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Roadtrip up trough Mozambique from 12/1/2011-22/1/2011.
After a night out in Maputo and a drunk conversation with my friend Ida, we decided to take busses (so-called "chapas") and other public transportation from Maputo to Pemba (ca. 2500 km). I had gotten a bar job at a lodge in Pemba called Russel's Place/Pemba Magic Lodge, because my dad had spoken to Russel about it. My friend Ida was going up north anyway and flying to Tanzania from here. So it was a great opportunity for us to see a lot of the country and experience something new and different! And so it was.. Most of the busses/chapas leave before dawn, so they don't have to drive all of the hours in the baking sun. The first trip from Maputo to Vilanculos was about 10 hours. It was raining all the way and of course the roof was leaking exactly where we were sitting! Everybody thought it was funny that the two white girls in the bus were getting soaked! We just laughed about it as well. In Vilanculos we stayed at a lovely backpacker's place called Baobab Backpacker's. Beautiful, right on the beach with a nice bar, pool table, bonfire, hammocks etc. We had a great time in Vilanculos, where we went out almost every night, went for a boat trip to a beautiful deserted island, called Magaruque, 2½ hours away, visited a local family where they cooked for us, and most of all just had fun and relaxed.
Next stop was Beira. Now this was something else! We arrived in Beira after 10-12 hours trip in a smaller bus. I had talked to a friend from Maputo and he told me that we should meet up with a friend of his in Beira, so about 15 minutes later Marco, who we had never met before, picked us up and took us to his house. His family was so nice and welcoming and we ended up staying in Beira for five days! We were only supposed to stay the night in Beira and take the next bus in the morning. Later the same night we went to his father's house in Beira. This house could be on MTV Cribs! - Swimming pool, pool house, fuzball, a playground, big birdcage with parrots and exotic birds, and a fitness center on the top floor! That night his father was having a barbecue for the whole family and we were also invited. Everybody at the party heard our "story" about taking the busses all the way up through the country and everybody laughed and thought we were crazy! We went out with Marco and his friends that night, got really drunk, were supposed to take the bus at 3 in the morning, got to the bus and saw that it had crashed into another bus, we refused to take that bus, decided to go back and party some more and make a new plan in the morning. By the way, Marco's father had encouraged us to stay longer and told us that we were more than welcome to stay at his place. The next day was a Sunday, so no busses were leaving and the next bus was Wednesday! So we went for a walk on the beach and relaxed the rest of the day. On the 17th we took a chapa to a little town called Dondo, where Ida had been working on a school before, so that was really cool to see. The next days we just relaxed and hung out with Marco and his family. We had a wonderful time! On the 19th we took the bus from Beira at 4 in the morning. It was the longest trip of all! The bus had to stop for a couple of hours to fix the lights, because we were gonna drive in the dark as well. We arrived in Alto Molocue were we stayed at a friend's place for the night. So that was great. We had a wonderful dinner, got a shower and went to bed. The next morning, the 20th, we took to different busses to get to Ilha de Mozambique. We stayed at a place called Amakuthini/Casa de Luis. A little private place, but very nice and simple. The people were very friendly. Ilha de Mozambique is a very beautiful island! It is so small and has a lot of architecture from the Portuguese, which is really beautiful. The next day we went to the museum (the Palace) and saw the old fort as well. It was all very cool and interesting.
On the 22th of January we left Ilha de Mozambique at 4 in the morning and took the bus to a junction at Namialo, where we were supposed to catch another bus to Pemba. We waited at Namialo, which was a very chaotic and hot place, for a couple of hours and no bus arrived. By this time everybody around us knew that the two "mulungos" (= whites) were going to Pemba. We went to sit in the shade somewhere and suddenly a guy came running and grabbed Ida's backpack and yelled "Pemba, Pemba!" So we ran after him and it turned out that a car had stopped by that was on its way to Pemba. They gave us a lift from Namialo to Pemba, which is about 300 km. Nice to sit in a normal car with our own seat and air-condition! We arrived at Russel's Place in Pemba in the afternoon. We were very surprised when we saw the place that I was gonna stay at for the next month. A great big bar with beautiful wood carvings all over the place. I still love the place and I'm amazed every day at how nice this place is.
To be continued…
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