Back to Malawi…

(705 km)

S 10º 12’ 71” – E 34º 05’ 66”

I was up at 6.00am, and prepared some breakfast for myself, eating it out on the patio while listening to Simon and Garfunkel on my I-pod… I paid the bill for the room, filled in the visitor’s book, and loaded my gear… Then I eased down the stone path in front of the cottage, and negotiated the narrow and flooded track back to the hospital entrance and onto the tar road…

This sign just outside Mikumi, gave me an idea of what was required today… It was still another 105km to the border from Mbeya….and a further 110km to the rest stop in Karonga tonight…

I struggled with my rhythm for the first half hour of the ride, as the road from the hospital went straight into the loops and tight corners before the National Park… There was no time to settle into the bike and get my balance right… I stopped after a while as I was riding my brakes too hard, making mistakes and having to brake too hard on occasion to avoid going off the road and into the gorge below!! I lit a cigarette, drank some water and took a few deep breaths, then started off slowly again, and before long I was at peace with the “Big Fella” and we started taking the twisty bits a little faster and choosing the correct lines through the corners…

Troops of baboon were again a common sight as I wound my way back through the Udzungwe National Park… I stopped in a lay-by, to take a leak and a few photos of the scenery. I was standing with my back to the bike, near my Top Box, and after pulling my zip up, turned around to find a humungous baboon sitting near my front wheel!!! Had I not just completed the process of emptying of my bladder, I am sure the fright I got would have done the job for me… I had not seen any baboons when I stopped, and had not heard him as he made his way to my bike. He sat watching me with those cunning little eyes of his, sizing me up, completely unafraid of me… I fidgeted for a while wondering what to do, and then taking out my Leatherman (feeling stupid as I did so, but thinking if there was going to be any blood shed today, it would not be mine alone!!) I opened the blade and took a step towards him, shouting “Fuck off!!” as loudly as I could… This was clearly language that he understood, as with a scowl in my direction, he lopped off across the road and sat on a large rock, still only a few metres from me… I quickly put my helmet and gloves back on, never once taking my eyes off him. He scratched the inside of his thigh while pretending to be interested in some leaves which lay at the base of the rock… But by the subtle lifting of his eyebrows, I knew he was watching me closely too… I hopped on the bike and hooted at him, expecting him to leap up in fright and head off into the thick bush… All he did was turn his back on me, dismissing me without a glance in my direction… I left him sitting on his rock, staring back down the road, probably waiting for another traveller to scare the bejesus out of….   

Finding a very large Baboon sitting near your bike will have this effect on you….

Just after the exit to the park, and a few kilometres before Mlandika, I came across yet another truck lying on its side below the level of the road. The driver had swerved to avoid another vehicle that was itself swerving to avoid a large pothole, and ended up totalling his truck and trailer…. He had used the time waiting for assistance to build two shelters on either side of the truck and had settled down in relative comfort. (All things considered…) His conductor had the smaller shelter at the rear, while he had a larger one at the front, where they cooked their food and sat shooting the breeze…and smoking mountain tobacco…lots of it, which may have contributed in some small measure to the accident… I offered them an energy bar, which they looked at with some suspicion, before declining my offer and then offered me a bunch of bananas…which I looked at with some suspicion before declining their offer… Tit for tat!!!!  

Another casualty of the Tanzanian roads and the weather…

I rode down out of the mountains and into the flatter areas around Mlandika and Matisse and was riding quickly towards Iringa, when a taxi came around a sharp corner on my side of the road… I locked the brakes and skidded despite the ABS braking, the bike fighting under me…shaking its head in anger… I felt the back begin to slide out and I yanked the handle bars to compensate… The taxi’s side mirror missed my own side mirror by what felt like millimetres… Then he was past and I had more of the road to bring the bike under control with, ending up on the opposite verge… Luckily there was no oncoming traffic, as I am pretty sure I would have ended up as a bonnet ornament…

When I got going again, I quickly realized that I had cooked my brakes, and each time I used them, it sounded awful….a harsh grinding sound, as if sand was caught between the drum and the pads… I had to slow down and use the throttle and back brake only, from there onwards… Not an easy thing to ride a long distance with… I hoped that the brakes would get me home… I had to adjust my riding style to compensate, which meant a slower and more careful ride home… Not a bad thing, I suppose, but in Allan’s words, “I was frosted, Dude!!”

I rode into Iringa and refuelled at another BP Service station, which I always seemed to gravitate towards on this ride. I ate an energy bar and bought a Cherry Cola and sat down under an awning, washing the former down with the latter… Huge areas of the lower part of town were still flooded from the massive amount of rain that they had the day we rode into the town on the way to Dar… I looked west in the direction I would be travelling and saw thunder clouds building above the Kipkengere Mountain Range and the Usangu Flats beyond them… I decided to ride on without my rain suit, hoping that I could get through this weather system without getting too wet… As usual, my luck ran out… About 50kms down the road, I pulled over near a stand of pine trees and hastily donned my rain suit, muttering “Shit, shit, shit…!” to no-one in particular, as the rain began pelting me… I hopped around with one leg in and the other trying to find its way into the other leg of the rain-suit’s trousers… I should have been an expert at this by now…

Flooded maize fields in Iringa….

The ride through the low hills west of Iringa went by quickly. I rode through the villages of Ifunda and Sao Hill, through James Corner and on to Ugimbano… I decided not to stop at Makumbako, as I knew there would be a few fuel stops further along…

I left the mountains behind and rode down through the Usangu Flats, to Wagingombe and Igawa. The A104 runs due west along the northern edge of the Kipkengere Mountains at this point, and is flat with gentle curves….good riding… At Igurusi I stopped for fuel for the last time in Tanzania. The little café off to the side of the filling station was open but unmanned, and I wanted something sweet and cold to drink. The owner was summoned from his hut across the road by a friend of the petrol attendant, and before long I was sucking on a Fanta and chewing on yet another packet of biscuits…

It seemed that I had shaken the rain for the day, and a short while later, just before the town of Mbeya, I turned south onto the B345 and rode this leg with all its twists and turns, slowly… I wanted to savour the beautiful surroundings and take some time to say goodbye to Tanzania… I rode at a sedate pace while thinking about all the experiences I had had on my short visit here… I would never forget the difficult conditions we had ridden in, especially that 13 hour slog to get to Iringa in the dark, or the elephants that caused us grief… or Allan Karl, who was heading further north, on his way to Turkey, to fulfil another chapter in his own destiny…

Last fuel stop in Tanzania….

Picking tea on a plantation near Kyela, close to the Malawian border…

Going back through the border was a breeze… I handed back the Temporary Import permit for the bike, had my passport stamped and was out of Songea and over the Songwe River Bridge back into Malawi in about 10 minutes. I had to buy yet another Temporary Import Permit on the Malawi side to get the bike across, but luckily my Third Party Insurance which I bought at Chipata when entering Malawi a few weeks ago, was still valid to the 23^rd of Feb, so no financial outlay there… I left the border at 4.00pm, heading for Karonga and a lodge which had been recommended to me by a traveller in Mikumi…

My route back through Malawi and into Mozambique…

The area around Kaporo is the primary rice growing area of Malawi, and at that time of day, the roads were crowded with people coming back from their paddies, hoes slung over their shoulders. Unlike the Tanzanians, who never waved unless you waved at them first, the Malawians waved at me with gusto. I returned most of their waves, but after a while my shoulder began to hurt as a result of sticking my arm up into the wind, and I began merely nodding my helmet at the happy crowds lining the road… I passed Iponga (and it still did!!), and then came to the roundabout on the northern edge of Karonga, where a dinosaur statue is erected to commemorate the finding of a fossil in this area some years ago…

More BIG numbers on entering Malawi from Tanzania…

I refuelled in Karonga, and while I was punching in the address of the lodge into my GPS, the attendant asked me to explain what the GPS was for… I showed him which lodge I was going to as an example what the GPS could do, and he immediately said that going there would not be a good idea…

When I asked, “Why?” he said,

“Because it is crosed down, sah…!” which I agreed was an excellent reason for not going there… He recommended Ngara Beach Resort, which was only 40km away as apposed to the 70km I would have travelled to get to my first choice… Another bit of luck from an unexpected source…

The next twenty minutes were ridden at a good pace, as the road surface along this stretch of the lake was in excellent condition… The sign for Ngara Beach came up and I turned left, down towards the lake on a narrow rocky pathway that served as a road… The track wound down among tall trees, and then out onto a flat section between two maize fields, past a large Baobab and finally through the gates of the lodge. I parked the “Big Fella” on a concreted section of the parking area, and was immediately welcomed by Daf, a friendly guy who seemed genuinely happy to see me. I realized why a few minutes later, when he told me I was the only guest!! There were two guys camping under a tarpaulin, but he said they didn’t count as guests, as they were cooking there own food, and were not “buying anything”…We negotiated the rate for about ten minutes, while I drank some water and muttered about going someplace else… He finally relented, and a few minutes later, I was comfortably ensconced in a stone cottage known as “VIP No: 1”. There were two such cottages available, as well as eight reed huts, a large dining area looking out onto the lake, and a cosy bar…

Three staff members ran the place, Daf the manager, Steven the “cookie” and George the security guard… I ordered chicken and chips to be prepared while I showered, and warned Steven not to over-cook the chicken, which most chefs in Malawi are fond of doing… When I came down from my cottage for supper, my dinner was prepared and waiting for me, and tasted great! I drank two “greens” while I ate, one for me and the other for Allan… I had promised him that I would have one for him at the first opportunity once I reached Malawi, and this was it!!

VIP No: 1… Ngara Beach Resort, Karonga….

I sat up late, catching up on my journal, while keeping and eye on a very large Armadillo Lizard that had worked his way into a crack near the door, and hissed loudly at me each time I passed… It had been a very long day, but strangely enough I did not feel the usual tiredness which normally assailed me after more than nine hours on the bike… Clearly I was getting used to the “big days”…!!

The wind picked up, and I stood watching moonlit clouds scudding across the lake from the doorway of my cottage… Daf and his assistants sat talking around a small fire at the back of the kitchen, and the two guys camping under the tarpaulin, snored a duo which I would have loved to have got on tape…

I fell asleep dreaming of the ocean, windswept waves washing up onto the lake shore barely fifty metres from my cottage, assisting with the illusion… Ngara Camp was worth “disappearing” to when the clamour of the outside world became too much… I could easily have spent a few days here… And some day I will…

Mokoro on the beach at sunrise, Ngara Beach, Lake Malawi….

I did not see a boat of any description while I was there, and presumed that they use a fleet of dugouts for the Para-sailing bit….

© 2008 TBMH