A long long road to Malawi

Two & a half days long in fact. My sore, sore bum will be testimony to just how many speed bumps lie between Dar es Salaam & Lake Malawi. The road was slow at times, not least due to the pot holes, police checks & numerous other straying cattle, donkeys & children.

The scenery changed from coastal climes to more rugged mountainous terrain as we return inland. As we wound our way through the hills near the Tanzanian border the agriculture changed from subsistence dwellings to large tea plantations . Everywhere we go happy people wave at the truck & shout greets after us.
After a good 1100kms of twisting turns we arrived on the shores of lake Malawi. We're camping at Kandi beach, a large over land truck stop where we've met up with 2 other trucks & are staying for 3 nights to catch up on domestic chores & enjoy some excursions. There are hammocks to chill in, snorking sailing & windsurfing for the more active & a little cafe for those to gorge themselves on Banoffe pie.


As a joke the girls from my truck signed me up for horse riding rider. Not to back out of a challenge, I joined 5 of them & rose at 6am to horse ride! What I hadn't realised was they had entered me as an intermediate rider !!! Having not seen a horse since I was about 13 I could hardly put myself anywhere near that level of competence, but within 15 minutes riding & a trot + a canter later, my under carriage were suitably numb enough not to be worrying about riding classifications & my finger nails had an intricate knowledge of the saddle they dug into!

I started the ride looking like a specially gifted child (see picture) & ended feeling like a star cowboy at rodeo. To cool the horses off after a beautiful ride through the surrounding countryside & local villages, we rode horses bare back into the lake, an amazing feeling to ride a horse when it's swimming.