Tofo To Malawi

After an eight hour bus ride we arrived at Fatima's Nest in Tofo and our first real glimpse of the Indian Ocean with its long, sandy beaches and big rolling waves. We spent two days swimming and exploring the area and sleeping in a traditional thatched hut. From here we had to take a bus into Inhabane, transfer to a boat across the bay to Mexixe. We had to wait a couple of hours for the bus to fill up to take us on to Vilankolos, another beautiful spot on the Indian Ocean. From the bus most of the homes along the way were made with walls of sticks or reeds or rocks held between sticks then plastered with mud. The roofs were thatched with large overhangs to keep the rain off the walls. Vilankolos is known for its archaepeligo and shallow warm water. There is not much choice of food in town as Mozambique is quite a poor country, but the scenery is lush and green and we found the people to be very friendly and helpful. There didn't seem to be any Internet in town and we met a lawyer who let us use his office computer to check our e-mails. Donna mentioned that he spoke English quite well and he told us that he'd fasted for a month in the bush and when he arrived home he went to get something to eat, he was struck down and when he woke he began to pray and it was in English. Wish I could learn a language that fast! We began to travel with three other Canadians and we had a marathon bus ride. We left at 4:30 am and with two mini-buses ended up in Chimoio late that afternoon. We spent the night there, rose the next morning at 4:00 am to catch the bus to Tete over rough roads and we thought that we would have to spend the night there, but we managed to catch a bus which cross over the Zambezi River and to the border of Malawi and luckily from there another mini-bus that took us to a backpackers hostel in Blantyre. The countryside into Malawi has very large hills and is quite lush. We noticed immediately that there is more wealth here. Tomorrow we catch a bus to Monkey Bay where we will take a boat, named the Ilala, up Lake Malawi, a three day trip. What an adventure!