Our welcome to Mozambique had a good and bad side. The bad side came first, with the hassle and hustle at the border. The process of temporarily importing the car, being told to pay a couple of dollars for the privilege of buying the form that we have to fill out, and a rather rude policeman who shouted at me to open the car for inspection. In the latter two cases, we refused to pay for the form, and didn't open the car for inspection. Long live diplomatic number plates...
From the border, we headed towards the capital Maputo, where the good side was waiting for us, namely an Italian friend of mine who I knew from a 2007 training course in Turin, and subsequent encounters in Nairobi and New York. Pasquale had moved to Maputo a couple of months before, with his wife Sara and their two kids. Another good friend, again Italian, that we were able to catch up with was Manuela, who I knew from the same training course and who had spent two years in New York at the same time as us and became close friends with Christel.
Maputo elicits a mix of emotions, feelings and thoughts. On the one hand, it is a hectic, bustling and tropical city located on a beautiful stretch of the Indian Ocean, surrounded by white beaches and palm trees. At the same time, the seafood available is ridiculously tasty, they do proper espressos and there is a very laid back atmosphere. On the other hand, many of its buildings are in a state of disrepair or even decay, rental prices seem to have reached Manhattan levels, people try to steal things from your car (bye bye Nissan hub caps).
We had a busy couple of days, went on a scenic tuk tuk tour of the city with Pasquale and family, and drove along the beach front filled with local parties together with Manuela. We also visited the stunning train station on a couple of occasions, once for the sights and twice for the drinks and nightlife. On Sunday, we took the ferry across to Catembe and drove out of town in an attempt to get to the elephant reserve, before realising that the roads were quite a bit worse than expected and heading back for a lunch in Catembe and a ferry ride back to Maputo.
On Monday morning, Pasquale and Manuela went to work, and Christel and I headed north towards the famed beaches of southern Mozambique.
Unfortunately, we had hyped up these beaches a little bit too much, to the extent that when we reached Bilene and looked around for a place to spend the night, that we were bitterly disappointed by the ridiculously high prices charged for dismally maintained rooms. The lagoon that borders the town, looked pretty when we drove down from the adjoining hills, but as soon as we got there, a force 7-8 wind ensured that it was not going to be the most enjoyable of stays. We had a decent lunch in a small restaurant by the beach, before settling on one of the overpriced rooms further along the beach. Camping would have been an even less enjoyable option, as the wind continued to blow fiercely until the next day, so we bit the bullet and shelled out $100 for a room.
Our sleep had been disturbed by power cuts that cancelled out the functionality of the air conditioning and marauding mosquitoes that were clever enough to feast on Christel as opposed to myself, and the next day we were glad to leave Bilene behind us, as we sought out beaches further along the coast.
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