June 25, 2004
We're in Blantyre, Malawi. We arrived late-ish yesterday after three rather rattling days of public transportation through Mozambique. We were on what passes for national highways the entire time, but the roads were generally worse than gravel roads in rural Idaho. Adding to the pleasure was the fact that all of the transport options are old prison buses. Not really, but they certainly look like it. The best one (or worst, really) was the minibus we took from Vilankulos to Chimoio. It had major spiderwebbed cracks running the full width of the windshield that had been repaired with putty. The putty, however, must have been failing, because we spent the whole trip with a broom handle shoved into the front seat back while the broom head was positioned against the largest radiating break in the window, 'hopefully' buttressing any probable implosion.
The scenery outside, though, was stunning. We went from tropical coastline to inland savanna grasslands. We saw thousands of coconut palms, which was fun, though David reminded me of the large number of people killed each year by falling coconuts. Baobab trees abound, too, a tree I've always wanted to see. [The really cool ones that look like the roots have sprouted out of the top, usually seen littering African landscapes when Westerners take pictures.] In an effort to make it four travel days in a row, we're off in an hour or so for Mulanje, which is the town at the base of Mt. Mulanje, which we hope to climb for the next few days.