'The warm heart of Africa'

The following morning at 0800, we ventured on to the Zambian-Malawian border with an American guy called Matt we had met at Dean’s Lodge. The border crossing was fairly subdued in comparison with the last (less chickens, and no rivers involved)...all we had to do was sign our names in a visitor book and write our passport numbers! We spent a while daring each other to write Father Christmas, but decided eventually it wasn’t worth the risk.

After the border we took a bus to Lilongwe, the capital city of Malawi. There were already noticeable differences in the landscape from the previous to countries, rather than flat dusty roads we were traveling on windy roads through the hilltops and lush greenery all around. That said, there was still noticeable poverty there were still potholes everywhere which we’re beginning to find comforting!

On the ay we were briefed by a local guy on the recent riots that had been happening all across Malawi - Lilongwe, Mzuzu and Blantyre were the three main cities that had been hit. Sadly around 19 innocents were killed by police in the demonstrations. There is another riot scheduled for the 20^th, so we were sure to be out of there before it all kicked off again. We were told that the government is a mess and the President has been changing his priorities (apparently due pressure from his recent wife, a politician herself). Malawi, sadly has had a lot of bad press for having some of the highest rates of HIV/AIDS, and totally grim poverty statistics.

We rolled into Lilongwe at around midday, to a great backpackers called Mabuya Lodge where we found a group just heading out to a local football match with a local guy called James. They kindly invited us to join so we paid the equivalent of 30p entrance and went with them! The team was the Silver Strikers, they are a professional team in Malawi and James played for them when he was younger.

The people we met in Lilongwe were so generous and welcoming, and despite the alarming statistics, its nickname ‘the warm heart of Africa’ is thoroughly deserved. Having had a hectic couple of weeks of travel we decided to trek on for one more day up to Nkhata Bay, at the north end of the lake where we could stop to recoup for a little while!