The journey - as they all do - involved some time on a bus. Well, several actually. I was on my first bus at 5am. 15 minutes later we were already running late having encountered a grumpy elephant on the road who wasn't keen on letting us pass...Once moving again, we headed to Chipata - the nearest town to the border. There, I found a taxi to take me to the border, where I entered Malawi very smoothly. Once in Malawi, I jumped into a shared taxi to the nearest town and then caught a local minibus (which I shared with what felt like half the population of Malawi) for the final 2 hours of the journey to Malawi's capital, Lilongwe. On arrival at the minibus station, I found a local cab to drive me to my hostel for the night. Quite a journey...
At the hostel, I met up with Ciaran. Ciaran was a medical student I met in Lusaka, where he was doing a 2-month internship at an Aids hospice. He was keen to spend a few days relaxing in Malawi, so decided to join me for the start of my Malawian trip.
The following morning, we got up at 5am and headed to the bus station for another day of bus travel to get to Lake Malawi. What fun! We were told our bus left at 7am, so made sure we arrived in good time to get decent seats for the 5-hour journey. But of course departure times for African buses are not an exact science...the actual departure time being 'when the seats are all full', which was a little over 3 hours after we got on board... After a very hot journey that ended up taking over 9 hours...we finally arrived at Nkhata Bay - a small town on the North-Eastern shore of Lake Malawi.
After a couple of long, hot and uncomfortable travel days I was ready for some peace, relaxation, beautiful scenery and a comfortable bed. Thankfully, Lake Malawi didn't disappoint.
Nkhata Bay
Early morning fishermen
Relaxing in the bar after a long hard day
of er, relaxing by the lake...
The lake is a total of 365 miles long and there is a ferry that travels the whole length of the lake once a week, collecting and dropping off passengers at villages and islands on the way. After a few nights in Nkhata Bay, Ciaran returned to Lusaka and I decided it was time to take to the water and explore.
Usisya
My beach bedroom!
The local ferry from Chizimulu to Likoma broke down, so
we found ourselves another, somewhat smaller alternative
Island friends
BIG catfish!
Playing 'Bawo' - a little like Mancala
Likoma Island is only 17 squared kilometres in size, but has a HUGE cathedral on it - built by Anglican missionaries in the early 1900s
This is Philip. He is the head chief of Likoma and
Chizimulu Islands and a very nice man!
Some lakeside critters...
A beautiful Water Monitor Lizard looking for food
outside my bedroom door in Nkhata Bay
Bats! - these guys hung out on the ceiling
above my bed on Chizimulu...
A Whip Spider - another Chizimulu bedroom resident,
though he lived under rather than over my bed... :-o
Interesting facts:
- Hippos and crocodiles live in the Southern end of the lake
- There are at least 16 individual languages in Malawi - the principle ones being Chichewa and English
- Malawi is officially the poorest country in the world
- Malawi is known as 'The warm heart of Africa'
Language! (Chichewa):
- How are you? - Muli bwanji?
- Thank you - Zikomo
- Mosquito - Udzuzu
:)
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