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1: Where we spent our nights TANZANIA 1.) Bim’s house, Arusha 2.) Holy Trinity Guesthouse, Dodoma 3.) Fishing Campsite, Bunduki 4.) Malela Nzuri Campsite, Mikumi 5.) Riverside Campsite, Irringa 6.) Riverside Campsite, Irringa 7.) Rough on the outskirts of Ruaha National Park 8.) FM Guesthouse, Mbeya ZAMBIA 9.) Safari Restaurant, Bar and Guesthouse, Mpika 10.) Eureka, Lusaka 11.) Eureka, Lusaka 12.) Cobra Resthouse, Luangwa 13.) Mama Rula’s, Chipata 14.) Eureka, Lusaka 15.) Eureka, Lusaka 16.) Jollyboys’, Livingstone 17.) Jollyboys’, Livingstone BOTSWANA 18.) Chobe Campsite, Chobe National Park 19.) Rough at the gate of Chobe National Park 20.) Okavango River Lodge, Maun 21.) Okavango River Lodge, Maun 22.) Okavango River Lodge, Maun 23.) Okavango River Lodge, Maun 24.) Okavango River Lodge, Maun NAMIBIA 25.) Backpackers Unite, Windhoek 26.) B... read more

Day 64 Ate breakfast in the hotel - Kenyeje and Chapatis - and then set off on the road towards Arusha. It wasn’t a long drive, only 380km so we reached Arusha at about 2 and booked ourselves in the ‘Masai Camp’ and rather large establishment with a very cool bar/restaurant area, that must get very busy during Christmas/New Year but today we seemed to be the only people filling it, or at least we thought so at first. After putting the tents up we retired to the bar for drinks and crisps. About 40 minutes later I wandered back past the tents to get something from the car and received a bit of a shock; an Indian family had opened our two tents and taken out our yoga mats which they’d spread out in the ... read more

Day 60 We left at 6 as usual, driving up the lake road with an aim of reaching Nkhata Bay, another popular tourist hot spot that apparently vies with Cape Maclear at Christmas and New Year. To begin with we were just driving through more of the same cultivated areas which at times was quite shocking as it was the first time on this trip that we’d seen children with swollen bellies from hunger. Malawi is certainly one of the poorest of all the countries we’ve visited and according to a magazine on display at Fat Monkey’s the average protein intake per annum for the average Malawian is 6kg! So that was the first part of the drive, it rained a bit too. But once the road began to trail the edge of the lake it ... read more

Day 57 Managed to leave Deans at about 7 and reached the border post of Mchinjii at about 8. As it was early we were the only people trying to cross over so we got through very fast and with no hassle, but I could see that the whole place was incredibly disorganised and had there been even just 10 more people there would have been complete chaos. So we were in Malawi, and amazingly the sun was shining! Malawi is beautiful but very cultivated - everywhere you look there is a field growing potatoes, or maize, or sugar cane or some other vegetable which so far I have been unable to identify…there are also so many people, everywhere! Little shambas and random villages every time you turn a corner in the road…I think that Malawi ... read more

Day 54 On waking, we all decided to buy a portion each of Faulty Towers full English Breakfast, which certainly sorted us all out. After that it was back onto the road again in the direction of Lusaka, one of our favourite cities. We were all quite looking forward to going back to Eureka and when we finally reached the lovely little campsite after a drive of about 5 hours, it really did feel like coming home. Sadly our Australian friend wasn’t there any more, he must have begun his epic drive through the rest of Central/Northern Africa and is probably somewhere in the middle of the Congo right now. We bought some beer and sat considering the bizarre feeling of having left somewhere thinking never to see it again, and then some 1 month later ... read more

Day 53 Frightening thing happened last night - after we’d had our supper in town (not the greatest meal, we thought we’d found another joint similar to our good find in Maun but it turned out to be rather less good quality than expected) we got back to our campsite to discover our neighbouring campers, a group of 12 South Africans with three cars between them, in a state of consternation; whilst out also eating in town they had been burgled! They told us that they had gone to Wimpy Burger and were sat in the window actually watching their car - they saw a slightly dodgy looking bloke on his phone hanging around by one of the cars so a couple of the men went out and shooed him away from the car. Sadly this ... read more

Day 52 It was a 5 o’clock wake up again as we were keen to get on the road as early as possible to make good progress into Botswana. After filling up with petrol we all tried to use up as many South African coins as possible as you can’t change them and we found some seriously yummy cinnamon Chelsea buns which did the job perfectly and served as a very good and for us unusual breakfast - daddy you would have been in heaven, all it needed was a bit of lardy cake too and some frothy coffee and I could’ve been at home! We drove onwards to the border with Botswana, a town called ‘Grobler’s Bridge’ where we managed to change the rest of our rand into Pula and spend the rest of the ... read more

Day 49 It was at last farewell to South Africa on day 49, as after driving out of Durban and inland for about 500 km we reached the frontier with Swaziland and crossed over. It had been a very early start (we left our campsite at 6) so we reached Swaziland at about 12, stopping once to buy some bread and jam for brunch. The border crossing was easy enough, no visa, just a 50 rand road tax and we were through. There was an unfortunate guy next to us who held both a Zimbabwean and a British Passport and they wouldn’t let him through because he’d just been to Zim and Botswana…he’d come with his whole family, all of whom had been given visas so we felt rather sorry for him. Swaziland is very beautiful ... read more