Africa Blog Posts, Blog Posts

Weeks 68 & 69: Site update, Drama and Jupiter’s Travellers

Some of you may have noticed that the website has been updated, this is what I was doing during week 68. That and starting to work on my Africa Travel Story content, the site still needs a few finishing touches and the content will take quite some time. At the same time as doing this I have been trying to get the bike sold, I have one local guy who is interested but wont have to money for a couple of weeks and a guy who is looking into the duty costs before he makes an offer. I also had an offer from an Australian guy who offered half of my asking price, but this wasn’t nearly enough, but I have met a local guy who buys and sells vehicles for a living who said he will help to too, so fingers crossed.

Last weekend I came to Mabuya Lodge to use the internet and met some really cool people, the first were two guys, one from New Zealand (Richard) and the other from Israel (Jonathan). They met in South Africa and decided to travel together in a land rover, unfortunately they rolled it in northern Malawi and are now backpacking. At around the same time I met another group which was actually made up of two groups. One was an English girl called Gemma and a South African guy (Bryn), they are driving to South Africa from Doncaster in the UK, raising money for charity (http://www.facebook.com/2DoAfrica). They had teamed up with a group of five Americans who are also driving two cars down through Africa for charity (shoebaru.com).

The ten of us had a great few days together while they were waiting for one of the cars to be repaired, then they left for Zambia. After that I had a few days of feeling fed up, the weather turned cold (19 degrees) and the days were dark and cloudy. The fact that I had been having a good time with this group and then went back to the tedious day to day of waiting to sell the bike, didn’t do my morale much good. I guess that comes with spending my time in a lodge where people are always coming and going, while I stay behind trying to sell the bike.

There was a lot of drama going on in week 69, firstly one group I met, had been together for seven years and split up in Ethiopia, the guy wanted the girl to fly home so he could travel alone, but they are still travelling together. Meanwhile, back in my compound, one of my neighbours is planning to go back to Europe to make some cash and his local girlfriend told him that the relationship is over. She then went on to steal his passport and force him to go to the police with her, apparently if you live with someone in Malawi for six months you are officially married, when this didn’t work she said she was pregnant.

Then week 69 ended with the arrival of Danielle Murdoch (motomonkeyadventures.com), another Jupiter’s Traveller who rode from Australia, she is now travelling with a guy called Mike who has also been travelling in Africa for around two years.

Europe Trip

I have been thinking through my options and still have not been able to make a decision yet. Basically I have found out that I have to get my India visa from the UK, I initially thought about doing it through the post, but I am also considering flying to the UK for a few weeks to sort out the India stuff, then fly to India from there, this would mean I could potentially be home for my Birthday, Xmas and New year. I don’t really want to come back to the UK, so my other options are to settle down in either Zanzibar or South Africa while I send my passport to the UK, get the visa, then get the passport sent back to me. I am also pretty tired of Lilongwe, so I might try to advertise the bike in South Africa and drive down there to sell it if there is enough interest.

Africa Blog Posts, Blog Posts

Week 67: Waiting in Lilongwe

This week has been quite uneventful, I have spent time hanging around the compound, socialising with my neighbours. I have had a few people come to view the bike, but have nothing of substance to report there. So instead of just having a very short post this week, I will tell you about some of the things that have been happening in the compound where I live.

The compound is quite close to the centre of Lilongwe, it takes about 20 minutes to walk into town, but I only go into town to get cash from the bank or visit the supermarket. We regularly have no water, I am told this is common at this time of year (Summer/Dry Season), so I either have a shower when there is some water pressure, or get a bucket of water from the lodge and bucket wash. My house is in a small section of the compound which it shares with the lodge, there are 10 houses and 8 of them are full. There is Cuthbert (Qb), he is the son of the owner of the compound, Ian and Jane, a Belgian guy and his Malawian girlfriend, Ali and Hussein, two Pakistani guys who are working here in Malawi and three women living in three of the other houses.

On one of my first nights living in my new house, I was sat in the yard talking with Ian, Jane, Qb, Ali and Hussein, when one of the women came and sat very close to me, started rubbing her breasts and doing something which I can only describe as an attempted sexy dance. This woman is quite large, when I say this I don’t mean fat, I mean large, she is tall and is not slim. Everyone found it quite entertaining, but when I rejected her advances this woman threw a glass on the floor and went inside her house.

Most nights we gather in the yard around sunset for a couple of hours, then go into Ian and Jane’s place to listen to music or watch a film on my laptop. It is really nice, but I am starting to get tired of waiting for my bike to sell. I really want to get out of Lilongwe soon.

Africa Blog Posts, Blog Posts

Week 66: Moving in

This week I decided to move into a self contained flat (two rooms, bathroom and bedroom). This will save me around 7000 kwacha ($23) a month, compared to the dorm room I was staying in before. I’ve spent most of the week hanging around with my new neighbours, Cuthbert, Ian, Jane and a couple of others.

I am still trying to sell the bike as soon as I can, it is currently advertised on the Lilongwe Chat google chat group, but I will try to ask a few more people who may be able to help me too.

Lilongwe is actually quite a nice place, there are supermarkets so I can get cheese and pork, which I had been craving while I was in Zanzibar. I now know that there is a more expensive lodge, across the road from my lodge, which has internet access which I case use for free, in 5 minute blocks. So I might be on-line a little more often this week.

Africa Blog Posts, Blog Posts

Week 65: Lilongwe

Well, I spent last weekend in Nkhata bay, relaxing by the lake, then started my week by driving the rest of the way down to Lilongwe. I checked into the cheapest place to stay (Welcome Lodge) and have been staying there all week. There is no internet access so I have been out of touch all week, but the place is clean and cheap so I don’t mind too much. My main objective is to sell my motorbike, I have given out my contact details to quite a few people and at the moment I am fairly confident that I should be able to get a good price, although my experiences in Tanzania are putting some doubts in my mind.

I think I have been missing out this week, I stayed in the lodge to try to keep my costs down to a minimum, but over the last few days I have been out with some Rasta girls I met, just sitting in a lodge that they are staying at while they are in Lilongwe. Its free and much more entertaining than sitting in my own lodge watching TV.

Finally, I am allowed to announce that I have been made a ‘Jupiter’s Traveller’. Some of you may have already heard of the book ‘Jupiter’s Travels’ by Ted Simon, well he started a foundation which helps other travellers, and the travellers who are part of it are given the title ‘Jupiter’s Traveller’. There is more information on their website for anyone who is interested. Here is a link to their blog post which announced my joining.

Africa Blog Posts, Blog Posts

Week 64: Returning to Malawi

I started the week thinking I had a good plan, I would sell my bike in Stone Town, go to Dar es Salaam, sort out the paperwork for the sale of the bike, then get a bus from Dar es Salaam to Lilongwe. I had moved out of the school house and was staying in the hotel at the beach, I spent Monday and Tuesday waiting for the buyer of my motorbike to arrange a time for us to meet. Then on Tuesday night he called and dropped his price, also adding that he couldn’t buy it for another week. Obviously this wasn’t going to work, so after feeling quite stressed for a few hours, I decided that I would take the motorbike to Malawi with me.

This wasn’t as simple as it sounds, I had let my temporary importation documents get out of date because I was trying to sell the bike and would sort out the paperwork after the sale. So on Wednesday I got a lift into Stone Town, dropped my bags in a hotel and went to the Tanzania Revenue Authority Head Office. I went in and spoke to the Manager, told him about my trip, showed him my website and explained I needed to renew my document. He was really friendly and once I had paid $25 he wrote that the document had been extended and put this stamp on it. From there I went back to the hotel and managed to arrange for the bike to go straight onto a cargo ship headed to Dar es Salaam that afternoon. By the time this was sorted out I had missed the fast boats to Dar, leaving only the slow (over night) boat. So I got that boat and slept on the chairs, I guess it saved me a night in a hotel.

I arrived in Dar es Salaam at 6am and went to the YMCA to check in before heading back to the port for 8am to get my bike. This actually ended up taking two hours, I spent most of that time sat watching the crane damage every car they lifted off the boat. Once I got my bike out of the port I went back to the YMCA and spent the day sleeping, going down to the cafe for cheap meals.

On Thursday I drove 515 miles from Dar es Salaam to Mbeya, this took 11 hours and once I arrived in Mbeya it took around 2 hours to find suitable accommodation. I ended up in a cheap local hotel, the room was tiny but clean and they had a hot shower which was great after the days ride. The only problem was my arms, I threw my gloves away when I thought I was selling the motorbike and 11 hours in the African summer sun left the backs of my hands rather burnt.

On Friday I rode from Mbeya down into Malawi to Nkhata Bay. This ride wasn’t too bad, there was a police checkpoint just before the border and they wanted to see my insurance, when I looked confident and started taking my document folder out of my pannier the policeman said he didn’t need to see it and let me go. The border crossing was easy enough too, although I get tricked by one of the guys who exchange money on the border. I knew that $100 is 30,000 MK, so when he counted the notes out 1 to 10, wrapping the tenth around the others to make three bundles of 10 you can easily think that is 30,000. The trick being that the notes are 500 MK each, not 1000, so you end up with half as much money as you should have. It took me a few minutes to realise, and by that time the guy was over on the Tanzanian side and I was in Malawi.

I also got a text from Simba, telling me that it was a guy called Ali Mcha who had reported me to the Security officer and Ministry of Education. Whether this was because I had helped Mohammed and Janet not get ripped off by him, or whether it is even true or not, I’m not sure. I don’t really trust Simba either so he may have just been saying it to shift the blame away from himself.

I arrived in Nkhata Bay and checked into their cheapest dorm, my hands were burning even though I had used my first aid kit to bandage them up, to keep them out of the sun. I have been here in Nkhata bay since then, resting in the shade, overlooking the lake. I plan to drive down to Lilongwe tomorrow and meet a friend, I want to sell the motorbike there and then find some temporary work here in Malawi for a few months while I arrange my time in India. Maybe do my scuba diving qualification while I’m here.