You won’t be surprised but just to reiterate once more … it was with heavy hearts that we left Nambiti, South Africa for the next leg of our trip. We had a 4am start (ouch!) to drive to Jo’berg airport in time for our flight to Mozambique.The drive was easy peasy as was the flight to Inhambane, Mozambique. It is north of the capital Maputo and is right on the cusp of the southern / northern split of Mozambique. Poor ol' Mozambique has not got the best rap for tourism because it is synonymous with political instability and civil unrest however recent years have seen a return to peace in the country and it is fast becoming a tourism hot spot because it apparently has amazing beaches and it remains highly unspoiled. Interestingly enough it is also quite popular because it is known as being very rural with dirt roads everywhere (even most of the highways) and small villages rather than huge metropolises. We were excited to find out!
We were booked into a fancy schmancy resort and had hopes of getting out and about sporadically between bouts of doing nothing. We were also very intrigued to see how we would cope with doing nothing for a while!! Upon arrival in Mozambique we faced the hilarious challenge of clearing customs. It is at this point that I should mention that I put Joep’s Dutch passport through the washing machine a little while ago. Yikes. It is still semi ok but it is clearly damaged and we were a bit concerned about how it would be clearing customs. Keep in mind that my Australian passport is also significantly damaged from the rain storm we got caught in when doing the bayou tour of the Mississippi in New Orleans … what a pair we are!!
Luckily we had no trouble in Mozambique (the only trouble we had was in South Africa where the customs guy had a good laugh at our expense when he saw the state of our passports but still let us travel … whew!) apart from the incredibly long wait, huge cost and fact that Joep was too tall to have his photo taken for his visa and had to squat down while all the immigration personnel gathered around to laugh at him … classic!
Once cleared, we headed to our awaiting transfer bus where we enjoyed a 2-hour drive to the resort. Our first glimpse of Mozambique was pretty exciting. As I mentioned, we had been warned that it is really rural and under-developed and people were not lying. It is largely dirt roads and villages made up of shacks. The region that we were in had no large metropolis and the people seem to live almost entirely off the land still. Just incredible!!
We weren’t sure what to expect of Massinga Beach, our resort for the coming 7 nights, but the website looked pretty awesome so we were hoping for the best. Upon arrival at the resort we stopped at a hut at the side of the road. I began to get a bit concerned. Never fear, a 4WD was coming to collect us from the road to take us down to the beach resort. There were no signposts at all for the resort so we were a bit curious about where we were headed. We drove through a hugely rural area along a dirt track and through a river (this is a true story!) and as we pulled up to the outskirts of the resort I was feeling less than confident.
Upon arrival at the resort however, we were ecstatic! It is a work in progress for sure as the development is still underway but half of the huts are completely finished as is the restaurant and bar area. We were blown away by the views from the deck and were very excited to see our room! Rightly so!!
We have never stayed anywhere like this! A whole hut to ourselves with an incredible ocean view. Huge bed literally looking out over the ocean, huge bathroom, our own deck with sun beds right next to … yup, our own plunge pool!! Just what every honeymoon couple needs!!
The next couple of days were spent doing absolutely nothing. We made a few friends at the resort whom we chatted with every now and then; we enjoyed the 3 meals a day and we lay around reading books and hanging with the local dog. It was pretty awesome.
We also put our names down to go out snorkeling and on a sea safari and to do a tour of the local ‘city’. It is at this point that we are going to sound like the worlds most spoiled couple … we got bored. Listen. We’re all for relaxing but when you’re in a country like Mozambique you want to explore a little bit right? Right?? Maybe not everyone. Maybe it is just us.
But here is the dealio. The accommodation was beautiful. The plunge pool was glorious. The services however, are a work in progress. The advertised snorkeling and diving and sea safaris and not readily available which means that if you are the sort of couple that relaxes by doing such things, you are left sitting around with nothing to do. Which is great for a couple of days! But not for 7 nights.
So after 2.5 days of doing nothing we were ready to do something. Joep headed to reception early Friday morning and insisted we be given a transfer to Inhambane town so we could check it out. We were SO GLAD that we did it! The town was bustling and there were close to no white faces to be scene. We really felt like we were getting off the beaten track whilst still being close enough to tourist R&R heaven. It was glorious! Even more glorious was … don’t judge us … we had WIFI access!!
Listen – We’re not yuppies. But the resort advertised that there was WIFI available. We had left all Skype dates until Massinga Beach thinking we have heaps of time to Skype. It was close to Christmas and we hadn’t contacted anyone! So we spent some time reconnecting and explaining to family that we were offline. We then made an executive decision … we didn’t want to do nothing for 4 more days. Within 1 hour we had decided on a new destination, changed our flights back to Jo’berg to the following day and booked flights to Zimbabwe! We are efficient!
We called with our travel agent Blue Elephant who was incredibly helpful with all of this right down to booking us a hotel in Jo’berg for our 1 night stopover AND arranging an incredible deal for us in our hotel at Victoria Falls … I never use travel agents but after all the help Blue Elephant gave us I will definitely use them in the future! It was awesome!!
Blue Elephant also contacted Massinga Beach to let them know that we would be leaving early. During the drive back to the resort I, naturally, got totally stressed out that they were going to hate us for leaving early. Joep, naturally, didn’t see the big problem. He was right. The owner at Massinga Beach was a bit bummed that we weren’t having an awesome time but did tell us that he gets concerned when people book for 7 nights because there isn’t much to do there … DUDE!! How about you put that on your website?? He agreed that the website was a bit misleading regarding the availability of activities and said he would change it and all in all we were all happier. That evening was our best evening at the resort (typical isn’t it?) as we hooked up with 2 other couples at the bar and ended up having an awesome evening of drinks and delicious crayfish! Still, we were not too sad to be leaving the resort, as we were ready for our next adventure.
Midmorning on Saturday we jumped into our taxi for our 2 hour transfer back to Inhambane airport the most shoddy airport I’ve ever been in and, for that reason, the most entertaining. Oh and did I mention there is free Wi-Fi there? Mozambique, you are so awesomely random!! You have no paved roads but there is Wi-Fi available pretty much everywhere ... talk about priorities.
We arrived in Jo’berg without any trouble and made it with ease to our glorious hotel where we showered, made a couple of Skype calls and headed out for our Christmas Eve feast … steak! Delicious juicy humongous steak! Jo’berg has a terrible reputation for being super unsafe. We cannot comment on that because we didn’t venture out and about much. Our hotel concierge drove us to and from dinner, which was at Nelson Mandela Square in a huge mall. It was a super glamorous spot and we kind of felt like we were back in Laguna Beach.
The following morning Santa Claus had delivered us the best Christmas gift ever – Flights to Zimbabwe and 2 nights accommodation at the Victoria Falls Hotel! We skipped merrily to the airport and we were ecstatic to arrive at Vic Falls.
Zimbabwe has had a rough few years of late and we were warned in advance that the Zim side of the falls is much quieter than the Zambia side but that it is the best side to view the falls from. We felt prepared and our expectations were exceeded.
Upon arrival at the airport we cleared customs (it was more than a little tense there though and I was glad to get out) and jumped into our transfer to the hotel. We were greeted like old friends at the hotel and once again, we were made to feel like we were doing them a favour by being there rather than the other way around. Surreal!
Even more surreal was the view from our room … we looked right out over the falls!! True story. No word of a lie. It was like a dream come true.
The hotel itself has a grandeur that cannot be described. Don’t get me wrong - it is old. And it is in need of renovation. It hasn’t had any renovations lately and that is obvious but it also adds to the mystique and charm of the hotel. You really feel like you have stepped back in time. I’m pretty sure it still looks exactly like it did when Queen E stayed there at the ripe old age of 19!! If those walls could talk!!
So after getting over the shock of, once again, being in pure luxury, we headed down to the terrace to enjoy a beverage. It was at this point that I realized that for the 2nd time in my life I was staying in a hotel that people come just to see … the 1st being the Hotel du Glace in Quebec of course! The views of the falls from the hotel are awesome as are the monkeys and warthog wandering around the lawns. Literally, monkey's just running around in front of you while you enjoy your afternoon G&T. Totally nuts.
We relaxed for a while before deciding to do the walk to the falls. We were so glad we did! What a way to spend Christmas day! There is a very good reason why the falls are one of the 7 natural wonders of the world. They are naturally wonderful! Every corner you turn you are mesmerized. The falls go for kilometers and the amount of water rushing over the edges is incredible. We were completely soaked by the time we had finished soaking up (pardon the pun) all the sights. We couldn’t help but repeat how happy we were that we had decided to come to Zimbabwe.
What was also highly amusing was that we were amongst only a few white peeps wandering around … we were very surprised by this because our hotel was full of white tourists but perhaps we just came at a random time. Anyway, because we were some of the only white folks there AND because Joep is so tall, people kept stopping us and asking could they have a photo with Joep or simply taking photos of us as we walked by. Priceless.
I could write for hours about the water and the spray and the rainbows and the noise of the falls but you need to see it to believe it so I won’t bore you all here.
Suffice to say, they are incredible and we are so glad we have seen them!!
That evening, after a relaxed stroll back to our hotel we dressed for dinner. We had opted for the buffet with traditional African dancers to entertain us … it was somewhat lame but we got to wear Christmas hats and pull Christmas crackers so we were happy. The following day we were disgustingly lazy. See? We like to relax! We just like to have the OPTION of doing something. We had grand plans of doing one of the adventure sports available at the falls but … well we kind of chickened out. We’re clearly getting older. May I also point out that since writing this blog there was an incident at the falls with a bungee cord breaking! YES! When we read that on CNN we were so glad we chose not to jump. Being a scaredy cat is not all that bad.
Instead of throwing ourselves off the edge of the gorge with only a cord saving us from certain death, we headed back to the hotel where we enjoyed a cocktail on the terrace before getting a bucket of ice and heading up to the balcony off our room to drink the complimentary bottle of champagne that we had been given by the hotel as a wedding gift. It is at this point that I should mention that at every hotel we stayed at we were treated to champagne and rose petals on our beds because we are on our honeymoon. I LOVE the free champagne. I am not a big fan of rose petals on beds. You win some; you lose some.
Having polished off the bottle of champers we moved onto the next highlight. We were totally looking forward to our last meal of our African honeymoon … we had booked into the Livingstone Grand Ballroom for a 6-course meal with wine pairing. We couldn’t wait!! The restaurant has a dress code so we glammed ourselves up, Joep in his wedding suit and me in a nice dress, and walked down to the grand ballroom.
As I mentioned earlier, there has been little to no renovations done at the Victoria Falls Hotel in recent years. This is especially apparent in the ballroom where you totally feel like you are stepping back in time and eating in the early 1900’s right down to the live piano music playing throughout the meal. You can totally picture the place packed to the rafters with the elite of society consuming wine and game to excess. Alas, these days the ballroom is rarely full and we were 1 of only 5 tables seated. It didn’t take away from the fun though!
For the following 4 hours we were treated to an incredible 6-course meal using all the finest china, crystal glasses and best silverware. We felt incredibly spoiled and behaved like giddy school children. The waiters were so wonderful, the food was delicious, the wine was perfectly paired and the atmosphere was like something out of a movie. Might I also add that the cost appears to be the same as it was many years ago too. We were astonished! It appears inflation hasn't hit the Livingstone Ballroom. Very nice indeed. We couldn’t have ended the trip on a higher note if we tried!!
Needless to say, the following morning our heads hurt and our hearts were heavy with the realization that month 1 of our 2 month honeymoon had come to an end … Mozambique was beautiful even though we ran out of things to do. We still recommend it to others and plan on going back 'one day' to see more of the country because it holds a huge amount of promise for an action packed vacation. Zimbabwe was amazing and everyone should see these falls in their life time. They are really something else.
We are officially the most spoiled people we know and we feel incredibly lucky to be enjoying such a luxurious, fun filled life together! I mean, we’re starting our married life the way we plan on continuing it right??
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