‘23 #3. Cycling Malawi: A story of smiles, wild life, and roller coaster roads

Song playing: Muerdo – Lejos de la Ciudad

07/08 – Songwe – Karonga. 60 km, mostly flat

The wait for Malawian authorities to check our Visa feels very long. We are impatient to see the lake and crack a beer at the beach. While waiting, we realize that it is one hour less in Malawi, what means that our daylight span goes from 5:45 to 17:45. Waking up with the sunrise now results in street lunches being ready one hour later. Great.

The immigration officer lady gives us finally our passports. We can’t decipher until when have we been granted the stay in Malawi, but that’s a problem for another day.

We find a place for our classic rice with beans and vegetables to refuel. Gaspard tries some words in Swahili but he is cut off with a smile very soon. “Swahili won’t be of much use here – you are fine with English”. Unlike Tanzania, who unified around Swahili language, Malawi did so around English, so the command of English is comparatively high. The price of the meal is doubled compared to the other side of the border (now at 2€ per meal). We are surprised but accept. We would learn that basic food supply and food in general are way more expensive in Malawi, due to its economic issues.

We get going while we leave and endless line of trucks going in the opposite direction. Custom/border issues again, we reckon. The first glimpses of Malawi are very revealing: landscape is significantly drier and there is no trace of buses or big cars. In fact, all cars that pass us are Nissan Senta. They go at full capacity, sometimes with the trunk half-open to accomodate so much luggage -as if the car was about to explode. In the seats, we count in some occassions up to 9 people. Houses are also more modests than in Tanzania, and we soon get other hints that tell us that the country is not doing so well: the quality of the phones of the people we talk with is poorer, and the proportion of beggers is much higher.

Something doesn’t change: kids go “bananas” when they see us, screaming “Muzungu” (white man) and running to the road to greet us, touch us, or ask us for money.

Everything is very joyful except the disgusting head wind that reduces our speed miserably. We take turns for the lead, switching every 10 km. We realize that we hate face-wind much more than elevation gaining.

We cross some dry pastures full of cows that we are sure have seen better days, at least in terms of weight. A youngster called Cornelius joins our cycle for a while and teaches us the first words in the local language, Tumbuka.

With the day kilometer-count about to reach 100 km, we make it to Karonga, the head of the north district. Although it counts with 60’000 inhabitants, it looks like a wild west town, sandy and windy. We continue through poor roads to the best rated hotel in town, the Golden Sand. The hotel is facing the lake and counts with wide, unmaintained gardens. Only half of the bungalows are constructed. However, we check the room, which is very clean, and the shower seems to work. After a bit of bargain, we make it to 25’000 kwacha (20 euro) for both.

We leave the hotel to withdraw money and do some other admin stuff, and some guys tell us about “our british friend”, who seems to be next door to the hotel. Like if all muzungus were friend by default. We go to talk to him, and we meet an Englishman, who is building his own lodge. It looks like he is betting in Karonga as a touristic destination.

After the errands, we try to go back to our hotel using Google map. The “route” is non existent, has no street light, and crosses what seems to be football fields, people’s houses. Without lights we are completely lost but people finding us in their backward nicely indicate us roughly how to proceed. We finally make it back to the hotel for some beers while enjoying the sunset, and we close up the day eating some rice in the nearby Mama Africa street restaurant.

08/08 – Rest day in Karonga

As usual, breakfast is included and, as usual, Gaspard asks the waitress that please no eggs for him tomorrow. For once, the sausage was not an industrial knacki but a nice merguez.

We spend the whole morning hesitating what to do next. We want to go to Nkhata Bay, 250 km south, but there are great reviews of a National park on the south west, Nyika. The issue is that it’s much longer, 370 km, and the road seems super rough and steep, with 3’500m+ full of ups and downs. Additionally, we read from some plans of the Malawian government to reintroduce lions in 2019. We call the park, and they tell us that they saw a lion 3 months ago, and that the currently don’t recommend coming cycling. But we confirm that if we don’t cycle after 2pm in the park premises, we should be fine. We check the map and seems doable, painfully doable. We look at blogs and YouTube videos and found two cyclists that took a similar route – great news! The are also elephants, who can be also damn dangerous. We are both hesitant, we had a overload of rough roads and elevation in Kitulo. But we end up with the feeling that we wil regret it if we don’t do it, so we start the planning. A few questions to the owner of the hotel reveal that it will impossible to find anything else than tomatoes, flour and maybe rice until after the park. The park doesn’t offer food for campers, so stocking food and water seems a major challenge. We go to the pakistani and end up buying 15 liters of water, 18 portions of food (mostly noodles and pasta) and lots of cookies and peanut butter for breakfast. We got 1.5 Kg of pasta with 400g of tomatoes sauce -forgot to buy salt- which will result in a 9 meals strike of tasteless, sauceless meals that we will not describe. We hope to avoid local water as so far we have avoided stomach issues and we want to continue like that.

In town, we are surprised by the fact that all major supermarkets are owned by Pakistani, Indians or Chinese. We meet some Indians that tell us that they have a coal mine business nearby. They seem to be doing well, as they drive a fat 4×4. It looks like that even the few natural resources of Malawi are not in hands of Malawians. On the other hand, we are impressed by the entrepreneurial mindset of the Asian community, whom we have met consistently all along our journey. They seem to prefer “head of mouse” in Africa as “tail of Lion” in Europe, as the spanish expression goes.

Back in the hotel, we enjoy some beers with the owner, who seems to be an important person in town. United Nations is hosting a meeting about food supply in the conference room of the hotel as we drink. The parking is full of 4×4, with chauffers chatting while the important ones talk. We find a bit awkward how the owner refers to the employees as “his boys and girls” and talks in a unpolite way to them. He complains about laziness in Malawi while he tells us that he studied in the UK. We heard that speech before… In any case, he is extremely helpful to us, doing a lot of calls to find out road conditions for our endeavour.

The sun sets and the food we order is being very late. We get an endless portion of the local flour mash, which creates us big trouble for sleeping -who would have thought there was a limit on how much we can eat on a bike trip. Probably, the nerves for the upcoming journey are also playing a role. It’s not a small feat that we are aiming for.

09/08 – Karonga – Mibanga – 42 km, 980m+

We wake up at 5:45 for a bromance breakfast to be eaten by the lake. Breakfast which the hotel crew has left ready for us the night before as they do not serve food at 6am. An unreal sunrise welcomes us to the tables by the lake. Fishermen start to populate the lake, offering us a magnificient view.

But there’s no time to waste. By 6:45 we have left the hotel and take the Western road. After 15 km, we reach the detour for the shortcut towards Nyika. The road is not that bad, we think. It’s relatively compressed and low in rocks. Not far after, we reach a coal mine that explains the road quality as trucks need to bring the coal back to the city – we wonder if it’s the mine owned by the Indians we met. The road deteriorates immediately, and imponent ups and downs start obliging us to get down from the bike and push the bikes up.

We start crossing very isolated villages, with much shier people than in the frequented roads. Kids won’t shout at us, but rather analyse us curiously. According to the hotel owner, we may be the first “white” people they see. Command of English is much more reduced, and the houses are even humbler.

But the people of this region must be fit, as the ups and downs are just criminal. There is a single narrow track and only a couple of motorbikes overcome us. We constantly see people passing us with bucket of water on their head to carry it from the river to their house about 200m higher. The sun is strong and by 2:30 we have just completed 42 km, and 1’000m+. Our backs and legs hurt from pushing the bike, our crusty, salty t-shirts show the marks of our efforts and we start looking for shelter, as we are quite done.

We ask at a house by the road, which counts with a fairly flat surrounding, if it would be possible to set the tent there. A young man translates for the house owner, who without any hesitations welcomes us. The family brings us chairs and offers help unpacking, which we uncomfortably and politely refuse. They observe us happily and curiously while we set the tent and cook. They are very excited and intrigued are ours “beds” and cooking stove. Before sunset, we observe them placing the chicken that run around the house (this is a classic in Eastern Africa) in the high basket cage to protect them from predators.

We go to bed completely exhausted, after some yoga and some message exchange with girlfriends and relatives. The cries of the hienas at midnight barely wake us up, as we feel quite safe and warm close to this lovely family.

10/08 – Mibanga – Kaperekezi Gate, 60 km, 1270m+

Malawians may not strictly follow light times, but their roosters are way too early birds, as they start welcoming the day at 4 AM.

We wake up at 6 and enjoy the biscuits with peanut butter that we have stocked up for power-breakfast. We will allow ourselves 6 biscuits per breakfast per person for the following week with some peanut butter for energy. The women and girls start their day going for water to the nearby stream, and we have a nice conversation. They don’t seem to be in a rush. We offer them a tip for their kindness hosting us, but they don’t hesitate to refuse us quite seriously. We realize that we have fucked up a bit, but we are happy to see how solemn they are about hosting strangers.

We start with the cycling and the ups and downs get more moderate, as the landscape flattens. Still, every 20 minutes at least, we have to push the bike for a while. The road starts swapping big rocks for compact sand, and we start advancing much faster. Bigger settlements start popping out, and we realize we are getting close to the other end of the road.

At every village, one of the older men, who we suppose to be the village leader, comes to us and greets us. They are all very kind. One of them also offers us a shortcut to make it to the road faster. Needless to say that the road doesn’t show in any of the GPS tracking apps we use (RidewithGPS, Google Maps, Maps.me).

So we make to the town of the “main road”, and we leave this de-tour away. Nthalire is even smaller than Karonga, but has the same “Far West” vibes. We are hoping to stock up water and food here, and we find some rice, tomatos and onions, plus a bottle of chilly sauce. There is absolutely nothing else to buy.

We have a solid lunch of rice, chicken and fries, and blog a bit, while we wait for the hottest hours to end. Conversations with locals don’t stop: they are coming one after another to talk to us and ask us what the heck are we doing here. They wish us good luck, good journey and they tell us that they will pray for us. It’s touching but at the same time a bit ashaming, as if it felt wrong that people in struggling need would pay so much attention to us, westerners, with a solved life.

We take the M9 and, although it’s better and often leveled, it’s striking that this is one of the main roads of the country. At some point, the road starts following the Zambia-Malawian border, but there is no sign of any road going into the neighbouring country.

An agitated man comes suddenly running to us. Frank is an officer from the Zambian side of the park, and he is concerned of us continuing too far at dusk, as there are elephants around. As he suggests to us, our plan was anyway to camp in the Range Post of Kaperekezi, where the park starts. He talks very vividly and intensely, as if he would be in some kind of substance, but still with a smile in his face, in the most pure Central African style.

We make it to the ranger post, which hosts both Malawian and Zambian officers (and their families). They seem to share building, language, water well. Nothing would tell you that you are in a nation border.

Some very friendly officers offer us a camping spot and show us the toilet and the well. We buy some bananas from some kids that warm themselves in a bunfire on the road. We are close to 2’000 m of elevation, and it’s not crazy warm anymore.

When we have set the tent already, a guy comes and invites us to sleep in one of the empty rooms. We are too tired (or lazy) and decline to move the tent inside as it was already pitched outside. Frank the park officer we met before has just came back to the gate and insist that we exchange contacts. He brings Gaspard to his modest house to exchange email address, WhatsApp and postal address written rapidly on a piece of paper. His house is very modest with only two wooden stools and a small shelves with only a couple of onions and popcorns (same priorities as javi I guess). After cooking, we hit the bed under the imponent view of the mountain pass we have to climb tomorrow.

11/08 – Kaperekezi – Chelinda, 37km, 1057m+

We are nervous due to multiple things: the accumulated tiredness – will we make it? – , the lion around – will it appear? – , the elephants – will we see them? – , the imponent climb – will we make it?-. But we are short in excuses, there are none. By 6:30 AM we are on the road -as we want to arrive by 1pm -and very soo we are pushing the bike, as the road is too steep to ride – surprise -. The good news is that it’s quite compact, so it allows for a smooth rolling, which facilitates the endeavour tremendously.

We take a good pace and by 10:30 we are reaching the plateau that extends above the mountain pass. We see a magnificient waterfall descending from it and we envision a wide savannah full of wildlife.

While we take the exit towards the Safari camp of Chelinda, the only one in the National Park, we can confirm the savannah is there, but the wildlife is visible in a much smaller proportion to Mikumi NP in Tanzania (in Kitulo was even shier). We see some groups of bushbacks, zebras and monkeys in the beginning, but soon we stop seeing. We will barely take a photo thinking this is only the beginning we will see much more alter – stupid us

Some sounds coming from the bushes make us nervous, and the big amount of burnt land makes us sad. We will later confirm that this is a common practice in virtually all parks in Africa, to regenerate the land and attract the game to those terrains. Many of the trees are exogenous and have been brought by British colons to make a paper factory. As they do not belong here the government has decided to remove them. Unfortunately the noice of the chainsaw and burning fire scare a lot of animals.

The deeper we come in the plateau, the colder and windier it turns, although we are definitely 5 degrees above Kitulo. We reach the Chelinda camp, formed by an airstrip to ensure supply, a luxury lodge with a campsite, and a village for the locals that work at the camp and in the conservation projects.

We are obviously heading to the campsite, which is 2km away from the main lodge and the reception, where we are going to pay the shocking amount of 25 CHF per person per night, absolute record in all our cycling adventures. A very friendly employee called Malinda welcomes us and shows us the facilities, which include a roof for the camping, unlimited firewood and hot water for the shower. We can also refill our water bottles from a filtered source, which we needed big time as we are running out of it. We guess that justifies partially the high price. Sadly the unlimited firewood supply used to either heat the water or make a bone fire come from the forest of the natural park.

The hot shower brings us back to the clean side of the world and, while we start to cook lunch, some other guests arrive. Yuri and Mattea are from Slovenia, are around 60, and they are serious Africanists, with 16 different trips through a big number of the National Parks and countries of the continent. You can find their stories here.

Their first action is to present us two ice cold Carlsbergs, which make us truly happy -almost more than the shower. I guess suffering makes you appreciate small things in life. We will later share a lovely evening around the bonfire, learning from the vast knowledge of Yuri about Africa, and trying to apply it to our trip.

12/08 – Holidays biking in Nyika National Park – 26km, 383m+

Our guidebook claimed that Nyika has one of the highest densities of leopards in the world. We intended to do a safari to (try to) see them, but at the reception, the manager Yonam lowers our expectations: all 4×4 are booked for the clients of the lodge (at 350 $/ night, it also includes the excursions), and they are anyways struggling to see leopards these days. For the rest of wildlife, we very well may see the same by touring around the park with the bike. We even have better chances to see them and get closer to them as the noice of the car is likely to scare them.

So we take our unloaded bikes and take a loop that brings us to the Chosi Peak, where we get a priviliged view of the surrounding landscape. Now and then, dozens of bushbacks and impalas run away when we pass by, elegantly jumping from side to side. We also get to see some Elands, the biggest antelope in the world. They make it up to 900 kg, and when they run away from us, the floor vibrates as if there was an earthquake.

We slowly reach the end of the loop, slightly disappointed by the veeery high expectations that blogs and guidebooks set about the national park. Just then, karma introduces a corrective feedback loop to our complain, and present us two beautiful zebras, which we get to observe from less than 10 meters.

Once back in the camp, we clean our bikes, which have started to make annoying noises due to the big amount of mud, dust and old grease that the components carry. Malinda observes us joyfully, and we get to know him better. His wife is a teacher and they have two kids. When asked about the situation in Malawi, he sorrows that it’s impossible to earn for anything else than putting food on the table. This is forcing for already quite some years Malawians to emmigrate to South Africa and to neighbouring countries. Inflation is rampant and acccess to basic goods, such as petrol, is challenging. The covid pandemic also put into risk the mere existence of the camp, with 47 employees before and now only 9. While the price of camping sore from 15 USD to 25 USD in 4 years. But the camp seems to slowly recover, as the lodge is almost full.

Today is the Street Parade in Zurich, a day we normally allow ourselves to party from midday till next morning. Despite this amazing trip, we still have a bit of Fomo .

At that time, new guests arrive at the campsite – Yuri and Mattea left early in the morning -. A group of 8 dutch in their twenties make an eclectic entrance, with 4 people on the roof of the Range Rover. We suspect a party will develop easily in the camp this night.

How wrong were we. After a couple of interactions with them, only one guy really pays attention to us. They belong to a Dutch aid organization active in the area, working weekdays and travelling to national parks during the weekends. Conversation doesn’t flow much so, instead of sharing a bonfire, we go to ours and they to theirs.

Their camping skills seem limited, with most of the tents being placed at steep grass fields, instead of using the flat area offered under the roof, tents collapsed a few times in the process of setting them up. They may want to be in touch with the grass.

But our big surprise is when, instead of popping beers and cigarettes, they spend 2 hours praying and singing songs – with beautiful voices, by the way – about Jesus and the Lord.

Nothing against that, of course. But we slowly want to sleep and the music is a bit too loud. We drop a friendly “good night” in the interlude between songs, hoping the implicit statement works.

The nice guy comes to ask us if they should stop singing. We just ask if it could be a bit lower. He tells us they are singing songs about “our God” and ask us if we are religious. Javi drops an “I am still discovering“ while Gaspard laughs silently inside the tent. We exchange numbers in case we want to visit their organization.

As we lie down in the tent, we receive a video call from our friends Javi and Paulina (at Zurich at street parade). It’s 8pm and they are done partying and having a last drink before having a burger. Way too early! The feeling of missing this burger after three days of instant noodles is horrible. We end the call. But at least the fomo for the party disappeared, after the fail of our friends.

13/08 – Chelinda – Vwaza Warsh NP – 110 km, 750m+

The celestial voices of our dutch neighbours provide a recovery sleep, and we wake up with the sun as usual. During breakfast, while the dutch sleep in their diagonal tents, something magical happens. First, a group of zebras stroll 50 m in front of us, while minutes after, dozens of elands surround the campsite, eating anything from the trees around. The ones that see us get immediately back to the forest, but most of them stroll calmly, offering us a priviliged view of their habits. Before leaving we go brush our teeth. By the time we come back the crawls have opened our pack of pasta and stolen some of our supply that we carried with pain for over 3500m elevation. Their are famous for stealing everything in the park (including cameras, phones etc). We smile, full of motivation to tackle another day of cycling.

Based on the feedback of Yuri, we have added a new stop before making it to Nkhata Bay: Vwaza Warsh NP requires a detour of only 30 km, and offers a unique view of hippos and elephants, two animals we haven’t seen much of yet.

The park is far – 110km away – but has more downs than ups. Still, all rough road, almost offroad. Antelopes and Elands keep surrounding us wherever we go. Flowers and savannah trees blossom wherever the land is not burnt. After retaking the “main road”, we start the descend towards the southern gate of the park. The landscape turns more forestry, and baboons start becoming visible and falling down the trees as we pass by.

Houses on the way remain very simple, mostly made of mud with a roof made of some plant’s leaves. They are sometimes covered with paintings and nice ornements to make them more beautiful. Interestingly enough, we notice that in Malawi houses seldom have windows . The soil has a vibrant red colour and mountains are covered with bright green trees.

We manage to stock up at a food stand on the way, and keep surprized of prices: an onion cost half a euro. We buy almost everything they have for sell, including some sweet breads that allow us to delay the lunch break and keep going.

An interesting fat is that although supply of food is scarce, beer supply is guaranteed. Both a curse and a blessing depending the time of the day. Calsberg seems to have invested in A LOT of places in Malawi.

Way continues as usual: hot, locals stopping us for pictures. As usual, the last kilometers before the park get troublesome with lots of sand. We arrive tired but happy to the park gate, where we pay double the park fee than in Nyika (20$ vs 10$), but pay as little as 10$ per night both for a bungalow, which is pretty decent.

Vwaza lodge seems to belong to the government and consists of only 5 bungalows and a kitchen area. On its front it’s the lake, and when we arrive we see as many as 30 hippos relaxing on the sun on the other side, not further than 100 meters away. A group of american students from Stanford are there, waiting for elephants to appear before they leave. But they get no luck and leave. They are in some kind of University project, they tell us.

Unlike Nyika, shower water is freezing cold, but the view is just priceless. We are alone and spend the cooking time talking with the watchman, Manuel, a retired ranger that keeps working to earn some extra money. His eldest son is in South Africa looking for a better life, he tells us.

During the night, the roars of hippos result a bit disturbing, as one could think they are literaly behind the door. But tiredness is a good ally of good sleep, and not even the roars prevent us from a recovery sleep in a decent bed, finally.

14/08 – Rest day in Vwaza Warsh NP

We wake up with the sun, and we find out we have extra cookies, so we increase the daily ration from 6 to 10. What a luxury. Happiness can sometimes be very simple. No tea, no coffee. Also, no trace of elephants. We believe there are some on the far other side of the camp, as we see some shapes but we aren’t allowed to go away without a guide. We leave the camp with the bikes hoping to get there, but the camp is fenced. Elephants have been brought to this park and are inside an electrical fence for acclimatisation. They should later be released in the parks. We find however a nice store nearby, where we can stock up rice, oranges, beer, tea, sweet bread and some corn snacks (this only for Javi).

We return to the camp, where we ask for a guided tour for the low amount of 3$. We agree with the ranger, Thereza, to start it at 13:00, a time in which elephants are likely to be active.

At that time, an heterogeneous group of British from all ages arrives. They are very friendly, and seem to work in an English school in Mzuzu, the 3rd biggest city in Malawi. The oldest ones, who seem a couple, tell us they change place now and then, and they have lived in Dubai, Sri Lanka, Portugal, and many others. Interesting lifestyle.

We meet Thereza, who carries an imposing M16 assault rifle for the stroll. For hippos and elephants, you know. Soon after the start, we already see some shy group of bores.

While discovering a bit more about Theresa and the park, Javi suddenly stands prettified and starts whispering: “Elephants!!”. Some elephants are exiting shyly the bush direction to the lake. The big ones lead the exploration, while the smaller ones remain on the bush. The wind blows from us to them, what enable them to smell us very easily, they obviously are hesitant because of us. We remain at around 100 m, which together with the M16 of Theresa should be enough precaution. As we stand still, more and more go towards the water, including 2 baby elephants, that stay totally protected by the mothers.

After 10 good minutes of a beautiful observation of the herd, Theresa persuades us to continue the walk, so we can maybe see buffalos and other animals. We assume the elephants will return to the bush after drinking water, so we continue. We do a loop, where we don’t get to see much, except for some impala groups and hippos. While passing back through the area where the elephants were, we start realising that the footprints head towards the bungalow region. “I hope they didn’t pass through the bungalows at the only time of the day we were not there” – says Javi. But they damn did. The British group was euphoric, they tell us that as much as 27 elephants, including 2 newborn ones, paraded in front of the bungalows to cross to the other side of the lake. They hid behind a table and didn’t move. We can’t believe it and have to laugh about our bad luck and lack of patience. They also tell us that the mother elephants were scouting the bushes where we were, looking for us, so somehow we feel relieved we didn’t stay waiting for them. But damn, if we had only stayed in the bungalow!

While we slowly accept and swalow our suboptimal elephant scouting and convinced ourselves that we at least saw them, life and karma proves us that there is always room for 2nd opportunities. A shy herd of elephants leaves the bush in the distance to drink from the lake, while slowly the rest of this 2nd herd follows.

One of the British, who seem to have a lot of knowledge about animal behaviour, mentions: “These ones are also gonna pass by!”. We lower our expectations but, to our joy, we see how the herd groups and decisively forms a raw to cross the lake in front of us. We take a good sit and open our relaxation beer of the day, while we enjoy silently a marvellous spectacle of nature. Lucky us.

A warm shower is best when you are dirty and cold. Even the simplest food can taste like heaven when you are hungry and tired. One of the motivations for this journey was to enjoy African wildlife while sweating on a bike, instead of sitting comfortably on a 4×4. After 1100 km mostly on offroads and 13,600m up, we have started fulfilling properly this ambition. It may be naive, but, somehow, the experienced scarcity makes these things more special, like if you would deserve it more and it would be a reward for your effort (and maybe also for your stupidity)

The satisfied group starts moving into more mundane activities, such as cooking. By now, the conversation flows very well with the English, and we learn a lot from them. Sarah, the mother, insist on giving us food and we end up eating our noodles and their curry for dinner, under a growing sky of stars. Sarah and Clint, the parents, run an international school in Mzuzu (Malawi’s 3rd city and our next stop). Their two sons and some friends of theirs are visiting them in Malawi during the Summer Break. They tell us that tonight the Earth is crossing the Perseus asteroid area of the Solar System and that lots of shooting start should be visible. The young ones are planning to wake up at 2 am. We decide to join them, but only Javi and another British end up doing so. Javi waits impatiently for the first shooting star, as the lack of sight and the hippo noises scare him big time. He sees one, then 2, asks for 2 wishes, and runs back to bed, while Gaspard sleeps placidly.

15/08 – Vwaza – Mzuzu. 80 km, 900m+

We decide to take a shortcut through the land and some mountains to Mzuzu. Clint the British tries to discourage us, as he thinks the road will be poor, but our “virtual friends” of Cycloscope, who have so much info about bike packing in Africa, write in their blog that the road is not so bad. It ends up being quiet decent, and we seldom have to push the bike, mostly because of sand.

We surprisingly cross a lot of Muslim settlements. Muslim make 13% of Malawians, and they are distributed all around the country. It seems that this area specially. Islam was bought to Malawi by Swahili and Arab slave traders that, in another regretful episode of history, had around Lake Malawi a hotspot for their raids.

We joyfully rejoin a proper road with proper asphalt that, despite the head wind, brings us to Mzuzu. The city is of medium size, and a big university in construction by the Chinese welcomes us. We get to see a line of around 200 cars waiting for Petrol, as the scarce resource of this week is gas. Last week was diesel. The situation seems very bad.

We head towards Macondo camp, as recommended by Yuri, the Slovenian from Nyika. They told us that this camp run by Italians that’s the best pizza in whole Malawi. We have been dreaming about the Pizza and proper coffee for the last 4 days, as we have virtually only eaten rice since the start. This was our motivation to arrive their biz lunch time so we could two Italian meals.

After enjoying a very good pizza (bear in mind the struggle for bringing ingredients like mozzarella to Malawi) we get to meet Luca and his wife (unfortunately, we forgot her name). They must be some of the most welcoming people in the world. They tell us we can camp for free, and they spend a lot of time helping us with tips and our shopping list for Mzuzu. We would like to buy some binoculars to observe wildlife better, but task seems challenging.

As a curiosity, Macondo camp is named after the village in which “100 years of solitude”, the Nobel winning novel of Gabriel Garcia Marquez, takes place. Our new Italian friends have been 10 years now in Malawi, after having crossed almost all Africa in a Range Rover. Their son Giovanni runs around the camp and they have some friends from home visiting them. What a nice crew. Luca asks us to spread the word that long time bike travelers may stay for free in Macondo, so now you know 😉

After completing our errands (we visit a big supermarket with European prices, and a Chinese Wholesale center with very bossy managers) we head back to Macondo, without binoculars. We enjoy a DELICIOUS home made pasta, and go to bed with both the stomach and the heart full.

Days on the road in this post (in total): 8 days (out of 22 days)
Distance cycled in this post (in total): 374 km (1’100 km)
Elevation in this post (in total): 5422m+ (13’200m+)