On Thursday afternoon, Christo, Vi, Leigh and myself hopped into Christo’s jam packed truck and headed south the Blantyre. Good thing about Christo driving is that he works for the South African Embassy and therefore has the coveted “CD” diplomatic licence plates, which means that we didn’t get stopped at any of the roadblocks. Road blocks are never much of a problem, but usually just bored policemen flouting authority. I didn’t know about the CD plate thing before, but every embassy and UN agency is assigned a specific number – 22 CD is UNICEF, 9 CD is South African Embassy etc. etc so if you happen to know all the numbers you can tell which agency the car belongs to. Interesting fact. Now you know.
We spent the night at Doogles hostel in Blantyre and the next morning drove about an hour to the base of Mt. Mulanje – the highest mountain in Malawi. The best thing about the drive to Mulanje, other than the fact that it is quite beautiful, is that it is a road that I have never been on before. There is some fundamentally exciting about going somewhere you’ve never been...I get little butterflies... gets me every time. The base of Mulanje is surrounded by Tea plantations and cedar forests. If you have never seen tea plantations before, they are the most astounding colour of yellowy-green in the sunlight. There is something slightly colonial-romantic about watching the workers stooped over picking the tea and putting the leaves in the huge baskets on their backs. Then you remember that they are probably paid pennies and you feel a little awkward...
Views of Mt Mulanje and the Tea Estates
We didn’t actually climb Mulanje. I’m saving that for a trip in May and stay tuned for a post of my adventures attempting to summit Sapitwa. If Mount Smiley is any indication, I’m going to have to keep jogging after work to keep fit! Rather than do anything too strenuous like our poor friends who actually were climbing Mulanje, we just did a really nice walk through the tea and the forest and took loads of goofy pictures:
Goofy Pic - Anna in the Tea
Nice Pic - Me, Leigh and Vi
Also came across the most gorgeous waterfall – fresh mountain streams cascading over huge mossy boulders... looked primeval almost.
Here’s a funny anecdote from dinner at Kara O’Mula Lodge in Mulanje, which became the quote of the weekend and a euphemism for Malawian restaurant service:
Scene: Dinner time at Kara O’Mula Lodge. Anna, Leigh, Christo and Vi sit down to dinner and take a look at the menu
Christo: what is the soup of the day?
Waitress: the soup of the day is always mushroom
Peals of laughter ensue, while Waitress looks on a little confused...
After Leigh and I went on another slightly more serious hike the next day, we packed up the tents and the truck again and headed off for the beach at Cape Maclear. I feel a little bit like I’m becoming a regular at Cape Mac (see, I can even call it by its nickname ) as this is the second weekend in a row that I have been! It’s a great place though, and all the hostels and restaurants are lined up along the beach and interspersed through the village so you get this really cool vibe of backpacker and village life all rolled into one. Met up with zee Germans (a rather largish crowd of, you guessed it, Germans) and had a great time hanging out on the beach and drinking lots of Carlsberg. We took a boat trip out to Otter Point where there are apparently otters and crocodiles, but unfortunately/fortunately we didn’t see any. Luckily, we did see some of the elusive Rock-dwelling Azungus... haha
Its like National Geographic
Anna being eaten by a Crocodile. Just Kidding!
Had a lovely big Easter Dinner at Cape Mac Lodge - where you pay slightly more, but get your food before you have to wait 2.5 hours, and the soup of the day is NOT always Mushroom - and then went off down the beach to a Black Missionaries concert (you can cross-reference them on my blog by taking a look at a previous post from August).
Great concert, great company, Great Weekend!
