait.  We headed off to Bua River Campsite in Nkhotakota Wildlife Park, following the Satnav and ended up turning up a very narrow unsigned posted track which definitely tested the 4x4 capability of the “Thomson” at one point!  The campsite really feels as though you are in the wilds of Africa – it is close to the river in the trees and is extremely hot and humid.

Day 32 Chinteche Inn Campsite

Lazy day on the beach planned. 

Having been woken at about 4 am by the German overlanders packing up their enormous truck / hotel (Das Rollanderhotel – something like that, anyway is was huge) on wheels, we were up and about from the crack of dawn. Breakfast has improved enormously as we were able to buy Marmite!!  

We spent the first couple of hours doing the housework, a load of washing, sweeping out some of the Nyika dust and shaking all the bed covers out – washing them will have to wait for another day! 

All the chalets in the lodge were booked for a conference (can’t even get away from conferences here!) so we had the beach to ourselves.  We then spent a couple of hours lying in the sun on the beach before a quick swim in Lake Malawi – we happened to choose the moment that the wind picked up so it was extremely choppy and very unlike any lake swimming we’ve ever done.  After lunch another hour on the beach by which time the lake was calmer so we had a more pleasant swim.  Especially for Ian’s colleagues, you will be happy to see that the parrots are well and enjoying the sun.

Fantastic dinner of pot roast chicken washed down with several bottles of green (ie Carlsberg larger – they have taken over the market here in Malawi).  Rest of evening spent uploading entries onto the blog as the wifi was back up and running, and was surprisingly fast.

Day 31 Chinteche Inn Campsite

Finally managed to go for a run while Ian went fly fishing with Gibson – it really does have a Scottish feel here.  My run was about 30 minutes along a track to the next dam with the antelope running off ahead of me – amazing!  The run itself was knackering, a combination of altitude and lack of running for the last month but at least I did it.  Ian’s fishing was also successful – he caught a rainbow trout!  

After a late breakfast and some landrover cleaning we set off - we were sad to leave our chalet and would definitely recommend that anyone visiting Malawi visits Nyika Plateau and Chilinda Camp.  

We were giving Gibson a lift so he was able to guide us back to the gate via a stunning short cut which meant much less time on the horrid dusty main track.  We had originally thought Gibson wanted a lift home to his village at the park gate but it turned out he was using his time off work to finish building his house so he wanted to buy cement and plaster.  The only place to get this was Mzuzu, which took us 4.5 hours to reach from Chilinda (2.5 hours from Gibson’s house) – including another short cut from Gibson over lots of timber bridges in dubious states of repair.  He planned to get home on the bus presumably with the cement and plaster!  We also went shopping in Mzuzu as there was a large Shoprite but it meant we were running even later but we would almost certainly arrive before Gibson got home. 

We eventually reached Chinteche after another 2 hours on the road just as the sun was setting – considerably later that we had expected to arrive.  Quickly put the tent up and lit the fire.  Luckily we had planned a quick beef stir fry with noodles – the advantage of having been shopping for a change.  

Day 30 Chilinda Camp

Full English break courtesy of Isaac before a 2 hour walk with Gibson (and a student) through the Nyika countryside. The walk was beautiful with lots of reedbucks, bushbucks, eland and rohan antelopes plus flowers everywhere.  We learnt that the park authorities have a planned burning rotation to provide new growth – we had originally thought all the flowers were due to rain but this is not the case.  Another useful fact that Gibson divulged was the local remedy for nose bleeds – inhaling the smoke of burning porcupine dung!

Had a leisurely middle of the day, reading and sorting photos out.  Then off for a 2 hour mountain bike ride with Gibson – this was definitely not leisurely probably due to the altitude (approx. 2200 m) but also a lack of exercise for the last month.

Back to the chalet for another fantastic 3 course dinner – tuna pate, followed by pork chops, spinach, carrots and rice, and apple crumble and custard for pudding.  We then spent a frustrating hour in the bar trying to connect to their wifi and failing.  As the generator is only on for 3 hours a night we returned to our chalet to sit in front of the fire – it is really cold here at night.

Day 29 Chilinda Camp

Up at 5.30 as of course sunrise is now an hour earlier but at least it meant we were on the road early.  The road quickly started to climb into the mountains which beautiful views back along the lake.  We stopped in Rumphi for money and tried to find a map in the bookshop, somehow we had managed to leave the Malawi map at home, but as we expected there is no requirement for maps here so we will have to make do with the small maps in the guidebook and the Satnav. The road soon turned to gravel after we left Rumphi and continued to climb for mile after mile.  We eventually reached the Nyika National Park entrance which meant we had 60 km to go before getting to our chalet for the night.  Ian generously offered to give a lady a lift to Chilinda (of course he did this when I was driving!).  The road from the gate turned into a complete dust bowl and I think the poor lady in the back probably wished she had waited for the next vehicle!

Having left Lake Malawi and turned right into the mountains we found that we had somehow actually ended up in Scotland –  rolling hills covered in bracken but unlike Scotland no rain.  Also in the 1950s the Brits thought it was a good idea to plant pine trees with the aim of using them for a paper mill (sponsored by British Paper Mills and Imperial Tobacco).  Clearly there was a Scottish influence as they also decided to populate the river with trout!   

Arriving at the camp we were surprised to find we had been upgraded to a two bedroom chalet with a guide, Gibson, and a cook, Isaac – not quite what we are used to.  We were also surprised to find out we had a variety of inclusive activities so we decided to go on a night game drive.  Before sunset we got to see lots of zebra, eland and rohan antelopes.  During the night drive itself we were really lucky to spot a civet, this was a first for us and it sat patiently whilst Ian photographed it.  

Day 28 Chitemba Campsite, Malawi

Last morning in Tanzania, left the campsite at 9 am to get to the border in reasonable time.  The scenery was beautiful mountain ranges and the banana fields were taken over by huge tea plantations over the last 50 km.  The border crossing was surprisingly smooth - we managed to side step all the hawkers trying to get us to change money and border agents selling car insurance and we were through and into Malawi within an hour.

Days 28: Lake Malawi, North Malawi
Days 29-30: Nyika Plateau
Days 31-32: Lake Malawi, Central Malawi
Days 33-35: Nkhotakota Wildlife Reserve
Days 36-40: Mumbo Island
Days 41-42: Liwonde National Park
Days 43-45: Zombo Plateau and Huntington House
Days 46-47: Lilongwe

Our immediate impression of Malawi was that it is a much poorer country than Tanzania, the roads were seriously potholed and the Chinese influence that has brought the motorcycle to Tanzania has not reached Malawi yet with the push bike being the main means of transport.  However, finding food stores and banks seemed much easier in the first town we stopped in, Karonga – hopefully this will be the case throughout our stay.

We decided to stop at a different campsite to the one we had originally planned to go to (original Thunduzi, new campsite Chitembe), and amusingly both the Spanish couple we had met in Ruaha and the German’s who had been at last night’s campsite both made the same choice – we are expecting to cross paths again before the trip has ended.

We were glad that we had cooked all the meat yesterday as we were able to quickly reheat our beef in red wine and for once had eaten and washed up by 5.30 pm (turned out it was 4.30 as we hadn’t changed our watches crossing the border) so we can actually have a relaxing evening walking along the Lake Malawi beach and even perhaps a beer in the bar!  The moonrise was spectacular – it was a full moon and it was dark red when it rose changing to orange as it got higher in the sky.

Reflections on Tanzania

We have driven 3855 kms (over 2000 miles) since we set off and have had some really long tough days driving on difficult roads but we have had a great chance to see lots of different aspects of life here.  

Tanzania is certainly not a cheap place to come to visit but it is a fascinating place. We both agree that our favourite National Park was Tarangire followed by the Serengeti.  Ruaha was very different and much wilder and we wouldn’t have missed the Ngorongoro Crater but not sure it is totally worth its exorbitant fee at this time of year. 

The people have all been amazingly friendly – we are now adept at asking how folks are before diving straight in with our questions, we are not sure the police are used to this though as they always look a bit surprised when we ask them how they are.  It has been particularly interesting visiting during the election campaign and seeing how seriously everyone takes it and are willing to talk about who they are voting for (not the taboo subject it often seems to be in the UK!), even the smallest villages have posters and flags everywhere and we have seen numerous rallies and political meetings during our month here.  

 It also seems ludicrous that there are still millions of people without easy access to water and electricity, yet mobile use is ubiquitous throughout Tanzania – clearly this just represents the difference in complexity of the infrastructure yet water is a necessity of life and obtaining it is still the mainstay of life for the majority where ever we have travelled. 

Day 27 Bongo campsite

After the long drive yesterday we decided to have a leisurely start so for once we didn’t get up at dawn and also had a proper cooked breakfast.  Finally set off at 10.15 for at least another 5 hour journey.  Scenery was a bit dull for the first part but the villages were fascinating – they seemed more affluent than further North judged by the fact that the majority of houses had electricity and there were less individual brick kilns.  Life still revolves around getting water though but with more bikes and motorbikes the transit of large numbers of water containers was much easier.  Street side vegetable stalls changed too with no sign of the onion and tomato stalls from further North, now there were loads of potato plus beans and cabbages.  The Tanzam highway was as busy as previous days even though it is a Sunday.  We came though a weighbridge at one point and the queues of lorries in both directions were horrendous – luckily we just went straight through.  We did come to a complete stop a little later – a policeman kindly informed us that we would have to wait a few minutes – half an hour later we got going again still no the wiser for the hold up.  

Close to Bongo campsite we went back into the hills and the agriculture changed completely with loads of small holdings everywhere.  The campsite is lovely and for once we feel that we are in the real Tanzania, the local children spent the evening playing football on the campsite in front of us and everyone walking past stopped to have a chat – shame our Swahili is still pretty non-existent. We have had meat fest for tea – we have had large amounts of steak plus potatoes and sweetcorn for our tea but that used less than half the beef so we have also cooked steak in red wine which hopefully we will get across the border and it will still be edible for tomorrow night’s tea.

Day 26 The Old Farmhouse Kisolanza

Woken in the middle of the night by a loud crash – we think it was a hyena but once we were awake we realised that we also had a couple of very large elephants within yards from “Thomson”.  The noise of them tearing the bushes apart was quite disconcerting – they can be extremely destructive.

First hour of the morning was spent cleaning the defunct fridge as the eggs had broken and gone everywhere – the smell of off eggs is not the best start to any morning.  Once we got going we headed up the river in the opposite direction to yesterday and were glad to see a lot more wildlife.  There were several herds of elephants along the river bed and you could clearly see their destructive path all along the river side.  We also saw a large pride of lions asleep under some trees plus a couple of lionesses with a large cub sleeping further along the river bank.  

Disappointed not to see more variety in antelopes as the park is famed for this but all we saw were hundreds of impala plus a couple of groups of lesser kudu. Lots of trees destroyed by the elephants but still loads of huge baobab trees to see.

Left the park 6 minutes before our deadline of 1pm (i.e. exactly 48 hrs after arriving) and headed back to Iringa – a 3 hour drive.  After a short stop in town for petrol, money and groceries (locations of which all meticulously researched – same ones as last time!!) headed south to our next campsite, The Old Farmhouse, Kisolanza.  A very different camp to our previous ones – we had our own banda with seating and cooking facilities.  We had heard they also had a farm shop where we could buy meat for tea but it turned out the meat came in frozen packs so we now have 1.5kilos of topside beef to eat tomorrow!