Malawi, More Than I Ever Expected

Hi everyone, thanks for checking back on our little trip. We have crossed into Tanzania now, so let's get caught up on how we finished out our wonderful time in Malawi. But first, on my last post I showed photos and talked about the scuba diving in Lake Malawi, but due to a slow internet connection was unable to post the short video I made. I have since updated the previous post with the video, but for anyone who missed it, here is the video again:

Ok, with that out of the way I can get back to my story in chronological order, back where I left off in Monkey Bay.

After our unfortunate departure from Monkey Bay and the argument over money (We later found out this was due to the fact Malawi is having MAJOR political/economic problems which I won't get into here right now. At this point no one trusts the Malawi Kwacha and is thus trying to put their money in US dollars before the value of the Kwacha collapses) we drove a few hours north to another beach spot called Senga Bay. There we stayed at another branch of Mufasas, which was empty besides us, the beach was not nearly as nice as Monkey Bay, and the place was jammed in between other buildings. However, it was just a night and the South African expat who ran the place was very friendly and helpful giving us tips on the rest of our trip. That evening Chris put his can cooking culinary techniques on full display and we ate a strange but tasty meal.

That night was a nearly full moon, and the clouds helped create a very cool looking ring-effect. Chris and I sat out under the stars, the moon and even a clearly visible planet or two while we chatted, listened to the gentle waves of the lake and sipped Carlsburg beers.

In the morning after my typical breakfast of Wheatbix and granola we packed up and headed the roughly 130k to Lilongwe, Malawi's largest city and the head of government and the accompanying NGOs who seem to blanket this country.

Lilongwe is a long way from western standards as far as major cities are concerned, but it had a few shopping malls full of all the South African shops Chris and Weon are familiar with. The city seemed nice enough, distinctly African, but with a few big companies and modern buildings that show westernization and “progress.”

The city also has the third branch of Mufasa's so after driving in circles a few times trying to find it, we were able to set up our tents and settle in for a few days. We were warned that the city had been receiving much higher than average rainfall recently and that if we wanted to could stay in the dorms for the price of camping but we stayed in our tents. I was outside doing a workout and suddenly it started to pour rain. Since I was headed to the shower anyways I stayed out and got wet, when I heard branches breaking and saw a few fall to the ground. A few seconds later a huge section of tree fell just 15 feet from me and on to Weon's tent. From the way it looked I was sure the tent was ruined but it turned out to not have a single scratch! (Later in a bit of a wind storm one of his tent poles broke, likely it was bent or weakened by this incident) Within a block of the lodge, two large trees (and maybe more I didn't see) had been blown over, knocking out power to the whole neighborhood. As I mentioned earlier Lilongwe is a hub of NGOs in Malawi and Mufasa's is a popular place for volunteers to stay while in town. As a result, we spent the evening drinking and chatting with a number of American Peace Corps members as well as a few other assorted volunteers and travelers and had a great time.

Just out exploring the city and the local markets. After watching the local tree/electrical crews cleaning up the downed trees (and them asking for money when I took a photo of it) Chris and I came into this local market, and when you go up a few wooden stairs, you enter what would clearly be described as “the shoe department.” Here you can find all types of used shoes, from dozens and dozens of stands. As you walk through, you see everyone replacing laces, polishing and repairing beat up old shoes to good condition before selling them, recycling in action.

Breakfast consisted of bananas and rolls bought on the street, lunch was made up of some spicy beef I bought from this guy as well as some deep fried potato wedges from the stand opposite. Delicious.

At this point we needed fuel for out truck and were beginning to be clued into the current problems Malawi and it's people are facing. As I think I said in the last post we happened to fuel up on the first day in three weeks Monkey Bay had received any fuel, getting lucky there and now it was time to hunt again. I think we visited four different stations before finding one that actually had gas and this is in the biggest city in the country. After waiting in a chaotic 'line' of honking cars, trucks and mini buses, we managed to fill up our tank. Due to the fuel shortage, it is currently illegal to fill jerry cans, but this little problem was solved by filling them inside of the cab, where clearly it would be impossible to see and figure out what was going on, haha. 46,000 kwacha later we were on our way.

Our destination was an unlikely place called The Shack, and tonight being Wednesday, was the night for western workers and volunteers in the city to gather for what I can only describe as the “I can't believe this is Malawi” beach volleyball tournament. By 8pm the place was going full swing and the fun went late into the night.

While I'm sure there were a few other things to do in Lilongwe, we mostly went for a quick look and to meet a few other people so with that accomplished we set out on the road again, this time for Nkhata Bay.

It was on this stretch that we had out first (minor) problem at a roadblock. We have an early alert system to which guard/police will give us a problem: if they look at the hood of the truck with the picture of us and Mandela and don't smile, then we know they will hassle us. This particular police woman was all frowns and cold questions. Supposedly we are supposed to have a yellow or orange (I forget) reflective strip on the back of our truck, despite the fact many of our stickers are reflective stickers already. We were told this was an automatic fine of 2,000 kwacha (about $12) but somehow Weon talked her out of it and we were on our way. I was shocked we got away without paying, because we have been told the only way police in Malawi get paid anymore is by bringing in enough fines. Anyways, that's our worst experience so far, not too bad.

As we neared out destination, we entered both a rain storm and a very scenic section of rounded stone hills and forests. These forests also happened to be centers for illegal logging done by crews in improvised wood and tarp shelters and portable mills, but they must be paying off the right people because it is out in the open with no attempts to stop it.

Upon our arrival in Nkhata Bay we checked out Big Blue Star, which was shut down for some reason, and another place I forget the name of, but as soon as we saw Mayoka Village it was obvious where to spend out time here. The whole place is a fantastic maze of steep and irregular stairs, bungalows, camping platforms, gardens, a composting toilet, two very cool stone showers and the all important lounge/restaurant/bar area. Once again I was pinching myself and thinking “Am I really in Africa?” At about $4.50 to camp (750 kwacha), it was also a fantastic bargain.

Arriving Friday night was perfect, because that is when they have the big BBQ dinner special. I piled my plate high with chicken, pork, potatoes, salad, eggplant, avocado, carrot and anything else that fit and dug in. Mayoka is without a doubt the happening spot in Nkhata Bay, and travelers, volunteers and locals alike congregate here on the weekends.

The next day Chris and I joined their boat trip, which for 2,000 kwacha I thought was rather overpriced, and even more so when we found they do the boat trip FREE on Tuesdays... Anyways, we loaded up with a few locals, British doctor volunteers, another traveler and set off a few km down the lake.

After stopping at some 5-6m high rocks to jump, dive and flip off which was great fun, and a bit of generally dull snorkeling, we played what they call 'Champion.' What you do is have three sticks, and everyone takes turns jumping over them. Every time they get progressively farther apart and people are weeded out until only one person remains. I can't remember this Swiss guys name (nice guy though), but in the end it was a tie between him and Chris, jumping distances I couldn't even pretend to clear.

On the way back to the lodge, it was time to feed the African fish eagle. The way this was done was by whistling to call its attention, then throwing a fish in the water that had a bit of reed stuck through it so the dead fish would float. The birds put on a good show with their speed and accuracy, then we stopped to watch it eat it's treat while perched in a dead tree.

Bored but still a bit curious about the scuba possibilities Chris and I went to Aqua Africa to inquire about costs, in particular for their night dive where you attract dolphin fish using a light, but at $40 we decided to pass and went off to a local restaurant for a lunch of nsima and chicken, due to the fact they had no fish for some reason. On the way we passed one of the small market areas, and saw this vender selling traditional 'witch doctor' medicine of roots, tree bark and seeds. I wonder which one cures cancer?

The lodge has two dugout canoes that are free to use (as well as a row boat, snorkeling gear, binoculars, bird books and more, I told you this place was cool) and that afternoon I got my chance to try one. Being simply cut out of a single log, it doesn't seem there is a lot of design that goes into these, and every log creates a different boat with different handling characteristics. Due to the shape and the small opening inside, you have to sit on top and quite high, which makes for a tipsy boat. This particular one was the harder of their two (the other had a large bulbous end from the original raw log, that obviously added a lot of stability) to paddle, but I was impressed with the amount of secondary stability it had. However not wanting to swamp the tremendously heavy boat, I was not about to test its limits! At the lodge, they have what they call “The Mayoka Challenge” which is two people have to paddle the tippy boat around the float in the lake and back. Chris and I made it less than one meter. I also found out you can buy one of these for 10,000-15,000 kwacha, but good luck shipping it home!

I used our time here to relax and do a lot of reading, something I haven't managed to do much of up to this point. Making up for lost time, I finished one book, read three more and started a fourth. Book exchanges at lodges often give you strange options to choose from, but I found some fantastic books in Asia that way and the same seems true out here in Africa.

That night happened to be the Africa Cup Final soccer final between Ivory Coast and Zambia, and it was supposed to be a very interesting game. Ivory Coast had all the super stars who play in the European soccer league and was ranked #1 in Africa, while Zambia lacked the star power and somehow reached the finals with a #16 ranking. Not knowing anything about African soccer, I decided to simply root for the underdog, Zambia. A few of us headed off to the local sports bar, which had a huge back room with a projector and sat maybe 100-150 people, probably 95% locals.

All the commentators were predicting an easy win for Ivory Coast, but Zambia held them off the whole game nil-nil and brought it to 30 minutes of overtime, also ending nil-nil. It was shoot-out time. After round one both teams had gone five for five, so it was time for a second round shootout, talk about a nail biter! Finally, Ivory Coast had a shot blocked by Zambia in the second round and the crowd, almost entirely behind Zambia, simply exploded. As Zambia took and made its fifth and final shot on goal to win the game, the hushed crowd again bust into celebration; shouting, screaming, chanting, jumping up and down, and hugging each other. I'd have to say this so far as been one of the highlights of the trip so far, with the same kind of positive energy and excitement as the underground heavy metal show I stumbled upon in India on my Asia trip . Fantastic stuff.

The next day was entirely uneventful, other than walking into town to get some pills for bilharzia, a nasty water borne illness that simply doesn't exist back home. I have no idea if I have come into contact with this while in the lake, but for a 5 minute visit to the clinic and less than $2 of meds, I consider it cheap insurance and it seems stupid not to take the pills, which are taken 6 weeks after the last swim in the lake.

Other than that, I went snorkeling, testing my point-and-shoot camera underwater, a Panasonic DCM-TS3. I have to say I'm impressed with this little camera. It was a hard decision after my little Canon Powershots rough but long life, and I think I made the right one. It's waterproof to 12m, shockproof to 2m, can do pretty good long exposures and has a pretty good rapid-fire mode. Given the limited selection of waterproof cameras, I think this is the top of the bunch and I'm very happy with it.

One of the bungalows with the town of Nkhata Bay in the background.

Our second time on the boat trip, this time free as it was Tuesday.

Me doing some cliff jumping and diving. The classic spot at the 520 bridge in Seattle is a fair bit higher, but this rock was still pretty fun to jump from, and it was because the highest spot I've dove from as well. I took video jumping off with my GoPro, and of everyone else jumping and diving, but it doesn't look all that impressive on film so it might not see the light of day, haha.

This time we played beach soccer with the locals and while I know they were not giving it their full efforts, I somehow managed to score a goal, something I haven't managed to do in a soccer game in a long time! Playing in soft, burning hot sand with a powerful sun overhead was a challenge for sure, and I don't think the game lasted more than 25 minutes if that, but it was great fun.

Being the rainy season, nearly every night since arriving in Nkhata Bay has been filled with lightening and rain storms. Out here when it rains, it pours. At times the thunder is literally ground-snaking, waking many of us from our sleeps at 2 and 3am to watch the sky flash like an irregular strobe light, listen to the machine-gun like rain, and feel thunderclap after thunderclap. Luckily by the time we get out of bed it is long over and even dry by 8 or 9am. I can only imagine what it's like out on those little dugouts fishing on the lake, those lights at the bottom of the photo.

These little lizards are everywhere, and I love them. It seems no matter where you are, these dudes are around to keep you company, moving in their strange jerky fashion, like a skipping CD.

This is Dave. Dave is from Canada. So is his girlfriend Karen. We had a good time chatting on their deck.

So for two days now both my ears had been hurting. At first I thought it was damage from freediving and not equalizing properly, or from the cliff jumping since I'd had that happen before, but once puss started coming out of my ears it was clear I had an infection. I returned to the clinic, got a quick visual inspection and again about 5 minutes and $3 later walked out the door with a bag of antibiotics. For all the problems with health care in Africa, this part of it is sure a hell of a lot better than America.

Local wildlife enjoying some fresh fruit from the tree.

This is about what most nights look like, hanging around with a rotating cast of travelers, locals and drinks. This night Gary, the owner was here to party, and he is nuts. At this point I've met a lot of expat lodge owners on my various travels, many of whom are drunks and stoners, but this guy takes the cake. Although generally a nice guy, he gets rowdy when he drinks and seems to cause a scene every time.

At that point, we had spent a full week at Mayoka Village and it was time to move on. As it turned out, Chris knew someone who was working just 10 or 15km outside of Nkhata Bay as a manager of the saw mill at Vizara Eco Timbers Limited, a rubber tree plantation, so we headed out for a visit.

Johan Gave us a tour of the small saw mill, which recovers timber from the old rubber trees on the plantation. Nearly all the wood cut here is shipped off to South Africa, where it is turned into things such as $1,000 dinner tables.

He walked us through the whole process; cutting the raw timbers into boards, treating them, drying them, bundling and shipping. It's a small mill but they are building a second mill that will increase production. The one number that stood out to me the most was that due to the nature of the rubber trees (size and shape) only 20% of the actual tree becomes finished lumber.

The heart of the operation and the real money maker is the rubber. Again, Johan walked us through the whole process from the nursery where the trees are grafted and grown to the processed rubber which is sold.

Here is a mature section of rubber trees. The tapped rubber is supposed to be collected every day, with each employee responsible for 500 trees.

Here you can see the raw rubber, exactly as it comes out of the tree and into the collection bowl attached to the tree.

After a few simple non-chemical processing steps, the rubber is put into sheets, dried on racks in a smoke room (hence the color) and pressed into 30kg bales to be shipped off and turned into car tires, rubber gloves and even condoms. In the back of this room, you can see the carts where the sheets are dried and moved around, on the right is the press where it is bundled together and farther in the scale to ensure bundles are the correct weight. It was really interesting to see how this is all done, and how amazingly low tech the whole process is. No doubt to turn this material into a condom or something nasty chemicals and high tech processing is required but to this point was about as simple as it gets.

After the tours, we sat around the BBQ and had a delicious dinner of chicken, sweet potatoes and corn, then enjoyed the fire under the stars.

We said our goodbyes (Thanks Johan , it was great!), forgot our kitchen knife, and headed north again towards Livingstonia, a mission town built over 100 years ago in the mountains above Lake Malawi. On the way, we picked up Jannes, another South African who we met at Mayorka. He is hitchhiking and busing through Africa and we were able to help him along on his journey The road off the main highway and the lakeside was 'only 15km' but it is a steep, nasty, rocky, hairpin dirt road that requires a sturdy vehicle. You can walk up for a few hours, drive yourself like we did, or hire a taxi for a whopping $50!

Before finding a campsite, we went to the end of the road to the church built in the 1890s in the town of Livingstonia, and was rewarded with getting to hear a few minutes of their excellent choir. They also have a small university in the town, but we wanted to get camp set up so we didn't have time to look around much.

We ended up at The Mushroom Farm campsite, a nice place currently run by a young traveler couple from America and Sweden, and a place with one of the best views I've seen in Africa so far.

The next morning we set off for the Manchewe waterfall, passing through a few houses, shops and the primary school.

The falls (well, there are actually two) are said to be the highest in Malawi, and they were mighty impressive. This is what it looks like to lean over the edge and look down from the closer of the two falls to the trail.

And here is the second falls, with some imported wildlife ;)

This one I just had to post because the girl is wearing a Pike Place Market t-shirt from my home town of Seattle. I'm always looking and laughing at the cloths that end up out here, I'm waiting for the day I find something of mine!

As the sun went down on us at Mushroom Farm we spent the evening chatting with each other and the other travelers, and were lucky enough to see some sunset colors, which we were told are rare to see from this area.

Up next we will be crossing into Tanzania, where we expect to spent a sizable amount of time on the islands of Zanzibar and Pemba, as well as enjoying some of the worlds best game parks such as the Serengeti. Stick around!

Goodbye Mozambique, Hello Lake Malawi!

Greetings from beautiful Lake Malawi! As I mentioned in my last post Mozambique was a major flop, but so far Malawi has more than made up for it. As I sit here on the beach writing, the radio is playing, the sun is shining, I'm watching the locals do laundry and swim in the lake, and I woke up this morning with a two and a half hour snorkel. But I'm getting ahead of myself, so once again I must start where I left off last time, in Vilankulos, Mozambique.

Baobab Beach Backpackers is the kind of place I stayed at in Thailand. I guess it was just my being ignorant to the backpacker scene in Africa but here it was in Mozambique. As I have learned and mentioned earlier, Mozambique ends up getting a lot of South African tourists, particularly young people on school breaks. The result of this is an intensely seasonal tourist network through some of southern Africa and while it has a great deal to offer, at this point it's no threat to SE Asia as a major destination, do in part to lacking infrastructure, higher costs and simply being less well known.

Due to the high cost of diving we did not have a great deal to do in Vilankulos, so it was mostly time to relax. The three of us went snorkeling together, but there was really nothing to see. The water here is amazingly shallow, I seriously think in places you can be 2km offshore and still stand. Anyways, because of these conditions, we were just snorkeling in a few feet of water, seeing some crabs, and just a handful of fish including this puffer fish. I ended up spending most of the rest of the day writing my last blog entry, eating a burger and just kicking back.

Being on the shore, as you would expect much of the local culture, commerce and lifestyle is based on fishing. Every day the fisherman go out and return with that rounds catch, creating quite a scene on the beach when everyone gathers to buy and sell. I didn't see it, but Chris saw and photographed a honeycomb manta they had caught. They shouted 'No photos!' to him as he approached it, because unfortunately it is a threatened species and was illegal for them to have caught.

In the evening, the three of us played some pool and chatted with the other travelers and locals at the lodge. Around 10 or 11, the party shifted to Beach Village, the other main backpackers in town and I followed that way. From there, I was offered a ride in the back of a truck to head to Afro Bar, the local bar and dance club in town. I have to say it was quite the party. Chis and Weon had headed in before getting here, so I spent the night drinking beers, meeting the locals, playing a drum, getting braids in my hair and dancing until 4am.

After sleeping in quite late, I reemerged into the daylight in time for Chris and I to head back into town to do some shopping in the local market. We were looking for a towel, a kitchen knife, some bread and to simply experience some local culture. As happens often, a local came to us and acted as a 'guide' helping us find things in the market and telling us about the place. I was hungry and wanted some local food, so I ate some goat and rice curry which was quite tasty. After we had completed what we set out to do, we returned to camp.

Beach Village had decently fast wifi for a fair price, so I took advantage of their great view while I updated my blog, did some banking, was able to use Skype to call my mom, grandmothers and great aunt and chat with my sister on Facebook.

I guess I made an impression at Afro Bar the night before, because Chris told me people came up to him (remember he wasn't there) and said “Your friend is awesome!” Honestly I'm not sure what I did that was anything special, but it sounded like enough fun that Chris wanted to come out this evening. With two Australians and a very tall Dutchman, we enjoyed some Tipo Tinto rum and danced until about 2am, all having a great time.

Almost a week after this night while in Monkey Bay Malawi, a whole different country, some local guy came up to us on the street and said 'Two Chinese girls were looking for you last night.” I'm not sure how they found where we were staying, but it was them alright. Unfortunately we were in a different town that evening and missed them, but it's funny how you can run into the same people in different countries while traveling.

Without much to keep us in Vilankulos, we returned to the EN1 heading north towards Malawi and hopefully a fresh start in a way. The road was mostly good and we were able to move quickly, though at times we had to almost dodge people standing in the middle of the road selling pineapples and chickens.

We continued up the EN1 until we reached the EN6 where we turned westward. One town we drove through was called Chimoio and I have to say I was impressed. The road was in great shape, there were street lights and for some reason an explosion of bicycles, something I had been shocked to see so few of up to this point.

We passed through to a lodge called Casa Msika on Lake Chicamba and as I think this photo shows it was a gorgeous spot. It turns out this is a popular spot for tourists from Zimbabwe, and the lake is known for bass fishing, but we were just passing through. It had the best shower I've taken in a while though, hot as you could stand, and more water than the monsoon rains. Yes, I took a long shower.

We drove back to Chimoio to fill up on gas and groceries, then headed north again on the 102. Again, the roads were good and the scenery was getting better and better. Finally we saw hills and got huge views of the countryside, rather than being on the flat coast and buried in cocoanut trees as we had been for so long.

One thing I'd always read about when traveling through Africa are the countless road blocks/check points, and often corrupt police or soldiers who control them. Maybe it is just our 'Madiba Magic' but other than being asked for food twice, I can say to this point we have had ZERO problems. That might change in other countries, I've been told Kenya is quite bad for example, but at this point the fear people have seems totally overblown. (just don't let them see you taking pictures ;) )

The 102 took us north through countless picturesque African villages, eventually reaching the large town of Tete where we crossed the Zambezi River. Tete is a town of industry, and while driving we saw international mining companies, processing plants, heavy equipment and even a Ford dealership!

As we got closer and closer to the Mozambique-Malawi boarder the hills became what a generous person could call mountains, the forest became more lush and our anticipation was growing.

We crossed near the town of Zobue/Zobwe, and the road went from the Mozambique 103 to the Malawi M6. The boarder was a bit strange but nothing out of the ordinary for Africa I suppose. We first had to dodge the crowd of people trying to exchange currency, and get our exit stamps for Mozambique, then we drove through I think 6km of who knows what country before reaching the entrance to Malawi. No one here had uniforms so you didn't know who to trust, and again we were surrounded by people trying to sell us car insurance and who knows what else. After fighting through them for a bit we entered the immigration office where after filling out a small piece of paper we were given our free Malawi visas. Weon dealt with the car paperwork, and everything went smoothly for a minute.

The challenge came in with the whole car insurance thing. As you might expect rules are never very clear in this part of the world, and knowing who to trust is difficult. We had to buy insurance for Mozambique so when we were told we needed it for Malawi it was not a surprise, but the price was. At the boarder other than the one guy walking around with a dingy notebook claiming to be some kind of official, there was only one office selling car insurance. They said there were two more but they were either closed our out of business. The price they wanted was 13,000 kwachas, almost $80 for one month. As we went back and forth trying to decide what to do, a well dressed local man came up shouting at them, saying that they were trying to scam us, that they should be treating us as guests and telling us not to buy from them. He seemed trust worthy as he was the only person who had nothing personally to gain in the situation, and while the insurance people sort of threatened us saying that the road block 30k down the road would give us a 5,000 kwacha fine and send us back, we pressed on without the insurance.

It was getting dark at this point but we pressed on to the city of Blantyre. It must be the Madiba Magic, but we sailed through THREE roadblocks without incident, usually just a question or two, a smile and we were sent on our way. In Blantyre we spent a while looking for a place Weon had been on his past trip through the city, but couldn't find it and found this place instead. They gave us a good deal on a room and for the first time in the trip we slept on beds. Well, two of us did.

The next morning we stopped for gas and the ATM was broken. This seems to happen about 30% of the time you come up to a machine, so you need to prepare. Very few places take cards, so cash is king and without cash you can find yourself truly stuck. Anyways, one of the gas station attendants (there were about 7 of them) rode with us into Blantyre to show us where to find an ATM and where to look for car insurance since we needed it but knew the people at the boarder were trying to rip us off. We got to an ATM, and then checked with two or three insurance companies in town. We ended up buying it from Prime Insurance Company Limited, and got one month for 7,000 kwacha, almost half what the people at the boarder asked. Another company offered 3 months for 10,000, but we only needed a month due to our visa length. I have to say I was impressed with Blantyre. People were friendly, helpful, the streets were clean, it had everything of a modern....ish.... town and I even saw people waiting at crosswalks!

We returned to the gas station and had to pile up a mountain of 27,000 kwacha or something to pay for the fill-up. At 380 kwacha a liter gas here is EXPENSIVE and again we wonder how any local is able to afford it.

I already mentioned how beautiful Malawi is, but here is more proof. We drove a few hours on decent paved roads through more small towns, corn fields, signs for foreign aid programs and other 'typical' scenes but we only had one place in mind, Lake Malawi.

CAUTION: We had a nice time, but when we were leaving Venice Beach and trying to pay for our scuba diving through Eddie, the price we agreed on was $150. The exchange rate at the time was 163 kwachas per US Dollar, but they tried to cheat us and say the exchange rate was 265/dollar. That would bring the price from the agreed upon $150 all the way to $241. We refused to pay, and had to sit and discuss/argue this on and off for at least an hour, ending with us making phone calls to the owner Ishmael (who was the most insistent on his inflated price) and videoing the whole exchange incase there were any problems down the line. As a result of this I'd recommend AGAINST staying at Venice Beach and instead staying at Mufasa Backpackers a little farther down the road.

Weon has been through Malawi before and he lead us to a lodge/camping area called Venice Beach, which is just off the town of Monkey Bay. While there is a tourist industry in spots along the lake such as where we are staying, the area is first and foremost about locals and local life. On both sides of our lodge is real, local Malawi. Every day people are fishing, swimming, washing and playing in the lake around us, and it's great fun to go mingle with the people and say hello.

That night we talked with Eddie and A Friend (yes, that is someones name, another guys here is named Cheese and Toast, and another is Tiger), and over beers and a pineapple organized a scuba diving trip for the next morning.

At 9am, we set off for our first dive in Lake Malawi, and the first fresh-water dive any of us had been on. The weather was perfect, the mood upbeat and we headed out to a small island ready for a great time.

In preparation for this trip I bought a GoPro Hero2 digital camera, mostly to use while diving. I won't go too in depth about it (unless someone has questions) but I'm using an aftermarket underwater housing with a flat lens by Eye of Mine, the tripod adapter and then a small vertical handle, meaning I hold it kind of like a lolipop. I also bought the LCD Backpac add-on, but honestly underwater the screen is almost impossible to see, so you really just hold it out, point in the general direction and hope for the best. That said, for my first time using it the results are surprisingly good. For video it is quite good. As a still camera it's not so good, but if you just take HD video (I'm shooting in 720p) of the whole dive and extract images from the footage it works quite well. Also, the flat-lens underwater housing is a MUST. I tried it today with the standard curved 'above water' lens and the video was absolutely worthless.

So the dive. In a word: boring. Visibility was not as good as we expected, but the real problem was there was very little to see anyways. The bottom is mostly boulders covered in silt, a barren sand bottom, and a handful of small fish. It was fun to be diving again (and to do it when I actually felt well) but we were all expecting more when the books say “Lake Malawi is the ultimate fresh water dive!” and other statements.

Edit: Alright, I found a decent internet connection and got the scuba diving and snorkeling video up!  I made a 290mb HD video in hopes of some magic internet connection, at least I was able to upload this compressed 55mb version.

The advantage of diving over snorkeling is of course that you can stay under water, go deeper and see more. The problem here in Lake Malawi that we saw more fish in the first meter or two of water than farther down, so in terms of life, diving didn't really allow us to see anything we couldn't see just using a snorkel. Still, it was a fun day on the lake diving, snorkeling, fishing and playing around and we managed to get it for $25 each person.

Oh, I almost forgot to mention, the cylinders were filled by the Malawi Navy. Since eastern boarder is the lake, they have a very small 'navel presence' on the lake that consists of three boats I'm told were given by South Africa, all which can fit on trailers. It was funny to see the “navy”, and right next to it on the beach is locals in dugout canoes.

Back in town buying some bananas and avocados from the produce stands.

Fish fish fish. This is where the days catch is laid out to dry in the sun.

The next morning I set my alarm early to get up in time to watch sunrise over the lake, and it was totally worth it.

The other reason to wake up early was to see the fisherman coming in from the night rounds of fishing. The primary catch is the small ones you saw above on the table, and they are not cheap. I was told a big bucket like the man in yellow is carrying goes for 10,500 kwacha. Every morning the beach explodes with life, between the fisherman, the buyers, the kids playing, women doing laundry and dishes in the lake and others just hanging around, it is quite a scene to witness.

The dugout canoe is still the primary means of water transport here on the lake, pretty amazing. You don't see it in this picture, but they attach paraffin lamps to the canoes to attract fish during the night catch, then use nets to gather the school they encircle.

Not ready to call it quits diving in the lake, we went out with Eddie for a second day in a different spot farther north on the lake.

Again conditions were the same, and aquatic life was pretty minimal. The dive consisted mostly of wandering through boulders on the sandy bottom and getting excited to see a few fish or a solitary crab. Weon is learning to spear fish and brought his gun along, but it's not easy. You can't see it well in this photo but he hit a catfish, but it ended up getting away.

The second dive of that day turned out to be very enjoyable. We went around the base of a massive boulder, which had cool caves, big overhangs fish nests that look like bomb craters and a decent number of small fish.

Once we had used all the air in our cylinders, we spent the rest of the morning snorkeling while Eddie and Weon kept spear fishing.

The most fun I had snorkeling was when I found little caves and tunnels between the boulders I could dive through. I'm still not that great at it since I haven't spent a great amount of time in the water, but it's fun to practice and improve.

Eddies spearfishing catch for the day.

This is the town of Monkey Bay once you get off the main road and into where the people live. Mud-brick homes with thatched roofs, chickens and goats running around, and lots of smiling kids waving to us as we walk past.

Like much of the developing world, regular electricity is no guarantee. This is the “big”grocery store in town.

In the afternoon I sat with Cheese and Toast (yes, again that's his name) under a tree to chat and people watch. We talked about village life, about girls, and he drew me diagrams in the sand of how they catch the fish.

That evening we went to Gecko at Cape Mclear, a thirty minute drive from our place since we were the only guests and it was a little boring sitting by ourselves. It happened to be Friday night, and there was a large group of people who volunteering as nurses in town at the bar that night. It was quite a surprise to see so many other travelers as we had been alone at our place for days now, but it was a good thing and we had a fun night dancing. Again, it felt more like the traveler bars in Thailand than

what I've experienced most of the time in Africa.

After another late evening, we took it easy for the day, with Chris and I walking into town for a bite to eat. This is traditional Malawi food: some vegetable, a fried chambo fish, and nsima. It was fun to sit at the restaurant and people watch, something I miss from traveling in Asia since we have been making most of our own food the whole time.

We went back to Cape Maclear that night, but the place was almost totally empty and we turned in early.

Bright and early the next morning I rolled out of my tent and decided to go for a long snorkel. I went straight to a point that was a ways out, and while it was long and boring getting there, I had a great time wandering and diving down between the boulders. A two and a half hour snorkel is a great way to start the morning.

Weon had gone paddling and fishing with Cheese and Toast the day before and organized a dinner that evening, so we went to the market together to gather the ingredients we needed. Walking through places like this is one of my favorite parts of traveling, and it's about time we start doing more of our own shopping at these kind of markets when we are in town long enough.

Sunset on the beach that night.

For dinner Cheese and Toast cooked us a vegetable stew with leafy greens, tomato, potato and two fish which we ate with bread. It was great to sit out on the beach and help make dinner, and we all agreed it was the best meal the three of us have had on the trip so far. True local flavor.

Next on the menu is to keep heading north up the lake, as well as seeing a bit of the inland Malawi. I have to say, the last week has been excellent, I finally feel like things are going well, that I'm really in Africa now, and that the future is very bright. Goodbye for now everyone, take care.