Nyamburo

It was yet another very early rise at 5am with light rain still falling after heavy rain and thunder had continued through the night. I got up and started to pack away my soaking tent before the rain got heavier again. As I was folding over the front of the tent to begin rolling it away, my hand came very close to a small scorpion on the underside, which after recovering from the shock, I kicked away. Later, a scorpion of the same species was spotted, and disposed of, on our truck and I was told that it would have given a very painful sting, so I was fortunate not to put my hand on the one under my tent. We had a quick breakfast and set off at 6.30am on the next leg of our journey which would take us across the border into Malawi. We passed through the mountain range with white misty clouds in the valleys, which had been so stabbed by repeated lightning strikes the night before. The weather was overcast, cool, dull and dreary as we passed our way through many wet and muddy towns with Tanzanians trudging through the wet ditches for lack of pavements. The landscape opened out into rural fields and rice paddies with an ancient look as farmers urged their oxen pulled ploughs across the sodden fields. As we started a long climb up into highlands it became very cool in total contrast to the recent high temperatures. As we descended the other side we stopped to buy carrots from a delightful family of roadside sellers who came up with big smiles and young children holding fruit and vegetables above their heads watched on by their, slightly bemused, younger sister. We were waved off by them, happy to have sold us their wares, and to have had us wandering 'mzungu' stop at their roadside stall. The children on our journey through East Africa have often been especially cute and delightful, although often not at school when at school age which highlights the poverty and lack of available education for them in the more rural areas. We later stopped at another roadside seller where a woman brought up fresh avocados to our truck in a traditional patterned sarong type dress with a shawl for the cold - she stood in the doorway and joked with her friend below about us 'mzungu' trying to find somewhere to put the avocados to give her back her bowl.
I fell asleep for twenty minutes and when I awoke we had climbed into high mountains and were descending with epic views over miles of mountains in wispy clouds looking over to Mozambique and down to Lake Malawi. We reached the border and had a fairly smooth entry. We drove on into Malawi and into a very populated rural area with traditional mud brick houses and wide flooded fields with an enormous, white clouded, mountain range in the far distance. The children cheered and waved as we passed and the adults were also very friendly and waved to us. The children looked absolutely delighted when we waved back which was very heart warming. Malawi has a relatively high literacy rate of 66% for its children but we still saw many young children working, although most seemed lively, happy and full of energy.
We approached Lake Malawi, a huge expanse of water backed by a huge dark mountain range. As we followed the lake we saw strange and mysterious plumes of orange 'smoke' rising from the lake which turned out to be enormous swarms of lake flies arising from the surface in tornado like structures. We drove past large areas of platforms where local fisherman were drying pungent smelling fish, and entered the small town of Chitimba where we found our lovely campsite, Chitimba Camp, right on the lake beach with the flat topped mountain, Livingstonia, rising above where Dr. Livingston lived for many years. As I walked down the beach to look at the view I was met by a group of friendly boys who asked about who I was and took my hand as we walked together and chatted about our favourite football teams and they showed me their friend fishing in the lake. It was a lovely moment and showed just how open and friendly the Malawi people are. In the evening we visited a nearby house where we served a nice dinner of maize, rice, spinach and beans and given a summary of the activities we could do the following day. On the way to and from the meal we saw thousands of fireflies, their lights dancing in the dark of a nearby woodland - it was a magical sight and something I have always wanted to see. I retired early to bed after another long and fascinating day in Africa.Read more