St Patricks day and Jared

So iv been travelling with Jared for a while now, sharing a tent etc. But theres just something i need to get off my chest while the other are writing about things of consequence. Now some of you may know he's been known to say things that are a little less than manly (regarding his love for shoes, shopping ect.) But his comments have reached dangerous new heights of sensitivity. Which is worrying since the aim of this trip was to toughen up a bit, learn how to rough it etc. Here are three of Jareds recent musings, tell me what you think:

"when i sleep the pillow really hurts my beard"
"this citronella soap lathers up so nicely in my hair"
"
Okay i forgot the last one, something about enjoying spooning a little too much maybe, I should write them down.

Should i really be sharing a tent with this man??

On a brighter note i am pleased to report that we found some Guiness in Iringa, it may have been brewed in Dar but it was every bit as meaningful. So we had a wonderful St Patrick's day, rounded off at a nice riverside campsite (in the rain). Today we rented out Stanley to some folk we met in Livingstone, so he's going on a safari (This is good because were too skint to pay for any park fees, but its okay), and we have the day to mess around in Iringa again. I like Iringa, its much better than Mbeya.

Oh and comments are really good and appreciated immensely, but put your name in there so we know who to send gifts to. Not really, but please do put your name in, there are lots of anonymous ones and its irritating.

Nkhata Bay

After a bit of research and discussion we decided to stick to our original route, thereby heading North through Malawi, rather than a detour South around the lake and up through Mozambique. (We decided on this after rumours that the borders in Northern Mozambique were closed and the possible petrol problems.) So, although it would have been a serious adventure, as I'm pretty sure we would have gotten stuck along a dirt track somewhere, we packed up in Lilongwe, and headed North towards Nkhata bay.

Mattie had been telling us how great the place was for days, so our expectations were extremely high! (He went there in 2005 with Shayno and 8 others) I have to say neither Jared nor I were disappointed, the place was awesome! We arrived at around mid day and the sun added to the island feel. We decided to check out our options for backpackers before we settled down, (we didn't want to make the same mistake we made in Lusaka - there we struck the bottom of the barrel, we tend to not talk about that anymore...). The first place was deserted, so we carried on our search, we eventually landed up in Mayoko Village where we were welcomed by Gary, the owner. Gary was well liquored up by the time we arrived, and due to his excitement offered us a room at camping price and a free beer, so that we could join him in the bar without any delay. We gladly accepted his generous offer and joined in the festivities. The highlight of the night was when Gary turned down the music, jumped up on the bar, flung open a bottle of Amarula and shouted "Its 12:30, all drinks are free!!!" and started chugging from the bottle like it was water (The actual time was 9:48 but that didn't matter...)






The next morning was a bit slow, but were revived by a buffet breakfast, and a cloudless blue sky. We all just lazed around, swam in the lake and got sun burnt. Good times.

Day 3 started with a tropical storm, but there were promises of a boat trip later on in the day. We waited it out and by 12:00 the storm had disappeared and we once again had sun. We joined the rest of camp for the boat trip in the afternoon to a small beach where we played some Frisbee and did some cliff diving. On our way to the beach we fed Fish Eagles from the boat (We threw sardines into the water right next to the boat and the eagles fished them out)

We used the hollowed out tree canoes to get across the bay in the afternoon, in search of some local food in the town. This is where Mattie and I discovered that Jared was not built for the water. After about 15 meters from the shore we heard a splash, when we looked back we saw Jared swimming next to his rolled canoe assuring us he was OK and we should carry on. We almost wet ourselves! there was Jared fully clothed trying to scramble back onto his canoe. The rest of the trip went better and Jared slowly got the hang of it, slowly.

The way back was the best part, we had some good food and all the stars were out. In the distance we could see lightning, we paddled to the middle of the bay (Jared stayed dry this time) and just chilled there, looking up at the stars. It was romantic... there I said it!

By day 4 we decided we were getting too comfortable, so we moved on.

Fawlty Towers

Okay, as everyone may have noticed Botswana was crap. Though adventurous, the beer was terrible, and there were way too many tricksy salt pans everywhere. We did bond a little, and the phrase "i love you guys" has been bandied about a hell of a lot recently. Oh we saw some elephants too which was a minor redeeming quality. But we were all eager to get out, and what a good idea it was to make the trecherous Zambezi crossing as soon as possible, and literally stumble upon the Fawlty Towers backpackers. Pd picked this backpackers, and as you can well imagine he's standing behind me right now.

The dark squirell is igor, he's new courtesy of shayno. Theyre looking over the back of the falls, almost.

Fawlty Towers: heaven, and so unexpected. Pool, dstv, internet, pool table and beautiful girls, and a guy, named Guy. First day we went to Vic falls. Its in fllod so we couldnt really see too much, but we were having too much fun to notice. Its more like wild water park than seventh wonder of the natural world, kind of like standing in a tropical cyclone with rain in every direction (Jared says "angle rain"). So the falls were good. Im in malawi now, so the beer is twice as cheap as it was yesterday, hance this makes less sense than it would ordinarily have. Sorry



That night we procured some cheap illegally imported dark rum, Admiral. A game of kings/ring of fire later and everyone was happy, especially Anne the danish girl. We continued our night at the club, called Fairmount where we danced like fools. What else can i say about Fairmount? Its like Greenman with flatscreens everywhere, fantastic!!! Let me take this opportunity to appologise to the other guests at Fawlty towers who may have been disturbed by shouts of Marco Polo, i am sorry, we all are.

The plan was to leave the next day but circumstances led to us spending the day on the couch, this was not a bad thing. The bulls and Sharks won. And the day ended with a fantastic braai courtesy of Nick the Australian, so technically it was a barbeque, but whatever.


Okay paying for internet sucks. Thats about all from me. Were in the midst of changing route a little, and going through mozambique, but you'll here more of that later.

Stuck in the pans

Picture this. A beautiful day. We were driving through proper bush with barely enough space on either side for Stanley's fat arse. (For those not yet informed, Stanley is the name of our '89 Hilux) We stop the car and standing on the roof to see where we were, the first roll of thunder is heard. The decision to move on and find the infamous Kubu island in the middle of the salt pans of Botswana is made.


We eventually find the pans (much thanks to the GPS unit lent to us by the Hiemstras) and are so stoked to finally be there that we forget to stick to the outer edge of the pans. We recieved this advice from an experienced traveller and ignoring it proved to be lank stupid. So driving through the pans, extremely proud of ourselves for finding them, we get stuck. And not the ordinary kind of stuck. Stanley was actually sinking into the ground. So out we jump, a little freaked out, and begin to fix the situation. While Matt & Pd find some grass and wood to prevent the car sinking (pretty difficult when the nearest bush is 1.5km away) while I began to unload the bakkie to lighten the weight and hopefully slow down the sinking nature that Stanley was quite used to by now. By the time we were done, all the luggage, the fridge, spare battery, 50 litres of fuel, the spare tyres and all spare parts and tools were lying on a plastic sheeting, itself sinking into the depths of the pan.

After much planning and a number of attempts to rescue our ride, we decided the best course of action was to find some trees, jack Stanley up and put the trees under the tyres. So off we set to the bush on the edge of the pan, not before marking the coordinates of the car should the sun set before we returned. It was 5.30 pm at this stage, three hours into the whole charade.

Hunting for trees proved quite successful until we tried to carry them back. Pd's hernia meant that he couldn't take much, although he tried his hardest. (Thanks dude) The trouble now was that the sun had indeed set and it was complete darkness on the pans. Cloud cover also made night vision not possible. So we turned on the GPS to start navigating, while pulling 5 trees through the mud in the pitch black. We felt like real animals. Grrrr.

Awesome, we're saving ourselves. Mood is good. But wait, GPS batteries die. Rats. We are now completely lost, shin deep in mud and an extremely vague idea of where the car is. But after half an hour or so we stumble across the tyre tracks we previously laid down and found the car. (Seening the path from that walk in sunlight the next made us realise we dragged wood for over 2 km's. Not cool. Although we're all lank ripped now.)

So we get to the car, jack it up, it falls, we jack again, dig, hack wood into size, place wood, find a dry place to camp and braai some wors. We were all lank despondent by this stage. We didn't have much food, about 10 litres of water and hadn't seen a soul (or sunshine) for 40kms of bush. But we slept well and awoke to what proved a beautiful day.

The plan was to let the sun dry the mud as much as possible after the previous day's rains, and then, using the trees as grip, simply drive the car out. The morning was good, we got the labour done and were planning to attempt to drive out at around 3 pm. But then the rain started falling once again and we knew it was now or never. So we dashed for the car. We decided what the best plan of attack was, I jumped in the car and all was like clockwork. With Matt and Pd guiding we managed to slowly move the car away from the wet stuff and next to our tent on a small patch of dry land some 250m away. Absolute joy.


Nothing can describe the feeling of rescuing Stanley from the pans. We were the happiest men in the world. We worked together as a team and not once did anyone lose their cool. We are a wicked team and are very proud of ourselves.

We then drove out as quickly as possible, deciding the Kubu Island is so 20th-century, and headed to Francistown. Watching the rains fall heavily over the pans as we drove away we knew we had made the right decision.

Day 1 photos

Internet is lank slow so here are the delayed pics from Pd's post. Enjoy.

Day 1 out of SA

The first day was excellent, we had the farewell breakfast at the Doppio Zero and said our goodbyes... And onto the last few admin issues before we left SA. We got our medical supplies, back to jareds and onto Macro for some beer. Then the N1 to the Botwana border at Groberlersburg where we had the first mild encounter with African beurocracy. It was awesome, the reason was that I tried to declare my camera using the invoice. After wasting 30 min I ended up just declaring it without any docs. But all was well once we crossed the Limpopo and entered Botswana. Fists impressions of Botswana was clean, friendly, rich and big. We did our immigration bit, paid our road toll and were on our way.

We entered Botswana at 18:05 and the sun was slowly setting. The firsts stop was meant to be at Palapye, but that proved to be out of our range. Therefore we made a plan. We spotted a friendly looking guy waving us by at the the first foot and mouth disease control point. We pulled a U-turn and offered him beer for a place to camp. He gladly accepted, so there we were chilling on the side of the road, in front of the squirrel guarded tent, drinking our well deserved case of castle. Elias, the guard, joined in the festivities, hesitantly at first, but soon loosened up and told us all about his country, without any of us understanding a word. None of us ended up any wiser, however we did learn that Elias cannot handle his booze. At all.

Well Joburg was a hoot, drifting between Shayno and Jareds houses, trying to strike a healthy balance between getting the last things sorted out, saying goodbye, chilling and partying. The Doors disrupted this balance a little on Tuesday night when i learned, along with Shayno that R22 is far to cheap for a bottle of vodka and leads directly to tears.

It seems as if every day we made a list of 5 important things to do, including finishing buying medicine, malaria pills, equipment, etc, and managed at least one, putting the other 4 off for the next day. The result of this being that we still dont have malaria tests, pens or beer. But these things have a way of sorting themselves out.

Now its off to breakfast for a final last goodbye to the Goedhals parents and Pd's mom who flew up to see us off, before we venture towards Botswana, or something? Jared is in charge of directions, for now. Then to the shops, Makro, travel clinic, petrol station.....okay maybe one more day. Or two