Africa
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Travelling Back In Time In A City Called Slaughter
You know how sometimes a place name captures your imagination and sounds and feels exotic? For some reason Bulawayo hits those notes for me, though with no real reason – we don’t know much about it and it doesn’t exactly have the ring of a Kathmandu, a Timbuktu or even a Casablanca, yet somehow it’s been calling. Which is how we come to be being driven by the ever reliable Kenny to Victoria Falls airport to board a small but smart Air Zimbabwe plane to the country’s second city. One thing we have learnt about it is how to say it, and it’s definitely not the “Buller-way-oh” pronunciation that the…
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Across The Border: From Zambia To Zimbabwe
All we ask Caroline at the lodge for is a taxi to the border. What we get is a driver named Steven who does that bit, but also chaperones us through the slightly confusing Zambian exit system and then drives us over the Victoria Falls Bridge as far as Zimbabwe immigration where he points out a smiling guy in a blue T-shirt. The smiling guy is Kenny, and before we know it we’ve skipped the line, got the obligatory stamps in our passports and been driven to the very door of our next stay. Expert courier service for the price of a taxi. It’s how it is here: service repeatedly…
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Livingstone: Thrills And Adrenaline At The Victoria Falls
We arrive in the town of Livingstone with high expectations and an even higher level of excitement, yet as we are welcomed into our digs by the ultra friendly staff we have no indication of just how many thrills the next few days will bring. Once in a lifetime experiences are, unbeknown to us, lurking in the trees. Our first glimpse of the waters of the Zambezi is as the mighty river swings around to come alongside the road, its calm waters feeding lush greenery on either side in total contrast to the surrounding tinder plains. The surface looks solid, glasslike, mirroring the cloudless sky, serene enough to kid the…
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Getting To Know Zambia: Learning In Lusaka
Eleven hours on a bus gives you, amongst other things, plenty of time to think and, in the case of our monster trek to Lusaka, the chance to reflect on our three weeks in Malawi. Did we enjoy it? There were many elements which we absolutely loved, but we’re not certain that “enjoy” is an appropriate word, simply because life is so different, and because so many things are decidedly difficult, that travelling the country requires constant effort. Let’s start with the good. Wonderful scenery, amazing locations, and a population which effortlessly earns its reputation as the “warm heart of Africa”. Friendly, helpful people everywhere. However, Malawi is a very…
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Out Of Malawi And Into Zambia: It Nearly Goes So Well
Before we leave Dedza on that journey to Lusaka which is filled with potential pitfalls, we really can’t leave the pottery without a Monday morning tour of the factory. A willing employee named Owen walks us through the entire process from raw material to finished product, and we have to say that every single stage is fascinating. If you’re ever tempted to order any Dedza pottery, we can guarantee that the legend “handcrafted” is absolutely genuine – despite its global appeal this is very definitely a cottage business using only time honoured processes. Yes some of the machines reducing the raw material to powder are driven by electricity, but from…
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Climbing To Dedza: Pottery, Petroglyphs & Bad Tomatoes
Miles trundle by as we journey back north, leaving behind the lush green fields of the tea plantations and soon passing again through the metropolis which is Blantyre with its big buildings, big crowds and big character, then onwards along the M1 through more police checkpoints than we care to count. Green becomes red, rolling becomes flat and then flat becomes spectacular mountain. After Ntcheu we’re not even sure which country we’re in, our maps suggesting that the highway we’re driving along is the border between nations, Mozambique on our left and Malawi on our right. Dedza announces itself with a large welcome sign and yet another speed trap, smoke…
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Journeys In Malawi: Southwards In Time For Tea
As we drive through Malawi, every town and village is an explosion of colour, sounds and smells, each place a sensory experience in its own right, in complete contrast to long distance vision which seems to be perpetually blighted by the dense haze hanging in the air and blocking out the long view. We had worked out for ourselves that the haze is a combination of red dust carried by the wind coupled with smoke from extensive burning of scrub, but, now that we’re travelling further south and the haze is thinning, we realise that water vapour from the great lake is the third element helping to create the mist.…
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Beneath The Great Plateau: Exploring The City Of Zomba
It’s noticeably more chilly here, both after sundown and in the morning. We are now in Zomba, former capital of Malawi, where the town sits at around 1100m above sea level, some 600m higher than Cape Maclear on the shores of Lake Malawi. Days are hot but darkness calls for an extra layer and long trousers and at breakfast time there is a pleasant freshness to the air. Our paths cross once again with the history of Dr Livingstone, and will continue to do so as, more by coincidence than by design, we trace sections of the great man’s journey through Central and Southern Africa. Here in Zomba his presence…
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Lake Malawi Days
It went on for a bit longer. The very friendly guy who smiled as he told us he’d given our room to someone else, WhatsApps after a couple of days to say that the usurping guests have extended their stay for a night and we still can’t take our original booking. When we do eventually move to Tranquilo after three nights away, it’s immediately obvious that our temporary billet was far superior to the one we’re now at – and given that we had, of course, refused to pay the difference, we’d inadvertently got ourselves a real bargain. Tranquilo has clearly seen better days, and what’s more, the dusty outdoor…
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Into Malawi: A Range Of Emotions In The Warm Heart Of Africa
Once we’ve left Mombasa behind en route to Malawi, Kenya springs one last surprise: the sight of the mighty Kilimanjaro which eluded us throughout our time in Amboseli. There, at last, it is, its unmistakable white peak clearly visible from the aeroplane window, perhaps not quite as majestic as seeing it from ground level, but….well, we’ve seen it at last! A few hours later, and via a flight connection in Nairobi, we are taking our first ever steps in Malawi, the tinder dry landscapes around the airport dotted with crisp shrubs, leafless frangipane and patches of burnt earth. The route to the capital city Lilongwe seems to be 40 minutes…
