Kaeseschmiere

So here’s something you should know about Malawian Kwacha, the Malawian currency. It’s worth so little that even Malawian banks don’t want it. What happened is this, approaching the border to Tanzania, Kam and I had a big chunk of Malawian money left over, due to a slight miscalculation of how much we would need for the Nyika hike. Being in a rush (what’s new?) to catch a train in Tanzania, we didn’t have time to wait for the banks to open in the town where we had spent the night in yet another charming cold-shower paint-peeling-off-the-walls guesthouse, named the Princess. So, early morning crammed taxi ride to the border in the hope of changing the money there. And there actually was a little bank at the border post. But would they take our Kwacha? No. ... read more

After three months of sitting on coaches, mini-buses, safari-trucks and on the couch watching soccer games, Malawi was going to provide some great opportunities to get off our butts and do some hiking. We skipped through Lilongwe, Malawi’s rather unexciting capital, staying only long enough to do a spot of shopping. My sunglasses were floating somewhere in the Zambezi, by now no doubt approaching the Indian Ocean, and the last piece of the plastic airline cutlery, which we had been using since our flight to Johannesburg, had finally broken. The sunglasses, cutlery, as well as our broken torch, replaced, we headed south towards Mount Mulanje, which meant a few more hours on another bus. We stopped for a night at a town called Dedza as a warm up exercise and hiked up the local mountain, after ... read more

All was quiet on the Zambezi river. Well, except for the soothing sound of the river itself, the breaking of tree branches at the hands, or should I say trunks, of elephants getting their midnight snack and of course the ever-present grunting snorts of the hippos. We had set up camp on a small island just off the Zimbabwean side of the river and were trying to get some well-deserved sleep after four hours of non-stop canoeing. My sleep was light, as I was popping my head out of the tent every twenty minutes to see whether one of the nearby elephants had decided to swim over to our island from the mainland. Suddenly a frightening yell came from the tent of our canoe guide. But before I go on, let us rewind back to the ... read more

by Kamini Crossing the border from Botswana to Zambia across the Zambezi River (the river forms the border between Zimbabwe and Zambia) was made much easier by a lovely Batswana lady named Ambrosia, whose friend gave us a free ride across the river. She also made sure we didn't get ripped off by the taxi drivers on the Zambian side. Ambrosia was on her way to Zambia to buy fruits and vegetables as they were surprisingly cheaper than in Botswana and worth the effort of crossing the border. We stayed at Jollyboys, a popular backpackers in the town of Livingstone and a very easy place to while away the hours: lots of cushions to lie on, swimming pool, bar which unfortunately : ) only sold wine by the bottle. However the first thing we had to ... read more

Happiness is sitting on a bus, not so old to be uncomfortable, but old enough to have character, African music playing on the loudspeaker, fried chicken (sold seemingly at every bus stop at every time of day) in your tummy, crossing the Kalahari, having spotted the rare Black Rhino earlier that day, and having made three consecutive smooth bus transfers. Botswana certainly started out well. The border crossing was quick and painless. The hotel we had booked was full, but the lovely lady organised a room at another place for us at a reduced rate and threw in a complimentary taxi. So far, noone had tried to rip us off, overcharge us or hassled us to buy anything. Our first stop after Gabarone, Botswana's quiet capital, was the Khama Rhino Sanctuary, where we camped in the ... read more