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Published: February 7th 2008
It's a hard life
Another day, another beautiful beach.No falo portugues
Crossing into Mozambique we left behind empty shops and multi-million dollar bus tickets and returned to a country where English is not the first, or even the second language. After the ease of English speaking Zambia, Botswana and Zimbabwe it was a bit of a rude awakening to encounter customs officials who could not speak English. Portuguese is the mother tongue here but with her reasonable Spanish and high school French Tracey bumbled us through into African country number nine.
Continuing with the kindness of strangers theme we were offered a lift from the border to Chimoi by a white farmer from Zimbabwe who has lost two farms and now lives and works in Mozambique instead.
Arriving in Chimoi we purchased our bus tickets to get down the coast and nearly choked at the price. Sure it was a lovely air conditioned bus with allocated seating but compared to other African countries the cost was huge! Mozambique is a budget holiday playground for South Africans and in just a few hours it was obvious that things were going to get more expensive. Dave was dismayed at paying more than 1 US dollar for a bottle
No need for walls
Our very cool dorm at Zombie Cucumber in Vilankulos of beer!
Other than buying too-hot-to-hold bread straight out of the oven from a bakery, Chimoi was unremarkable and we were happy to be off to Vilankulos the next morning even thought it meant a 4.30 am start! (Insert Dave crying sound effects here!)
Our overpriced bus turned out to be even less value when it dropped us at the turn off for Vilankulos rather than the town itself which left us 20k away in 40 degree heat. Luckily (we thought) we managed to hitch a ride in the back of a pick-up with about 20 locals to get down to the town. However it turned out that this is how everyone gets about off the main roads in Mozambique and there is always a fee to pay. Enterprising locals drive around looking for stranded would-be passengers, pick them up and follow the road to a certain town before everyone tumbles out the other end, wind swept, sunburnt and generally a bit worse for wear.
Still wilting in the midday sun we got a bit lost trudging along sandy tracks with heavy packs, so it was a great relief to finally arrive at our hostel 'Zombie Cucumber'.
Not quite Oxford Street
But this is the main shop in Tofo! This place was great. For one they had a pool and for another thing it was run by a wonderful British couple who were not only flying the St George (happy Tracey) they were also flying the NZ flag (happy Dave - most places only have the Aussie one!)
Coconut shy?
A swim and a beer later we wasted no time in booking a two dives for the next day. This would be our first dive in the ocean so we were very excited. Next we set off to explore the ‘town’ with a huge number of street children offering to 'help' us as we walked around or to 'show us the way'. Apparently many come from neighbouring villages to try and make money from tourists. Some have lost limbs to the mines that still remain in fields after years of civil wars, others have lost their parents for the same reason or because of fighting or HIV.
Tracey's Spanish plus a good deal of hand gesturing and a large portion of guess work just about got us by and we managed to buy some lovely fruit in the market. Then we caused great amusement by…
Has anyone seen my camel?
A sand dune on the beautiful island of Bazaruto during a break from diving. shock horror… eating a coconut. It turns out most people buy the brown kind we are used to seeing at fairgrounds to take home and use for cooking. The concept of drinking the milk and eating the flesh raw was alien to them, even though they do eat the green fresh-from-a-tree coconuts where the flesh is still soft.
Tofo, anything but vegetarian
Our first sea dives the next day were great. The Indian Ocean water was 29 degrees at the surface and as clear as a bath. We swam with giant sea turtles, small rays and more different types of fish than we thought possible. The coral was also amazing, so many different shapes and colours. Lunch was spent on an island with a huge sand dune that of course had to be climbed. The sand was SOOO hot! David decided to run down the face of the dune and was forced to stand with his feet in the sea for several minutes to recover. The second dive was just as fun though the visability wasn't great. Others on our dive seemed disappointed and kept going on about how much better the diving was further south in Tofo
On a sandy knife edge
Promise to cook me dinner for the next week or its goodbye to you wifey. so that's where we headed next.
They were so right! Diving in Tofo was amazing. We saw three huge Manta Rays, huge shoals of fish in whirlpool formations above us and a whale shark passed us by just as we were surfacing from the second one. On a different trip we also snorkelled alongside a 4m whale shark. We thought it was enormous but our dive master told us they grow to 14m. This one swam quite calmly near the surface so we were able to keep pace with it. Dave swam a few metres down and along side it and looked it straight in the eye. Its eyes were much smaller than his, but its mouth was as big as him. Luckily they only eat small organisms so we were perfectly safe…. .until Tracey got stung, several times by jelly fish. After a quick vinegar splash in the boat she got back in the water and continued following the shark only to get nailed again. This time it was by two types of stinger, one small and clear and the other bright blue. These got her across the stomach and legs and most painfully right across the face
As fresh as it gets
From swimming to cooking in under an hour.
(Sorry veggies!) and lips! By this time everyone in the group was getting stung so we all clambered back in the boat to head for home.
Later we found out that we were lucky to all made it back. One man on a trip with a different company got left behind, 800m out at sea. Luckily the current was heading in the right direction and helped him back to shore or he could have ended up in Madagascar!
Bargaining that's off the scale
We could have stayed in Tofo forever. The hostel was cool, the beach was beautiful and the diving was amazing. Plus every day local fisherman catch and sell the widest array of the fresh fish, prawns, lobster and octopus. We walked down the beach and bought some fish straight off the boat. The fisherman gutted it for us and we took it home and cooked it for lunch. It went from living to eating in under an hour and man did it taste amazing, although we did feel slightly guilty when we went diving again and saw all his buddies.
We have a very good technique for buying from local markets. We never buy quickly
Shopping on the go
Locals swarm around our bus selling everything from coconuts to cashews to live goats in sacks. and we always watch the locals first to gauge the cost before it suddenly gets doubled or tripled for the white man. We’re also bargin so hard that we are sometimes mistaken for white people who live here. This actually happened while we were buying fish because after we had agreed our price per kilo the fisherman rather joyfully showed us the ‘other’ scale that he keeps in his other pocket. This one actually shows the weight at twice what is should be in order to scam the tourists. The fact that we was sharing this little in joke with us made us feel very localised.
Sadly, after three days we decided that we had better go before we were tempted to spend all our money diving, so we found a cheap bus and headed south to Maputo, the capital. A cheap ticket meant back to sharing our space with every man and his goat in a sack! And of course the traders who crowd the bus with their wares every time it stops. On this route tasty roasted cashew nuts were a speciality.
Maputo was the nicest of all the African capitals we had been to and
Kids in blankets
Roadside goat for sale we had a good couple of days but as always we were keen to get out of the city and back to the countryside as quickly as possible. Our ‘highlight’ was discovering we were staying at the same hostel as the man who was left out at sea! We were pleased to hear the company had more than made up for their mistake with plenty of free dives!
Now we’re heading to one of only three African countries that remain under the control of an absolute monarchy. You can read about where that is and what we did there, next….
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Penny Rymer
non-member comment
Swimming with Whale Sharks
Just read your last three blogs! Absolutely brilliant and wonderful photos! Loved the fact that you were shone such kindness by total strangers. As usual your descriptions help us to feel part of your experience. The diving must have been out of this world - quite humbling too I should think swimming beside a Whale Shark! Poor you Tracey being stung by the jelly fish - agony - and I hope the stings cleared up quickly. Lots of love to you both and I look forward to the next blog. If I don't contact you again beforehand, have a wonderful time in Kenya with all the family. Penny