Relax in Southern Tanzania

Wachisa comes and finds me to say his goodbyes. We have talked a lot over the past few days so not much is needed to be said. It is just a quick hug and a goodbye. There are two big buses waiting to leave. I am on the 8.30 am Blantyre Express, not even half full as it leaves Chitipa. I sit back and enjoy the ride, my head full of amazing thoughts. In Karonga I try and find some Mzuzu coffee for Cath but fail. I get a border car and am soon spending my last kwacha on a big plate of rice and beans, a cup of hot spicy ginger tea and two Kuche Kuche beers with two stranded Tanzanian oil tanker drivers. I get my passport stamped and leave Malawi. I walk across the bridge and am back in Tanzania. It takes an hour or so to get my 7 day transit visa. I find a bus at the junction and head for Kyela, the nearest town to the Kasamulu border crossing over the Songwe River. I immediately start overdosing on oranges, avacados and pineapples. The streets are lined with fruit stalls piled high. Vitamin C is something that my body has lacked the past month and I need to make up for lost time. The differences between Tanzania and Malawi are immediate and obvious. Shops are full of imported goods and the variety of goods is so much more. It is so obvious that Malawi is the poor neighbour in these parts. 

I am up early the next day after a noisy night with my room next to the bar. I need to find a bus to Matema beach on the Tanzanian lakeshore. African Gospel music is playing in the bus. The bus drops and picks people all along the route, so the journey takes a while. The road crosses a flat floodplain and then the hills come into view that loom over the lakeshore. When I arrive the beach is very quiet and I sit for an hour listening to the waves hitting the shore. At the end of the beach is the fishing village of Ikombe. I walk down the beach and things get busier as I near the village. I find a room right on the beach which I think will be quite noisy tonight and I am right. The nights catch has been landed and women are cooking fried plantain and usipa. At the guest house Lottery Nyondo from Chilumba helps me settle in. I bump into lots of Malawian's here, a fisherman and a prostitute among them. I walk out of the village and down to some quiet beaches. It is really picturesque but the fishing beach is covered in litter. I have a little accident when I slip off a wet rock and trap my toes. I am out of cash and find a place to change $20. I settle into Anna's Pub for a Kilimanjaro and a Safari beer before teaching Anna the 'bottle top' trick. I was right and it proves a noisy night until gone midnight. Then the lights on the fishing boats light up the lake. I am up with the sunrise. I get some fried plantain and fish for breakfast. There is a lot happening including some gospel singers making a video using a drone, some young boys in 'wato' style canoes and kids going to school. 

The next morning the sounds of chickens and sweeping wake me early. I pack my bag and walk back along the beach. I am soon back in Kyela and again need to change some money. The 120 kilometre road to Mbeya winds up through the lush hills and tea estates. I decide to get off in Tukuyu and by 1pm I am in the Kivanga Guest House with a big double bed, mosquito net, warm blanket, clean sheets and two comfy pillows all for 10,000 MK (£3). Some of my clothes need a clean. I am less confident speaking here knowing no Swahili. It is a cold morning up in the hills. An early bus takes me to Mbeya and I head for my usual place to stay the Wema Guest House and get room 4. I get a chapati and a sweet tea from Florida and then a juicy pineapple. Most of the day is spent exploring Mbeya old town. It is a clear day and Mount Mbeya looms large over the city. Tanzania has a general election coming soon and on the TV are lots of election rallies and shows. The current President Samia Suluhu Hussain looms large over everything especially the road junctions. She was not elected but sworn in March 2021 after John Magafuli died so this will be her first election. People say she is just a 'puppet' but is tough on opposition leaders with Tundu Lissu recently charged with treason. My flight leaves at 6.45 pm tonight. I have very little money left so I decided to change up one last £20, buy some presents and be able to afford a bed in Dar near the airport. It proves a good decision. I check out at 10 am and kill a bit of time outside the guest house. I have a good feed of chapati's and beans at a cool roadside place before walking up to the old town. I get a very packed minibus to Mbalisi on the airport road. I stop a Tunduma bound bus and just about squeeze in by the door for the ten minute trip to the airport. A lot cheaper than the airport shuttle bus! In the old terminal airport toilets I have a strip down wash using the toilet sprayer. I throw some old dirty clothes in the bin and put on some clean clothes for the trip home. I am presentable again and I have 55,000 TS in my pocket. At Dar airport I consider for a second staying inside the terminal building but then head over the road to where the action is. I feast on hot fresh chapati's, avacado's and tea. I find a  room for 25,000 TS and sleep well. My Kigali flight is due to leave at 4.30 pm so I have some time to kill. The sandy back streets are interesting. A TANZAM fast train heads out of central Dar with the high rise centre in the distance. One last Kilimanjaro beer and I walk to the airport about 5 minutes across the road witnessing a comical bump between an old orange vendor pushing his cart and a three wheeled tuktuk. The place I stayed last night offers an airport shuttle which seemed a bit strange. The flight leaves on time, so does the Kigali Heathrow leg and I am back in good time to take an earlier bus into Victoria and Central London. After a few hours sitting in the sun on Chelsea Bridge I get the Newcastle 'National Express' bus heading north, remembering the aborted trip back north in 2017 that ended up in a London hospital. No such dramas this time as we arrive at 7.45pm on time. Cath collects me and I am due back to work in the morning. Images of Chitipa and Northern Malawi were in my head.