Uh oh, it's another long blog coming up.

Well my last entry kind of ran out of steam again, for which I must apologise, but I did at least have a good reason! It turned out my tiredness was because I had malaria and although it was only mild it still made me fell pretty run down and apparently write not very good blogs. Anyway, there is a lot to catch up on.

After spending too long in Lilongwe we moved on to Lake Malawi and experience a bit of the lake life as it was something which we were yet to do. We didn't want to go to the places jam packed full of backpackers and instead opted to stay on two small islands in the middle of the lake. The first was called Chizimulu and there was really only one place to stay on the island which was run by a very friendly English guy. The place was really tastefully done and right on the water and was a nice place to recharge after being ill. He also wins the twin awards for having the friendliest dogs of the trip and also the bread baking award. After we came better aquainted he invited us to watch the champions league final at his house although as the powe went off at ten every night we missed the sad demise of Arsenal and had to content ourselves with listening to it on the world service. I think watching it would have made it even more depressing anyway. After about four nights there we moved on to Likoma Island which was about ninety minutes in a dhow across the lake. The journey would normally have been fine but with the combination of the extreme sun and my antibiotics I did threaten to get heat stroke but luckily I had Marte there to look after me and put a wet shirt over my head and cool me down. Before we boardered the boat I had asked if the captain could take us to the place we wanted to stay which he hapily said he could. I foolishly assumed he meant in his boat only for him to land the boat nowhere near our accomodation. He then lead us on foot in the mid day searing sun with our full backpacks wearing only our flip flops to the place we were staying. I have to say that I have never seated so much. And given my history of sweating, particularly in my first year at univeristy and earlier in this trip, that is quite an achievement. The place in Likoma was nowhere near as friendly and I kind of wish we stayed in Chizzie, but you take the highs with the lows.

We then headed over the lake in to Mozambique. Things in Africa are often a lot more complicated than they need to be and this the case in this instance. The Lake is serviced by a passenger ferry which places various places along the lake twice a week. So when our none English speaking woke us up at five in the morning and said our taxi was not here (sign language) and that the boat was going, from the other side of the island, in an hour we had no choice but to trek, again, with a full packs only this time very early in the morning. Of course once we had walked the eight plus kilometres with our twenty kilograms of baggage the boat told us that they would not be leaving for another four hours. So we just sat on the boat and enjoyed the view and the chaos around us as they piled in more passengers and more bags of maize. We arrived in the port town of Metangula and Dover it certainly wasn't. The bays are nearly all to shallow for the big passenger boat fo dock so you have to get taken ashore in the smaller life vessels. This is pretty James Bond-esque at the best of times but in the dark in choppy water it was certainly as a challenge. We jumped off the boat thigh deep in Lake Malwian water with nlots of people staring and not helping as we struggled on to the shore. Luckily we managed to encounter apperently the friendliest immigaration officer in Africa who found someone who spoke English to help us find our way out round the pitch black town. We were taken to a very local place to stay with very large cockroaches but it had a mozzie net and a place to wash and was only for a night so it did the job.

The next morning we got a minibus to Lichinga which was the provinces capital. The first part of the journey was pretty average apart from the conductor of the minibus behind us wearing an ankle lenght fur coat and large father christmas hat which flapped in the wind as we dangled out of the minibus. Quite a sight. We were going to stay in Lichinga but we got there relatively early so we decided to crack on. This was a lot easier said than done. Transport here leaves at just stupid times, I mean four in the morning stupid. So after that time your transport is limited to chapa's which although they have their own special name are often just pick up trucks which you get stuffed in to which leave when full. We waited in Lichinga for nearly six hours waiting for trucks to leave. Hopping from one truck to the other. When we did finally leave we were lucky enough to sit in the cabin with the driver rather than in the back with twenty other people and their luggage exposed to the sun and wind. We were about halfway through our journey when we got a Malawian border town when the all the passengers climbed out the back and driver helpfully informed us that he was going no further because he has no passengers. This was not particularly good news as it was dark and African towns in general are not that great after dark, let alone seedy border ones during a powercut. Marte and I took differing approaches to the situation. I just threw my hands up and thought 'well that's life (in Africa)' and started thinking about were we could stay the night. Marte stuck out her bottom lip and was adament that we get to Cuamba that night. I told her not to be stupid and had one of those hushed voice arguements, then there was lots of shouting and pointing outside to another truck. This next truck, this time an even bigger one, was going to Cuamba and before wither of us new it we were sat on the floor of a truck, in the pitch black ready to go. The other passengers took great delight as I fell on my backside as the truck accelerated in to the night but it was actually a pleasant trip. Of course being night time the driver drove doubly as quick but wrapped up in our coats, staring up at a stars from the open back of a truck, holding on to whatever I could; I felt very content. Like the previous night in Metangula we arrived in Cuamba well after dark and once again the people were extremely helpful. A bloke on the truck pointed out two places were we could stay and before we new it we had a room and were tucking in to a substantial portion of chicken and chips. The days comedy came from myself. In every African town or city there are numerous holes and ditches in the ground. They are hard enough to dodge in daylight as they are hardly cordoned off, so after a second day of over fourteen hours travelling, walking with full backpacks in the dark; we all know what happened. One minute I was walking the next moment i had half fall down a meter deep drainage ditch. After it was apparent I had not broken my leg it gave Marte something to point and laugh at me about, but I have to say it was quite funny.

We stayed in Cuamba two nights because the train was not running the next day and although hardly the most inspiring of towns it was really pleasant to stay in random medium sized Mozambiquan town and try to adjust to the fact that suddenly everyone is speaking Portugues. The other drastic change was how beautiful the women are here. One of the few advantages of having a previous pro-communist government was that the women were given a more equal standing and the women are much more in the public sphere and dress accordingly. Anyway, we got the train to Nampula and although it left bang on five in the morning after the predictable delays we got to Nampula after dark....again. We jumped in a taxi outside the station, stayed in a pensao which was way too expensive but we were too tired to care. The next morning we headed for Ilha de Mocambique (Mozambique Island). This had been the aim of our traveling since crossing in to Mozambique. About five hours from Nampula, it is a small island just off the mainland whioch was used by the Portugues as the capital for the country until it was switched to what is now Maputo. After being inland for so long we were looking forward to seeing the Indian Ocean again and we new we were getting close when the usual hawkers outside the bus were selling large trays of huge pink prawns and bread. We stayed in a really beautifully decorated pensao which was all teroctoa washed and had a nice rooftop to watch the sun set and the kids and fisherman on the waterfront. Ilha was a really unique place. The north of the island is filled with grandiose colonial architecure but since the Portugese have left the island all the colonail buildings have been left detereorate. It is quite a place to walk around with these imposing ornate buildings just crumbling with just a few squatters living in them. A few have been renovated which helps get an idea of what the island must have once been like. The island also gave us a nice change in diet as well and allowed us to have some quality seafood and Marte insists she had the best prawns of her life. We stayed there for about three nights and then moved on to Pemba.

To get to Pemba required another unholy early pre four in the morning wake up. Waking up at this early hour was somewhat helped by the fact our room was directly opposite possibly the loudest mosque in the whole of the Southern Hemisphere. Whilst all infidels were trying to sleep the Mosque would belt our morning prayers before morning had bearly started. We got a truck to the junction in the round where the bus passed which was going to our destination, when it finally happened. After over five months in Africa, I was pick pocketed. As I was just getting ready to put my backpack under the bus I felt someone brush pass me and I new straight away what had happened. I turned around and guy started to run. Luckily for me he was wearing dungeries which made him easy to grab. I had hold of him and spun him round and then suddenly thought 'mmmmmmm, so what now then Pete?'. I quickly came to the conclusion that this probably was not the best time to open my fighting account in my life and let him go. Then I had a change in heart and semi chased him for a bit, sqealing like a big girl, then he was gone. He did look pretty scared when I had hold of him. This was no doubt partly due to the muscles bulging out of my shirt and slightly because of African's like of rough justice. In Kenya and Uganda at least it is not uncommon for angry mobs to beat to death thieves and alike. Anyway the incedent brought many howls of joy from all the hawkers, left Marte rather confused at why I was chasing some poor little African lad and me very angry. After all of that we got on a bus to Pemba and we arriv ed in the mid afternoon.

Pemba took us both by surprise becuase it was a lot more developed than we imagined. The place was swimming with expats, particularly from South Africa, who were busy buying up the coastal plots attracted by Pemba's climate and nice beaches. We stayed there a few days and planned our next move. The plan was to go to Ibo Island which in theory should have been perfect destination for us both. It was remote and tough to get to, we like a challenge, it was off the main traveller trail, we love getting off the beaten track, and it was the place where many of the slaves were shipped to Mauritius, we love a bit of history. It was total crap and the trip kind of broke us, especially me. To get to the patch of sand where the boats left from was a little over 120 kms away, this took about seven hours. Yes, that is seven hours. This means two things. One, we were going extremely slowly and at certain points men on their bicycles had to brake so not to ride in to the back of our pick up. Two, the road was very very bad. Our transport there was a pickup truck which we got mpre out of luck than anything else. We both perched on the back, exposed to the sun wind and dust but as normal Marte was kindly offered a seat in the cabin which she had no choice but to accept. That left me on the back for five hours with my legs wedged between leaking Jerrycans of petrol. Now I wasn't too fussed with the highly flamable liquid spilling on to my legs, these things happen. But when the young lads standing on the back of pick-up start smoking, then it starts to get a bit much. I enjoy the disorderlyness of African life but sometimes it is infuriatingly stupid. We were talking to an Aussie couple and they were saying that they went to a fish market in Maputo selling the most beautiful fresh fish, yet in the middle there was a steaming pile of rubbish. Sometimes the carelessness gets a bit much, and it is such a pity. We got there eventually, without first degree burns, and we quickly chartered a local dhow (sail boat) to take us to Ibo. Because it was low tide we spent a lot of time stuck in various sand backs but we made it after a couple of hours. We stayed at a particularly crap French place and it was so unfriendly we left the next day to stay at the local telecom companies place. The trouble with Ibo was.....there was bugger all to do, eat or sea. The forts were all really run down, the old colonial town was deserted (as we new it would be) but wasn't all that compared to Ilha de Mozambique, and there was nothing to eat. All we could get was cold fried fish from the one local bar in town. These things happen, sometimes places places just don't live up to your high expectations. But then it happened, again, Marte was sick. This time it was a full out vomiting frenzy including a great effort in the hallway. This of course meant we could not leave the day we wanted so we spent another crap day just feeling bored, marte feeling vomity, knowing we had twelves hours of horrendous travelling to come the next day.

I am used to overfilled African minibuses and buses, thats one thing. But when they start doing it on small dhows which have to take us on the choppy Indian Oceans, thats a bit much. We were so low in the water everytime we turned I thought we were going to get inundated and then I saw something that no young man should have to see. An elderly lady put her arse over the side of the boat and had a wee. I don't know what was more disgusting, the look of satisfaction on her face or her urine on the side of the boat. The less said the better I guess. Anyway we made it safely to shore and jumped immediately in to the waiting truck. At first everything looked to be fine, a big truck with benches on the side, it could have been worse. Or so I thought. By the time left the truck was jammed with approimately eighty people. This would be troublesome on a well sealed road but on the rutted tracks we were going down this was just dangerous. As the truck stuttered over the deep gullies in the road there a few heart stopping moments when it felt like the whole thing would tip. As the road flattened a little the only things worrying Marte and I was the elbow of a gentlemen which was consistently hitting her in the face and the iron bar which my spine kept hitting in the same place, over and over. By the time we got back to Pemba we were tired, dirty and pissed off. Plus, meat had not crossed our lips for a week. I was sick of breast feeding babies, poohing toddlers and pissing grannies. For the reasons outlined, and the fact we were running short on time, we indulged ourselves and flwe to Maputo. This saved both a lot of time and a certain amount of sanity.

Maputo was the first major city we had been to since Dar and its streets filled with cars and people was difficult for the sense to comprehend. We flew with the national airline (an hour and half) which was very professional and could have been any airline in Europe. But then we got to the airport and jumped in to a 1960's Toyota Corona taxi and it reminded us we were most certainly still in Africa. The high light of our day was most certianly going to the cinema, something which we had not been able to do since Kampala. We watched Mission Impossible III and I don't know if it was because we had not seen a film for a while, but it was a cracker of a film. We watched it in what is porbably the biggest cinema I've ever been to, about a thousand seats I would guess. Including ourselves there was a total of four people in this huge theatre watching Tom do his thing. After Maputo we moved up to Tofo beach. This was significant because it was the last time on trip we would be able to Swim in the beautifully warm waters of the Indian Ocean. We stayed at a place called Bamboozie was like a little village in itself, but was a great place relax in and we found a nice shady spot and pitched out tent. The beach itself was amazingly dramatic with a long stetch of sand bordered on one side by high sand dunes and on the other by the wild Ocean. At Tofo, It started. Yes the World Cup. This is the second World Cup I've watched away from home now, and I do get a bit homesick when I watch it but it's always nice to be able to walk out on to the terrace of the bar and look in to the horizon at the moon making patterns on to the Indian Ocean. I watched England stumble to their victory against Paraguay and also won the score prediction betting that was going on in the bar. The football did threaten to take over our trip a bit, I found myself watching Iran versus Mexico when I should have been enjoying the sun. But it made a nice change.

Also on Tofo we did one of the best things of our trip and gave me one of the best images of the trip and one which I don't think that I will forget for a very long time. We went snorkelling but not the usual coral reef sort of trip but look for whale sharks in the deep blue water. After only a few minutes of looking out trip leader said, we had one and to get ready to jump in the water. Seconds later I was bopping about on the ocean surface trying to looking for this whale shark and then it gracefully and effortlessly appeared out of the gloom and I didn't whether to panic or marvel at its beauty and size. It was well over ten metres long and had about half a dozen fish swimming underneath it cleaning it. It was straight out of BBC documentary and beat all other wildlife viewing that we had done on the trip so far. I could barely breath through my snorkel I was so in awe of it. We were lucky enough to see eight more whale sharks and I can still see that first one as it slowly ermerged in to view.

After Tofo we went back to Maputo, watched England beat T&T, and then moved on to South Africa.

More to come.....