The final stretch back to Lilongwe was like the final nail in the coffin of bad roads. In this case more specifically, road construction. For probably 90% of the distance to Lilwongwe.
Once we entered the city limits of Lilwongwe. Gridlock. Why? Road construction.
What was billed as a leisurely 3 or so hour drive back to Lilongwe turned out to be our typical very long drive. In this case close to 7 hours and because the road was in such a state of turmoil there wasn’t really any countryside to enjoy along the drive. Just dreary, dusty and desperate little villages and hamlets existing along the fringes of the highway construction.
We entered Lilongwe around 2:00 pm hoping to beat the rush hour. We spent almost 1 1/2 hours to travel a distance of less than 6 km!
It was too bad the last leg of our journey was this way because we did see so much beauty over 1,700 kms of driving through the variety of landscapes this country offers.
The upside is there is a lot of road infrastructure upgrades happening in Malawi and it seems that everything will probably be in turmoil for 1-2 more years but I think the results will be a very much improved road dynamic for Lilongwe and greatly improved highways for at least what we saw through our 1,700 km journey.
We departed The Warm Heart of Africa on August 24th after 15 days and made our way back to Johannesburg for a two night pit stop before heading out for some beach time in Mauritius.
About an hour before departing Chitimba it started to rain quite heavily which is unusual for this time of year and it gave us a feeling of foreboding because we had to cross back over the mountains towards Mzuzu. Us and many semitrailers facing a very long and steep incline on wet, muddy, slippery and destroyed roads. We weren’t looking forward to the drive.
We made it without a hitch however and it didn’t seem to be as bad as when we came from the other direction four days earlier.
It was still really bad but it was at this point that I came to realize that the last time we drove this section it was near the end of a long drive and we had already dealt with a lot of shit and we were tired so I think it made it seem worse than it really was. I’m over thinking it. It sucked. But not too badly.
The road from Mzuzu to the turn off to Luwawa was over all very good and took us into higher altitude scenery.
As we made our way into higher altitudes we noticed that the forest trees had been planted and realized that Malawi has a silviculture industry as we drove through the center of of the Vipya Complex Forest Reserve.
We had to exit the highway onto a gravel road and had about 8 kms of seriously bad road conditions through a working silviculture area on the outskirts of the national forest.
It becomes tiring writing about bad roads but this 8 km section really pissed us off. There is a nice small resort at the end of the road, can’t they do at least some minor repair? Maybe this is supposed to add to the idea of the remoteness of the lodge but I think the road would be a big surprise if you showed up in a 2WD sedan.
We spent one night at Luwawa Forest Lodge located in the higher altitude forest near a sawmill and forestry operation and close to a bream stocked lake. It was set among a beautiful landscape and promoted itself as a family or group destination for weekends of horseback riding, hiking, fishing, archery etc. They also host local and area schools for weekend field trips and such occasions.
This was just a pit stop on our way back to Lilongwe but it would have been a nice stop for two nights to allow us to explore the nearby lake and hiking trails.
The food and service was excellent and once again, we were the only people staying at the lodge.
One highlight however was the water. The tap water was certified as excellent and safe to drink and management made it clear that we should drink it and it was cold and fresh and wonderful. A bit of a surprise when you expect most water in developing countries to be un-potable.
Also surprising was the evening temperatures. I can’t find the elevation we were at but it got very cold when the sun went down and apparently the temperature hit a low of just around 2 C. It definitely felt that cold and the sky was clear with little light pollution so we were able to see the Milky Way in most of it’s glory. Unfortunately the photos don’t quite do it justice.
After a nice breakfast we departed back to Lilongwe. The owner of the lodge told us there was quite a lot of road construction on the way back so it would probably take a “little” longer than usual to get to the city.
As it turned out, ‘quite a lot of construction” was a very big understatement. The trip back was about 270 kms and I swear 200 kms of that was road construction!
Then we had to deal with the Lilongwe road construction.
