Warm people, cold beer

After a delicious breakfast of pau, scrambled eggs and bacon with filter coffee and a great view, we headed down to the Guinjata beach one last time, Werner feeling particularly sad to be leaving! We drove back to the main road, amid dancing children, goats and villagers. We headed south again, this time for Bilene, which was known as a popular playground for the wealthy Maputenses.

Just past Xai Xai we knew we were coming up to the bridge under construction, which had caused us a fair amount of delay on the way up, and we dreaded the queues that might have formed. As we approached we saw that the queues on our side of the bridge weren't too bad, but on the other side they were massive. Just our luck though, as we arrived a truck had broken down RIGHT in the middle of the bridge, and there was no way around! Werner went to check it out and we decided to seek an alternative route.

We followed some other cars down a dirt road, which went through a lot of farmland, lush and green. We drove for quite a while down this road with no idea where we would end up as the GPS refused to locate us. The cars were streaming down this track as they all were looking for the alternative route. Eventually we came to a start of a settlement, but there was a narrow part in the road, and another enormous truck was stupidly trying to get through. We all had to move out of the way, and amazingly he made it. Finally we rejoined the main road and the GPS was happy again.









We stopped in the chilli growing region of Inhacoonga to buy some super hot piri piri sauce at one of the many stalls on the side of the road. After another few hours, we turned down the road to Bilene, this one was in excellent condition, but sadly the sellers here were selling wood, charcoal and indigenous plants, frying in the hot sun...



We pulled into the Praia do Sol resort, whose motto is "Warm people, cold beer", and were indeed warmly welcomed by Solly. He, and a group of ladies carried our stuff to our little hut, through a beautiful jungle like path. The accommodation was again basic but very clean and full of character! Made entirely from local materials, the hut had two single beds under a huge mosquito net, with complimentary mosquito coils, and a neat bathroom. There was mesh instead of windows under the roof, and again no curtains, so not too much privacy!









Thee was a shared kitchen hut between 3 units, which was excellently kitted out and in fact very pleasant to sit in, amid the shady trees and birdsong. It had a gas braai, gas stove, two fridges and locked cupboards with everything you could need for cooking! We used what was left of our supplies to make pau jaffles deliciously filled with tuna, sweet corn, baked beans and cheese, washed down with gin and tonics, yummy!






Next we headed down to the beach, right next to the resort. Bilene is located on an estuary, in front of the sea, and all the resorts are on the estuary side. The sand was the whitest we had seen, but a little coarser than other beaches. There were a few families chilling under the umbrellas and playing with their kids. A jetski was parked on the sand and was later used to pull a bunch of kids on a banana.









We had a swim but the water was extremely shallow, too warm and slightly green... We decided to stay standing in the water and challenge ourselves with a bit of beach tennis.

Later we took a walk down the beach, spotting a few more isolated resorts, a dead eel, and some fisherman.


We then retreated to the bar for 2M beers overlooking the lovely view of the beach.





Before dinner we had to draw some mets, since none of the ATMs in Xai Xai seemed to be working... We managed to find the ATM in the Bilene town with no problem and drew enough cash for the last of our trip, since the hotel had no credit card facility. As we drove through the town we saw an interesting mix of Mozambiquans and foreigners in the streets, some enjoying the little restaurants, bars and shebeens in the area. We passed the market and there were even a few stalls still open.

We had our last dinner in Mozam at the Praia do Sol restaurant, and spoiled ourselves to delicious prawns and barracuda, washed down with beer and R&R!






We again woke up early, due to the lack of curtains. The huge, quite attractive mosquito net had been completely useless in the night, as it didn't close properly, but our saving grace was a standing fan which kept the biters at bay. We made a yummy breakfast of baked beans, sweet corn, eggs and pau, the last of our stocks, and contemplated how to spend our last hours in Mozam.

We checked out, packed the car, donned swimming cozzies and grabbed snorkeling gear and packed this into a double canoe we had rented for an hour. The barman had told us we could paddle to the estuary mouth, and thus the sea, in around 25 minutes. This was our plan, since we didn't have a boat of our own, and there was no other way to reach the sea


We set off against a mild current, in the warm shallow estuary, and soon realised there was no way we would make it in 25 minutes! After around an hour of hard paddling, we finally beached the canoe in the soft sand in the estuary mouth, amongst quite a few other boats and jetskis, all of which had reached there with a motor!

We ran into the clean turquoise ocean, the waves breaking erratically towards the mouth, and had a super quick swim before heading back. We had already had the boat longer than we paid for, plus we were supposed to be on the road to Nelspruit by this time!

The paddle back was even more taxing - the current kept pushing us into extremely shallow sand banks, and at times we had to get out and push! Finally we made it back after more than two hours, exhausted but satisfied!
It was only on the road to Nelspruit that we realised the folly of not putting sunscreen on our legs the whole time!

And so ended a fabulous trip, in Werner's words "one of the best holidays ever!"

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Location:Bilene, Mozambique

A little piece of South Africa

The turn off to Guinjata, Coconut bay and Paindane is off the potholed road just before Inhambane. It became sand pretty quickly and we pulled over to deflate our tyres. Further down the road we came across a number of dancing children - naughty little boys standing right in the road doing some kind of hilarious cross between the chicken dance and pelvic thrusting, afterwards holding out their hands in the hope of sweets.

We later pulled into the Cumbini resort, and waited for the owner to drive up in her Pajero. She took our docs and escorted us to our house - quite a large and solid looking thatched unit with a large (empty) living area and fully kitted out kitchen, with two bedrooms and an amazing view over the sparkling sapphire sea. The accommodation was fairly basic but for the first time we had a working fridge and huge freezer plus 24 hour electricity, so we were pretty happy! 10 minutes later the resort staff showed up selling fresh pau (Portugese rolls), just in time for lunch.









After having a look at the pool and restaurant, which was playing Sokkie treffers, we took a drive to check out the famous Taurus supermarket, a South African run store and the only real supermarket we had come across. The store had absolutely everything you could need, although unfortunately no fish as apparently no one was catching. So we stocked up on a thick juicy South African steak and some lamb choppies for our dinners.






Next we walked down to check out the beach and were amazed once we got to the main swimming area, it was absolutely packed with South African families, each one with their beach gazebos and tents lined up along the superb soft clean sand. There were tons of jetskis playing in the waves and kids swimming. We risked the bluebottles and had a swim, then relaxed on the beach for a while in the hot sun, wishing we had brought a gazebo, cooler box and chairs like everyone else!






We walked back to the house and chuckled at the Cumbini owner who had looked shocked that we wanted to walk to the beach. She recommended to drive down, and it seemed that was what everyone else did. She even drove around the resort in her Paj, no one liked to walk here!

Around 18:00 we drove, yes drove, to Jeffs dive centre down the beach, for dive planning. We were greeted very warmly in Afrikaans by the crew at Jeffs. I had emailed to request a Manta reef dive and we were pleased that they had booked us on the 6:30am dive out there. We confirmed all our details and then headed back to braai for the night.




The braai was an excellent sturdy construction with a chimney and a great view, and we enjoyed a glass of wine as the sun went down. The steaks were really delicious and we were starting to make our way through the ton of food we had brought with.



The next morning we woke up with the sun and headed to Jeffs for our first dive. The boat was full for the 25 minute bumpy boat ride out to Manta reef, one of Mozambique's most famous reefs for its Manta cleaning stations. We dived Nitrox and had a good dive but sadly no Mantas... We did see many other awesome marine life though, such as enormous schools of fish which didn't even swim away as we cruised through them, 4 massive potato basses, which were also very chilled, and large eels, even two white tip reef sharks! We also saw the manta acoustic equipment the scientists had told us about, and really enjoyed the dive.

Back to Cumbini for lunch and a swim in the pool, then back to Jeffs for our second dive at 13:30, this time to Devils peak - a closer and shallower dive site. The dive briefing was my first ever briefing in Afrikaans! It was an incredibly beautiful dive site, with many amazing corals and anemones, and we saw eels, a large stingray, porcupinefish, leaf fish, nudibranch and many more. We went through a narrow swim through, into a cave full of different fish. The visibility wasn't great and sadly still no mantas, but no matter! That concluded our diving for the trip and we hoped to come back another time and have more luck with the mantas and whale sharks!

I accidentally left the suncream on the dive boat, so we hung around waiting for it to return, and grabbed an R&R drink at the "Dusk til Dawn" beach bar, relaxing on their hammocks and watching the waves. We shopped at the few market stalls, selling everything from sarongs and T-shirts to carvings to bracelets. Werner grabbed a quick swim before the boat returned. We concluded our day with a long nap before braaiing again for our last night in Guinjata.







The last morning we again woke up early, and I used the opportunity to take some lovely photos of the view at sunrise.






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Location:Guinjata Bay, Mozambique

A piece of paradise

We left Tofo after finalising our Nitrox divers license, and picking up some pau (Portugese rolls) on a grey and rainy day. We were feeling relaxed and happy as we drove along the sand path that leads out of Tofo. Little did we know we were about to get caught by our first Moz traffic cop... Dressed in white shirt and cap, he pulled us over before leaving Tofo, still on the sand "road", and pointed out that Werner was not wearing his seat beat, and that he had committed some other offense we could not fathom due to language barriers. Eventually he got us to park in a different place, and it dawned on us that the road was in fact a one way and we had been going the wrong way! We didn't even realize there was more than one way! So we pleaded ignorance and apologised profusely, and managed to get away with it, fine and bribe free.

We turned and drove back the "right way" and when we got back to the traffic cop, his policeman friend asked if he could have a lift. We figured it was the least we could do, and took the polite guy to a petrol station some way down the road towards Inhambane.

Back in Inhambane, we drew some more mets and stopped to fill up. The language again got a bit confusing and for a moment we worried whether we had filled with diesel or not. We checked the guidebook and confirmed with relief that "gasoleo" is in fact diesel, while "gasolina" is petrol.

We drove back down the bay, and then around towards the town of Maxixe, directly opposite Inhambane across the water, but fairly far by car. Maxixe lacks any of the charms of Inhambane, and is laid out in a grid like pattern, with a few petrol stations and little else of note.

After another hour or so we reached the town of Massinga, and 10km further we turned off towards Pomene. The road was dirt, more like mud, and at this point we found out that we had 54km of this to get through! It was still drizzling intermittently, and Werner had to drive very cautiously through the mud tracks. We passed through some villages, where the children cried "sweeeets" as we passed... We eventually reached the entrance to the nature conservation area of Pomene, where we parted with 600mets.






From here onward, the road was more like sand, and actually a little easier in the wet conditions. After a number of kms, we reached a sign announcing "Welcome to Pomene city" and entered a large local village area, complete with some curio shops, many huts, even a caravan and boat, all amongst swaying palm trees. The cries of the children changed to one of "chocolaaaaate" as we drove past and waved, wishing we still had more stationery to hand out rather than sugar.




The road took us past mangroves of amazing trees growing right in the salt water, and at one point we started having to swerve to avoid crabs. They were beautiful - small and black with one huge red and yellow claw. And they were crawling around the mangroves in their thousands! We stopped to take photos as the sand grew thicker... After over an hour of driving like this, and barely seeing another car, we started wondering why we were going to this place, and imagining that we could easily be the only ones there...






As the sand got thicker and thicker, we started seeing signs of Pomene lodge, and eventually pulled in, shocked to see many many campers and their 4x4s - almost more people than we had seen in Tofo! We parked up beside reception and checked in, marveling at the filthy state of our car. After this we experienced our first "almost stuck in the sand moment" as we tried to pull off. Letting air out of the tires did the trick, and we headed off to our beautiful water chalet...






The chalet was one of ten, built on stilts right over the sublime estuary with views to die for. It consisted of a large bedroom with a huge king bed, lovely patio with chairs for chilling and a neat bathroom with all we needed. We celebrated our arrival with ice cold Savannahs on our patio, watching as the tide went out. We spotted a huge flock of beautiful pink flamingoes in the estuary and watched as they ate, faces underwater. We were asked to place our dinner order before 16:00, so we walked over and chatted to Ian, the head chef. He recommended the crab curry, which I couldn't resist, and Werner decided on fresh king mackerel.















We had a few hours to kill before dinner, so we started with a quick walk on the beach. Quite different from the other beaches we had visited, this beach had no dunes, and quite a lot of plants growing in the sand near the fringes. The sand was the same white silky soft texture, and the sea deep blue and wonderfully warm. A large number of pine trees added to the palms, and we wondered whether these were indigenous to this area. They dropped spiky seed balls on the sand which was the only downside to the shade and shelter they provided.









Next we drove to the "old hotel" - a once beautiful Portugese style hotel which has been abandoned and fallen into ruin. We drove through the "Pomene city" village to get there, and drove up some very sandy tracks before parking. The location of the hotel is awesome, situated in a spit of land that juts out into the sea, with fabulous views over the beaches on both sides.














We walked around the old crumbling buildings, red tiles smashed on the floors and graffiti on the walls... The place had a kind of eerie post apocalyptic feel, and we were the only ones wondering around the ruins. We saw beautiful beaugainevilleas and mosaics and tried to imagine what the place would have been like. We walked to the edge of the spit and spotted some fishermen trying their luck off the end.












We returned to the lodge in time for a shower, a rest and then dinner. The "Cowrie Cove" restaurant had been beautifully laid out with five tables outside overlooking the pool and estuary. The crab curry was delicious, served whole and almost hugging the rice. I had to work hard with the provided board and hammer like tool to get the meaty flesh from inside the crab and claws. Werner also really enjoyed his fish. This was followed by the second best creme brûlée I have ever had (no one beats my sister's). We finished with a cup of tea before retiring to our super soft extra large bed.









The next morning we woke up early, something we were getting used to on this trip as the sun rises before 5:00 and most places had inadequate curtains... We didn't mind as it gave us a great opportunity to go exploring. The weather was still cool and cloudy, quite pleasant after the heat of Tofo. We walked along the estuary all the way to the mouth, spotting shells, hermit crabs and even a sad dead puffer fish along the way. The flamingoes were chilling near the sea, and we debated whether we could wade across to them but it was a bit too deep. So walked along the deserted beach instead, feeling the wind pick up as we left the shelter of the estuary.
























After the walk, we were feeling a strong desire for coffee as none was provided in our room, so we showed up to breakfast a little early and they let us sip our coffee by the pool while they finished getting ready. Breakfast was excellent - continental of fresh fruit and the yummiest warm home baked muffins, plus a choice of an English breakfast or omlette.

After breakfast we explored further up the estuary, and found the dive centre and horse stables. We played some beach tennis and frisbee on the soft sand, struggling a little with the wind. We self catered our lunch and then chilled with gin and tonics on the deck until the time came to go snorkeling.









The lodge had created a false reef near their dive centre, in the estuary, by sinking a truck and quad bike, and a whole bunch of tires. We swam out to the boat which marked the spot, and struggled against the current to try and reach the reef. It was really hard work, but really rewarding, as we saw a huge puffer fish and it's baby, trigger fishes, butterfly fishes and many other beautiful reef fish.

For dinner that night we had both ordered the Portugese chicken with chips/wedges, and really enjoyed it with its piri piri sauce. We also had our first try of the most famous Mozambiquan holiday drink, the R&R - made with Moz Tipo Tinto Rum and Rasberry soda, so delicious and didn't even taste like it had alcohol in it...



The next morning woke us with brilliant sunshine as the cloudy weather had passed, and we again started our day with a lovely walk. We enjoyed our breakfast, sad that we would have to leave soon. We decided on a swim in the sea, and were followed by Polly, the lodge's adorable little dog. She loved running with us on the beach, and while Werner was catching waves, I laughed as she had cleverly cornered a crab, and was barking at it wildly while it tried to nip her with its claws.


As we left, the roads, if you can call them that, were quite different from the way in, as it was quite a bit drier. The sand was a lot softer, and the mud at least set into a harder dirt road. We stopped back at the old hotel on our way out, checking out the rock pools we had not seen on the last trip. We discovered another lodge on this side of the sea, and some families sunbathing and swimming with their kids.









At the conservation gate we stopped to reinflate our tires, and again picked up a hitchhiker - this time a park worker on his way back to his family in Massia. Once we said farewell to him, we continued our adventure, this time heading back down south to Guinjata bay.



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Location:Pomene, Mozambique