On the road again...

Are we sitting comfortably? Then I'll begin again. When last I found time to commit my musings to the net, I had just had my spooky "it's a bloody small world" experience in Dar. The next morning was another of our horrendous early starts, back off across the harbour ferry (this time without White Nile getting her tail-bar stuck on the loading ramp...) and on out of the city. Needless to say, after my evening supping slushies at the bar I snoozed for a fair part of what was basically just one really long day of driving. No activities to mention, just the odd stop for food and/or petrol and/or toilets. We drove through the middle of Mikumi National Park (solely because the main road south-west through Tanzania slices down the middle of it), and finally arrived, after dark, at our campsite near the town of Iringa in southwest Tanzi.

Now this was a bit of a culture shock, as we went from the big-city feel and tropical swelter of Dar to the mountains and a campsite on an old farm which didn't have any electricity. Everything lit by paraffin lamps, a bar in what is basically a mud-hut (with luke-warm beer) and absolutely freezing cold. I had an early night, and promptly earned myself the emnity of much of the truck by snoring pretty drastically. The combination of the cold, possible dehydration and the fact that I'm sleeping in a "mummy" sleeping bag, which gives rather less room to manoeuvre than a sarcophagus, appears to have kicked my intermittent snoring into gear. (These last couple of nights, sleeping in a dorm bunk in Swakop, there's been absolutely no problem.)

Anyways, it was up for yet another terminally early morning start (I am growing to loathe the hours around 5am ad 6am), this time complete with my hands going numb and feeling on the verge of dropping off as I put my tent away, before piling back into White Nile and rumbling on down to the Malawian border. That's one of the things I possibly underestimated a little about the trip, is just how many days do get consumed simply with getting from one place to the next. Africa's fricking huge. Anyways, no worries at the border, so we rolled on down, with the gleaming Lake Malawi on our left-hand side in the afternoon sun.

Malawi is absolutely gorgeous, picture-postcard style. It's also known as the "warm heart of Africa", on the basis of how friendly the people are, and that seems pretty well-deserved too (although there is still the usual African syndrome that a truckload of kizungu is met by hoardes of kids waving and screaming "gimme pen!" - quite what makes a biro such a status symbol is confusing, but never mind). Our destination that night was the lovely Chitimba Beach, a camp-site down on the lake below the old mission of Livingstonia (no prizes whatsoever for guessing where that name came from...). This was to be the first of several lovely days in Malawi, but that will have to wait for another day. For my time is nearly at an end here (truck leaves in 5 minutes), and I must bid you all adieu.

Take care and have fun,

Pat