Malawi to Tanzania

Since we raced through Mozambique travelling across the short east to west highway in the north, I can’t really claim to have seen the country. Two bathroom stops and two border posts were all we saw. Doing this fast trip was going to allow us to pick up an extra day in Dar Es Salaam to relax at the beach.

We entered Malawi in the evening. Malawi is a long narrow country that is unfortunately known more for its Aids/HIV rate than anything else. The people were very nice but also needy. There doesn’t seem to be many sources of income. We did pass beautiful landscapes where farmers are adapting to the hillsides they live on and figuring out how to make something grow. The first night, we arrived late and camped outside the capital city of Lilongwe. The next day we went to see the city before moving on. We should have just moved on. There was truly nothing there except a lot of people standing around, which has been a common theme in most of these less developed countries.

Malawi is long and narrow country because Lake Malawi occupies around 50% of the land mass. The lake is long, stretching from the southern border to the northern border and has lots of beautiful scenery. We camped at two different lakefront locations. In the first one, where we would be staying for two nights, we decided to upgrade to a beach hut rather than use our tent. The night was peaceful until around 3 AM when the skies exploded into a massive thunder and lightning storm soaking all the others in their tents and leaking into our truck too. The campsite was very nice and the next day was a relaxing day spent reading and listening to books on tape (iPod actually). We then traveled north to another Lake Malawi site for a single night which featured beautiful skies, a nice setting and a local craft market where we purchased a few goodies.

Here are some scenes from our drive through…








Malawi does have some beautiful teak carved products that are inexpensive. We found something for Marissa that will help her know she “will never walk alone”. You have to be a European football (Soccer) fan to get this.

We woke early and headed to the Tanzanian border, passing more remote, spectacular scenery. The crossing was uneventful as was the evening. The crossing did bring some immediate changes. Houses, which are clay or mud brick, now had metal roofs, not straw. People were making products for sale that required some manufacturing like furniture.. The next day, we headed to Dar Es Salaam, a large city on the Indian Ocean. We drove through to a ferry which took us to a campsite on a nearby island which offered free wireless internet connection which didn’t work. We headed into the city the next day. Again, lots of people, more buildings and economy than we saw in Malawi, but with it lots more chaos, crowds, congestion, traffic, smog, etc. Most people wear shoes here. Not a joke, but a common theme we have encountered is lack of footwear. Some people on our trip tell us that this is one way to quickly rate the relative prosperity of the people. Many people in Zimbabwe approached me to offer things for trade and they didn’t want expensive camera equipment, they wanted my New Balance walking shoes.

We left Dar Es Salaam and took a two hour ferry to Zanzibar. A little history lesson for most people. There used to be two countries, Tanganyika and Zanzibar, who merged into one called Tanzania in 1964. Zanzibar has been the home for many conquerors over time but the Arabs and Persians had the most success as the country is 96% Muslim. There is an old town area where we spent one day and then we traveled to a beach resort for two more. In the old town, called Stone Town, the streets reminded me of Venice since they were winding with few easily identifiable landmarks where it was easy to get lost in the maze. The best thing there was a night food market where the make “Zanzibar Pizza”. This would be a small tortilla with some vegetables, a choice of meat or fish and an egg that is fried on a grill. Very tasty and not hard to make. You can probably Google this and find some recipes.
At the beach resort, we ran into a constant African problem, unstable electricity. On our full day, we lost power at least 5 times. The internet worked really well when the power was on. We found out that our youngest fractured a bone in his hand and then found that someone in Staples messed up and canceled my insurance, so he could not get immediate medical help. It got quickly resolved but trying to help him make the right decisions from this far away is hard.

The climate is hot and humid but our room had a ceiling fan and air conditioning, which made for great sleeping. Susan went snorkeling while I chilled out at the beach in the almost 80 degree water. The sunsets were beautiful and it was pretty relaxing, but as you might guess, all this chilling out is leaving me a little cold. I want more action! Today, we leave the beaches and head to Kilimanjaro where we will be camping in 55 degree temps, it sounds very refreshing. The best part is we head from there to see the annual animal migration in the Serengeti. This part of the trip ends next Saturday and our final two weeks, part three of the trip, heads to Rwanda and Uganda the next day.

Zanzibar sunset...