A small country but with a lot to offer. Zambia’s eastern neighbour. One of the poorest countries in the world. Only half the size of Sweden but with 13 million inhabitants. A big variety in nature and landscape. One of our best vacations.
In March 2009 we flew with Kenya Airways into Lilongwe. It is just one hour very comfortable flight from Lusaka or some two days bumpy drive! From Lilongwe we had arranged with a rental car and soon we went through the hilly, green landscape towards Cape McClear at the southern part of the lake. We arrived to Danforth Yachting three hours later. Greeted by the two big dogs barking but turned out to be the most mellow kind of dogs. The nice couple, Howard and Michelle Massey-Hicks, who bought this place some ten years ago showed us to our room.
The first thing we did was to go down to the one gazebo where you have your breakfast, lunch, dinner and afternoon coffee. We turned two chairs around so that they faced the beach and the lake, had some coffee and watch our kids play in the sand. This is how it continued. Such a relaxed atmosphere.
Danforth Yachting is not only about relaxation, good food and drinks. They can also offer you all kinds of water sports such as scuba diving, snorkelling, hobie cat sailing, kayaking, waterskiing etc. You can also spend some days or weeks cruising the lake on board ‘Mufasa’, their big catamaran.
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After breakfast one day we went out on the lake to do some snorkelling. We spent a day in a nice and sheltered lagoon on one of the islands visible from the mainland. We were provided with all snorkelling gear and we brought some left over bread to feed the huge amount of different species of fish found in the lake. Not only the kids were fascinated! In between all snorkelling we had a nice lunch which the chef prepared for us on board the boat. On our way back to shore we had a good view watching the eagles from on top of the roof of the boat.
Four days at Danforth was not enough but we had to move on. We went straight south from the lake to Zomba. We stayed at Ku Chawe Inn, placed literally on the rim of the Zomba Plateau. The air was cooler at this level, the vegetation was more lush and green but still you could see a lot of baboons climbing the pine trees. From the hotel you had a great view overlooking the mountainous landscape. You could even see as far south as to Mount Mulanje, said to be the second highest mountain in Africa.
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After a nice dinner we went back to our room where the hotel staff had already lit the fire in the stove. We put more logs on and soon fell asleep thinking of Malawi how diversified as a country. The next morning we took of hiking the mountain. With kids we actually drove our car on the mountain and made a few stops hiking the sorrounding areas. The mountain is full of waterfalls, lakes, hilly climbs, nice forests and always breathtaking views.
The last part of our vacation we stayed in Blantyre. We spent one day going even more south down to Mount Mulanje. The mountain arose impressively in the distance and this day with clouds flowing down the sides. As far as you could see in the surrounding rolling landscape beneath, there were huge plantations of tea and coffee and sometimes tobacco hung out to dry. We parked our car and went for a walk to one of the many waterfalls. If you have more time you can hike the mountain for a few days and walk from cabin to cabin.
The day after we left Blantyre to catch the flight back to Lusaka from Lilongwe. On our way we stopped for lunch in Dedza at Dedza Pottery. They make some nice pottery from white clay but with a variety of nice glazing.
We spent some ten days in Malawi but could easily have spent a lot more. Malawi is definitely on the list of our top three vacations.
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