Day 114-115: Mfuwe to Mchinji

January 24, 2025 to January 25, 2025

Animal watching

The point of the detour to Mfuwe was to visit the South Luangwe National Park. We had a recommendation of a guide from a cycling French couple we met in Botswana. Cath had organised a day of driving around the park with the guide via WhatsApp.

Apparently, we were lucky (don’t they always say that?) to stumble across a leopard and cubs, a pride of lions (very sleepy under a tree), some hunting dogs (also dozing under a tree) and the normal list of herbivores (hippo, giraffe, elephant, and a pile of gazelle-like animals). We probably were lucky – in the wet season the animals don’t need to stay as close to the river as during the dry and so they head into the jungle. The prey moves away and so do the predators. Luckily for us there were still a few animals close enough that the guide could track them down. And we got bogged on a ‘track’ - a very water logged patch of ground. Turns out there are limits to what a land cruiser will drive through.

We’ll need to keep our eyes peeled – we still need a photo of a hyena and male lion.

Queue the list of photos of animals.

Apparently they say they don't use the collar to find them unless they really really can't find them

We'd already ridden one way from Chipata and it wasn't the most entertaining road, so decided to hitch a lift back. Which turned into getting a shared taxi. After watching the taxi driver strap the bikes upside-down to the outside of the car we weren't full of confidence they would make it unscathed so, after much discussion, scratching heads and gnashing of teeth, we bought a couple of extra seats in the car and had the bikes relocated inside. Somehow, the same number of people fit in the already full car. I don't think anyone uses "number of seatbelts = max number of passengers" rule of thumb here, but I was surprised to see 7 in the first two rows of this tiny car (and they recon they'd get another row of three people if our big bikes hadn't taken up the space in the back). The tardis would have been impressed.

Leaving Chipata we got a good dose of the wet season - lots of rain as we tried to change some money and ride out of town. Not the first time we've seen rain, but it's raining all day sometimes now.

Today's ride: 38 km (24 miles)
Total: 5,946 km (3,692 miles)

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