A holiday in Nkhata Bay
Trip Start
Feb 20, 2007
1
27
38
Trip End
Jun 2007
Nkhata Bay,
Malawi
Tuesday, May 1, 2007
The morning I took a matola to Nkhata Bay was chilly and rainy again, and I caught a cold on the way, as I was sitting by the window which had to be kept open for the passengers behind me. The skies cleared as we left the mountains surrounding Mzuzu, and by the time we arrived in Nkhata Bay an hour later the sky was blue. My spirits lifted with the weather as I saw the beauty of this little lakeside town
Beach, Ruarwe
. The town is essentially comprised of a few dusty streets with little shops and vendors selling fish and fruits. The hills behind are covered in trees, and the main attraction is the beautifully blue lake, shimmering under the hot sun, with the faded outlines of the mountains marking the border between Mozambique and Tanzania on the opposite side. The scenery and laid-back feel of the town reminded me a lot of Ko Pha Ngan island in Thailand.I checked into Big Blue Lodge, near town, where I got a spacious bamboo hut with a view of the lake, which was only 10m away. The place was lovely, with good food, a private beach and extremely friendly staff. I spent two days there, mainly relaxing, reading, writing and swimming. The lake's water is 28°C, so it was lovely to dive in and cool off every hour or so during my lazy time spent here. There is a small risk of catching Bilhazia, a water-borne disease carried by little snails in the lake, but I have purchased tablets that will take care of that problem.
One night I went to town to watch the first leg of the Chelsea-Liverpool Champions League semi-final, in a lovely little outdoors bar in town. There were about twenty men sitting around a small television there, and although there was little room I was immediately offered one of the best seats. Any polite refusals on my part to take the seat were ignored. I had great banter with the men who were watching the game, declaring myself to be a Chelsea supporter for the night, as most of them were Liverpool fans. After the game I was convinced to move on to the town's nightclub, Club 672, where I danced the night away with a big gang of friendly men. The club's prostitutes seemed too shy to approach me, and although I could feel myself being watched by them I was thankfully left alone for the night
Coast of Nkhata Bay
.After two days I moved to Butterfly Lodge, on the other side of town. My reason for this was that there was only one other tourist in Big Blue for all my time there. Although I usually don't like meeting too many tourists (I'm in Africa, and prefer to spend time with Africans), I have been starved of western company for so long now that I needed a quick dose of it to keep me sane. Butterfly didn't have too many tourists either, but it had the advantage of being next door to Mayoka Village, which is Nkhata Bay's backpacker magnet. Here I met, and made friends with, many lovely fellow travelers, from all over the world. I even met two Irish backpackers, an occurrence that is so rare here in Africa that it deserves a mention. My days were spent doing very little, reading, writing, listening to music, swimming (at least five times a day) and chatting with my new friends.
I went diving one day in the lake, which cost me back a mere $25. I have heard that Nkhata Bay is the cheapest place in the world to dive in; I had hoped to do my Advanced course here but there weren't enough people to make up a class. Diving in the lake was somewhat different to sea-diving. For starters, the buoyancy is completely different (because there is no salt in the water), and there is no coral on the bottom
Fishermen on the lake at dusk, Nkhata Bay
. The fish in the water are nearly all from the Cichlidae family, and have all evolved from two types of fish. They were coloured bright blues, yellows and whites, and usually measured no longer than six to eight inches long. One type of female Cichlid keeps its offspring in its mouth most of the time in order to protect them, occasionally allowing them out to play. We came across one such fish, with the babies outside, swimming near their mother. Unfortunately we came too close, and the mother abandoned them, leaving them open to attack from other fish. A few were indeed eaten before we got a chance to back off enough for the mother to return. All the babies bunched up in a tiny group as the mother approached and they suddenly disappeared, into the safety of their mother's mouth.As I hadn't dived in nearly a year I was quite rusty on everything. I had to be helped assembling my equipment, and had troubles with buoyancy for the first twenty minutes or so of the dive. After a while everything began to come back to me and I was able to relax and enjoy the diving and the beautiful fish that were all around us. There were many rocks under the water, and we swam through long narrow passageways surrounded completely by these rocks. This was fun, if a little claustrophobic and frightening - they were not the sort of place one would want to get stuck in.
I befriended a lovely Swiss man named Alan while at Butterfly
Lodge, Ruarwe
. He had been passing through the area two weeks ago and had been given a job minding a lodge 50km up the coast, in Ruarwe, while its owner went on holidays. Ruarwe has no road going there, no electricity, no phone coverage; it is truly in the middle of nowhere. There are two ways of getting there; firstly by taking a truck along a dirt road for nine hours from Mzuzu to Usisya, and then walking for five hours along the coast, or secondly by taking the ferry, the MV Ilala up there. Because of its cut-off nature the place hadn't seen any guests in quite a while and Alan told me that the staff had no money left to receive wages from. I decided to go up there for a night, to see the place, to help the staff, and to visit what was by all accounts a beautiful place. Alan and I managed to round up five others - two Israelis and three Norwegians - to come with us, and the next day we all set off.The night before leaving was Alan's birthday, and the locals threw quite a party for him at Butterfly. Although he had only been there for two weeks it seemed like he knew everyone and this party showed just how popular he was. This is not just a reflection on how likeable Alan is, but also on how welcoming the locals are. Even after a week I felt I knew half the town, and my daily trek into the supermarket to buy water took three times longer than it should have because of stopping to talk with all my new buddies
M.V. Ilala coming to ferry us away down the lake
. The party was one of the best I have ever been at - we sang and danced on the beach for five hours, with Jambe drums and African melodies providing our music. We swam under a full moon, admiring the stars, and relaxed on a raft that was tied up a hundred metres off the shore. Everyone there was friendly and in great form, and it was one of the best nights I have had in Africa.The next day we caught the Ilala to Ruarwe, a four hour ride north on the lake. We were all very tired and feeling a little rough, but it was exciting to be on a boat again, and on such a spur-of-the-moment trip to this remote part of Malawi. The Ilala was built in the 1940s by a Glaswegian company, and nowadays it is the lifeblood of Lake Malawi, making weekly trips up and down its length. People in places like Ruarwe, which have no road access, rely on it for transport and delivery of all sorts of goods. As I was mulling over its importance I thought that it mightn't be a bad idea for a government to donate another ship like it to Malawi, perhaps the savings made by supplying NGO workers with normal cars instead of big 4x4s might produce the money required. The ship has three floors, again with first, second and third classes, a little restaurant and two bars. We traveled second class, which was comfortable; we lay out on a canvas covering on an open deck and worked on our farmer's tans.
I spoke with Chris, an Englishman who I had been staying next door to in Butterfly Lodge, for most of the way
Market day, Nkhata Bay
. He is working with an NGO in Usisya which seems to be quite good. They have a focus on education, and are actively seeking to encourage local farmers to diversify what crops they grow. At the moment most only grow one or two types, mainly maize or cassava, which form the majority of their diet. Naturally, eating such a limited diet is unhealthy, and they are encouraging them to plant other crops such as tomatoes and fruit trees in order to improve their diets. They have made a "demonstration garden" within their grounds where they have grown some of these plants and trees in order to show the locals what can be grown in Usisya. They then give seeds for free to anyone who wants them, and teach the locals how to plant these crops. The uptake has been slow - Chris said that a lot of what they do takes time before being accepted by the locals, as they are suspicious of the NGO's intentions. At first, he said, the locals were very wary of the NGO, and thought that they were there to make money. Now, however, they have grown to trust them more. They also have plans to build a library for the locals, and Chris is looking into solar panels so that they could have a computer there too.We arrived in Ruarwe at about noon, and were dropped to a beach with a small lifeboat as the Ilala couldn't pull up to the shore. There were about a hundred locals there, most waiting to board the Ilala to travel further north
People waiting on the Ilala in Ruarwe
. We were greeted with stares - they are so isolated here that the arrival of seven mzungus is most likely quite a curious occurrence. The children always look quite frightened of me in this kind of situation. I often play on this by returning their stare expressionlessly for five seconds, and then suddenly sticking out my tongue at them and crossing their eyes. This always gets a reaction, whether it is laughter or absolute bewilderment. Sometimes I run at them making a monster-like noise, and they always take fright and run for their lives. Once they stop and see I'm laughing they laugh with me, and that barrier of fear is broken down. The parents particularly like this game, and laugh appreciatively.We had to walk for about twenty minutes along a grassy path to the lodge, passing many simple houses made of red mud bricks and thatched with straw. All along the way people stared at us, returning smiles. My greetings in Chichewa were often not returned, not out of hostility, I later learned, but because they speak a local language here and many do not speak Malawi's national language. The lodge itself was wonderful, carefully camouflaged into the hill it was built on, with stone paths leading from hut to hut and to the bar. The bar itself had a back wall made from a natural rock formation, and had wonderful wooden carvings decorating the place. Below the bar there was a place where we could swim, which we did immediately
Sunset, Nkhata Bay
. The water was very deep, and there was a high rock from which we could jump the 10m or so down to the water below. I eagerly climbed up the rock, thinking only of the jump, but once I was half way up I remembered my fear of rock climbing from a close call I had when climbing in Kerry as a child. It was too late to go back, and I slowly made my way up to the top and leapt off. We returned to Nkhata Bay the following morning with the Ilala, feeling much better after a relaxing day at Ruarwe. Unfortunately we couldn't stay any longer, as it would have meant waiting a week for the Ilala to return, essentially the only form of transport available to us. On the boat I spoke with an Adventists pastor who approached me. I asked him about how he manages for money living in a rural community like Usisya (where his Church is), thinking maybe he relied on American donations. What he told me was rather shocking - they use the old "Jewish" (his words, not mine) system of collecting tithes from their congregation. So every farmer who is a member of this Church has to pay the pastor one tenth of what he earns in a year. I couldn't believe that a man of God would find it acceptable to take such a large amount of money from what Chris had told me are very poor people. Donations to a Church are somewhat acceptable, at least they are voluntary and people can give what they choose. The tithe system essentially puts a forced tax on these people, further eating into what little means they have. I wonder if Jesus Christ would have agreed with this practice.
