26 February - Modi Bwanji!

26 February

Nhkotakota – Dwanga

40 Miles

Erik:

Today's highlights:

• 1 hour of silence (no people) as we rode through a mountain
• Golden baboons, two families
• riding through the misty rain
• All in all, I'm dead.

The atm at Dwanga doesn't work which means we have no money until Nkata Bay. We'll make due.

Steph:

We had breakfast in town today and learned a few things. Patrick and James (our waiters) taught us some basics in Chichewa. "Modi-Bwanji" – Hello, How are you? "Tidibueno" – Fine. "Caieno" – And you? "Zicomo" – Thank you. Woo! We practiced and tested it out all day. Most people just stared and said nothing but some actually responded! Very exciting.

There was a bit of road today that did not have people or villages. It was about 45 minutes worth of silence that were surprisingly wonderful. It made me realize a few things.

• I miss the quiet! Just the two of us huffing and puffing up the hills and the birds chirping. Saying hello to every single person all day long on top of the huffing and puffing is kind of exhausting. It was nice to be in nature again.

• Then again, I forgot how stressful it can be just to be in nature. Haha. We saw a few baboons on the road and stopped to watch them for a while. They're smaller than the ones down south but it reminded me of how it was in Botswana and the Caprivi. Always on high alert, listening to crunching twigs and other scary sounds. Constantly starring into the bushes hoping nothing comes charging out at us. Sleeping with one eye open and freaking out about the slightest little sound that seemed out of place (like we would ever know if it was out of place :) Don't get me wrong, I loved it. It was so exciting never knowing what was around the next turn. But also just slightly nerve racking.

We stayed in Dwanga instead of going all the way to Ngala. We were both tired and I'm really dehydrated. We found an ok place to stay and walked to the village to try the atm. We're total celebreties. The kids go crazy when they see us walking around and the adults just stare. It's weird man.

Rain clouds

School girls that came to talk to me for a while :) Really sweet