9th August 08

Date: 9th August 08
Location: Hwane, Swaziland
Weather: Clear blue skies and sunshine but cold to start. 24°c
Status: All together and happy to be moving towards Mozambique…

Up late and finally cleared out the mess from the night before, we’d decided last night to recreate our very own Olympic opening ceremony as the real Olympics started in Beijing on Friday evening! This involved a few bottles of wine, some hastily created props including a torch and a number of special events. Hasten to say to debris left afterwards required some cleaning up!

Hit the road east towards the border between Swaziland and Mozambique, wasn’t too far away so we pulled into the capital Mbabane for a bite of lunch and then drove the remaining 80kms to the border. We bought our visas here at a cost of R175, the car insurance at R80 and 20 minutes later all of the documents and passports were ready to collect. Simple borders are an absolute pleasure….

As we drove through the initial parts of Moz the scenery started to change with the most obvious being the introduction of coconut palms….everywhere!!! this was my most overriding memory when I visited the country 8 years ago to watch the eclipse!

We drove through familiar territory for me passing recognisable petrol stations, toll booths and the industrial zone of Maputo and as the sun dropped down in the sky started to look for somewhere to spend the night, the four of us all together out camping for the first time!

We’d aimed to get all the way through to Imhambane and Tofo beach but the lack of daylight beat us and using the gps system located a campsite on the beach just north of the capital, Maputo at Macaneta.

I thought it would be an easy beach camp but as we drove through the town the gps directed the Colonel straight to the ferry on the edge of the marshes! We enquired with the locals who recommended it as a good place to camp and boarded the 4 car ferry! The rickety old chug boat took us across in 10 mins and after driving for 20 mins on some rutted muddy roads arrived at the campsite.

Dinner and bed.

End of day location: Macaneta, Mozambique
Distance covered: ???