Maputo

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Maputo, the capital of Mozambique, is what Lonely Planet describes as one of the most agreeable capital cities in Africa. Don’t get me wrong I liked Maputo but I fear for the worst in the other countries.

The Portuguese knew how to build a city, stuff as many trees in as possible and then build some attractive building. The city is at the moment a wild mix of recently renovated building, buildings, which haven’t seen a new coat of paint in years and some, which clearly haven’t been inhabited for a long time.
Not really surprising as the so-called civil war that ravaged the country for many years ended sometime in the 90s and it left the country in a miserable shape. Therefore it is quite amazing that the city recovered and is in the shape it is in today. The only real problem in the city is one it shares with a lot of other developing nations cities… garbage. It’s everywhere.

It was anyway a nice introduction into and I quote Matt here ‘real Africa’.

There is not much to do and I did it all. The knee is getting better so I could walk around quite a bit. The highlight of the Maputo city tour was probably the take away shop in a Mosque. The cake in there was delicious. It was only topped by another patisserie (one of the other Portuguese legacies are cafes) with even better cake and decent coffee. Yep am really living like the locals 😊

One of the strangest structures in Maputo is the iron house, which was designed by Mr. Eiffel of Eiffel tower fame. As the name suggests it solely made out of iron. You would think that building a house out of iron in a hot climate is stupid…. and it is. The interior heats up too much. You can’t blame the poor guy for which it was build not to use it as residence

I was lucky enough to meet some really nice people in the hostel, which solved the problem of what to do in the evenings. Maputo nightlife is pretty good with a few venues with live music and most important beer.
The highlight for me was a visit to the local amusement park/restaurant area, which is a strange combination of (you guessed it) restaurants and rides including bumper cars.

After all that stress I’m heading north to a beach…

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Photos

Maputo
Capital of Mozambique

Iron House
Designed by MR Eiffel of Eiffel tower fame. Sounds like a stupid idea to build a house of steel in a hot country. Well it is. Was designed as a residence but was never used as one as it was too hot..

streets in Maputo
Why use dustbins if you can use the street.

Maputo Fort
Build by the Portuguese a very long time ago...

Mosque and take away shop
Have a close look and you will see the take away shop. They had yummy cakes. Why cant we have such things in Churches. Would get me into one

Art
After the civil war ended a lot of weapons were colleded and some were turned into art

Street sign
Many of the Mozambiquen street signs have either an important date on them or the name of a socialist leader. Tis includes Mao, Mugabe and Kim Ill from North Korea

Amusement Park/restaurant area
Maputo has a amusement park which also doubles as restaurant area. Lots of food and fun to be had

bumper cars
probably the highlight so far