Saturday 1 November 2008

As we cannot agree on the title, this is about us going to South Luangwa and Malawi...

Having left our short stint at a life in luxury behind, we soon headed towards Malawi. The drive through Zambia is rather long and tedious, but after a couple of days we made it to the border. The crossing went smoothly and we subsequently headed towards Nkhata Bay on the shores of Lake Malawi. Mayoka village on the shore is truly a great place to stay. We did a couple of pretty nice dives in the lake, and just hung around drinking Carlsbergs and relaxing.

After about three days we went down to Lilongwe to pick up Thomas' friend Morten, who was joining the trip for two weeks. Having picked him up, we went straight back to Zambia towards South Luangwa National Park.

We spent three days exploring the park based at Flatdogs Camp (a flatdog is a croc), and got to see most of the usual suspects (all the antelopes, warthogs, elefants, hippos, buffaloes etc.) But the highlights were probably the elefants and hippos that came straight through camp every night. It is kind of interesting braai'ing spareribs with a hippo grazing about 20 meters from you! Another great sighting were a herd of about 500 buffaloes during a walking safari, you feel sort of small and surrounded in such a situation (especially as there were 20 elephants behind us as well). And finally we got to see a family of 8-9 lions guarding a killed buffalo from the vultures and other carrions.











From the Luangwa valley we went north back into Malawi, instead of the more traditional south route. This was a very remote and nice way to travel, and the roads were not as bad as we feared. We overnighted in Mzuzu in Malawi, before heading up to the Nyika Plateau the next day. The scenery at the plateau is stunning, and the campsite nice and remote. At no time during our three days there were there more that five other people in the park, great! The wildlife is different from other parks, as it is open grass land. But there are many antelopes, and supposedly a lot of leopard (not sure I believe that though....).





























Next stop was Mayoka Village at Nkhata Bay again. This time around we made a bit of an impression with the staff and other guests. Unfortunately this was partly due to a couple of relatively long nights at the bar, where we had a bit too much Danish Water (Carlsbergs, and even Carlsberg Elephant beers among those.... ouch). The first night Morten unfortunately took a bit of a tumble down a rock leaving him with a quite a few cuts and bruises, though no stitches or anything. Christian also managed to stub his toe pretty badly, so our extensive first aid kit came into a bit of use again, good thing we had it with us! But all in all we had a great time at this great place. And it must be added that Mayoka is build right into the rocks, so the pathways are a bit tricky, especially in the dark and "late on".










After leaving one of the most relaxing places so far on our trip, we are now back in Lilongwe. We just put Morten on a plane (after having been to the doctor to get his cuts cleaned and some penicillin....), and now we are waiting of our next visitor, Christian's friend Simon.

In two days we will cross into Mozambique to do some diving, and a bit more relaxing, and then it is back to South Africa.

6 comments:

Unknown said...

Hej folkens!
Dejligt at høre fra jer igen. Jeg glæder mig til at høre lidt mere om jeres dyk i søen. Det er vel meget anderledes end at dykke i havet? Tror altså I skal forberede jer på at vi nok forlanget et "lysbilledshow" når I kommer hjem til jul:-)
Fortsat god tur! /Camilla

Unknown said...

Hejsa,

Jeg klarede turen hjem, på trods af en hævet fod og diverse maveproblemer. Men det var det hele værd - en helt fantastisk tur, med verdens bedste rejseguider. Mmm - jeg får helt lyst til elefantøl og vodkashots med tabasco.

Jeg håber i har en fortsat god rejse i Mozambique.

- Morten

muttimarie said...

Kære børn, why did I dream about you, julefrokost and elephant beers? Good to hear from you and knowing you are enjoying life but please take care..... I have started the count down:-) Kærlige hilsner muttimarie

muttimarie said...

12.11.08 HAPPY BIRTHDAY,Pernille:-)
Kære Pernille vi ønsker dig et hjertelig tillykke og håber du får en skøn dag.
Kærlige hilsner
far og mor

Mads said...

Hejsa.
Jamen hvad er det dog for en tilstand, som i sender stakkels Morten tilbage i ... syg og kvæstet ... tsk tsk :)
Nå, men bortset fra det lille uheld kan jeg forstå på ham, at det bare har været en super go tur, og ikke mindst, at i alle har det godt dernede. Det er jo rart at høre (selvom jeg nu også regnede med det :)
Jeg ku se, at i har haft problemer med bilen, men håber da, at i har fået styr på det, og er kommet videre og ud og dykke.
Ha' det godt dernede. Vi ses om en go måneds tid.
Mads

Anders Peter said...

Hej med jer
Det er dejligt at kunne læse om jeres oplevelser dernede og vi glæder os til at se billeder når I kommer hjem :-)

Og et stort til lykke med fødselsdagen til Pernille :-)

- Jeanette & Anders Peter