i dont always get where i want to go, but always end up where i need to be

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its been too long. which means im going to scoot through as fast as i can to catch up with myself and be able to be more detailed next time.

we vacated moshi the day after kili. the bus joourney to dar was non descript save the (AGAIN) aweful choice of tv they played.... generally adulterous women getting bashed about by their husbands, then a film about an albino boy (devils child in africa) who killed a tribe. im mean... come on!
anyway, got to dar and checked into a slightly seedy backalley hostel (think i need to write to the loney planet about that reccomendation!) swarming with backstreet boys ready to take your money at any given second! found ellie and debated the pros and cons of getting up at 4am to catch the bus to malawi (several routes, several buses, noone entirely sure what was going on). so we were up at 4 and at the bus station just after, bleary eyed and wanting an easy ride. no such chance. we were hounded! it was still dark for gods sake! but the station was rammed. luckily the locals get hounded too. but still. one price for us, a different one for everyone else. its something you learn to live with coz theres no way round it. so we got on and were immediately bombarded by a guy making us pay to put luggage on. he didnt even work for the company! and got increasingly aggressive. grr.

the landscape was pictureseque all the way. sweetcorn and bilboa (?) trees crisscrossed the plains. now we know why theres so much popcorn about! we were heading for mbeya, near to the boarder and the closest we could get to malawi for the day. we were uncerimoniously thrown off the bus at a petrol station over much deliberation about where we actually were. we were told the bus was terminating there when in fact it was going to zambia! oh. ah well, it was ok, a bit hairy but we were in mbeya so all good. the hostel was another budget gem from the guide book, more like a house/motel if anything. the food was sceptical (im pretty sure i had goat.. and it was as tough as old boots!) and the whole affair felt very much like fawlty towers... with no english! we asked the receptionist about the bus the next morning. she put her coat on and walked out... and didnt come back. ah.

however, up at 5 for the bus at 6. we were sheppherded next door where big gates were opened and we were put in the back of a very dark, non operating bus! but what? thought this was the bus to the boarder... yes yes sister, just sit we will leave. we were at the bus station... the one where they buses go at the end of the night. haha. and they had to jump start it to get us out! oh the hilarity! onto songwe, the tanz/malawi boarder. lots of black market guys trying to do business with us, using their utmost charms and getting nowhere (there was a bureau de chance right the next side!) and crossed over. malawi here we come!

the immediate difference is actually the people. they're so friendly and v non threatening. perfect. taxi to karonga and off to the next bus station to attempt to get to nhakata bay.. our final destination. we caught one of the mini buses (forget their name) which was cramped, filled to bursting, but pretty fun. the boys in the boot were persistent to say the least... mainly centering around their need and desire for a white wife! i told them i had 10 husbands already and couldnt possibly have another. they found this amusing, phew! ther was an odd one though... aparently its cool and quirky there to wear attire that even camden would be proud of... long golden fingernails and a bish bosh of vibrant get up. who thinks these fashions up?
the whole thing stank. of fish! but there were very cute babies on the bus, and a man with a monkey! all confined to about 1m squared. haha.

1 more minibus to nkhata bay (right sp i think) from mzuzu and we were there. unfortunately the hostel we wanted to stay in was full... all that way! but we stayed in an equally lovely one right on the lake which was beautiful. and we had the nicest room ever at cheap low season rates! hurrah! but their water system had broken for the night. so they gave us a bucket of water, which was nice of them, until we realised it was from the lake... how did we realise this? there were small fish in it! haha. oh god... we so wanted a shower! dry shampoo in a can was the only way forward! the place we wanted to stay was called majorka village. and we ambled our way back over the rocky crages in near pitch black to find it for the bar. our head tourches and the resident dog (guard dogs that take you to the different hostels on that stretch all on their own!) lead the way. what a night! we had fresh lake caught butter fish on the open air bar overlooking the lake. we drank carlsberg special brew and partyed with the locals who were the epitemy of fun. to demonstrate this ill tell you their names... i kid you not, we met... 'sweet and delicious', delicious to all those who know him (his mother said he was born that way!), happy coconuts, and perhaps the most brilliant name in living history.. 'small mountain mango boobs'... boobs for short. who could fail to have a good time with people like that!good people, good vibes, good times.

up early for sunday 3/5/09 and make to mayorka to meet 2 dutch boys who clamined to be canoeying the lake and invited us along. we ordered picnic sandwiches and a crate of beer and got the canoes in order. the first was fine, canadian stylie and bouyant in all the right places. we thought all 5 of us could fit in easy but were told in no, we had to use 2. the second being a dugout. a dugout is basically a death trap of a vehicle made from the trunk of a tree thats been dugout (funnily enough) and you have to paddle with you legs on the outside. 1 person is hard enough. with 2 its damn near impossible, capsising is inevitable so much so that the hostel has a challenge that if you make it to a near by moored boat, round and back with 2 people then you get a free nights accomodation. so we put the boys (fred and martyn) in the dugout.

so much fun. it took us an hr to get to the bay around the corner (which takes about 8mins to walk to!). haha. you can imagine us all trying to get there in canoes. one of the boys were off in a second and ended up swimming pretty much the whole way.
we had fun on the beach and made it back before dark. the hostel was home to the first compost toilet ive ever used... and very good it was too. check the photos! it also had a snail shower! no door, just a winding path to the shower where it had a little window looking out over the lake. highly idilic. the evening was concluded with a performance by mountain mike, a rasta man from the country who wrote his own music and performed at the hostel every sunday. mountain mike continued to entertain us with his reggae songs about trouble and love and his troubled loves and lovely troubles (including one about his sister who didnt like being called a prostitute?!?!) until the mood had sufficiently been brought down to a sombre level. at which point he sent a collection round to see if he could get enough money together to go and buy some beans to plant at the market. i think he got enough from his evening reviving his tales of rasta woe. we concluded the night with a game of pictionary, including a german guy who told me that coz my nails were still blue from kili i was lucky to be alive coz when they go blue up there it means you only have 5 hrs to live (drama queen!). he went on to make some other wild claims through the night and was taken with several pinches of salt!

mon 4/5/09. time to move on. we check out, just in time for me to find the hot tap on the shower! and munch cornfakes for breakfast. nice, but the milk was unpasturised.. tangy!chilled out for the day, said our goodbyes and headed down to the harbour at 6.30 to catch our ferry at 8. yep, the plan was to get the ferry all the way down lake malawi (lake of stars as its more commonly known) for 2 nights, 1 day.

the harbour was jus tthe most manic thing i had ever seen. i would have to spent the next 3 hrs just to tell you everything that we saw down there. but the best way to do so is to say that it was like the loading of titanic (the ship being considerably smaller of course). everything from the army loading tree trunks to people shifting fridges was being loaded onto the back of the ship. most things were carried down the platform on peoples heads and there was a huge surge and mass of crowds trying to force their way on. we tried for 30mins then gave up and went to the back to wait for it to settle down. i have no idea how they crammed so much stuff and people onto that thing. its a miracle it didnt sink. after 3 hrs (nearly midnight now) there was space for us to get on. we had bought 2nd class tickets (but the guys had mistakenly given us 1st class). there was no way we could fit into second class. like, no way. you couldnt even breath there. suddenly it dawned on us that this boat trip might not be all it was cracked up to be. it could quicte easily be hell on earth! ew headed to 1st class, just to see if we could wing it. 1st class is top deck. open air with a bit of shelter, a small bar, 10 plastic mattresses for rent and little else. it was busy but no where near rammed. we bagged ourselves a small piece of wooden deck and bedded down in our sleeping bags. Alas the man came round for tickets. we held our breath and got away with it. unfortunately the germans we were with werent so lucky and got sent back downstairs. grim.

the next two days pretty much went on like this. most of the crowds got off at lakoma island about 10am the next morn and we stayed in 1st class until they realised their mistake. by that time there was room in 2nd (enclosed room of about 10 sbenches that stank of fish). there was a small (3tabled) restaurant for breakfast and dinner. the food wasnt too bad. we also tried the 3rd class food..nhisma (boiled maize) and some grissle. not pleasent at all.

the ferry was delayed for 17hrs coz another of the boats had broken so everytime we stopped offshore they had to offload people and baggage (including 2 4x4's no less!) into rowing boats or little motor boats to take them to shore. ahhh.

finally we were at monkey bay and im not ashamed to say thank god i dont have to do that ferry journey again. if you ever get an offer to catch the boat down the lake of stars, no matter how romantic it sounds, just say NO!

asfter changing more black market money and having a nice cuppa in a funny tea room (bare room with just some benches and a cup of tea!) we got to cape mc clear and found a place to stay, happy to be back on the beach.

theres not a huge amount to say about the tiny hamlet that is cape mcclear, we went to the clinic to pick up tablets for the worms in the lake. everyone who goes to the lake has to take the pills 3 months after being there otherwise you die! ok, thats a little dramatic, but they can do nasty things to you. we ate some food and got swarmmed by 20 kids on the we to do so. all fighting to hold our hands and take us to the restaurant and talk to us and even jsut to smile at us. the kids there were the best ever! we went to a reggae bar owned by on old school scot who got lost in africa and never returned! the bar was his hobbie. we attempted snorkelling until we got to within 20mins walk of the place to be told we had to pay a park fee! grr. and that was pretty much all we did.

time to leave again. the last week had been spent debating the pros and cons of travelling through mosambique to get to S.A. we really wanted to and it would be cheaper than flying. but... we came to the exec decision to skip it. we realised that there just wasnt enough time, africa being what it is when it comes to transport and distances, we just couldnt. we were a bit bummed but at the same time we had come up with a better solution to our travel problems. we had found a bus that would take us, very cheaply, from malawi to jo burg in only 30 hrs! sweet! we were doing it.

stayed at a nice hostel in blantyre, the irish owner was amazing an drove us to all the different bus companies to get the good deal and find the right one, then we used the fast internet for free (you have no idea what a luxury that was!), then orderd us take away. turns out he was a property and land developer in africa and did hostels on the side. this was the first time he had ever stayed in his own hostel, and hed bought his wife and daughter along for the ride. v nice family.

the coach was a bendy london style bus. if you can imagine that flailing through africa at high speed you've basically got the image of our 30hr journey in your head. haha. it was fine, the only issues were the god damn boarders which were a pain in the arse as were thought thered be beaurau de changes there and there wasnt so there was even more black market money changing at rubbish rates. not only that, there was the transit visas we needed. we were going through mosambique for 4hrs and zimbabwe for about 12 hrs and had to pay an additional 70usd for the priviledge! and it had to be paid in us dollars, which we didnt have. but the very nice woman on the bus sorted it all out for us. the bus was actually pretty good, except for having the most uncomfortable seats in existence, but they continually fed and watered us and checked on us for the whole time. phew!

the time came at approximately 5am monday 11/5/09. id been looking forward to it for a while now, one of my hit list countries had arrived..... we had crossed the boarder and entered South Africa.

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