pinchy85

The bus from Victoria Falls to Harare took about 13 hours and was extremely uncomfortable. The only decent road to make the journey, takes you back down to Bulawayo, then north east towards Harare. We hadn't got much sleep by the time we arrived at midday. I rang Niall, who I had met in Vilankulos and had offered us a bed when we got to Harare. After about 15 minutes, he pulled up in a 1964 safari jeep, which he was driving around, while his jeep was getting repaired. This was an awesome way to get around and Niall gave us a bit of a guided tour as we drove the city back to his house in one of the suburbs. Christina and I were in need of a power nap and after a short one, ... read more

After getting a lift from Ingrid to the bus station in Mutare, I found a bus going to Masvingo easily enough. I was heading for Great Zimbabwe 27 km south of Masvingo. Great Zimbabwe is a set of ruins built by indigenous Bantu people and date back to between the 13th and 14th centuries. They are the largest ruins in Sub-Saharn Africa and the only ruins of this kind south of Ethiopia. These ruins caused some consternation amongst the colonisers who discovered them. One of the justifications that the Europeans had for colonising, was that the African people were inferior and required the assistance of Europeans to develop. Accordingly, there were great archaeological efforts to prove some link between another civilisation and Great Zimbabwe, but they have been proved to be built by Bantu people. Once ... read more

My next destination after Tofo was Vilankulos, about 200 km up the coast, as the crow flies. I was told that this was an easy enough journey and that it shouldn't take too long. Having been in Africa about 8 months by this stage, I really should have known that this would not be the case. Nevertheless, I had a fairly easy morning after the full moon party the night before and got the bus from Tofo to Inhambane a bit later than I had planned. I wasn't worried about this though, because from Inhambane, all I had to do was get a ferry across to Maxixe and then get a bus to Vilnkulos, which should take somewhere between 2 and 3 hours. Going north from Inhambane, it makes a lot more sense getting a ferry ... read more

After getting my passport back from the Mozambique Consulate, with the visa inside, I got a minibus from Mbabane to Manzini, where the buses to Maputo leave Swaziland from. Unfortunately, I arrived just as one had filled up and was about to leave. This meant I had to wait for another one to fill up, which took about 2 and half hours. The one advantage of having to wait this long was that I got the pick of the seats and got a seat up front, a lot more comfortable than being squashed in the back. It was 5 o’clock before we got going and I was sitting beside a guy from Tanzania who lived in Maputo. He warned me as we approached the border that we could be there a while, depending on whether the ... read more

On leaving St. Lucia, my next destination was Sodwana Bay. Again, this is not an easy place to get to without your own transport and I knew it might be a bit of an effort. Firstly, I had to take the return journey to Mthubathuba. I found a minibus, but they said it would cost me 250 rand, despite the journey a couple of days in the opposite direction costing 17 rand. I resolved to try hitch, but got no joy from the many holidaying white South Africans, who clearly would never dream of picking up a smelly backpacker. Funnily enough, about 20 minutes later, the minibus that had tried to charge 250 rand passed by, this time half full with passengers and this time agreeing to let me on for the correct price. At Mthubathuba, ... read more