Homeward Bound

Day 59 & 60       15^th & 16^th November

We flew north to Mzuzu, with stunning views over Lake Malawi and much better visibility than when we flew in nearly 2 months ago. 

We refuelled and cleared customs, then on to Dodoma, Tanzania, with lovely views of tea estates and forest plantations below as we flew over the highlands.  

We had stonking headwinds all the way, making the flights even longer, and we finally arrived at Dodoma late afternoon to find that all the hotels were full due to a conference!  Thanks to a kind taxi driver, we ended up in a $20 per night guesthouse in town that was decidedly ‘local’ but at least it was clean and no bed bugs!  Never did a nice cold beer taste so good!  Wish we could say the same about the chicken & chips...

We were airborne by 7.30 am the following morning, thankfully with better winds, and after a brief stop in Mwanza to refuel, and a further stop at Entebbe to do the customs & immigration bit, we landed at Kajjansi at 1.45.

What an adventure it has been!

60 days

6 countries (7 if you include Uganda)

37 separate flights

60 hours of flying

5944 nautical miles

10,700 kilometers

Our little aeroplane has done us proud – apart from needing to pump up the tyres a couple of times, she has gone like a dream.  All the lodges we have stayed at have been fantastic on the whole, with friendly staff and vehicles that have collected us from airstrips on time every time – and no jackals ate our tyres!

Now it is down to sorting and editing around 300 GB of photos and videos – we not only took clips of interesting animals and their behaviour, but also had a GoPro on the plane, recording some of the scenery we flew over!!  We will continue to add the best of these to this blog site in due course for those not on facebook, and you can also follow my wildlife photography on https://www.facebook.com/Sherry-McKelvie-Wildlife-Photography-863968497007463/ if you enjoy it.

The plane will be up for sale early next year, as it is just too expensive to run privately, so if you know anyone that wants to buy a brilliant little Cessna 206, please tell them to get in touch (serious enquiries only!)

Thank you to all of you who have been following us, and especially to the team who were monitoring each flight on the Skytrack system.  We can see from the blog site that around 80 or so of you have been regular readers, but we don’t know who you are (apart from family & close friends of course), so if you can spare a moment to share who you are and from which country, please can you add a quick comment below?

Thanks so much.

Sherry & Jeremy

Majete magic

Day 57 & 58  13^th and 14^th November

Despite the weather in Harare in the morning, we managed to squeeze out low level from Charles Prince Airport and dodge the thunderstorms in Mozambique and arrived in Malawi in the pouring rain. Just as well since the situation in Zimbabwe the next day may have delayed us considerably! After clearing Customs and Immigration at Chileka Airport (Blantyre), we flew into a little airstrip at Majete National Park, in southern Malawi, where African Parks have been working at renovating and re-stocking since 2003, with remarkable success.  Read more at https://www.african-parks.org/the-parks/majete.

We stayed at another Robin Pope lodge, Mukulumadzi, on the banks of the Shire River, which starts in Lake Malawi and eventually joins the great Zambezi.  To get to the lodge one has to cross a swing bridge - and of course go back and forth every time one goes for a game drive - I don't like wobbles and Jeremy doesn't like heights.....!

A family of warthogs that live under the dining platform greeted us on arrival, and we found two elephants having a soak in the river outside our chalet, who later wandered past us.

The game viewing in the park was not exactly abundant since the rains had begun, but there were lots of Impala with new babies, fluffy Waterbuck, and some beautiful Nyala, similar to Kudu but smaller, which we had not seen before.  We loved their 'yellow socks' and the fur ridge on the backs of the males, which stands up when they are being aggressive.

The birds were lovely too, and we had one African Emerald Cuckoo that sat in the tree above our chalet each afternoon.  There were plenty of Bohm’s, Swallow-tail and Little Bee-eaters swooping around, a couple of nice Nightjars on a night drive (Fiery-necked and Square-tailed I think), a gorgeous Racket-tailed Roller, and I finally managed to get a photo of a Purple-crested Turaco, having tried at various camps and gardens in Zim and failed.

The park itself is a real gem – lovely trees and stunning views of the river and the mountains in the background.   In amongst the green were startlingly white tree trunks, locally called ghost trees but a form of African Chestnut.

On our first night, we had a big rain storm, which cooled and cleared the air, but also brought out the bugs in force the following night – beetles and spiders galore!  Whilst enjoying a drink before dinner, we were visited by a couple of very cute bushbabies, who dropped in for a quick peanut butter treat – the mum had been an orphan and hand-reared, and had taught her offspring to like it too.

On our final evening we did a sundowner cruise on the river.  Gorgeous sunset as usual!!

Harare

Day 49 – 56    5^th – 12^th November

After leaving Kariba we flew to Harare to spend a week with friends Linda and Oskar Rothen, who we met during our early days in Uganda.  They have a lovely home on the outskirts of Harare, in Umwinsidale.  It was a fun and social week, meeting up with some of their friends, various folk we had met on our earlier safari at Kavinga, a walk in Mukuvisi Woodland with ‘facebook friend’ Ann Warner and her family. We also enjoyed a marvelous curry dinner and an afternoon looking at old photographs with long-lost relative Tom, whose Grandfather was Jeremy’s Great-Grandfather.

Mukuvisi Woodland

One evening we attended a showing of some original footage of ‘Operation Noah’, when an amazing team of dedicated wildlife lovers rescued more than 7000 animals, from snakes to rhinos, over a period of 5 years from 1958, after the Kariba Dam was built and the valley gradually flooded, leaving the wildlife stranded on ever-decreasing islands. You can see a short clip here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_xaKRk870JU&hl=en-GB&gl=UG.

We also spent a delightful morning at the animal orphanage ‘Wild is Life’, meeting Moyo the baby elephant, Marimba the Pangolin and Noodle the Wildebeest, and feeding several giraffe, amongst others.  More info here http://www.wildislife.com/wildanimals.html.

This lion had the most enormous paws!

Harare itself was a surprise to both of us, with beautiful tree-lined avenues and lovely old houses with huge mature gardens.  The Jacaranda, Flamboyant (Flame) and Mimosa trees were all in bloom, and whilst some of the roads were pot-holed and only half the traffic lights worked at any one junction, the traffic was way less than in Kampala and - bliss! – hardly any motorbikes!

The political and economic situation is dire.  Farms are still being grabbed from white Zimbabwean farmers, who have put their whole lives and savings into them – just a month ago a beautiful, flourishing farm was taken from a family, and they were given just 6 hours to leave. 

The shopping centers were also a surprise with luxury goods still available, but at a price, and some nice shops, but shelves are slowly depleting in the supermarkets and businesses are closing at a terrifying rate, giving rise to massive unemployment.

Just a day after we left, the army took over and put President Mugabe under house arrest.  Hopefully the crazy downward spiral of the country can be contained peacefully and a new era begin.

We loved our time in Zim, and are sad to embark on the final part of our SKI Safari – 2 nights in Malawi and then back to Uganda via Dodoma where we spend one night.

Lake Kariba

Days 47 & 48       3^rd & 4^th November

The next stop on our journey was two nights at Musango Island on Lake Kariba.  We landed at Bumi Hills airstrip and then had a drive and a boat trip to the island, to the delightful Musango Safari camp run by Steve and Wendy Edwards for the last 25 years.  A lovely small, personal, tree-shaded lodge overlooking the lake and a great place to relax, with cool individual rooms among the trees, thatched down to the ground and little bushbuck wandering around.

We declined the game drives in favour of pottering round the lake shore on their pontoon boat, watching elephants coming to drink, and the odd herd of impala plus lots of lovely water birds, including the White Crowned Lapwing, which was a new bird for me, the Giant and Malachite Kingfisher, the Great Egret, Reed Cormorant and the Green-backed Heron, watched by the odd wary hippo and a terrapin.

A group of 8 fun-loving visitors from South Africa made for enjoyable get-togethers at mealtimes, and the food was superb.  The little swimming pool was a welcome refreshment in the heat of the day.

A highlight was having dinner under the stars with 3 elephant passing silently by along the beach in the moonlight.

Another fun activity was throwing a freshly-caught fish out into the lake and trying to photograph a Fish Eagle swooping down to pluck it from the water – we were allowed 3 attempts, and boy do they move fast!!  Luckily, with my Canon 7D II going flat out, I did manage to get one or two decent shots.

Shortly after the fish eagle fun, we were privileged to watch a beautiful Osprey cruising above us, then folding back his wings and diving at incredible speed into the water over and over again to catch his breakfast (unsuccessfully) until the Fish Eagle chased it off ‘his’ patch.

We were sad to leave such a lovely and unique little piece of paradise.

We are now in Harare, staying with friends Linda & Oskar Rothen, who used to live in Uganda.  We are here for a week before we move on next Monday to Malawi, so we won't be blogging for a few days.