We’ve done five dives now; one was called off because of rough seas. The first was a wreck called the Mataora, outside Avarua harbour. The wreck was broken up, and in places was little more than a pile of twisted metal. We didn’t see heaps of fish, but it was a good and interesting dive. The water was reasonably warm (24C) and visibility was good. We saw angel fish, damsel fish, some big lionfish, cod, crown of thorns, triggerfish, rainbow wrasse, threadfin butterfly fish, anemone fish, clownfish, checkerboard wrasse, blue spotted grouper and trumpet fish. The coral around the wreck was very plain, but appeared to be alive. We hung around town (Avarua), having lunch at Trader Jacks, waiting for the second dive, only to be told that it had been called off due to rough ... read more

Well, this is it, the end of our trip. We arrived back in the UK on Saturday morning to grey skys and drizzle. I cant remember right now where we last wrote from , so I'll work my way backwards and when you come to somewhere you recognise, you can stop reading! We spent the last week in Johannesburg staying with a friend. We hired a car for the week, making it so much easier and cheaper to get around. We went out to a couple of animal parks in the Gauteng region, and saw plenty of deer and antelope, and more lions and rhino. We also went to another cheetah research and breeding centre, this one better organised and funded than the one in Namibia. But we didnt get to play with the cheetah here! ... read more

Next stop was Windhoek, Namibia, our second to last country on the trans. We spent a short few hours in the city as we were all eager to be on our way to Etosha. Windhoek was a great city, clean, friendly, well laid out and ful of the things we are used to in our other lives. It also suddenly seemed expensive! Etosha National Park was great! We didnt get to see a lot of predators, but we did see hundreds of zebra, giraffe, gemsbok (Oryx), springbok and impala. At the waterholes there would be hundreds of animals mixing and drinking. We did see an African Wild Cat and a lioness with two small cubs. At the campsites (very nice) there was a waterhole where we sat for hours in the evenings. Here we saw a ... read more

The train from Bulawayo to Vic Falls was ok, nothing flash, just two small bunks in a very small room, an unlockable door and a window blind that kept shooting up. Still, it made a change from having to drive on the truck all that way. We arrived at Vic Falls at 7am, tired and hungry, to find that bread wasn't available anywhere in town that day. We had a great, but expensive, time there. I went on an amazing microlight flight above the falls, we both did the "Sundowner Cruise" and watched the falls from both the Zimbabwean and Zambian side, getting really wet in the process. We also bought more souvenirs and sent more parcels back to NZ. The falls are really impressive, especially now as the river is about full. They fall into ... read more

MOZambique 17.05.03 From the idle beach life of Malawi we spent a day in Lilongwe then crossed Mozambique. The road we drove along was the worst for ages, back to West African standards. We couldnt even leave the road for toilet stops because of the risk of land mines. We bushcamped on a piece of dirt just off the side of the road that had an abandoned shack on. We woke to find ourselves surrounded by shy kids from the houses scattered all around us. We'd pulled off in the dark and hadnt been able to see a thing. We didnt stop in at apart from overnight in Mozambique, another country that we'll have to come back to, but drove straight to Harare, Zimbabwe.... read more