Jill and Bow's Travels

Happy Holidays!!

Christmas in Africa... we must admit we are having difficulty feeling the Christmas spirit that we have grown accustomed to for the past 20 odd years... but we are coping!

Jill has previously mentioned our mini-holiday on the isle of Zanzibar so I will try and fill you in on what we have done since we left Dar Es Salam.

Because we have a 4-wheel drive truck we decided to go "playing" in the south of Tanzania for a few days before we head to Malawi. It was quite unique to get off the typical 'tourist track' and see some villages that perhaps haven't seen Mzungu (white people) before. It's quite the site when you get a whole village all waving at you as we speed by in our truck, sometimes waving with both of their arms flailing everywhere with a huge smile to go with it.

We bush camped for a few days and it was getting to be quite a while since we had the pleasure of showering. We came across a river where some of us wanted to rinse ourselves off or at least try and scrape off the 4 days of accumulated dust/dirt off of our feet and legs (though by the looks of the river, totally brown in colour, some of us had doubts that we were getting any cleaner). Then we continued to go further into the depths of the Tanzanian forest to camp in another field much like the one where we stayed the previous night. We were driving along this 'bush track' for approximately 2 hours when we drove through this little valley and Marcus our tour leader/driver mentioned that maybe it would be a good idea to camp back on the other side of this valley in case it rained. He thought it would have been quite the ordeal to get back over the next day if there was rain. It turned out that it was a good idea because as soon as we got all of our tents up the downpour came. As I mentioned before, some of us in the group were dying for a shower so before I knew it there was Jill and about a dozen others out in the pouring rain, washing themselves, shampooing their hair... I was one of the few that remained inside the truck.

The next day turned out to be quite the experience... because it rained most of the night the trip back took 8 hours instead of 2. About 20 minutes after leaving the bush camp we got stuck in the mud going over this makeshift culvert. We actually were very lucky to get out of this predicament considering our rear tire was almost 6 feet below the road if we would have slid 6 more inches. It was actually quite scary at the time. We were lucky that this happened in a village though because after the weight of the truck broke some of the culvert and it seemed to be just hanging there we were able to get pulled out by 15 of us on the end of one rope while the locals attached their tractor to another rope. Then the tractor escorted us out to the 'main' road in case we had any further trouble...

Well, apparently it didn't escort us far enough because we got stuck a total of 5 more times after that! But don't worry, I won't get into fine detail now because we had Jill Meloche, official photographer for the Arnprior Chronicle at the seen catching minute by minute footage! Then because we had such a long day we decided to stay in one of the little villages. It was fun hanging out with the locals, and who would have thought we'd be having dinner in Mehenge when Sadam Husein, the Ace of Spades, was finally caught!

The past 6 days we have been in Malawi. It is very beautiful as well and the locals all speak very good English. We have been spending our nights at camp sites along Lake Malawi (aka the Calendar lake because it's 365 miles long, 52 km wide and 7 hundred metres deep). It's been bitter sweet though because there have been all of these beautiful beaches but there's a chance we could catch some disease (Belhertzia???) which attacks your liver, so we have declined to swim in Lake Malawi. We thought we better be careful considering we won't be home for 4 more months before we could get checked for it. Though last nights camp site was attached to a Hotel and they had a pool so for an extra $5 we swam in their pool for the afternoon. It was a little paradise!

We have spent a lot of time with the local Malawi people and seen quite a few unique things. We saw the Witch Doctor in Chitimba as well as meeting the chief of the area, George. We went on a village walk in Kande beach as well and visited the local school, went to a local church service on Sunday morning and have given many locals our address for them to write us and practice their english. It will be interesting to see how many will actually write us.

Now we are in the city of Lilongwe and we'll be spending the night tonight here and then heading to Flat Dogs Resort in Zambia tomorrow. This is where we will be spending Christmas. Instead of waking up to see what Santa and his little helpers have brought us this year, we will be on an early morning game drive and then having a 3 course lunch to celebrate X-mas! Turkey and all the fixings, but I doubt they will have pumpkin pie for dessert or anything near my Mom's world famous Nanaimo Bars! But we will cope.

So Merry Christmas everyone and have a great holiday! Jilly and I are thinking of you all and will be thinking of everyone on the 25th of December!

Bow.

Posted by jill at December 23, 2003 10:36 AM