Hi!
Only 15 more days left, and I am starting to feel reluctant to go back!

First, as promised my stories of Vilankulos: I arrived with the Swedish girl on Saturday last week, reuniting with the other 2 Swedish girls who left earlier. The travelling was challenging again, as it included 2 minibuses and even a small boat for 0.30 eurocent to cross the lake. But it was nice to arrive at a place with people you know, and it was worth the travelling as Vilankulo is probably even more beautiful than Tofo. The area is more remote, and you have to move in cabs outside your hostel, but the view is amazing and the hostel is nice as well.

The next day we went on an island tour to Bazaruto Archipelago, and this was yet another adventure.. The 'boat' was a so called dhow, a small sailing boat with a patched up sail and other old worn out stuff. The trip to the island took 3 hours, after which it took another hour to get to the reef to go snorkeling. The ocean was even more rough in between the island and the reef, and when we went back to have lunch on the island we almost sank.. We all saw the huge wave coming up to us, being higher than the boat itself, but we did not right away realize the danger from it. When it hit the boat, the boat tipped over halfway, and the captain and the gasoline tank were thrown off. The motor was still running, and the captain was hanging on to it. Luckily the boat tipped back, but there was an awful lot of water in the boat and it was now mixed with gasoline. The captain got back in as well, but all together it hadn't take much more to have a much worse ending..
After this incident we got back to the island, had a nice lunch, saw a stunning view from up on the sanddunes, and than returned. It was another 3 hours back, and when we got back we were cold, felt dirty and realized that it had been an extremely unsafe expedition. When we told our story to the other guests and staff, we were told that none of the other companies went out that day because of the strong weather, and they even have solid big boats.. It felt so good to be back safe and sound and we have definitely learned from this!
The evening was spent with a Brazilian chef who barbequed the most amazing meat, and tired but happy again we went to our beds.

Truth be told, most of my next days were spent by the side of the pool, only 'worrying' about what to have for lunch and dinner. Serving food is like rocket science here, and we had some crazy incidents.
First of it is guarenteed to take at least an hour to get anything, even including something like a pancake or a bowl of yoghurt for breakfast.
Second, the menu looks promising, but guarenteed they don't have the ingredients to prepare over half of the dishes. They don't always bother telling you: we actually once had a burger which was missing the actual burger, but they tried to cover it up by bacon and other ingredients.. Surprisingly after being angry for being told they had no burgers left, the same plate showed up 10 minutes later with a freshly baked burger on top of the bacon. One of those things you rather don't want to know the story behind!
Third, other than frequently not having electricity, the town occasionally runs out of gas. As most companies standard use gas for lack of electricity, the options for food preparation become about 0 without gas. We once ordered our food, waited for an hour, until the chef came out saying that 'Oops, no gas, no food'. I guess he didn't get to think of starting yet during that first hour..
Fourth, though the menu looks nice and they do seem to have the ingredients, most food is sh*t. Never had a lasagna in my life that tasted awful, or got a toasted sandwich with cheese that was supposed to be 'bruschetta: bread with tomato tapenade and basil'.
And fifth, the hostel had no fridge but only a freezer. And as there actually were supermarkets close by this time, it still takes the fun and appetite out of having your own breakfast if you have to wait for 2 hours to end up hacking through yoghurt sprinkled with cornflakes..
So, as an act of desperation, we had dinner about 4 times in this high end, exclusive, fancy restaurant called Casa Rex where they served many many delicious meals, including real chocolate fondant as dessert. We went nuts! It actually got to the point where we kept asking for second rounds of their free freshly baked bread because we couldn't get enough. I have rarely been this full (sorry for the expression mum- 'only trashcans get full, human beings have had enough') in my life!

So we found a way to turn the food into a very pleasant thing, but after spending 3 weeks in Mozambique I'm disappointed to say it is a very expensive country. And not like 'Africa expensive', but 'European expensive'. And all in all I can say that having travelled to 5 African countries so far, Africa is far from being cheap. I know there are countries that are dirt cheap, but they are not in my itinerary. It leaves me with a worried feeling as I am way overspending on my budget.

But, more importantly: Vilankulos and hanging with a group brought up partying! And we are talking serious, until the sun comes up-partying. We even went all dressed up to this Halloween/Full moon party, but it was very TIA: after an hour the volume had to go down because of neighbours, and after another hour it was pitch black and dead silent because the electricitely was out. But, TIA, so people find something to make music with, start singing to it and than everyone joins in with dancing. Brilliant! Loved it, especially the fact that ALL African men have to dance all night, and boy can they dance! I have been tossed around all night, swept from my feet and twirled around, and I still couldn't get enough. Though it must be said, it is not possible anywhere in Africa to leave things at just dancing. It's tiring and can leave a bad and annoyed feeling at the end, but once you get past that it is truly amazing.

And than it was time to say goodbye to my Swedish friends after almost 3 weeks, and we all felt sad. We all had a great time together and I feel lucky I got to befriend them. After another horrible bus ride (11 hours, cramped, with empy jerrycans to put in the aisle as extra seat, and only 1 stop which was at the side of the road to all pee next to eachother), I was back in Maputo.
Again I met great people, and 2 nights later I was on my way to fly to Dar Es Salaam, in Tanzania. Since I was reading Hunger Games and had my earplugs in, I realized 8 minutes before take off they had changed the gate and I was sitting at the wrong one.. Luckily my time at LifeCell has enabled me to catch last minute flights, fjoe!
It was a first one to me though that we had 2 stops where I had to get off, wait in a room with a few others, and return to my seat after 20 minutes. Ah well, Africa has been a lot of 'first ones' for me!

I am now in Zanzibar, Tanzania, and that is a whole other world again! It is beautiful and even cheap, so I am all happy ;-)
Though there have been riots in Stone Town 2 weeks ago, it is completely safe in Nungwi where I am. So don't worry! On the ferry I met 2 Spanish girls, and I am spending my Zanzibar week with them.
Next week Thursday I fly to Uganda to meet Elke, yeah!

Long story as always, so cheers and much love to all :)