Walkabout - The long way home

The Late Posts: Farewell to Mozambique

2010-10-24T14:49:00.001+02:00

To anyone with that much free time (to stumble across a blog that hasn't been updated since May), I just thought I should assure you that my journey did come to a safe conclusion (I'm not still stuck in the bowels of Mozambique with only half of one leg left thanks to stumbling over an old landmine). I'll try and pick up where I left off and skim through the next few months of the trip.

Having already been to Ilha de Mocambique, I opted to carry on to Nacala (which is famous for being full of "banditos"!), while Viktor (the Swede) checked out the island.

Nacala was ugly and boring despite every opportunity offered by its location to be otherwise. My journey there was, in hindsight, a disaster! The cheapest place I could find was well over my total days budget - meaning I could afford no place with tables, or even chairs!

Because I arrived on Sunday however, everything was closed which was very annoying because it meant I had to stay an extra day there - it was the only town in the north that potentially had larium besides Nampula.

My suffering was, as it turned out, in vain - they had no larium. In disgust I marched off in a random direction, got pretty far out of town when I stubbed my toe pretty badly on some cracked paving. Eventually I admitted to myself that the road was leading nowhere and limped back to the hotel.

Anyway after a crazy series of different transportation means: motorbike, minibus, truck, pickup and finally a 3.5km walk in beach sand, I arrived at Cabaciera Grande (the mainland opposite Ilha de Mocambique) This was more like it! Coconut palms and a massive, ancient room at a reasonable price.

I was the only toursit there (I was actually staying at the "Tourism College") and the Mozambicans are not the easiest people to converse with (what with the lack of a common language and all); so when Viktor said he was going to head to Nampula the next day, I decided to join him.

So early the next day (well before dawn of course), I strolled over to the mangrove covered shore, boarded a dhow to Ilha (this would be much quicker than walking the 3.5km getting a pickup to the main road). There wasn't much wind at all, so, with some makeshift oars, the two crew paddled us most of the way.

I then met up with Viktor, and we caught a particularly cramped and uncomfortable truck to Nampula. When we pulled into Nampula in the late afternoon we set about hunting for a connecting form of transport heading south. No-one understood us no matter how hard we tried, not maps nor charades could make them understand what we had in mind. Eventually we gave up and sat on the side of the very crowded street to discuss a plan B. It was then that Edwardo, a truck driver came to investigate the commotion surrounding us. Thankfully he could not only understand English, but he was a truck driver heading down that way later that night.

It was a nice truck, but after a couple of hours of driving, Edwardo needed a nap and it was way too cramped and hot for the four of us to sleep there (the fourth person being one of Eddy's "wives".) We all got up after another few hours and carried on. We had to stop again pretty soon though as Eddy had hit not one, but two village dogs and the villagers weren't happy about that - they were happy about the compensation money Eddy paid them though! The road soon deteriorated to one of the worst roads I've ever seen.

Anyway we reached Mocuba about lunchtime and I said my goodbyes to Viktor, Eddy and the mute "wife". I then waited an hour or two for the transport (this time in the form of an insanely cramped back of a landcruiser).

Unfortunately this ride only went halfway to the border, leaving me with 100km to go. I waited on the the side of the road with the only other person trying to get the the border - Frank. We sat there for hour after hour, watching the sun go down with despair. There was no restaurant in the village (called Benfica!?) but it wasn't too difficult to find someone willing to give us a meal for a bit of dough. After the food an old lady came out of the house behind us with reed mat for us to lie on.

Anyway to cut a long story short we waited the whole night, and nothing came! Luckily I was so exhausted that I managed to get some sleep despite the mosquitoes (and my lack of Larium) and the fact that we were sleeping on effectively bare concrete.

The next day we stopped the first vehicle going our direction - it was already packed. I've described many horrible trips so far, but this was really the worst. Most dangerous and most uncomfortable! I was perched very precariously of the side wall of pickup with my legs extending horizontally, lying on top of a mixture of luggage and people. It took 100% of my concentration and all my strength to keep myself from falling off or breaking my coccyx (not well padded at the best of times in my case!).

Being delirious from the pain, hunger and fatigue; I was left to the mercy of the money changers. Mercy wasn't around though so I changed money with Neri, who thoroughly ripped my off! I didn't care though, I could see the border!

As soon as I crossed, the dirt roads became tarred, people understood what I was saying and everything seemed green and lush! I even had a seat on the bus... a whole one!

Mozambique isn't a shithole. BUT if you are on a budget similar to mine, don't speak Portuguese and are planning a trip to the north... don't go.

The Untamed North

2010-05-14T16:54:00.001+02:00

After a bit more that the usual amount of arguing with the bus conductor and driver (and entire village that appeared from the woodworks to put their two cents in!) we got to Pemba town.

Unwilling to pay the extravagant taxi fee to the backpackers place, and being in serious need of some exercise, we decided to walk most of the way, and then hitch if necessary.

As it turns out that the guy who gave us directions wasn’t fully accurate in his description of the distance. He said “it is faaaar, when it should in fact behave been: “eish, it is faaaaaar! Thankfully we didn’t get all that far before a Chapa (a truck in this case) picked us up and dropped us at Wimbe Beach only faaar from the lodge!). We stumbled into “Russell’s Place” only wheezing slightly and I promptly set up my tent (after haggling the price down a bit) at the far end of a nice lawn (what seemed like an ideal spot at the time, but later proved to be flawed in one very serious way…).

Pim, eager as ever to catch up on his sleep took a nap while I, despite our long hike to the place was eager to get a feel for what was around (mainly to find a place to have supper – Russell’s place was pricey!

Unfortunately I couldn’t find a thing! I then changed my objective slightly to finding a way down to the beach through all the busy building sites (no housing bubbled has burst around here!). Alas in this objective I was also unsuccessful and so I returned to base where I had to settle for a swimming pool and good food!

The next day we spent wading through the Mozambican bureaucracy in an attempt to get a copy of our passports “notarized” which was eventually successful. It did give us a good excuse to explore town and we had a good lunch (fish of course) at what I reluctantly accepted as a good price – for Mozambique. The reason we went through so much grief to get the stamp was that we didn’t want to carry around our originals (for obvious reasons) and we’d already been checked several times in Mozambique. One of the times – in Nampula we didn’t have them on us and were promptly ordered to the police station. We were only a few streets down from the hotel then, and convinced the pair of well armed (think sub-machine guns) officers to allow Pim to run back and get them while I stayed as a hostage. The fantas we bought them, I think, helped our case along. After we’d been cleaned I lost the ability to translate their mixture of Portuguese and Swahili and so wasn’t able to understand that he and his friend were also very hungry, and so we got away.

Sometime in the next four days of lounging by the pool and eating freshly baked bread rolls (with fish samosas in them) for breakfast, Pim carried on to Tz and I met lots of other interesting people. One of the days another budget backpacker arrived - a Swede who’s uncle my family knew from Zambia! Small damn world we live in!

Any way that night the most massive storm raged and while the Swede’s tent had a broken pole, it did have the rainproof outer-layer that mine lacked. So when the two of us met at the coffee table the following morning it was only too clear which of us had had a more peaceful slumber!

Even before I’d gone to bed I’d set up cups and bowls to try and catch the biggest leaks. It was so heavy that when I did get to bed, I lay there for about an hour and a half repositioning my (now floating) water catching devices and thinking: “surely this can’t go on for more that 5 minutes, there can’t be this much water on earth let alone floating above it!”

I was wrong and it quickly became apparent why my choice of site had been wrong too! Being at the bottom end of the (gently sloping) garden, a lake rapidly formed, tuning my tent into an island. Luckily I’d pegged the thing down properly or I’d have drifted out to sea and would be sending blog updates from Madagascar!

As the floor of the tent rose and strained against the pegs, I closed my eyes and told myself that I was sleeping in a nice, comfortable waterbed. It was comfortable; through I failed to incorporate the constant dripping on my forehead (see Chinese water-torture) into my delusion.

Having failed to ignore the worsening problem, I did the next best thing – I ran away from it! I threw my raincoat over my rucksack, unpegged the tent and floated it to higher ground where I removed all my valuables and dashed to the bar.

Luckily I found refuge in the (mostly) unused upper deck of the bar. And thankfully it didn’t rain like that again for the rest of my time in Pemba.

The one day we (the Swede - Viktor and I) got a lift to Wimbe beach where we rented some fins and snorkeling masks (I’m getting pretty hooked by the whole snorkeling thing by now) and swam out to the reef. It was nice, but in our stinginess - refusing to hire a boat - we missed out on the best bits.

While at the diving shop I noticed a sign offering snorkeling with dolphins for 20 USD. This was something that had been recommended to me by my grandparents. (Yes, they saw it on TV!)

The catch was there needed to be a minimum of four people so we spent the next couple of days trying to convince people to join us. We got one extra person eventually on our last day and headed down to the dive shop (willing to split the cost of the 4^th person if we had to).

We didn’t have to; and so off we sped in the speedboat in search of some dolphins! While cruising out to the dolphin zone we noticed thousands of massive jellyfish forming a minefield below us just like that scene in Finding Nemo (except these jellies were huge ugly brown ones with a couple of deadly – looking blue ones in between).

Having passed the minefield, the waters cleared up, we spotted the pod and gave chase. When we were a couple of meters away we anxiously plunged in and swam after them. They fled.

It was a fairly disappointing first foray, but we jumped in the boat, caught up and tried again. We repeated this several times, each time getting closer. Once they really seemed to be playing with me, dodging this way and that, staying just out of reach. It was fantastic – one of the highlights of my trip, and we all had big stupid grins on our faces the whole time.

Well, the whole time until they led us back into the minefield! We hesitated to jump in, but our stern faced captain insisted these jellies were of a harmless variety. Not wanting to be the only fool with jelly burns, we jumped in simultaneously.

Instantly I was struck by a burning sensation all over, but I assumed my mind was fooling me. I caught a glimpse of a dolphin and gave chase. It really felt like you were in a video game, swimming unnaturally fast because of the flippers, you had to dodge the jellies in three dimensions!

I was quite enjoying myself, but, having to focus all my energy on dodging jellies (you only have one life in this game!) I lost track of the dolphins. I stopped to locate them and realised that the burning hadn’t been imaginary, and was getting worse! I rushed get out, fearing some sort of allergic reaction.

Ever the scientist though, I paused to poke one, just to see….

On the way back the burning subsided, and we stopped for a quick inspection of a wreck (thankfully there weren’t the usual guardians – hammerhead sharks – that you’d find any movie featuring an underwater wreck! Then paused at the bar on the beach for a sundowner (helps with the jelly burns!)

The next day we got a taxi (well before dawn of course!) to the bus station, headed down south (we hoped) to civilisation.

P.S. Please forgive me if there are more mistakes than usual - being too lazy to sit and type this myself, I had a secretory do it instead, then went through it quickly and corrected the obvious ones...

5th (and final!?) Island Paradise?

2010-05-11T14:37:00.000+02:00

After the utter serenity of Lamu, the classic picturesqueness of Zanzibar and the isolation and beauty of Chizumulu and Likoma islands, Ilha de Mozambique had a lot to live up to simply because it fell into the category "island".

The chapa from Nampula dropped us off 50m from Casa de Luis, a nice homely sort oif place with camping (either in the courtyard, or on the wooden deck above the dorm room.) Relatively speaking, camping was cheap and since the upper deck had a thatched roof, there was no danger of getting drenched!

After dropping off our things and setting up our tents, I went out to explore while Pim (the Belgian guy) took a nap. Turns out that he was more in touch with the local habits than I - the whole island was sprawled out, fast asleep on mats and mattresses on the streets! Only a few old men were (half) awake, playing some strange board game.

I immediately liked the town, though it was way too hot to see the whole thing; so I got back to the Casa and joined the rest of the island in their lunchtime seista.

When it was (marginally) cooler, Pim and I had another walk around. When the sun was just about going down we followed the promising sound of a party in full swing.

We later found out that we'd arrived on women's day in Mozambique - something they are (and should be!) very proud of. The party was just up from the only real beach and it seemed the whole island had shown up. Everyone from little toddlers to old grannies were strutting their stuff on the dancefloor. We stopped to watch and grab a couple of sundowners. The party raged on for about two hours then abruptly broke up and everyone returned to their mattresses in the streets!

We took it to be the end of the day so we headed back to the casa, stopping for some supper on the street (boiled cassava and some fried fish).

I started off sleeping on a bed thing on the deck - outside my tent (it was way too hot and uncomfortable in there!), but I had to move in after a couple of hours because of all the mozzies!

By this time I already suspected that the islanders had very strange sleeping patterns, but it was still surprising when one of the times I woke up to wring out my sheet (I was sweating bucketloads in my tent!), I heard the sound of the party once again pumping! They hadn't gone to bed after all, just power-napping to get the energy for a few more hours of crazy dancing!

Anyway we spent much of the next three days walking round the island, living off of fish, squid, bread rolls and boiled cassava. It was really chilled and relaxing but the nights in the tent didn't improve for me (Pim moved downstairs into the dorm - with fan!!). It was a constant battle between the mozzies outside the tent, and the unbearable heat inside.

After all those days of exploring, we'd pretty much covered all there was to see on the island; so after one night's luxuary in the dorm, we started off up north - before sunrise of course!

Mad Rush to the Coast

2010-04-28T12:52:00.001+02:00

Northern Mozambique: The relative luxury ends here. This after all “one of the continent’s last wild frontiers – rugged and challenging for travel” (Lonely Planet).

On Likoma Island I met a Belgian chap who was also heading over to Mozambique in a dhow. Neither of us speaks any Portuguese!

So off we set, starting early-ish from Mango Drift in their battered old Land Rover into the ‘town’. From there we were officially stamped out of Malawi, we changed some money then boarded a dhow bound for Cobue 7km away. When we had paddled out into the wind they dropped the sails which, much to our amusement (and yet slightly worrying), were made of a bed sheet (main sail) and a couple of sacks sown together (front sail). After a bit of joking about the unseaworthyness of the craft the wind really picked up and suddenly we were flying along at an impressive pace. Though the wind was so strong that we were at such an angle that the right hand side of the vessel (Port? Starboard? Does anyone really know!?) was about 5cm from the water-line.

Within no time at all we’d reached the shores of Mozambique and hiked up the hill to the immigration office (one of the five non mud-dependent structures in the ‘town’!). An emissary was dispatched to the home of the official who was not happy that his post-lunch nap was being interrupted .Well I assume that’s what he was rattling on about. In truth I have absolutely no idea what he saying so I just smiled and handed over my passport… “Visa?” I enquired.

Anyway we later found out that there was no more transport that day. Anywhere. So we lay on the shore reading and sleeping. The next day we were first to the truck (good because it meant we got good seats in the cab, bad because we then had to drive up and down the one (dirt) road in the town for what felt like hours as the truck became more and more full. You see it turns out that in Mozambique (and all of the other countries I’ve passed through on this trip) the concept of “full” isn’t a simple binary yes or no question as it is in Sweden, but more of an analogue scale ranging from empty to a ridiculous world record attempt at squeezing in people, luggage and livestock!

Still I guess that’s what makes it cheap so I can hardly complain. Anyway we eventually got going and cruised the bone jarring road to Metangula in no time at all and luckily connected with a large, newish bus just outside the town bound for Lichinga. The AC blasting in the bus had little effect – mainly because all the windows were open and we ate a steady stream of dust all the way to Lichinga.

Anyway we got to Lichinga eventually, found the cheapest, dodgiest accommodation available - still double the price of anything decent in Tz or Malawi! After a quick tour of the town we had some food and had an early night.

We woke up early – about 04:30 or there about to catch the bus to Cuamba. Unfortunately this turned out to be too late for the nice big buses and so we reluctantly settled for a minibus. We then had a chance to improve on our previous minor tour of the city as we were treated to two hours (literally) of driving round at high speeds, both driver and conductor attempting to let everyone, sleeping or not, know about our imminent departure! We were fairly comfortable for the first few hours, but unfortunately this was not to last. Unbeknownst to us, the driver had made some deal with his mate in a town halfway to drop us all off, from where the friend would take us to our final destination. Everyone else appeared to have understood what was coming and they were prepared. As soon as we pulled up alongside the friend’s bus, they promptly jumped ship leaving the Belgian (Pim) and I to argue our case with the driver and conductor (both of whom spoke no English!). Reluctantly we followed our fellow passengers; but by this time all the ‘good’ seats were occupied leaving me with one of the backless fold-down ones which I had to share with a lady whose bottom was in the least bit unsubstantial!

When we arrived in Cuamba I was in a thoroughly bad mood, having eaten practically nothing the whole day! Looking at the menu of the nearest restaurant didn’t help – everything was horrible overpriced. As I set off to find a more reasonable place a massive storm broke out so I didn’t get further than the place next door (even slightly more expensive!) and had to settle for one of the cheapest things on the menu – a piece of meat on a bun (still the price of 2-3 decent meals in Tz!). So that night I went to bed hungry, wet and very much disliking Mozambique.

The next morning was again an early one, but at least the train to Nampula set off more or less on time (0500). Although we paid for economy class (the only one available), we were treated to a whole wooden bench each. Going to be a better day for sure I thought as we pulled off, treated to a fantastic sunrise over some great mountains.

We stopped in every little village along the way where we picked up more ans more passengers. A few hours in we lost our bench privilege but we were still comfortable – being able to stretch our legs, go for a walk up and down the carridges. And we had plenty to eat and drink. Despite the train running every day, the way every single village had turned out en mass to sell us stuff, you’d think they hadn’t seen it in months! Most of the cooked things were drenched in oil, but there was a lot of fruits and veggies thrust through the windows also! We quickly learned the Portuguese numbers and a few other essential phrases (like: “that is too expensive”) despite some confusion along the way (e.g. they call 1 “mil” – meaning 1000 because the government slashed three zeros off their currency not so long ago).

The WC’s were interesting on the train – they didn’t bother with the façade of a toilet like they do, so I’m told, in England where, despite it appearing very modern and clean, there’s still a sign saying “please do not use this toilet while the train is in that station.” That would appear to make the Mozambican rail officials more honest, or at least less deceptive than their European counterparts. It was a bumpy train ride though and, while it was fun to take a leak while watching the tracks whizz passed, it seemed I wasn’t the only one having trouble staying one target while being thrown this way and that, one leg holding the door shut!

As our comfort gradually declined it became increasingly clear that, while they said it was a passenger car, it was being used as more of a cargo car, supplying the city with all the fresh produce (and quite a large percentage of their poultry as well I'd guess). As we got nearer to Nampula (the last five hours or so) the buying of goods became frantic, with some women elbowing others out of the window to get the better deal on the bag of beans. Our bags quickly disappeared, as did our legs, under a mountain of beans, fruits, cassava and some things one normally wouldn’t assume to be edible!

So when the train finally pulled into the station 14hrs after leaving Cuamba, we were justifiably fed up and desperate to get off. A great deal of patience and restraint was needed by both of us as the now lethargic ladies (all that buying really took it out of them!) slowly claimed their beans and made their way onto the platform. Eventually we were able to grab our bags and get off. Luckily we “didn’t notice” the queue formed to get through the gates until a policeman shoved us into it, but by that stage we’d covered most of the distance to the gate. We walked round for a while looking in vain for some cheap accommodation. Luckily someone we asked knew the owner of the adjacent hotel (quite fancy) and got us a ‘good deal’. I was in a better mood up until we went looking for supper and I had to again settle for a Prego com Pão (meat on a bun) but it was quite tasty and I’d eaten well on the train, so I wasn’t too bothered. After the strain of the previous day’s travels, the AC and decent beds were warmly welcomed.

The next morning we caught the minibus to Ilha de Mazambique (a mere 3.5 hrs!) - The last leg of the rush to the coast. Pretty standard, cramped ride, but as we drove across the 3.5 km bridge (they say… doesn’t look that long!) I knew that it had been worth all those long hours to get here. The ocean looked great!

I'll Just Shoot Through Malawi...

2010-04-09T10:19:00.000+02:00

Having spent a great and relaxing time with my cousins around Iringa, I decided to make my way to Mozambique. And, not wanting to go all the way back to Dar for a visa, I decided to to the 'easy way' - via Malawi. The fact that the Malawian one month visa is free may have just tipped the scale for me.

So I set off for the boarder and after two very long bus rides back to back, I arrived in Tukuyu - not far from the boarder. I stayed in yet another dingy guest house/brothel and carried on the next day to the boarder.

At the immigration desk I was greeted with three grinning faces - two of which I recognized. It was a group of Israelis two of which I'd met in Zanzibar a couple of times. After greetings were exchanged their smiles vanished as they told of how they'd been held at the boarder for three days! Turns out they'd bought a car in Dar and intended to sell it in S.A when the drive down there. There were however some issues...

Anyway it just so happens that I got there just an hour or two before all the red tape was hacked away and they were free to carry on. So I got a lift with them (contributing to the fuel of course!).

When all the formalities were sorted through we jumped in the ride, bound for a place called Mushroom Farm - a place they were convinced it was possible to obtain some of the more magical variety. Alas, they don't even stock, let alone grow any mushrooms at all!

To get there we had to climb up onto a plateu via what could well be the most dangerous road I've ever been on! It was extremley steep, dirt, blind hairpin turn after blind hairpin - no railings of course. One section was completely slick black mud. It was tough going and the twenty-something year old land cruiser was struggelling, even with 4WD engaged.

We arrived just as the sun was dissappearing over the top of the hill - I'd hate to have done that at night! We camped - my first test of the new tent besided opening it in Sweden... Verdict: It's shite! It's not big enough for me and my bag despite it being a 2-3 person tent (maybe they use Congolese forest pygmmies as the standard!?) The main problem with it however, is that it isn't waterproof, in fact, not even water resistant!

The heavens opened sometime during the night and my sleeping bag became a liferaft as the water poured in from every seam! It's a miracle that I wasn't washed over the cliff on which my tent was precariously pitched!

Unfortunately the food there was beyond our budgets and we were forced to make do with glucose buscuits and a shot of their strong coffee. This of course did little to improve my mood after my night sleeping in the puddle. We then hiked up to some waterfalls (stopping on the way to pick up more supplies - i.e. glucose bikkies) where we had a dangerous swim on the edge. We managed to to skip the entrance fee of 20 Malawian Kwacha as we were apparently conducting some sort of research on the falls... I've got nothing against Israelis, but it has to be said that these three drive a hard bargain. The woman a the gate did try and refuse our feeble excuse, but we managed to bribe her with some, yup, glucose biscuits!

Afterwards we jumped in the car and drove hard all the way to Mzuzu where we bought some supplies (noodles) and extended the transit permit for the car.

We got to Nkhata Bay and the Israelis immediately set about finding other Jews with which to celebrate the upcoming Passover. Within 20 mins they'd located another three israeli girls and more in the following days.

Anyway we spent two nights at a place called Butterfly (both of which I slept in the car at the camping rate). Just my luck that on the second night it poured down again and it was established that the vehicle was not waterproof either : ( So when we'd decided to shift to another place with a more lively atmosphere (though slightly more tacky) called Big Blue Star, I thought I'd splash out on a dorm room where I was relieved to find that the roof had no obvious leaks!

The night of Passover unfortunately coincided with the weekly ferry, the Ilala, as it made its way down south, stopping at Chizimulu and Likoma Islands before heading further south. So I said my goodbyes to the Jews, all dressed up and making nice things to eat. Then we (a young Dutch couple and myself) headed down to the ferry. This time my suvival food consisted mainly of Maheu and a loaf of bread. We reasoned that the journey was only a couple of hours long, and economy class would do just fine (1/5 the price of 1st). Besides, we were told that once the guards checked the tickets adn went to bed, we could shoot up to the 1st class deck and savour the luxuary.

The ensuing cat and mouse game that carried on for the entire of the journey between us and the fat ticket guy was nothing short of comic! Luckily we'd left our big bags up top with a British couple we'd met in Nkhata Bay so we were able to be fairly stealthy. After being kicked off the deck once or twice by the fat ticket man, we managed to bribe the security guard sent to escort us back to the sardine tin into smuggling us back on top. Fat Ticket Man: 1 - Us: 2

An eccentric, hippy-type British guy had been waiting up for the three of us (his only guests) at Wakwenda Retreat. We had a couple of beers with while chatting and watching the Ilala of load a couple of tonnes of fruits and sugar in the moonlight.

We then spent a great three days lougning on the beach, eating coconuts, hiking in the hills and snorkelling (chilling basically). Chizumulu for me was difinitely up there with Lamu in terms of island paradise! Wakwenda Retreat was really done up nicely and was cheap for what it was worth! The meals however, were not (though v. nice) and I quicly ran out of maheu and noodles; especially with my suspected tape-worm infestation (these things are a reality you have to deal with) - constant hunger being the clue.

Anyway the Dutch couple had to move on, and I decided I had to as well. We set off fairly early for the other side of the island, where the dhow to Likoma leaves from. We ended up having to wait a couple of hours (a lot longer than what the journey eventually took us) for the wind to change direction. It didn't, but we set off anyway with the tiny, noisy engine. Thankfully though, the timing turned out to be perfect - as we got to the centre of the lake we noticed that we were surrounded by three heavy storms (one in Mozambique and one on each of the islands). They moved around us and we squeezed through the gap between them, successfully (surprisingly given my track record) avoiding getting drenched.

So we spent two days on Likoma island - more chilling, playing volleyball and walking in the hills. This was also very nice, but somehow didn't quite have the same charm as Chizumulu. Still, I saved some money by camping (sounds like suicide, but for the camping price, they give you a tent which they assured me was waterproof!). After the two days there the Ilala was on its way back up the lake and most people jumped on it and took it back to Nkhata Bay. A Belgian guy and myself however hired a dhow to take us the 7km across to Mozambique... More about that later...

Ok so maybe I didn't just shoot through, but I had a good taste of Malawi and am looking forward to getting back there when I've suffered enough with the Portuguese!

More Pics on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=405685&id=731815045&l=b2dadb3db7

Heading South...Kinda

2010-03-22T14:43:00.001+01:00

I realise now that one of my original posts - about why I'm doing this trip and blogging about it as well has been buried deep in the menu on the right hand side. This has left at least some people with nothing better to do than read about my travels a bit lost. If you feel this description fits you, give this a read and thanks for the support!

I ended up staying about a week at this horse safari place (called Ndarakwai), helping out where I could (basically sorting out computer issues - anitvirus etc...).

The elephants were great - extremely intelligent things with an impressive repertoire of tricks and commands they respond to (/understand!?).

On one of the days I was quite keen on joining one of the horse safaris but I think both Carlos and I realised that my equestrian skills would be stretched too far if we happened across a herd of wild elephants or a cheetah!

I did get a chance on the last day to ride however, and did some game viewing - I saw a herd of impala (and a lone eland that had been adopted by them). Even though this was in the relative safety of the training ring, I was quite proud.

After my week at the camp I headed back into Arusha with Emily - an ex-overland truck driver who had been giving Reiki sessions to both the horses, and Carlos.

I then spent a couple of relaxing days around Arusha - staying with the same friends as before. I stuck around there until Wednesday - where I moved into some cheap guest house right in town opposite the bus station - the bus was to leave at 0600 the next morning! That evening I got a dalla dalla out to a really nice venue where another family friend happened to be up from Zambia exhibiting her artwork. It was the opening night of the exhibition and wine and good food flowed generously. She did really well, selling more than half of the paintings in just a couple of hours! Most of them were really great but unfortunately a bit over my budget!

I worked out that if I had bought one, I'd have had to fly back to Sweden within the following 36-48hrs or have to go out on the street begging!

Anyway some of my friends insisted that I took a taxi back to the guest house and not another dalla dalla and, perhaps seeing my stubbornness, stuffed the taxi fare into my shirt pocket! It was only 2030... there were still plenty of dalla dallas! Anway, I was very grateful!

The next morning we set off eastwards pretty much on time. Yes, east... I thought I'd be heading south! Iringa lies almost exactly due south of Arusha, we were heading back to Tanga via Moshi! After a couple hours of having the sun in our faces I cleared my throat and asked the guy next to me if this was really the bus to Iringa?

"Yes", he laughed, "there weren't enough passengers so we are going the long way round to find some more!"

14 hours and much discomfort in my lanky legs later we pulled into Iringa. Now I had to find a place to stay :S being 20:00 already and with all my luggage, I felt quite uncomfortable. Hearing the Muslim call to prayer made me slightly less worried - perhaps because I figured surely no-one would rob me while praising Allah!?

Thankfully there was a plethora of cheap guest houses just two streets down from the bus stand and I stumbled into the first one I saw.

"Sorry, we only have a double room." the man at the desk said, "you will have to pay extra for it."

I opened my mouth to protest this, but instead asked how much a double costs. 6000Tsh (about 30sek)! It really wasn't worth going to check if the grubby place next door had single rooms. I'd splash out.

The next morning I took my time eating breakfast (two samusas and a chapati with a cup of sweet, spicy tea) before jumping on the dalla dalla out to my cousin's place about 40kms away.

After arriving and chatting for a while got a lift into the bush and spent the rest of the day relaxing at a dam fishing. Walking back on the single path home, predictably, I got a bit lost and ended up trudging though a dambo (wetland). As for the fishing - I caught nothing but some aquatic flora (no, you can't fry that in batter you know who you are!).

Having spent a couple of relaxing days meeting people, checking out the farm lands and planning my next move, I've decided to head off to Malawi tomorrow where I'll spent a few days waiting for the ferry (the Ilala) to make it's way around the lake, then cross into Mozambique. I also had the opportunity to download some "in-flight" Portuguese lessons in Arusha which I should really listen to a couple of times before I get there!

The slightly more adventurous route into Mozambique is at the coast, but this would mean having to go back to Dar for a couple of days and procuring a visa as there isn't really a proper boarder post there apparently, just a guy in a canoe who will paddle you across if he has the energy. It sounds like it would be great fun, but would cost me almost a week and a half with all the red tape and traveling!

That's all the news for now... not sure how good the internets are in Mozambique but, as always, will do my best to keep the updates coming in and take lots of pics - I've filled one of my 4GB sticks already (most of them rubbish but anyway)!

Oh and for those of you who are wondering, my anti-malarial drug (Larium) hasn't yet had any serious side effect (apparently you can get some really psychotic nightmares!).

The Journey Inland

2010-03-08T15:50:00.001+01:00

After the relatively expensive Zanzibar, I was keen to get back into the cheap life on the mainland. So when a family friend offered me a bed in Dar for a couple of nights, I would've been crazy to turn it down. I ended up having a really good time there, living the high life - electricity, running water and good TV - poor Chileans by the way!! And they turned out to be really nice people - very funny!

Well it was really nice there, but apart from meeting up with the Brits again after they were done with Zanzibar for a couple of drinks, one crazy Mexican themed party at the Irish pub (random? yes, but the tequila made it seem perfectly natural!) and a wander around the big market full of Chinese knock-offs of famous brands; nothing major happened.

After about four nights at this guy's place, I got a bus to Tanga - one more stop along the coast before heading inland. It was extremely hot, but otherwise a very nice town. I spent two nights there before moving on to Moshi.

Moshi, famous for being pretty much at the base of Kilimanjaro, was full of "flycatchers" - people who earn money by shoving tourists into offices where they can book a safari or climb Kili and getting commissions. They are extremely persistent too, offering everything under the sun. Eventually they all resort to selling "Bob Marley cigarettes".

Anyway the first night in Moshi I spent in an extremely foul place, with bare live wires (luckily the power was "finished" so there was no real danger!) and no water at all, not even buckets! So I stayed one, horrible night there and, after by early morning walk to catch to sunrise over the mountain - which was fantastic - I packed my stuff and left.

The next place was miles ahead of the other - it was a Lutheran mission hostel thing, also pretty close to town, but very quiet, peaceful and clean. It only cost 1000Tsh more and included breakfast - it came to 7000Tsh a night (about 35 sek). It was well worth it.

I spent the rest of that day just walking around the town and in the internet cafe. The next day, on a friend in Sweden's insistence, I went to check out the International School of Moshi. It looked so close when I looked at it on the map! I pretty much spent the whole day walking there and back - I stayed for less than 10 mins... Thanks a lot you know who you are (Mati!)

Anyway the following day I jumped on a dalla dalla to some waterfalls in rivers from the glacial melt off of Kilimanjaro! Very beautiful area, so green and lush! The one waterfall had a 5m jump into the pool below - which I did without thinking about. Then I went for the big one - 8 or 9m, and you had to really jump pretty far out - a couple of metres, to avoid the branches and rocks in the way. The adrenaline had me shaking all the way back to Moshi (though the local banana beer - tastes a bit like champagne, we stopped for on the way helped to settle me down a bit!)

I said "we" - I met some American guy there at the falls who was also going to overnight in Moshi - he's doing some research in a village on the other side of Arusha. I got him to take some pics and even a video of the jumps - I'll try and get them up when I can!

That night - Saturday - we went out looking for where the party was... it wasn't! We went to pretty much every bar in Moshi that was open!

Anyway the next morning I spent in the internet cafe getting pictures and the blog post about Zanzibar up. We then jumped on a bus bound for Arusha, where I stayed the night with some more family friends - very friendly and welcoming people (and I'm not just saying that because they might be reading this - she writes her own blog about life in some hills around Arusha - which you can check out here!!!). That night we went to the neighbours (more family friends it turned out - such a small world) for sundowners which was great.

Staying also staying with us was a Spanish guy - Carlos, who runs eco and adventure safaris in western Kilimanjaro - horse riding, mountain biking etc. The next morning he was heading back there - about 3 hours away and offered to let me tag along. Sounded like such a great opportunity to spend some time in the bush - these things are hugely expensive for someone on my budget, and there isn't many places that you can just go and camp in any more. So that is where I am right now, it's really beautiful, cool and apparently there are a pair of elephant orphans (now big) that are really tame - can't wait to see them and maybe even feed them.

All running on solar here so I can't be too long, will put the pics up when I get back to Arusha!

Edit: Still here and have had the time to resize and put up some pics - it's been sunny!

Zanzibar Adventures

2010-03-07T08:15:00.001+01:00

Luckily Franko (the guy from the bus) did offer to show me to a cheap place, because Dar is crazy!! The matatu/ dalla dalla system is much worse than Nairobi's! Anyway his wife was waiting at the bus-stop with a Taxi (which they kindly insisted on paying).

It turns out that the place he showed me to was literally next-door to his house and they invited me round for dinner after a quick but essential shower!

Franko and Lucy (his wife) then insisted on taking me to see a concert, which didn't work out in the end - the band was 4hrs late and I was really tired!

The next morning, again on Franko's insistence, he showed me to the ferry dock, where we'd already missed the early one and had a few hours to kill. He showed me round the fish market then we ate some soup and chapatis then he left.

While waiting for the ferry I started talking to a Dutch couple - quite strange people. Like me they'd paid for the full VIP lounge on the 'slow' ferry (the man in charge refused to allow wazungu to buy anything else - he said to me: "Look, you can sit wherever you want on the ship my friend, but you still have to pay 20 USD!" )

When it was time to board they decided to sit on the roof deck, not the VIP lounge. It was fairly cool up there, but soon became way to crowded so I wandered round the ship in search of the lounge. VIP was much quieter, and cool with the AC so I stuck around. I sat next to a large group of backpacker type people. As it turned out, they weren't a group... There were 2 English guys (volunteers), 1 American ('traveler' - been on the road for 18 months, going through 52 countries!!) and 2 Dutch girls (volunteers/placement year of med-school), all about mid-twenties. They seemed interesting and, after the 3hr journey came to an end, we stuck together in search of accommodation - with the exception of the 2 Dutch girls.

Wondering the streets of stone town, we were struck by the noise (many cars, mopeds and most of all... generators!). Zanzibar has not had power for about 2 and a half months! The other thing that struck us was the sheer number of people selling the island hit song "Jambo Bwana" on CD, either alone, or in combination with weed and/or a Maasai necklace!

We ended up in a place called Manch Lodge which was marginally cheaper than the Annex of Abdullah (ok it was a lot cheaper, but I just love that name!). Thanks to some very poor mental maths skills on the part of the receptionist, we got a big discount and so we booked and paid for 2 nights there.

We then wondered the streets looking for the music festival. Unfortunately it turned out that the main festival had finished but at least we could catch the after-party, which was to held the next day on the other side of the island.

That night we ate at the famous seafood stalls selling pretty much anything that once moved in the ocean. We sampled things like: shark, marlin, kingfish, octapus, squid, baracuda... We also tried the famous Zanzibar pizza, cooked on the lid of a dustbin, which was delicious!! To wash it all down with we had someone squeeze us some fresh sugar cane juice with lemon and ginger. Good stuff.

We spent the next day wandering through the markets and relaxing on the beach about 10 kms from stone town. That evening we got a ride with some rasta guy to the party, partied on the beach until the music stopped, then went all the way back to stone town. Bumped into the Dutch girls there... this became quite a habit on Zanzibar.

We had to wake up early the next morning - checkout time was 10:00. Then we sat on the street until a cheap enough taxi thing came to pick us up! We drove back to the place the party had been (Jambiani) and found a nice cheap place. We stayed in Jambiani for two nights, then moved up to the very top of the island - Nungwi. This turned out to be a Swedish colony - even some of the locals spoke Swedish!! We stayed there for 3 nights (two of which I spent on the floor because Joel (the American) left to continue his epic trip and I'm a bit of a cheapskate!). We went to two parties there, both pretty much on the beach which was cool.

While there we also got to swim with some massive turtles at a natural aquarium thing.

One of the Brits, Andy, had studied marine biology at uni and apparently the best place to snorkel in East Africa was the Mnemba Atole, so after Nungwi we jumped on a dalla dalla down to Matemwe, just opposite Mnemba. We spent two nights there waking up early one morning to check out sunrise.

After a breakfast of fruit, chapatis and a fried egg, we set off to try the snorkeling. The colour of the water was crazy, just picture postcard material wherever you looked! Of course the snorkeling was amazing (being my second time, I now had something to go by!). Andy also explained how to make the pressure in your ears equalize, which means you can go as deep as you want without them feeling like they're going to explode! I think I saw pretty much everything I'd hoped to see (except a seahorse, Tom said he saw one though).

After Mnemba we jumped on a dalla dalla back to stone town, left our bags at some cheap guest house (Tom and Andy were gonna stay another night or two). Then we went to the docks where I bought a ticket for the overnight ferry back to Dar. Naturally I went for the cheapest option - what a mistake that turned out to be!

We then went round the markets for a couple of hours, ate at the seafood stalls again, then I jumped on the ferry and , about 2 hours later (which was 2 hours late), we set off.

The ferry was really just a cargo ship with a lounge with some benches bolted on the side as an afterthought. It was of course loud, uncomfortable and overcrowded. And hot! I tried to get some sleep, but even though I was sleeping on my bags, I kept waking up thinking someone was trying to steal something! We were just waiting in the harbour most of the night but could only get off the boat when the port opened at about 06:00. Saw nice sunrise in the harbour though... a nice end to a great time on Zanzibar!

By the way, there are more pics here: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=385625&id=731815045&l=7f1eb74028

Kwaheri Kenya!

2010-02-25T08:07:00.001+01:00

First of all sorry for the 2 weeks of no news - island life is great for many different things (mainly relaxing), but one thing it is not good for is internets! Especially Zanzibar, which has had no electricity for over 2 months now!

So where am I now??? In Dar Es Salaam, just got back from Zanzibar this morning!

Lamu was fantastic.. really the best place I've been so far by a long way! Zanzibar was more beautiful in the classic sense.. but Lamu had more style and was less commercialized (at least where we stayed).

For the first few days in Lamu we did get hawked a couple of times a day by captains offering dhow trips.. but it's such a small town, that they all recognized us after the 3rd day! The predominance of Islam on the island does however mean that there are only about 2 places (in the Lamu town itself) to get a drink, one is called roof top bar, the other is at the police canteen!

On our 1st day we went there for a beer there and ended up eating, then playing volleyball against the local team/ police force... they were good! Very random.. but fun!

One of the days (we stayed for many!!) we gave in and went on a half day's dhow trip. It was amazing! I don't use the word awesome much.. it's too American.. but that's what this was!!

We set off at around 0800.. well tried to - the wind was "finished". "Oh great" I thought, this is going along the same lines as my last sailing experience! But the water was so inviting we didn't get impatient, we just jumped in alongside the slow moving vessel and splashed around for a bit.

Before we knew it the wind had picked up and we flopped back in the boat and cruised on. When we arrived at an arbitrary point in the middle of the ocean they called "deep sea" we dropped in a couple of lines with some squid as bait, and some rusty iron nails as sinkers.

Pretty much as soon as you felt the nail hit the bottom, it was time to reel it in again - with a fish on the hook of course! It was crazy! Within half an hour we'd filled a bucket full of fish of all different species!

I snagged the catch of the day:

When the bucket was full and all the hooks had been stolen by giant fish, we head back in the direction we came.

We stopped at the reef opposite Shella beach for some snorkeling. It being my first time I was quite terrified of all the poisonous fish, eels, sharks, sting rays etc. It was fantastic though! really amazing stuff. The others who had done this stuff before thought it was pretty rubbish - afterward we found out that the el ninio thing a couple of years earlier had devastated the coral, and it hadn't returned to it's former glory yet.

It was still the highlight of my trip up to that point!

The next day I went to see a family friend who lives on Shella beach - it was really interesting to hear some of the stories of what it's like to actually live there all year round. She also strongly recommended that I go down to Zanzibar to catch the end of a massive music festival going on there.

Predictably it took me the whole of the next day to decide whether to rush down or not.

Either way the next day Pavel, Eva and I got the bus down to Mombasa - Wes was going to fly. In Mombasa I still hadn't decided, right up until I was in the booking office for the bus to Dar... The seats on the bus looked comfy - that sealed the deal as far as I was concerned - Zanzibar it is!

It was a loooong journey, but no problems at the boarder or anything (although I did forget 100 USD in my passport as I handed it over to the immigration officer - really looked like a bribe attempt :S ).

At the boarder I was chatting to a businessman - Franko, who was going to visit his wife and businesses in Dar. He offered to show me to a good cheap place when we got there.

Beach Life

2010-02-10T16:31:00.000+01:00

I'm now in Lamu, an island off the coast of Kenya (north of Mombasa) it's a great little island with a lot to see and do... stunningly beautiful! Here's how I ended up here and what I'm doing:

From Nairobi:

I left for the train to late - by matatu of course! I thought I was gonna be late and was practically running through Nairobi to the station. Of course I wasn't late! In fact it would be another 2hrs before the train actually set off.

Anyway I ended up in a carriage with some really interesting people - Pavel (from the Czech Republic), Wes (from California) and Vincent (Kenyan).

I was really looking forward to the next morning where we'd eat a nice full English breakfast while checking out the man-eating lions of the Tsavo National Park. Unfortunately, and possibly the only time in the history of the train's operation, we were pretty much on time, and that meant that most of the Tsavo had whizzed by while we were asleep.

Anyway so we ate the breakfast and a couple of hours later we rolled into Mombasa station. We managed to leave our bags at the station and headed off for food and culture.

The culture we found ('we' being Wes, Pavel, Pavel's girlfriend Eva, and myself), was one of extreme laziness. We ordered some food and sat there for 1.5hrs before any food came. And it wasn't like some exotic foreign food that was hard to make, we ordered ugali (nshima) and nyama (beef) - the standard meal!

When we'd eventually eaten we carried on to Mombasa Old Town and Fort Jesus. A really interesting historical site... apparently.

In the evening we decided to share a "cab" and work our way north till we came across a decent budget hotel. We eventually found one and ended up staying two nights there. We spent those days on the beach, playing pool and visiting some ruins and things like that.

We then moved on to Malindi (well we sent Wes on there, we stopped along the way to see some more ruins!). When we arrived in Malindi we were surprised to hear all the locals greeting us in Italian! Little Italy is an understatement! This place was overrun with them! The accommodation Wes found for us was quite a posh place so we were delighted to hear it cost the same per person as the grubby place in Nairobi... at least that was what he'd understood. He was wrong unfortunately... it was double the price :( Anyway the next day we spent exploring Malindi and that night we moved into a place half the price.

The next day we got up relatively early and got the bus to Lamu (the jetty where you catch the ferry to Lamu). Another hot, dusty, bumpy, back-breaking bus ride! I was particularly unfortunate that the cushion in my seat had been eroded and there was a piece of a plank of or something digging into the small of my back the whole way.

When we eventually got to the island we were assaulted by would-be captains offering dhow sailing trips with snorkeling and lunch on a beach. All the exact same offer for the exact same price! Anyway Pavel and Eva had arrived 20 mins before us (they woke up earlier and got a different bus) and had found a great place to stray. It's a little cottage thing in the middle of the old town (there are no cars on the island so there are only tiny little narrow streets) with it's own roof top terrace and sleeping for 6! It's really great and works out (shockingly) to 500 per person - the same as the grubby place in Nairobi!

Lamu is so good I don't want to spend all my time in this "cyber" with it's sticky keyboard! It really deserves its own post - with pics, which I'll get up asap.

Kwaheri (bye) for now...

Back in Nairobi!

2010-01-31T09:26:00.002+01:00

Be sure to check out my updated route map. The red route is obviously the one I've actually followed so far (more or less).

Anyway after the first night in Mbita I decided would've liked to switch accommodation to something a little better, but stingy as I am, I'd already paid the 250 bob (about 25 sek) for both nights, so I stayed. The reasons for wanting to move were many - it was located directly underneath a noisy bar, the shared shower was a filthy bucket, the shared toilet was a really nasty hole in the ground with a gaping hole in the side of the wall facing onto the main street, and finally, the cats. A bunch of cats were screaming all night long right outside my room. When the cries woke me up at 0400 I at first thought it was a baby. Eventually after almost an hour of lying there listening to this racket there was a scuffle, a shout, a crash, then the most blood curdling scream of death I've ever heard. Then silence.

As heartless as it sounds now that I'm re-telling the story, I was enormously grateful that the little bugger had been decapitated, or drowned, or whatever! Unfortunately the next night followed a similar pattern - there must be an endless supply of these demon cats.

Anyway I spent the two days in Mbita walking around, swimming in the lake, chilling on the beach under a fig tree belonging to a guy with only one leg...

The 12 o'clock ferry "to Kisumu" does not, in fact go directly to Kisumu, nor does it leave at 1200! It arrives at 12 ish and leaves at 1430 for a town called Luanda, from there you get a bus to Kisumu. I was really looking forward to seeing the lake - the whole purpose of getting the ferry. Unfortunately, for the 45 min journey it was so hot that all the side shades were down and no one could see a thing!

Anyway got to Kisumu and got a tuk-tuk (I think that's what it's called) - one of those 3-wheeled cross between a car and a motorbike, to a nearby guest house thing.

Just as a side note to clear up possible confusion over the Kenyan transport system, you have: the aforementioned tuk-tuk, the matatu (mini-bus), the piki-piki (motorbike) and the boda-boda (a bicycle with a fat cushion on the rear package carrier).

Anyway I spent two day exploring Kisumu - quite a nice city, then in the morning of the third day (with the aid of some guy from Uganda I'd befriended) I hauled my katundu (bags) down to the reputable bus company booking office to book the bus back to Nairobi. 1100 shillings please.

No thanks! So we dragged the bags back across town to a bus "company" that only wanted 500 bob.

I should have gone with the expensive one! heheh sure enough we had to sit in the hot, grubby, noisy bus station, bombared with a steady stream of goods people brought onto the bus (from vcds and dvds to live chickens and handkerchieves).

The bus broke down just over half way, and we had to sit under a tree for about an hour until the engine had cooled down enough and the smoke that was billowing from it had stopped.

Eventually we got there (but due to the delays it was now nightfall) and I had to haul my bags all the way across Nairobi to the place I'd stayed the time before.

With the help of some taxi drivers, and a guy that had been on the same bus, I eventually stumbled into the place.

I spent most of the next day exploring Nairobi, which doesn't seem as intimidating as it did at first.

Am now staying with a family friend (a Swedish diplomat) in a very posh area - nice swimming pool, good food, running water etc.

A day or two of luxury before I carry on to the coast.

Adventures on the Banks of Lake Victoria

2010-01-25T14:07:00.002+01:00

I'm slowly building up a bank of stories from trip by writing a diary everyday but as you can probably imagine, spending that amount of time everyday blogging would kind of defeat the purpose of the trip! So anyway, since my last post, I'll just quickly run through some the highlights:

After a long day walking around Nairobi with Ieuen and one of the guys who tried to sell me a safari on the first day - turned out to be a pretty ok guy, and good guide!

That evening I got the overnight bus to a small town called Homa Bay - the most terrifying trip of my life!! I don't know if the fact that we left an hour late made the driver feel he had to compensate by going twice as fast, but I didn't sleep at all. Adding to the threat of death and general discomfort of the journey were the facts that: I had no seatbelt, the guy next to me was slightly obese and drooling on me, I only had a shirt and pair of shorts which made it very cold, I was suffering from spontaneous, chronic nose bleeds (my black sock came in handy in the absence of any tissue paper) and finally the constant stopping and starting for road blocks and trenches across the road. So all this made for a pretty crappy journey. At the final bus stop we all got off and I got a piki piki (motorbike) taxi to a couple of different "hotels" till I found one that fit the budget.

Anyway it turned out that the prime minister of kenya was stopping by that town on that day to deliver some very important speech. So I just dropped by bag and went for a stroll around the town. Nothing much to see really apart from the lake, but even that sight was slightly spoiled by the hundreds of snotty nosed kids shouting "Mzungu, How are you?"

Didn't get to see the PM in the end.. The crowds were so huge that the police HAD to beat them back with thier batons. Given the Kenyan police's reputation for crowd control (usually involving a firearm), I decided it was best not to stay.

I chatted to a couple of people who, seeing my apparent boredom, suggested that I take a Matatu (minibus) to the next town 20kms away called Mbita. Given my experience so far with Kenyan buses, I decided to look into the option of going by boat. Apparently they only go in the afternoon and I'd payed for the night in Homa Bay, so I might as well stay until the next day, resolved to climb the big hill around the town the next morning.

So the next day I woke up late, ate some lunch (cheaper than the previous day as they forgot to charge me the Mzungu price). Then set off for the hill, stopping by the supermarket to buy some water - where i met two guys who looked about my age, who insisted on showing me the way. Suspicious at first, I led them round town a bit chatting to them. When I was convinced they didn't want to kill or rob me, we set off. Got some good views...

Then it was back down to check on the boat situation - now apparently they only go every 3 days and today was not one of them! So on the insistence of the two guys (Alex and William) I went to stay at their place - they were rich apparently because their dad was a Bishop. The fact that I was an atheist didn't seem to deter them. If anything I became their little conversion project. It became a bit awkward the twentieth time they asked me if I had any connection to rich donors who I could link to their orphanage.

Anyway I slept well and the next morning I went with Alex to Mbita in a packed corola stationwagon - 10 people including the driver! Thankfully this particular road was so terrible that we never got above 40km/h and it ended up taking almost 2hrs for the 20 something kilometer journey.

So I'm going to stay a night or two here in Mbita, then see if I can get the biggish ferry to one of the bigger cities in Kenya - Kisumu...

Back in the "Dark' Continent

2010-01-22T09:43:00.000+01:00

Well this is my second full day in Nairobi and so far so good. I've actually made more money than I've spent (more about that later!).

The flight was pretty bad - didn't sleep at all really except for the leg from arlanda to rome, that was pretty empty so i got 20mins or something. In Addis I realised that, in Arlanda they hadn't given me all the bording passes I needed. Just for the first leg, which would have been fine - they were ready to write one out for me at the check-in desk, but aparenty the booking number/ticket number on my printout from sta travel had been
'refunded'!? Anyway I had to sit on the side, while she let everyone else through, then she searched on her db for my name and eventually found it! anyway, not going to use those chaps again!

I was picked up at the airport by a friend of the family's who made me feel much safer by giving me tips like:

- Don't wear a watch on the street - ever!

- Don't answer a call on the street, if you have to take the call, duck into a smart looking hotel or shop.

-Never carry more than 50 USD in cash and don't carry your credit/ debit card.

And loads more, I had heard it was bad, but this bad!? This guy has lived in Nairobi for 22 yrs!! Anyway so far so good.

So we check out a couple of places to stay which were pretty dodgy/ empty. Then we tried a place called New Kenya Lodge pretty close to the CBD, and for just 500 KES a night.

I'm in a dorm with a guy from Wales whose name is impossible to spell (Ieuan!?) and there have been a couple of Japanese guys.. Apparently this dirty, nasty little place is really famous over there. Even the books on the bookshelf are all in Japanese!

Anyway so far we haven't ventured much further than a couple of streets down to get supplies. Yesterday however, after coming back from a late lunch, the guy at the top of the stairs where we're staying said he had the opportunity of a lifetime for us. An Italian movie was being shot just two streets down and they needed a couple of white extras. Why not!? I think we both would've done it for free to be honest, but they offered us 1000 KES each. The guy working where we stayed told us that we might be able to get the price up a bit if we bargained. Anyway a couple of hours later we were chilling under a blue light outside a club just chatting (that was our big role!) and another white guy had joined us - from Durham. Anyway we were basically just in the background. The film seemed really cheesy - called A New World (or the Italian equivalent) and the main (possible only) actor there was also the director and he wrote the script - i.e. an arrogant idiot.

The filming went on until midnight and were all pretty fed up by that stage, but it was all worth it because thanks to our bargaining skills, and some generosity on their part, we got 3000 KES.

So that's where I've got to so far. Tonight I think I'll get the bus west to lake Victoria...

D Day!

2010-01-19T09:48:00.000+01:00

I just thought I'd write a quick post to say I'm off in a couple of hours! Barely got any sleep last night I was so excited!
Btw I decided (after careful consideration) to let my brother sheer my winter coat - more practical:

Maybe I should have left it with just the sides shaved? Heheh

It was the biggest size on the clippers :S

Anyway, better get to packing. Will write again from Nairobi!

You tell me. What IS there to do along the way?

2010-01-10T00:07:00.000+01:00

With the departure date looming and paperwork piling I've been quite busy lately (hence the lack of blog posts). Not to mention the fact that I'm trying to earn some cash on the side by building some websites. Now, with 10 days to go (supposed to be 7 days left but the guy at the travel agency who's name I won't mention *Mikael from STA Travel* messed up the booking!), I might just have enough to make it to Zambia but I'm becoming increasingly aware that I have no idea of what I'm actually gonna be doing once I get there. Sure I've got the route I drew up, but if I just hitch-hiked that, I'd be in Zambia in a week! I've gotta come up with things to do along the way to keep me occupied for about one month in each country!!

My mum's brain wave - write a blog post asking people to send in suggestions of cheap and fun things to do in each country... hmmm put myself at the mercy of the internets?! Sounds dodgy, I mean these are the kind of people that sit at home all day watching videos of people gettin "own3d" on youtube and pictures of alcoholic cats.

heheh anyway it's worth a try. It kind of reminds me of a travel show that used to come on discovery channel or something called The Diceman where a presenter and his cameraman would get 6 activities/places to go to chosen by random people they met along the way and decide which they'd do by rolling a green die.

So if anyone has any suggestions or tips please send them in! You can either post them in the comments section or email them to me at: bwana_shmane [at] yahoo [dot] co [dot] uk

btw I'm considering shedding my winter hair (it went down to -32 C here!) to do a time lapse video kind of like this. What do you think?

Shoestrings Still Cost Money!

2009-12-01T01:00:00.003+01:00

With the economic crisis still raging and unemployment still rising, the prospect of getting a job was looking pretty bleak. Add to that my lack of work experience, no driving licence and poor spoken Swedish and you've got next to no job prospects. Nevertheless I've been applying for jobs, mostly online, for a couple of months.

Right in the beginning of my searching, through some family connections I got some peacework at a building site. Well it was more like an oversized jigsaw puzzle actually - it was a 200 odd year old log house that someone had taken down up north, labelling all the pieces, to be reassembled pretty close to where I live. So my job was basically to run around the site carrying log 14A here and a sack of moss over there - the bottom of the rung work (not that I'm complaining, well my back did a bit but anyway I'm grateful for the work!).

"Wait. A sack of moss?" I hear you ask. Yes moss, the same moss you're thinking of.. the kind that doesn't gather on a rolling stone... the guy in charge wanted everything to be original and old school so between each log a copious amount of moss was stuffed. And yes, everything was "original", even the odd nail that we needed to whack in.

Anyway we eventually got the roof on and that job came to an end, leaving me financially about half way to the target I'd set. What now?

Well since then I've been applying online like crazy, registered myself at a job centre, went to a ski resort job fair and even put up 'peacework wanted' flyers up. And what is the result of all of this job hunting? I raked up the leaves in some old lady's garden.

**Not Me.... Yet**
Oh well I thought, let me try and re-evaluate the amount of cash I'll need for this trip. Maybe my original figure was way off. I just plucked it out of the air anyway! So, using the lonely planet's online guide for Kenya (using their minimum daily budget - 13USD a day), I worked out how far I'd reach. Well I was far off my original guess. I think I'm about halfway through Mozambique when I run out of money.

"Don't worry" my dad says to me, "That's when the real adventure begins!"

To which I replied, "no dad, that's when starvation and a life of crime begins! I'll probably start using drugs and be forced to live in a cardboard box"

"Well what's your definition of an adventure!?"

Bloody Hell Vaccinations are Expensive!

2009-11-26T19:18:00.003+01:00

"Hmmm... Seven months backpacking in Africa. That sounds a bit dangerous." says the guy at the travel agent as I put my proposal to him. I shrugged... "how bad can it be?". He quickly checks the Swedish foreign affairs recommendation and it looks pretty bad. Not only will I be robbed, stabbed, kidnapped, robbed again and blown up by a terrorist, I will also be fortunate enough to contract: Yellow fever, Hepatitis A, Hepatitis B (and possibly C), something they call "tourist diarrhoea", Rabbies, Cholera, Malaria, Typhoid, Meningitis, AIDS... And that's just in Nairobi! "Bugger", I thought, they want more money from me to get vaccinations against these things. Oh well...at least now when I get blown up by the terrorists, I won't have the runs!

Anyway I went to check out the vaccination office which of course was overrun by unending (yet very orderly) queues of Swedes desperate to get their hands on a dose or two of the swine flu vaccine. "Wimps!" I thought to myself as I patiently got a queue number and went to the back of the line.

Source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/curiousexpeditions/ / CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

When my number was eventually called up I went into this office and was presented with this list of diseases and the price next to each one. Bloody hell vaccinations are expensive! Luckily for me (or maybe not.. we'll see later on) the guy had obviously had a long and hard day dealing with the paranoid public and was in no mood to argue. So I started going down the list with a pencil, crossing out all the things that didn't seem too bad. "Meh, rabies can't be so bad can it?" I asked the doc to which he just shrugged.

So now my xmas wishlist consists of yellow fever, hep A and B, meningitis and a couple of others :P

And while I'm dealing with the medical stuff I thought I might share an essential medical kit list from a couple doing a similar thing to me, but in a car: http://thelongandwinding.co.uk/_/kit.html

My Connection with Mambilima

2009-11-26T14:22:00.000+01:00

     The boarding school (Chengelo) I attended for five years in a remote part of Zambia was hell for a number of reasons that I won't go into here. It did however have some good things that made it almost worth while; one of these things, for me at least, was the outdoor program. Once a year each form goes on a trip into the bush and everyone is ripped from their comfort zones but (usually) end up having a great time. In form five however the form is split into three groups, one goes to Lusaka to work with a transit home for street kids, the other goes north - something like 14hrs to Mambilima Special school and I can't remember where the third went.

   My group went to Mambilima where we spent a week playing, talking and teaching the kids (though I think they taught us more things than we taught them!). I think the two most striking things that came out of the experience, at least to me, were how tough these people were - if you've ever been beaten at football by a guy with one leg and no arms you'll know what I'm talking about! The second thing came out when talking to the only physiotherapist there (who doubles as the informal GP). He constantly pointed out to us that so many of the horrific cases we saw could relativley easily be prevented or treated by simple operations. The coordinator of the outdoor centre (Ndubaluba) linked to the school, Richard Thompson, reckons that such an operation would cost around $150 which is really cheap considering the result!

   I found some pics on flikr from Mambilima: http://www.flickr.com/photos/mencap_photos/1275025116/
If anyone has any other feel free to post them on here or send them to me at: bwana_shmane@yahoo.co.uk

  Oh yeah, and there'll be more info about Mambilima (what they do, how it started etc.) coming soon written by guest blogger Richard Thompson

The Route

2009-11-24T16:20:00.002+01:00

I've managed to work out how to draw my route on a google map. It's very rough, but it gives you (and me!) an idea of where I might be going.

View African Walkabout in a larger map

If I get enough time at a computer along the way I'll try and add another of these showing where I ended up going to show the importance of being flexible.

What's this Blog About!?

2009-11-23T23:18:00.005+01:00

   This is my first blog and was initially just going to be the story of the trip I’m going to take - getting from home in Sweden to home in Zambia with a shoestring budget and a couple of months to kill before uni starts. Somewhere in the many vague discussions I’ve had with people about this trip someone suggested that, if I’m going to do something stupid, I should at least use it to raise money for a good cause.

   With stories of every man and his dog sailing solo around the world, and scaling Everest, I thought backpacking alone through Africa would be kinda easy. Then again with my complete lack of experience, money or any sense of direction I’m bound to run into adventures (problems) along the way. I’ve decided to skip the European countries and flying straight into Kenya and walk/hitch-hike/cycle/what ever it takes to get down to Zambia!

   So if you want to read stories of beautiful sunsets and missing wallets while giving to a school for the physically disabled in a remote part of Zambia called Mambilima. The money will go towards the students getting operations - many of them have conditions which could be corrected by an operation but just don’t have the money - an operation would be in the region of about $150 (though of course any amount is greatly appreciated).

What's to come (in no particular order):

-A bit of background on the school and how I got myself into doing this trip.

- My many attempts at raising the cash for the trip (cause airfares don’t pay for themselves!)

- A rough description of the route I plan to take.

- And finally the the trip itself (which I will obviously only start writing when I actually set off - middle of January. I’ll try to keep it as regular as possible with pictures and stories(from my experiences in Zambia there are internet cafés everywhere!)