November 2011 - Zambia - South Luangwa

After extending our stay at Lake Malawi yet for another 3 days, we half-heartedly decided that we really needed to move away from there...
Once you leave the lake shore the scenery becomes drier with cute little hut villages all along the way set amongst large areas of trees with red, yellow and orange leaves; all of the sudden the city of Lilongwe pops seemingly out of nowhere and you are in the capital of the country. It is a pleasant little city in which we spend also longer than expected. Cruisi was making a noise that needed to be taken care of. Waiting, repairing and waiting some more took 2 and a half days. (once on the road again we realised that the noise is still there...)
Because of all the driving around in the city the fuel would have not lasted us until the Zambian border and we needed to get a few litres to reach it, this took another half day.
Finding a petrol station is easy, there are plenty, finding one that actually sells petrol is a huge mission. We drove all over the place and we almost exhausted the last drops of our fuel until finally we found the only station in the whole city still having some. The cue of waiting cars was enormous, reaching over two blocks away from the station itself. We had no option other than wait patiently and pay in the end about 70 USD for 25 litres of the precious liquid.
Petrol really makes the world go round, there is no question about it!
After an extended stay in Malawi we reached Zambia. We did not know exactly what to expect from this country apart from what we had heard some of the nicest and most welcoming people which is definitely the case. Apart from that we were pleasantly surprised to be entering bush environment again, we had missed this after getting in touch with it in South Africa, and we did not have a proper bush experience since we left it actually.
With ‘bush experience’ we mean being in environments and situations that remind you of the extent and remoteness of the stereotypic African wilderness and give you the feeling that a wild animal could come out at any time from one of the bushes around. The sounds of places like this are unique, the sky seems bigger than anywhere else and the sunrise and sunsets can be truly breathtaking.
And this is what we headed for when driving up to the national park of South Luangwa. We found an amazing campsite (Wildlife Camp) just outside of the park; there are no fences here to mark the boundaries of the park, people need to make way for animals here and not the other way around when their paths cross. So when we arrived at the campsite we were greeted by 3 giraffes standing just next to the bar area. We camped just on top of the river bank, which is dry during this time, and had the view of the whole riverbed and the opposite banks of the park. The most amazing location to stop after a long drive and like proper overlanders, get the chairs out, open a cold beer and sit back and enjoy the African sunset.
During the day it is hard to do anything else than either sit somewhere in the shade or drive around with open windows, climbing out of the tent at 6 am already makes you sweat, it gets really hot here, it can reach up to 50 degrees on a good day. We have reduced our meals to two per day and they consist mainly of breakfast and tomato salads, its too hot to eat. This is quite convenient as the overlanding life of driving, eating carbohydrate laden African diets, sitting down again and drinking afternoon beers had resulted in some fat accumulation...
It is the end of the dry season and everybody and everything is waiting for the rains to come. Just in front of our campsite a hippo left his last breath on the river bank after not finding enough water to stay in. The lions and hyenas did not even bother to eat him as most of the animals are so weak because of the lack of water that they are an easy and fresh pray.
The nights are a great spectacle. Each night we can wake up and watch the hippos come to the green grass of the campsite to have a feast. One night an elephant came so close to the tent that he touched it with his tusk, we could have shake hands.
Although we could have done most of our game watching from the camp we did nevertheless enter the park. Here the fees are a mere 30 US Dollars per person and 15 for the car compared to the 80 and 150 in Kenya, Tanzania etc, here you are by yourself and everything seems truly wild.
In the park we had breakfast on the roof of Cruisi waiting for the animals to come. At some point we realised that the roles had been reversed, giraffes and antelopes were standing just behind us watching us, we had not even realised them.
Another closer encounter happened when we were standing in the middle of an elephant herd and Cruisi started fuming white smoke from below the engine cap. It looked quite concern-able! We switched it off and waited for the elephants to get some distance before checking. The smoke was coming from the air-filter for no obvious reason. With the mechanical expertise we have on board we figured out that some exhaust smoke must have gotten trapped in the filter (...), something like a mechanical burp. It never happened again.
We left the park after 4 days. Not only does the Zambian bush-life remind one of South Africa but even more so the Zambian cities which are a concentration of South African shopping malls and supermarkets, you can find everything from Mr Price, Pick & Pay, Edgars, Standard Bank and Shoprite (which here is more similar to the SA Woolworths!). Lusaka especially, the capital, made us feel like back in South Africa just a bit safer... This is where we are at the moment. Next, we are planning to head to the famous Victoria Falls.
P.S. Luisa’s Confession: I killed a chicken. After managing to avoid millions of them over the 18 000 km we have been driving so far this one was one of the stupidest and Cruisi was too fast and heavy to stop without creating an accident. I hope it could still be used for someone’s dinner...
P.S. 1. Zambia has squirrels with the biggest and monkeys with the bluest bollocks ever!

November 2011 - Malawi - North - Chilling!

The last two posts are a bit out of sync, the Malawian tempo caught us up and even the thought of looking up an internet cafe was too much.
We managed to stay 13 days within a distance of 40 km in the North of Malawi; this beats our record of a maximum of 3 nights in one place by far!
Malawi is aaaweeeesome, we love it!
Whoever is relatively close to this part of the world, you should really come and have a look. Erik pack your bags!
We are back to life on the beach and it feels so good! Lake Malawi is so big that it most of the time you forget that it is not the sea. When it gets windy the waves can reach up to meter or more (no surfing unfortunately but kite surfing and SUP could well be a niche here). The water is warm and clear and you can spend hours kayaking and snorkelling.
The lake is famous for its many colourful fish and indeed there are fluorescent blue, yellow and pink fish all over the place. They are especially popular for aquariums and indeed it feels like you are swimming in one.
The fish might not appear in the extend of the psychedelic colours described by the travellers we met along the way but the famous Malawi Gold can make everything more colourful than it really is, why not!
The beaches are sandy, the weather is perfect and the people are incredibly chilled. Most of the guys must have spent a previous life somewhere in the Caribbean; dreadlocks, Reggae music, hot booties, peacefulness and a lot of Happiness in the air!
The first nights we stayed in a little bamboo hut just on the rocks with a big Mango tree above us, then we moved 3 km down the road to beautiful little bungalow with a private beach and now we are camping on the beach under big trees with a Yoga temple just next door (its deserted but the vibe is there). The fish is really tasty and comes fresh from the fishermen, yesterday we even managed to cook a perfect fish soup on the coals.
People seem very content in this little, pretty poor country. The only problem arising seems to be the current president who although did great good to the country over the last years is seeing his term come to an end and is securing his future by stocking up on private planes and hummers, leading to an extreme mismanagement of petrol and diesel in the country. People are queuing for petrol and many save what they have got because they don’t know when there will be some more. Organised as we are, we stocked up Cruisi’s reserves of petrol in Tanzania and will not have to refill while in Malawi.
There is not too much to report on really from our last 10 days; one day blends in with the next almost unnoticed would not be for darkness, time does not exist making it pass quicker when one becomes aware of it. It will be hard to leave this place.

November 2011 - Tanzania - Long Way Down

It was nice entering Tanzania again, the only country that we are visiting twice during our trip. But since we had already exhausted the time we would spend here on the way up with an extended stay on Zanzibar we decided to drive through as quick as we could.
The scenery was great and we felt very lucky to experience this part of Tanzania from top to bottom. The North is still quite green on the border to Rwanda but once one reaches the centre everything turns into shades of brown. It gets really hot and it is extremely dry. The South again is greener.
In the North the Baobabs had actually green leaves, in the centre they were as most of the time leafless and in the South they had flowers! Its funny to see seasons pass in just a couple of days.
There are small villages and settlements everywhere in-between this scenery, which is what most of us in our mind associate with Africa. It really makes you wonder how people can choose such uninviting environments to live in. It is boiling hot, dusty and so dry! Nothing green grows here and it looks like it has not rained for ages. People make their livelihood out of cows and although those cows look quite skeletal there must be water somewhere... The cows’ masters on the contrary, are extremely healthy looking. Masai men put a lot of attention into their appearance! Hair styles, clothes and jewellery are really advanced and make one think of a small fashion show in this deserted bush.
The stretch of about 1500 km took us 4 days long. We were recommended a short cut via Dodoma instead of taking the unpaved B6 that was apparently too bad to drive on. So instead of driving 500 km on gravel we opted for the route that was 300 km longer but supposedly tarred. This was not true and the additional 300 km were on really bad gravel that took us a full day.
We reached that part on the route on the third day and were already quite tired. The gravel and the painful vibrations in Cruisi did not help our mood whatsoever. On that stretch we did not only lose a part of the exhaust but also our temper, more than once. We told each other several times how f.... annoying we find the other and had walks into the bushes as the only escape from the 10 cm separating and the only means to release some energy. We managed though without further serious insults or mechanical problems .
Days like this really do not feel like holidays. We woke up as early as possible, had a quick breakfast and were on the road. Either of us was driving for the first part of the day and after lunch and coffee on the side of the road the other was taking over. Add to that about 40 degrees of dry heat and two tonnes of dust wherever you can imagine it.
When at some point we got stopped for the 4th time within 100km by a police road block just to show that we actually do have a driving license (...) we got a bit impatient with the police officer informing him that his colleagues had checked us already 3 times this morning and what was this whole checking all about anyhow. He looked a bit confused, apologised and told us to go. A few meters away we realised that out of security reasons we should rather lose our temper with each other rather than with police officers and the next road block, we approached with forced politeness again.
Only one officer asked if we could buy him ‘breakfast’, but told him straight that we do not do bribes and with a “ Oh, ok, thank you very much, have a great day” he let us go.
The necessity of bribes in Africa truly seems to be an urban legend. As long as you know that you are right there is no need for a bribe. The ‘budget’ for bribes that so many South Africans had told us that we would need will be spend on beers once we get back.
For now, we have arrived for one more time in paradise, Malawi!!! Pictures and news on the next post.


P.S. Fred is becoming an uncle again, this time from the side of his twin brother! Congratulations Sophie and Guillaume, we can’t wait to see the new Douelle!!!

October 2011 - Rwanda Kigali & past

Bearing in mind that Rwanda still is one of the poorest countries in the world, its level of development and organisation have been quite surprising. Here are some random facts about this country which we have found rather non-African:

-Public buses are powered by Biofuel (there are not too many which makes it easier, but still!)

-Rwanda is producing its own energy supply via electro plants build on Lake Kivu that transform its methane supplies into energy

-All across the country we did not see one single African-style hut; the houses no matter how small have all brick roofs

-No obvious tin-build townships anywhere to be seen

-Optic fibre glass cable is laid throughout the country making Rwanda one of the countries with the most wide availability of high quality internet on the continent

-Rwanda is committed to supply each school child with a computer within the next 5 years
-Rwanda has one of the highest percentages of female members in government worldwide, it is in the same top 5 as the Scandinavian countries (people hope that with more females governing the country genocide will be less likely to occur again!)

-Plastic bags are illegal in Rwanda making it the cleanest country in Africa

-On the last Saturday of each month all city roads all closed from 8 to 11 am for public cleaning, the whole community participates by walking through the streets and picking up whatever waste they can find (although there is none!)

-Crime is virtually non-existent according to what we have been told, have read and seen.

-The traffic lights in the capital have timers on them so drivers and pedestrians can see how
many seconds they have left to cross... this is really not matching in the African time-concept!

-Drivers stop at zebra crossings...

There are some obvious reasons for the well organised state of this country and some less obvious.
One of the more obvious ones is a tight organisational structure on which Rwanda’s society is based. This structure was even recognised by the colonisers making it, unlike other African countries difficult to impose their foreign rule on; Rwanda was fully closed to foreigners up to the 16th century. Rwandans amount to only 11 millions, all speak the same language, Kirwanda, and have the same believes and past these factors make a uniform coordination of a country a far easier matter than by having different tribes, religions and languages such as in the case of Kenya or even South Africa.

The main reason however, that seems to tie this nation together is what it is most famous for, the 1994 genocide of the Tutsis. 99.9% of all Rwandans were affected by some sort of violence during those times losing a family member, friend or neighbour. 10% of the population was killed. This is hard to comprehend. The Genocide Memorial in Kigali is a much recommended place to visit and learn about the past. Rwandan people do not want to forget the past, out of fear that it could happen again; there are memorials in each tiny little place. The most important for them seems to learn out of what happened, support all affected and forgive by putting responsible people on trial. Since there were not enough courts in the country each village established its own. The court cases continue up to today.
How Rwanda managed to accumulate enough wealth to create an infrastructure like the one it has remains a bit less obvious. Yes ok, it has a tourism industry, but there are really not that many tourists around (we met 6 in the whole of the country) and how many people do you know that have been to Rwanda? The country does not have significant natural resources or major industries. The main source of income except tea and coffee exports seems to be a fairly tight taxation system to which everybody adheres to (at least those living above the poverty line) and which also causes the European level of pricing.
Nobody did refer to the level of foreign aid that the country has received after the genocide. But we speculate that the foreign community felt such guilt for their involvement or non-involvement during 1994 that it might have tried to pay this guilt off in terms of financial support.
The UN was present during the genocide but did not intervene, it would have been capable of preventing it but the people on the top were too busy discussing the matter in their offices in Geneva and could not take a decision on whether it was a genocide or not what was going on in Rwanda. Once they decided that they should help the people being openly slaughtered on the streets they could not agree on who was to pay for it. Once that was settled, 100 days had passed and 1 million people had been killed.
Just as a side note, the French government was supplying the Hutu regime at the time with weapons to carry out their massacre... French companies were kicked out of the country immediately after 1994 by the president.
There is a strong presence of the police, in uniforms and undercover, this does not seem to bother people. They see it as means to prevent any possibility of the past repeating itself and at the same time it makes the country one of the continent’s safest, for Europeans this a concept hard to comprehend but since the people are happy, why not!
Apart from all that, Rwanda has most definitely the prettiest women in Eastern Africa.
It is a tiny country in terms of distances and in comparison to most of the others we are passing during this trip so we ended up driving through almost the entire country and still did not spend more than 10 days here.
We are on our way back to Chapati land, Tanzania!

October 2011 - Rwanda Lake Kivu & Ningwe NP

We arrived in the tiny but yet so much spoken of country of Rwanda. They call it the country of the thousand hills and this is indeed what it is. The scenery is amongst the prettiest so far.
Our first stop was the city of Gisenyi, which is just next to the border with the Congo and is Rwanda’s beach-retreat since it is built on the shore of Lake Kivu. Surprisingly the beach is really nice and it could almost be a beach on the Mediterranean only that the water is a bit less clear. People are chilling on the sand, swimming and having a walk along the pavements (!) that are lined with massive trees. There is green everywhere and it is extremely clean. This is the most European looking place we have been so far. Gisenyi could easily be the St Tropez of this region, where all the aid workers, UN officials as well as Congolese gangsters are spending their money and afternoons sipping cocktails while taking a break from their base just a few kilometres away in Congo.
We drove all along the shore of the lake to its southern point which is not far away from the border to Burundi. After each turn on this tiny road leading along the lake there was yet another spectacular scenery to take a picture of.
Rwanda’s tourism strategy is clearly laid out for up-market tourism; research has shown that people who come to Rwanda have an average of 200 USD to spend per day. Consequently, camping is something that does not exist and the rest of the accommodation options are expectantly pricey. The prices are of a European level but this also applies to the standard of the accommodation, there are no bucket showers here, hot, running water every day!
So until now we have been staying in church accommodations which seem to be the only alternative for backpacker budgets, people don’t ask about your religious views but just to make it safe there are no double beds. Yes, we are married and yes French and Germans can get married..!
After a lot of back and forth, we finally decided that we could not leave this part of Africa without seeing any sort of primates (big monkeys);
we did not visit the gorillas and neither the chimps of Tanzania or Uganda, but our consciousness could not be stilled until we could tick it off the list. So eventually we opted to visit the chimpanzees in the Nungwe National park here in Rwanda.
We did not have to track long into the forest when the first chimp crossed our way. Those guys, with whom we share 99.5% of our DNA, are really big. And they are fast, so as quickly as we had seen him he was gone again.
We could hear them screaming from around the forest but spotting them is a different story. After literally crawling through bushes and brunches, sliding down mountain slopes and fighting with all sorts of vegetation while hunting after their sounds we managed to get a quite good look at a group of them. Unfortunately there are no decent pictures to show...
After all this excitement we felt we needed a proper meal, being tired of rice, potatoes and banana we went for the most exotic option available in the little Rwandan town of Butare, Chinese and believe it or not it was the best Chinese either of us had ever had.