How to visit Likoma
Posted By Sika on March 17, 2009
I don’t know about you, but I’ve never fully got into the Africa swing of things. Sure, I relax more, I trust that things will work out (or they won’t) and sweating over whether or not they will is usually futile; but when I’m travelling, I like to know how and when I’m going to get places. Especially when I’ve only got a week off from work.
You can get to Likoma by plane or by taking the MV Ilala ferry. The ferry approaches Likoma either from the north (Nkhata Bay) or from the south (Monkey Bay). If you want to go from and come back to Nkhata Bay, you are on Likoma Tuesday-Saturday. If your start out point is Monkey Bay, it’s reversed. If you want to stop in Likoma and then continue on in the same direction, you’re stuck in Likoma for the whole week.
Because Michelle lives in Mzuzu, and going there would give me the opportunity to go to the Tanzanian fabric market . . . er, I mean, Michelle came down south when we went to Mulanje and so I owe her . . . er, I mean, Nkhata Bay just worked better, ok? Geez. I took the overnight bus Friday night from Zomba to Mzuzu, leaving Zomba around 7:30pm, and arriving around 5am Saturday morning. The annoying thing is that I had to either arrive at the bus depot before dark–so around 6ish, or take a taxi there. It’s boring waiting for the bus for an hour and a half–especially when the power goes out and there’s nothing to do but stare at the various shades of black.
Saturday was the requisite fabric market visit and resting and eating Indian food. Sunday we went to Nkhata Bay, deciding to stay at Butterfly because it’s quieter than Mayoka, but Mayoka is an easy peasy walk away. Monday we hung out at Kaya Papaya, a neat Thai restaurant with incredibly good and different food. Although the cake could’ve been better. But the pumpkin soup and homemade bread was excellent.
The Ilala leaves Nkhata Bay at 8pm, about the only time on the schedule that’s right, as near as I can tell. You can buy tickets at the dock any time that day (or before), or you can wait and buy tickets on the boat itself. The First-class deck tickets are about MK2800. There used to be a Peace Corps discount. We were told that it no longer exists, but it might be possible to bargain for one. Bargaining is only possible on the boat, though, not at the dock. If you don’t buy a ticket at the dock, they’ll try to stop you from getting on the boat, but you can just insist that you’ll buy a ticket on the boat and you should be ok.
After climbing up to the first deck, we put down our stuff and I went and hired two mattresses from the restaurant on the second deck. They are MK300/mattress/night. It was a pretty clear night, so we put our mattresses in the middle of an L made out of life preserver containers, to block ourselves from the wind. The Zomba drumming group that was heading to a wedding on Chizimulu used our mattresses as a resting spot until we decided to lay down and sleep.
Sleeping didn’t last long, though, because around midnight we got to Chizimulu. BLAAARRR! went the foghorn. We were unloading and reloading at Chizi for about 2 hours and then BLAAARR! again as we left for Likoma. We got into Likoma at about 3:30. We had been told by Mango Drift to wait on the boat for the blue and red motor boat that would come, but the guy ushering people off the boat basically insisted that we all get off and wait for the mango drift boat on the shore. In the end, we waited for about 3 hours until someone took pity on us and found us a matola, which cost MK300 each and drove us about halfway there, until the roads got so bad that we had to walk. Turns out that the motor boat did come, but not until 7, which seems a bit ridiculous.
There are two choices of places to stay in Likoma that are on the beach and not in town. One is Mango Drift, which is where we stayed, and the other is Kaya Mawa, which is much more exclusive and expensive. You can pay $35 to have a several course meal at Kaya Mawa even if you’re staying at Mango Drift. Michelle and I wanted to do that, but Kaya Mawa had no guests and therefore no kitchen staff.
At Likoma, here’s what there is to do: read (books you brought), write (stuff you brought), play cards (you brought), knit (stuff you brought), doze in a hammock, walk into town, snorkel, swim, and kayak. In Nkhata Bay the snorkel equipment was in pretty good shape, but at Mango Drift not so much. Most of the masks had no way to attach the snorkel and several of the flippers were cracking at the heels. But it was usable and nice not to have to sort it yourself.
On Saturday, the motorboat headed to us when they saw the Ilala coming from Mozambique. We all got in the boat around 3pm. We had been told that the Ilala was sighted about an hour before the motorboat arrived, and then it took nearly an hour to get to the Ilala, and so I was a bit nervous (remember what I said earlier about not stressing about stuff I have no control over? Well, it’s a process. I’m not perfect, people). Turns out I needn’t have been: we were nearly the first Likoma people on the boat.
The journey back was uneventful. Once again, we were lucky that there was no rain, because even the canopy-covered part of the first class deck leaks when it rains, and then the only rain-free area is at the bar. Another traveller told us that really the only leg on the Ilala where the second and third-class deck is too swamped with humanity to be inhabitable is Nkhata Bay to Likoma, and so if you’re travelling on, you can switch decks after that leg. That might be a good option if it’s rainy. We were closer to the big engine stack in the middle, so it was louder and smellier, but the trade-off was that we were able to grab the bench under one of the light bulbs without actually putting our mattress in the light.
We arrived back in Nkhata Bay at about 2am on Sunday morning. We debated getting off the boat and seeing if we could get a room at the Safari Guesthouse right by the dock, but ended up staying on the boat and sleeping instead. The only flaw with that plan was the captain was friggin’ bugnuts. He kept on making these loud, angry pronouncements. Usually in Chichewa and English, I’m pretty sure they’d require a pretty good aptitude in both languages to understand, so I’m not sure who his targets were. My favorite was when he said, “If you people keep [something in Chichewa about moving forward, I think] and [something in Chichewa I didn't catch at all] I will be [something in Chichewa about punishment, I think] and I will WRITE A VERY BIG REPORT!” He seemed to think that was sufficiently threatening until about 45 minutes later and it all started again. That time I’m pretty sure he threatened to take away the gangplank, and I went to look over the side. Where exactly nothing was happening. A Malawian came over to reassure me, and tell me to go back to sleep and we would still be able to disembark at daylight.
We got up at 4:50 and packed everything up, just in time for the BLAAARRR! of the foghorn telling us the boat was going to leave in 30 minutes. There were minibuses on the dock, so we got on one of those*. We got into Mzuzu at 7 or so and had breakfast at the Mzoozoo Zoo ’cause in Mzuz the power is usually out on Sundays.
That afternoon, at 4:30pm, I caught the KJ Transways Bus to Zomba**, arriving in Zomba around 2am***, where taxi drivers were waiting and ready to take me home.
*The wrong one: the three people who were on the minibus when we got on were placeholders to convince us the minibus was more full than it was and got off as soon as there were 4 actual passengers on the bus.
**Cheaper and nicer than the Axa, especially since I was supposed to have bought a ticket for a nicer Axa bus but it got replaced with the Country Commuter. All the KJ buses are nicer than the Axa Country Commuter.
***The key to these long bus rides is not to eat much and to hydrate really really well several hours before the trip. Then drink little to nothing until you’re in the last hour or so, and hydrate really well after. Or, eat and drink normally and bank on other people taking bathroom breaks or getting stopped at roadblocks long enough to pee at the side of the road.
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