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Published: March 11th 2013
Hot Sauce of Mozambique
Peri-peri - the lethal stuff!Mozambique/Kosi Bay 20th Feb to 3rd March 2013
Clothes and food packed, check! Trailer packed, Check! Early start, got up at 4 am and left at 5. Managed to avoid most of the early morning traffic of Johannesburg which was great as I am sure it would add an extra 2 hours to our trip – not want you want to contend with at the start of your holiday. Mostly the road was good with all the road works just about completed although the road through Piet Retief still needs attention. We only had 1 stop and go just on the other side of Pongola. As we approach Pongola the vegetation changes – signs of a different climate – warmer sub tropics. Seeing my favourite fever trees, gives me that special thrill that we are heading for Moz.
Border procedure: Mozambique/Kosi bay border is an relatively painless procedure. Police check first, then they let us through and we park on Moz side. I took our passports to have them stamped on SA side then walked over to the Moz side – a prefabricated room, where they stamp your passport. There is no
no-mans land as there usually is at a border. Paul sorted out the car’s temporary entry permit and all the official stuff was done! At the border we have to deflate our tyres because we immediately drive onto soft sand. Very few signs and plenty of roads to choose from to drive on which can be quite confusing, as you are not sure where you will end up. Luckily we know where we are going, although even we took a slight detour as an extra road had been made since we were last there, but with Paul’s navigational skills and our GPS we got back on the right track. There is a myriad of roads leading over and around sand dunes and hills and a first time visitor will easily get confused. But because it is a single track, new tracks are made for various reasons: to avoid oncoming cars, create a new track when there is a deep puddle after some heavy rain (that you can easily get stuck in – believe me that sand is deceptive as it sticks like glue to your tyres!), and even some new tracks are made to prove to others that their 4
Pongola
Fruit in a box x 4 vehicle is bigger, better, faster and they can climb the steepest dune.
Those new tyres aren’t so great!: After travelling a short distance Paul commented that the new tyres we had put on our car didn’t seem to be doing so well and he might need to deflate them some more. We stopped and did just that then carried on driving couple of hundred meters, but we were still not happy. Then to our dismay Paul noted a spray of sand – the reason we weren’t managing so well on the sand was that the jockey wheel had somehow managed to dislodge itself and was ploughing through the sand. This was after Paul had checked that the jockey wheel was tight at the border, as we usually do. We managed to tighten the jockey wheel back into its position again, but we were concerned that it would be difficult to manoeuvre the trailer at the campsite as the jockey wheel had worn away on the inside. It usually takes us about half an hour to travel to the campsite although it is only about 15km as it is all soft sand.
Near Jozini dam
Up, up and away! We arrived at our campsite and fortunately Paul manages to reverse and manoeuvre the trailer with the car so we don’t have to strain ourselves and move it at all by hand. That is one of the things that my husband is good at – reversing with a trailer – I don’t even attempt to do it, I leave it in his capable hands. As we set up camp the humidity hits us with both of us drenched as we unpack and we are dying for a swim to cool down, but most important is to get our campsite organised before it gets dark. Once that is done we walk down to the beach but the sea is a bit rough so swimming is not an option. The campsite is just behind a small sand dune, covered in coastal vegetation with a few paths leading through the bushes to the beach. The constant sound of the waves crashing on the beach is music to our ears.
As we head off to dinner at the restaurant, our usual tradition on the first night after a hard days driving, the heavens opened. We had done everything we
Jozini
Street food possibly could to prevent our tent from leaking and hoped that all precautions have worked. Of course the first thing we order is drinks to slate our thirst while our bodies adapt to the humidity: 2M beer (Dois M pronounced doh-eesh) for Paul, a locally produced Mozambican beer, which didn’t touch sides in the heat.
We both enjoyed a lovely dinner of Portuguese/Mozambique lemon and herb chicken – note without the peri-peri. They bring the peri-peri separately and if you wish you may add some to your food – but
BEWARE! It is like hell-fire! Many a person has been caught off guard by that fiery sauce and it will remove your tonsils more skilfully than a surgeon. We ordered salad with the chicken – our waitress returns: sorry, no salad – only chips! Such is Mozambique. They often don’t have certain items on the menu or run out of things as supplies are limited. Expect these mishaps, then you will be pleasantly surprised with what Moz has to offer. It is a long and slow process for Moz to recover from its war wounds and after all TIA (This is Africa).
Tuck shop
Forgot to buy supplies? Back at the tent we discovered there has been a slight leak in two corners from the rain, only leaving small puddles on the floor. The next day we discovered that the only place we hadn’t sealed previously was at the stitching on the ground sheet and that seems to be the only possible area where water could enter. Operation Slap on Sealer and all holes now have blobs of rubbery sealer on them. Be gone, leaks! It didn’t rain for the rest of the holiday, so we still don’t know if it worked. That will be our next camping trip’s problem.
We spent most of our time relaxing, swimming, taking long walks on the beach. At the start of the holiday the seas were fairly rough but towards the end it had eased a bit. Even so the waves are still powerful and combined with the current that can cause serious harm and even be fatal (during one of our previous visits a gentleman was swimming and broke his neck – a sad tragedy). There are no life guards, so swimming is at your own risk. We calculated that we
Mozambique
Been farming? had been coming to Ponta Malongane for the last ten years – a mighty long time and we have brought at least 5 different couples/family with us as well. There must be something good about this place!
We know the area fairly well and this time we didn’t do as much exploring as we normally do. Maybe it is our age catching up with us, but we needed to relax more this time. After packing all our dive gear we eventually did no diving either, as the sea rough for the first few days and although the seas were calmer with 60 plus weekend divers filling the boats, we opted for a more relaxed break this time. Having said that, there is some really good diving in the south of Mozambique, so it is worth a try for those of you that might head there.
I hope to write more about our previous Mozambique holidays in future blogs, so keep your eyes peeled for those ones. Southern Mozambique is a playground for South Africans. It is the centre of diving operators, or where you can swim with dolphins, fish and
just have some fun in the sun, with a bit of Moz culture thrown in. We drove through to Ponta do Ouro one day. On the way, if you stop on one of the highest hills you can get cell phone coverage from South Africa as international roaming can be quite costly. This is where we catch up on news from home and our family is always happy to hear we are still safe and sound.
Ponta do Ouro has more of a buzz than P Malongane. This is where the backpackers, surfers and some international tourists go as well as South Africans of course. This little town consists mainly of houses in various conditions from total dereliction (since the war) to brightly coloured paint and newly built or renovated houses. Neat little hedges planted around them – typical Portuguese-Mozambique. Ponta do Ouro is also the only town near there with a fuel station, there is no hospital, only a clinic – the nearest hospital is at Manguzi back in South Africa.
Between the two towns of Do Ouro and Malongane there are so many little
Ponta Malongane
Next soccer match: 2.30! shops, bars, restaurants and curio stalls selling the same products. The same curios with slight variations and with the first couple of visits you may buy but after so many years we feel we have enough mementoes of our trips and stick to our photos and memories. If you like a tinny mix of African contemporary music with erratic booms through large speakers you can spend some time there and eat a meal, but we prefer the peace and quiet of Malongane camp, complete with creepy crawlies, snakes, monkeys and bush babies and of course bats.
One of the highlights of our trip: One night after dinner we went for a walk on the beach in the moonlight and we found four little stragglers: newly hatched turtles making their way down to the sea. The rest of the brood had made their way down earlier, by the looks of the limited remains of the evidence. We managed to save these poor little creatures from being devoured by crabs, although two looked like they would struggle to live to a ripe old age. The effort it took them to walk down
Ponta Malongane
What about on coming traffic? the long stretch of sand purely through instinct was a miracle to behold. This was the first time we had ever seen newly hatched turtles and they surely can be added to the cute list.
We find that the people of Mozambique on the whole are very friendly and helpful. They are very willing and some very capable of speaking English, though others only know a few English words. The minute you greet them in their language: Bom Dia! They answer with an obrigado/obrigada at the end and a beaming smile on their faces, so pleased that you have made the effort to speak their language even if it is only a couple of words.
The last night of our 7 day Mozambican holiday we went for dinner to a restaurant cum sports bar called Sunset Shack, overlooking the lake at Malongane. We had a lovely dinner of Portuguese chicken again and some prawns and of course I had to have one of the traditional drinks called R&R – Raspberry and Rum to say farewell to Moz! Just about everyone that comes to Moz wants to have some prawns, even
as far south as this. Shall I let you in on a secret? From Maputo and further north you will get delicious prawns but these little critters in the extreme south are probably from South Africa as it takes a good few hours to get supplies from Maputo. Still, we are also guilty of that and a couple of prawns here and there add to the holiday spirit.
We were certainly not ready to leave Moz and I shall miss just being able to walk on the beach and have a quick swim. In case no-one has noticed, we are real beach bums!
Rescue mission, ok, minor rescue mission!: After packing up the next day, we had a last swim then a shower before driving to the border. On the way we saw three men with a Hyundai stuck in the sand – their wheels were sitting at 3.2 bar – not conducive to sand driving! They were heading up to Maputo, thinking that there was a tar road all the way and had got themselves lost and stuck within a couple of kilometres from the border.
Ponta Malongane
Our trusty steed and home on two wheels at the campsite We told them it was sand most of the way but there was a section that they would need use a ferry to get to Maputo or drive a long way round on a badly potholed tar section, their eyes turned to saucers and they decided there and then to end their adventure if they could get unstuck! Because we had our recovery gear with us we could pull them out of their predicament. A bit of a mission, as we had to unhitch our trailer, manoeuvre our car on one of the tracks and guide them on what to do. We deflated their tyres to about 1.8 bar and there was another look of horror on their faces till we assured them that we would get them back to the border and pump up the tyres. They managed to drive back to the border without any further mishap, following us and once there, had their passports stamped again, to leave Mozambique – surely their shortest trip, if not the only trip!
It took us all of 2 minutes to get our passports stamped and a bit longer to pump up all the
Ponta Malongane
Humidity gets you tyres of two vehicles and we were on our way again. Our trip was not at an end yet, because we had a few days booked at Kosi Bay just outside Manguzi which was less than 10 kilometres from the border. More on that in my next blog!
Please note there are more photos below and on the next three pages.
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