Malawi
After Zanzibar we lost a few of our traveling companions at Dar es salaam, including the resident bird watcher and burnt englishman, Duncan, leaving only 14 of us on the truck and lots of room to stretch out through the tail end of Tanzania and into Malawi, and of course room to store all those Malawi Chairs we were bound to purchase.
The southern Tanzanian roads arn’t too bad, or we were getting used to them by now, I’m not sure which.. either way we made good time to our over night stop just north of the Malawian border - and at a farm that had turned the river valley into a organic farm run by a expat woman, its called ‘The Old Farm House, and is about 50km from Iringa and I can safely say its the best campsite, food, bar, roast nuts, and amarula hot choc in tanzania!
After an earlier morning start we left out little bit of Tanzanian Heaven to head down through Mikumi National Park, passing Elephants, Giraffes and a few Eagles, to the border with Malwai at Songwe. After getting our passports stamped by the very firm fisted border officials, we continued southwards through very green surroundings heading towards our first sighting of Lake Malawi. On the way we picked up a couple of locals for the trip to Chitimba and some local beer to cool us down on the hot afternoon.
With the added benefit of the beer, we soon arrived at Chitimba Beach resort on the shore of Lake Malwai, we pitched the tents on the beach front and headed into the mirror like water for a relaxing swim and cool down, the sunset over the lake was something I’ll not forget.
Next morning we made the decision to move on from Chitimba and give ourselves a couple of nights further south, so we headed to Mzuzu to pick up supplies, it was My turn to cook, so after being given 5USD’s Jade and I hit the market, and bought the best selection of veg you’ve ever seen, and bread straight from the oven. We also had to shop for the ‘bad taste’ party planned for the next night, I’d got Kathy as the person to buy for, and found a beautifuly ugly green droopy dress 
Kande Beach was our new home, and again we had beach front access, after having a few beers and a swim, we headed to the Village Chiefs house to be given a meal and entertained by the children, it was great fun, though I was told that I dance like a Malawain, I’m not sure thats something to be proud of!!!!!
Our second day at Kande started early, I had an early start to slaughter and prepare our dinner, a lovely little black pig, from the village, the had some assistance from the locals, who took the head and trotters as payment, by 8am the pig was on a makeshift spit supported by a couple of sand ladders, and being basted with my homemade recipe. We had some time to take a tour of the village, and visit the local school and hospital, it really seemed as if the locals were trying quite hard to improve things. One young boy by the name of Krastom Banda befriended me for the village trip, nice guy, and if anyone fancies sending his school some stuff (they are desperate for balls!!!) the address is Kande School, PO Box 7, Kande, Nkhata Bay, Satero, Malawi, Africa.
The rest of the day past lazily, with a bit of body surfing in the lake, that had turned from a mirror like surfice to rolling breakers, bit of reading with a cold beer in the bar and of course some time spent ensuring our pig was cooking nicely - I was on cooking duty for that evening. As the evening started, a sugar filled cocktail was brewed, unfortunatly based on large quantities of sprite and alcohol and very little fruit juice, giving everyone a bit of a sugar high, but not much in the way of drunkness, I say unfortunatly, because the next part of the evening was changing in to out bad taste outfits, and as you can see from the pictures this would have been so much easier with a bit of alcohol in the system, its hard enough climbing out of a truck with a mini skirt on, without being self concous about it. 
Soon enough we started on the pig though, and it was fantastic meat, really tender and tasty, I could have eaten the whole thing myself!! The rest of the night was spent playing some silly game envolving a lot of bending over and picking up a bag with your mouth, and not getting very drunk, thanks to the weak cocktail, I think I finished the evening at the bar, looking out to the lake with Lizzie and a few others, very pleasant.
The rest of the days in Malawi were passed in the same fashion, swimming in the lake (well body surfing anyway) lunch at the delightful little cafe and the afternoon with a beer and a book somewhere, or playing with the new Bao set we had carved (and over paid for:( ) all in all very pleasant.
Eventually we had to move on and after managing to get the truck off the beach (thanks to Shep’s excellant driving) we hit the road south along the lake side, then up in to the hills towards the Zambian boarder.
