Nkhata Bay, Malawi - Day 222 - Boots on the Loose

Bus ride from Chitimba to Mzuzu was good, at least as in we didn’t hit anyone. Man they sure pack ’em in here: on average around 20 – 23 (or more) people at a time. Stopped somewhere along the line to buy cassava (the main staple food here); minibus worker thought it would be amusing to give me a big, phallic looking piece to try, so for everyone’s enjoyment I dug in and ate it (tasted like a raw potato). Stayed at the Mzoozoozoo in Mzuzu; there are an amazing number of “expats” in these parts mainly running lodges (for some reason that word annoys me to no end… not sure why). Town didn’t have a lot to offer besides a bank and incredibly expensive internet.

I’ve been wearing the same, DISGUSTING pair of retched shorts for 6 months now. They reek. Sometimes when I get them washed, they come back worse than before. Furthermore they’re now way too big for me – often we’ll be sitting on a minibus and I can’t stand my own smell (standing is usually okay, presumably because they’re further away). Anyway, FINALLY got a new(er) pair from the 2nd hand market for around $3 (Esprit’s from the late 90’s). Unfortunately they say the 2nd hand industry has recently ruined much of the tayloring business (they’re bought from Western countries… often you’ll see Value Village tags still on them!). But since people barely even wear shorts here, finding a new pair was out of the question.

Back at “The Zoo” they had a fantastic movie collection, as well as a PS2!! Wowwww…. On top of that it’s up in the mountains so is nice and cool in the evenings. …so even though there wasn’t a lot to do in town, it was a nice place to relax for a couple days. Manage to score a ride down to Nkata Bay (about 50km away) with one of the lodge owners the last day. Before leaving went and watched the “Souls of the Ghetto” do a fundraiser/practice event down at the town centre. Actually really quite good with a really high-energy singer (even doing push-ups before the show!) doing all originals. There’s an upcoming music festival in Harare, Zimbabwe that they’re raising money for… hopefully they do well. It’s been a little sad on the trip so far how much live music we’ve been able to see (ie. next to none). Too bad we won’t be in Zimbabwe – would be fun to watch…

Got to Nkata Bay in record time (as in, a little uncomfortably fast at times). Stayed out at the Butterfly Lodge which is a 15 minute walk into town. As suggested by a Canadian guy (Ben) back at the Mushroom Farm, requested room #4 which is great because I can actually urinate directly into the lake after dark from the balcony (view’s okay too I guess).

Without a word of hyperbole, Lake Malawi is the nicest lake I’ve ever seen in my life. It’s absolutely crystal clear, warm like any other tropical beach in the world, beautiful sandy beaches. It’s so big that it actually has big waves when the wind picks up; when it’s clear we can just make out the mountainous silhouette from Mozambique on the other side. Often times we’ll see horror movie sized swarms of lake flies way out in the middle (I’m talking high enough to touch the clouds). Every night after dark, all the fishermen congregate out in the middle of the lake in their dugout canoes with their lanterns (last night I counted over 70 of them); is a beautiful sight except the lake is pretty badly over-fished. Apparently the Gates Foundation donates plenty of mosquito nets every year to Malawi that these thankful fishermen use as fishing nets (count it as yet another Western failure… these nets really don’t allow anything to pass through except water, thus the over-fishing).

Bumped into a girl, Julia whom we had met way back in Cairo on the Dragoman tour we were on. Her and another couple were taking the MV Ilala (ferry) down to the bottom of the lake so the night they were leaving we came on board and got a brief tour of the ship… got me quite motivated to do it ourselves, except we’d have to wait another week for the boat to return on it’s course.

Lots of time spent on the beach, town doesn’t have a huge amount to offer… went for drinks the other night at a locals bar, Club 672 (people here are always happy to see us venture into these sorts of places). Bought 2 doubles of vodka (vodka shots come in little, ketchup-like packets) so 4 shots and a bottle of Sprite for $1. Nice. No glasses though so had to make do with mixing in the Sprite bottle. Oh… and the men’s toilet is the lawn beside the building. Love it. It’s truely hard to imagine at times how we’ll ever manage to re-integrate ourselves into society at home…

On our second to last night at the Butterfly, went out to watch the Football Champion’s League final between Milan and Liverpool (though Jen didn’t figure out it was a game of any importance until it was half over); all the local kids were going crazy for Milan since everyone on the continent worships Chelsea and Manchester United and Milan had previously knocked them out? I guess I see the logic… was funny to watch them heckle us as though we gave a rats ass who won (presumably they thought we were English). Went to the lodge next door the next morning for breakfast to find the wacky owner completely wasted drunk at around 10:30am. Quickly figured out he actually hadn’t yet gone to bed the night before; there seems to be a pretty serious drinking problem for many of the foreign lodge owners we meet in these parts (trying to avoid using “expat”).

For the rest of the day it was cold and rainy so we took it as a sign to leave the following morning… ended up buying a beautiful little wood-carved table from the bartender, “Fortune” for around $30; didn’t like his chairs as much as others we’d seen so we’ll wait until the next big city. Liked Fortune so much that I actually gave him the unopened mosquito net that I’ve been carry around for 8 months now (on the promise that he’ll actually use it to avoid the Malaria he gets every year).

After another night in Mzuzu, headed to the Luwawa Forest Lodge next… around 120km south of Mzuzu, got dropped off at the side of the road at the turn off for the lodge (around 10km down a logging road from the highway). Gave George, the owner a call and was down to pick us up in short order.

The highways in Malawi are eerily deserted; on the main “M1” highway that runs from top to bottom, you hardly see any vehicles at all… driving down at 10am on a Monday morning, we probably drove past 20 cars over the 100+ kms we went. Apparently there’s been a huge crachdown the past few years to get rid of the old beaters which I guess has caused this (of course driving in the back of a pickup with 23 other people is perfectly acceptable). We were told to stay off the roads at night since the police leave their checkpoints around 6pm, and out come the jallopies except now most the drivers have been drinking. Good job. The highway itself is in incredibly good shape – some of the best we’ve seen in Africa; the only funny thing is the guard rails used to be made out of wood but are now just cement posts since every scrap of wood has been ripped off.

The Luwawa Forest was really strange simply because it looked so much like home – lots of big, fir and pine trees as well as many other non-indigenous types such as eucalyptus. The trees were planted back in the 50’s to be logged for pulp and lumber, but then it was decided that it caused too much pollution in Lake Malawi, and so there it sits in the middle of one of the poorest countries in Africa.

Pulled into the lodge just in time to head up to the fire watchtower for a “sun-downer”. It was SO cold. The forest is up around 2000M, the wind was howling and you could actually see your breath. There’s a guy that lives in the tower for 4 days at a time (switching with someone else). Other than company during sun-downers, would be a pretty boring job (but a job, nonetheless).

Decided to splurge on a $50/night “luxury suite” back at the lodge. Very nice. Used to be a logging camp, equipped with it’s own squash court even, and has since been upgraded by an English guy (George) and his wife. He employs 28 locals that live on the grounds for free (up from only 5 when he took it over) and seemed to have a really good attitude about it all (when I asked if he used a lawnmower he said no because it would take away someone’s job… lawns here are always cut by hand with a machete (sp?)).

Ended up meeting another couple with a vehicle that were heading south to Lilongwe after only one day – a day before we wanted to leave, but in these parts when there’s a free ride available, plans become remarkably flexible (even George the owner understood when we told him we had to leave a day early). After breakfast the next morning went for a wander around the grounds, climbed up the tree fort, went out for a paddle in the “Canadian Canoe” around the little dammed lake (becoming experts in the canoe now), and let the dogs lead us on a walk down the “Indigenous Forest Trail” – all feeling much like BC, except for the fact that we were supposed to keep an eye out for Leopards on the forest walk.

After dinner got a chance to watch some traditional Malawi dancing out on the front lawn. Every time one of these opporunities arises, Jen complains that she doesn’t want to take part because she thinks it will be put on for the tourists, not genuine, etc. Of course there’s always a chance she’ll be right (and I’m not particularly fond of those types of things either) but so far on the trip they’ve always turned out to be a real highlight. Started with about 20 or 30 women dancing and singing in a circle around 3 drummers in the middle; many of them with their young, sleeping children roped to their backs with a piece of cloth, head bobbling around to the beat. One girl in particular was only around 10 years old with her (hopefully) sister hanging off of her. Was quite mesmerizing to watch. Later came out a fella with a crude costume of feathers glued to a baseball hat and shirt, and bells tied around his ankles. Seemed like at first when he came out all of his friends were kind of laughing at him, but of course ended up doing a great dance for us.

And off to bed early since our ride wanted to leave early for some unknown reason, similar to everyone else we’ve met on the trip so far… ah well…