Nkhata Bay Cont: Boat Race

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Day 6

This morning - I sat on my balcony that over looks the lake (unbelievably beautiful view), played on my laptop and read my book. It was a good morning.

In the afternoon the backpackers was offering a boat race (in the local dugout canoes) and the prize was free pizza - 3 people in a team and it was a relay. The guys decided they would enter (Tim, Matt and Joost), while Tessa and I opted out. My ear wasn't great and I wasn't all that keen on getting it wet. Turns out no other team entered so we decided to do a girls verses guys boat race. I was convinced the guys would win but wanted to give a good go at it. Carol (the doctor friend of Tessa and Joost) was our third member.

Matt and I went first and he started off strong but I circled the float first and headed back to the stairs to hand over to Carol. Carol went against Joost next and although he did catch up a little, he also bailed and we maintained our lead. Last was Tessa against Tim - by now we were way ahead. Tessa circled the float first and was headed back when she fell. She climbed back on and kept going (still ahead of Tim). I think the guys struggled more with the balancing aspect. When Tessa was about 20m away Joost swam out and tripped her over. And so it began...
The next few minutes were filled with hysterical laugher, swimming to the canoes, tipping, hanging on, climbing on. Tim tried to paddle with his arms and legs to win. Matt anchored himself to the front of Tim's boat to keep it level, while Carol and I tried to get Tim off, with Joost trying to get Tessa off. It was hilariously funny.

Thankfully the judge of the race knew we would've won and the girls were named the champions. In terms of the free pizza, it turns out it didn't matter who won because we would all shared the pizza at dinner because tonight was the fish braai.

After the race we swam out to the float and all relaxed for awhile.We were thinking aloud about how good it would be to have drinks here, so Matt & Joost swam back to get beers, cokes and popcorn. They didn't last long, so we got them to go back and get more. One of the barmen put a crate of beer/coke in one of the dugouts and paddled it out to us on the float. Legendary.

For the next few hours we swam around the float, snorkelled and just chilled drinking, talking and laughing and enjoyed our sundowners.

Edward had arranged for us to to braai the Catfish and butterfish (that we had caught the day before) and make rice and salad for dinner. Matt was in charge of the braai, while the rest of us set up for dinner and made the salad, rice and cut pineapple for dessert. We also ordered our 3 pizzas.

We had our 'family' dinner with candlelight around a big table down by the water. It was a special time. It was most our last nights at Mayoka and in Nkhata Bay, so we made the most of it. Edward, Grant, Joost, Tessa, Carol, Matt, Tim, and myself. Good times.

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Photos

Boat Race
Ash vs Matt

Girls on the raft
Me, Claire, Carol, Tessa