Nyika and December travels

We have been doing an outreach clinic to Adventist Health Clinic Lilongwe to try to help out up there. So, Sunday morning early (6am) we drove the 4 hours to Lilongwe. Dr Varona (peds), Dr Maranan (obgyn), and Dr Araujo (surgeon) with his wife (nurse) also joined this trip. After a quick lunch, we set up the ultrasound and stress testing machine while the others got set up in different rooms too: Araujo did endoscopies, Maranan PAP smears, and Varona saw the kids. Afterwords we all enjoyed a nice Italian dinner before bed. Then up early for another 1/2 day clinic doing consultations, echos, and ECGs. 

 

Monday afternoon, while the others headed south to return to Blantyre, Darryl & I headed north to take 4 days off for our Christmas Holiday (make-up days for other Holidays I have worked throughout the year). The first part of the journey took 4 hours on good roads: Lilongwe to Chinteche Inn. 

We arrived just after dark, but the trusty GPS got us there safely! 

We stayed at a very nice little bungalow just a few meters from the beach and enjoyed relaxing in the sun and snorkeling in the water: some shells and a few fishes, though nothing like the World Heritage area in Cape MacClear further south.

And we again saw the famous "lake flies" of Lake Malawi...known as "the lake that smokes" from prior explorers because when these flies swarm up out of the water it looks like smoke rising from the lake itself...

Then we continued our drive up to the Nyika Plateau in northern Malawi. The GPS said it would take 9 hours to drive the 260km (120 miles), we soon discovered why: the pavement ended and we were on a dirt road only able to go about 30mph weaving between potholes and ridges. We have found another road less travelled! Many things in my life have led me down a road less travelled, today was not an exception.

And we enjoyed the drive through the Malawian countryside! I captured a few images of local villages/houses/people.

The drive took 7 hours from Chinteche Inn through Mzuzu where we stopped for something to eat at Pine Tree B&B and then on to Chelinda Camp. This is a completely different area than the rest of Malawi. Full of antelope and big skies with big rain clouds! Some of the most amazing landscape pictures and rainbows! 

And you could hardly take a picture without getting a Roan or Eland in the picture!

We stayed at Chelinda camp in one of the self-catering Chalets, but did hire a cook who made 3 wonderful vegetarian meals for us each day! He also kept the fire going as it was only about 50 degrees F there...a pleasant change compared to the 90 degree weather in Blantyre...

On the game drives we saw many birds, a jackal, lots of roan / eland / reedbuck / bushbuck antelope, zebra, blue monkeys, bush pig, owls, serval, and hyena. While there are reports of leopards in the area, we didn't see any.

hyena scat - white from the bones they consume

3 hyena in the dark

  

south end of a north-bound bushpig 

We recommend this as a destination if you have both the time and petrol/fuel for the 1600km roundtrip from Blantyre to Chelinda. The overnight stay at Chinetche Inn, while expensive, was also wonderful and relaxing. It was truly a restful time for us before returning back to the hospital to be on call for the week between Christmas and New Years. And we had lots of opportunities for taking pictures, one of our favorite things!