The Warm Heart of Africa

Fingers-Crossed

After our recent border experiences, we were really starting to dread border day. Dressed in over-sized green cargo shorts (Coons calls them his “border pants”) and one of his two t-shirts, Coons parked PJ on the side of a large white building and was immediately swarmed by people selling peanuts and exchanging money. Once we had a fat stack of Malawian money, we entered the building where we handed over our passports and paid for our visas. We decided to get the car registration started in the meantime while we waited for the visas to be processed. This seemingly nice lady with the typical African lack of spacial awareness walked up to us, asking if we needed insurance.

Insurance Lady: “Hello Sister. Hello Brother. Do you need insurance today?”

Us: “We have COMESA, but thank you.”

After we finished filling out the registration, the officer said we needed to pay three separate charges, some in Malawian Kwacha and some in USD to the bank. Lazily, he made us fill out each of the deposit forms with the bank name and account number as if we were supposed to know it. When Coons pulled out the stack of money to separate the fees, he noticed we were 13,000 Kwacha short. The fixer was still around trying to direct people through customs and immigration, the man begging, “Brother, give me money,” was making his rounds, but the cunning insurance lady was nowhere to be found. She had most likely pick-pocketed us and disappeared.

After sitting and stewing, all of our fees were paid and our visas ready. We drove away ready to be done and restart our Malawi experience. Starting now…

We stopped at Barefoot Safari camp on the outskirts of the capital, Lilongwe. This was a proper South African setup with individual grass pitches, running water, electricity, and a braai. It had been a while since we had a setup like this. Wanting to fit in a three-day hike before our volunteering started, we were on a tight timeline so we could only spend one night here before beginning our journey south.

On The Road Again

Eager to get out of the city and out in front of the huge 18-wheelers clogging the road, we followed the crowd of taxis passing them as we left the city. Of course, we were immediately pulled over by men in bright white uniforms. The traffic police informed Coons he was speeding and the fine was 10,000 Kwacha (about $13 USD). He had video evidence with his digital camera outfitted with a speedometer gun which he proudly showed Coons. Ugh, okay restart again. Starting now…

On the roads, there are typically two different speed limit signs. There is a 50 kmph sign as you enter villages and then a 50 kmph sign with an X through it as you leave. So in town, you are to drive 50 and outside of town… not 50? We tried asking officers at the various traffic stops how fast we could go in a “not 50” and most of them didn’t understand us. Smiling with their heads tilted slightly, one answered he didn’t know (How? You are a traffic officer? This is your job) and one answered that you could drive 90-120 kmph. However, this is impossible in practice, because you can sometimes see the 50, not 50, and 50 kmph signs in quick succession, leaving little time for acceleration. We actually were stopped because we were driving 53 kmph (32 mph) in a 50 kmph (31 mph) zone. What. The. Actual. Hell. As the traffic stops piled up, our ETA on Google Maps crept later and later.

At one point, we were stopped behind a tractor-trailer truck for several minutes who was prevented from moving forward by a large gate the police weren’t opening. One of the female officers directed us around the truck. As we pulled forward she hollered:

Female Officer: “Stop! Reverse! Pull over to the side!” she yelled, picking up an orange traffic cone.

Female Officer 2: “You have run over a traffic cone. That is reckless driving.”

Stunned by these dramatic, obviously orchestrated antics, we sat in silence for a moment. Do we try to explain the situation? Argue? Pretty sure nothing under 10kmph can be considered ‘reckless.’ Finally, Kourtney spoke up and added some honey to the situation.

Kourtney: “Madam. We are so very sorry. Please forgive us. We made a mistake.”

Satisfied, she let us go.

Why did we come here?

Still on the road, we made it to Blantyre which is the last major city before Mount Mulanje and stopped to refuel. With sidewalks for the pedestrians and two lanes for inbound and outbound drivers separated by a partition, we were thinking we would cruise through and make up for lost time. Not even ten minutes later, people were shouting in the streets, some of them at us, only some of them in English. Confused, we continued on, windows rolled up and doors locked. Then old, white, run-down taxi vans started driving head-on towards us. We knew they didn’t obey any traffic laws, but this was a new low. We finally realized there were riots in town and started to try and find our way around. This would take much longer than expected and cost us a tire, which you can read about in PJ Part 5.

In the dark, we reached the base town of Mount Mulanje and were immediately swarmed by freelance guides who approached us, pounding on the windows. Worn-out, we said we couldn’t think of hiking the mountain yet and begged them to direct us to Hiker’s Nest Backpackers. Once safely inside the hostel gate,  Ruth greeted us, and we let out a sigh of relief. Seriously — starting now…

Mt. Mulanje

At first, we were thinking we needed a day to recover after all of the previous shenanigans, but the next morning after a good night’s sleep, we were determined to start hiking. Coons organized a guide and we set out at 10am. To the base camp of Mt. Mulanje is a steady uphill climb — 1,500 meters of elevation gain over 13 kilometers. Not prepared for the immediate and nearly constant uphill, carrying all our gear on our backs, this took longer than expected ~7 hours. Feeling tired, sore, and wondering why we allowed ourselves to hike after sitting on our butts safaring for three months straight, we reached the camp.

We met a nice Belgium couple who were one day ahead of us on the typical three-day schedule and looking for a ride to the lake where we were also going. They shared with us the dinner their porter cooked for them, a lovely vegetarian dish, and we swapped stories about traveling over firelight. We exchanged numbers and planned to meet up to head to the lake together.

The way up to the summit was an hour-long bear-crawl up slick granite rock and then an hour of climbing over and under huge boulders. It certainly kept us entertained and alert! Thankful to have small packs, we were able to complete this section in record time to enjoy the 360 views.

On the way down the sun was beating down on us and we could feel the sunburn coming on. Should’ve packed the sunscreen! Once we made it back to the camp, we made lunch and finished packing before setting back out to the next camp.

The next camp was another two hours, mostly downhill. We were back looking at the beautiful flowers and trees as we neared the top of one valley. Then the sky turned violent and dark; the thunder started crackling just above our heads and the rain started pouring down. We kept trekking forward at a more hurried pace, but the rain continued to beat down of us for the final hour. Trudging through puddles in the rain with a pack cover collecting water is one thing, but when lightning is illuminating the sky just above us, we started to feel uneasy. When we finally arrived at the rest camp, we removed our soaked clothing and put it out to dry overnight and leaned our shoes by the fire. A really sweet Israeli couple, who had also just gotten married and were on their honeymoon, made us a cup of tea while we warmed ourselves by the fire. Coons shared his experience during his birthright trip, and they shared their experience visiting The Book & Bar in Portsmouth, New Hampshire.

The next morning we left the second camp and continued to walk downhill to a waterfall with a view of the massif behind and a nice pool for swimming. It was lovely to relax and look at, but we didn’t swim as we had a big day ahead of us: we had offered to give another American named Ben a ride to Blantyre where Nadeem and Kasim said they had a spare tire waiting for us. Then we needed to make it to Zomba to pick up the Belgiums and continue on to Lake Malawi.

Lake Malawi

We arrived late at night — again — with the Belgiums. We stayed at the Funky Cichlid and it was awesome and so relaxing. They treated us to dinner and drinks and we were all looking forward to some R&R after that brutal and beautiful hike.

The Funky Cichlid has a restaurant/bar overlooking the water with a volleyball net and kayaks for rent. They have pool tables and couches for lounging and we took full advantage of the latter. We took some time to blog, nap, and eat at the restaurant. There was a Mother’s Day party set for that evening, but we met some day-drinking locals who ended up being too old for how obnoxious they were. One gentleman, in particular, was ruining all of the ladies’ day. He hollered at anyone who would listen that he didn’t appreciate the hostel dogs co-existing with him. “I AM NOT A DOG!” Culturally, dogs are kept for protection in Africa; they are not fed, cared for, or loved. They protect the family and the livestock. Finally, his wife put him to bed in the car so we could relax in peace. The night turned into a party with drinking games and dancing and excellent conversation. We left for another part of the lake the next day where we planned to dive for the first time since Central America.

Lake Malawi is a beautiful lake nestled between Malawi, Tanzania, and Mozambique. We had an excellent time scuba diving in Nkhata Bay with Aqua Africa. We observed lots of interesting fish 30 meters down including enormous catfish — the moms protecting their babies and the dads circling near us skeptically — and mouthbrooders, whose babies stay near their mother and swim into her mouth at any sign of danger.

At nighttime, we helped a group of dolphin fish hunt. They followed our flashlight over and in between the rocks and when we would illuminate a small fish, they would gobble them up quickly. It felt great to be back under the water. The only thing we needed to do now was grab medication to combat Bilharzia, a disease caused by flatworm parasites that live in snails that inhabit Lake Malawi — they just love passing the parasites on to humans.

The next morning we went shopping for groceries and headed to the Kings Highway Rest Camp. This is probably one of the nicest camping spots we’ve had thus far in Africa. Our spot was right on the beach. The facility is run by a lovely South African couple who brought us clean water to drink and stuff to keep the bugs at bay. The facilities were so beautiful and clean, we thought about sleeping in them. Warm showers, western-style toilets, soap, and hand towels — what more could you want?

We took one last dip in the lake (with all its fun parasites) where we were immediately swarmed by a group of local children. What started as a round of high-fives quickly turned into a rambunctious playtime over the next hour. Non-stop throwing children off of our shoulders and flipping them into the water. We felt as though we had gotten another work-out in. Once the sun started to set, we made dinner, and reflected on our time in Malawi, preparing for our epic drive through Tanzania as fast as we can! Uganda or bust.

Malawi is called “The Warm Heart of Africa” and people from Malawi are sure to tell you when they greet you. We suppose we agree. The police are a little absurd and Africa time continues to get the best of us. However, we met a lot of genuine people who were very nice and helpful, and we tried to be as equally nice and helpful. We saw the beauty of the mountains and felt the relaxation of the lake (We’re really hoping we don’t have Bilharzia!). All in all, it was worth a visit.