Mozambique part 2: Vilanculos
Door: Nayan Heijmans
Blijf op de hoogte en volg Nayan
13 September 2016 | Mozambique, Vilanculos
We arrived in Vilanculos when it was already dark. It was crowded with people who were crossing the main road wherever and whenever they liked. When we were looking for our hostel Baobab we had to ask directions a couple of times (since we don’t speak Portuguese, it had to be a couple of times.) At one time two kids ran to our car shouting ‘dinheiro’, holding one hand palm up. We said ‘no’ and I tried to continue on the sand road. However they stepped on the side step of our car, holding onto the doorpost (cause the window was open.) I stopped the car, but they just kept standing there. When I closed the window they held onto the doorknob, so I decided to give a little more gas (walking speed or less) but it looked like they were having a good time. Then all of a sudden I used the break and the kid who was most on the front side of the car flew a bit forward, hitting the side mirror with his head. The mirror bended forward, the kid fell on the ground. While I stopped the car the kid already stood up, being scared a bit I guess, cause he gently bended the mirror back in place. While he did that we saw a man approach on foot and the kids ran off. A lesson well learned, in the future they will think twice to shout ‘dinheiro’ in our faces.
During our first (and actually only) full day in Vilanculos we were looking for a bank who could give us some US$ for our stay in Zimbabwe (the US$ is their only currency nowadays.) Since we heard that cash in Zimbabwe had almost run out, plus we would need some US$ for visas when crossing the border. We didn’t find a bank still open after 15:00. Therefor we decided to find a supermarket to buy some canned food, so we would always have something to eat if we wouldn’t be able to find dollars in time. As you might have guessed, all the supermercados (not really super, more like smallmercados) we could find were closed. Eventually we found a petrol station where we bought some cans and pasta, just in case. When we returned to the hostel the guy at the reception wanted to help us with our dollar problem, we told him we needed around US$600, so he called someone who said he could sell us US$80. After we waited for a short while the guy arrived with a big pack of money. He told us he had US$600 and he gave it to me like it was nothing. I counted it and all 600 were there. He asked us what we needed it for and after we explained that we needed it for 5-6 days of Zimbabwe he tried to sell us more. He even asked me to make the exchange rate, so I used the daily exchange rate, which I found online. He accepted immediately. This smelled a bit fishy to me and we actually didn’t want to take any money from him, since we thought it was fake money. However we decided to take the original US$80 so that he didn’t came there for nothing and to minimize the loss if the was fake money. The guy wasn’t happy about it and he raised the rate plus he asked for Tuktuk money in an unfriendly way. We decided to give it to him, just to be rid of him.
Since this day had turned out to be real shitty one, and we didn’t had time to do a boat trip to the islands, we decided to not leave in the morning to Zimbabwe, but stay for another night, maybe at another hostel. We contacted the Swiss couples to meet up again and have some drinks together, since they were also in Vilanculos. We went to their hostel.
Zombie Cucumber was the name of the Belgium owned hostel where the Swiss stayed. We arrived there by Tuktuk (which almost got stuck in the lose sand roads) and when we entered the gate the Belgium owner welcomed us. He said that we were most welcome to have a drink and that we could find the Swiss at the restaurant. It was nice to see these friendly people again and we had some laughs and exchanged the experiences we’ve had. They showed us their hut and we decided to stay the extra night in this hostel as well.
From the Zombie Cucumber bar 3 of the Swiss (1 went to sleep) and ourselves went to a local club called ‘German Backpackers’ (only in Portuguese of course.) At arrival the club was empty, so we had our drinks on the top floor of the club, where there was also a bar. Around 11 we entered the club below. It was a local club with local music. The guys danced with their feet and the girls with their hips. At one point the girls were standing in a kind of circle as one of them putted a bottle on the floor. She started dancing on top of the bottle, lower and lower. We got told that this was a kind of game dance, where the girls are dancing over and around the bottle in turns and are not allowed to throw the bottle over. It was really a cool thing to watch. Some of them had great dance moves. Also one of the Swiss girls gave it a try and she really managed well. Good job! The night was a really AMAZING! (We called a lot of things amazing that night; it was kind of our joke then.)
We returned around 4, 5 or 6 to our hostel, where we had to check out at 10 in the morning. After we had checked out, we moved our stuff to Zombie Cucumber. This place was slightly more expensive, however we had our own open-air bathroom again, just like in Tofo (at Baobab bathroom facilities were shared.) After checking in we decided to go on the boat trip we wanted to do the day before, also this had actually been the reason for us to go to Vilanculos.
When we arrived at the beach there was a small boat. We stepped in the water and I putted my bag and flip-flops on board. In the process I dropped my phone, in the seawater 40cm deep. At that moment I thought I was my heart stopped and that I was dying. As quickly as I have never been I tried to grab my phone out of the water and putted it into a towel. I checked if it was still working and it was, after that I shut the phone down, so sadly I couldn’t take any pictures of the boat trip to the island.
After a 20min boat trip we arrived on a bounty like island where we got to snorkel. They also had made lunch for us, some rice, salad, curry with calamari and 2 whole crabs per person. We had this nice buffet like lunch right on the beach. It was really awesome and at sometimes I even forgot that my phone had probably died only such a short time ago.
We had dinner at Zombie Cucumber and afterwards we joined the Swiss at another bar for just a couple of drinks. After these drinks we said goodbye to them and went to sleep, because the next day we had a long, long way ahead of us.
We left Vilanculos early in the morning and headed west. The reason for this was that above the Save River there could be rebels shooting on passing cars. The road west however was not a tar road. From Vilankulos to the Chicualacuala border it was around 515km. From this 515km almost 400 km were sand roads, some in good condition, others in bad condition. Alongside these roads there were almost no persons living. The first hour we didn’t see anyone and we rarely saw other vehicles the whole day. Sometimes we saw some huts and cattle. If we got stranded here, it could take days for someone to pass us, with little to no phone connection at some places. We knew that this was the real adventure.
Luckily all went well. This whole trip took us 10,5 hours. We were also lucky to find a petrol station where we could pay with credit card at the end of the sand road, since we had spend almost all of our last cash on the previous petrol station on 1/3 of the trip.
We decided to spend the night at the Old Railroad Station where we could pay for the stay with South African rand. At first she asked 350 rand for the night, when we said that we only had 200 rand left, this was also fine (luckily for us, but we didn’t knew yet then. Later more about this.) The building looked very beautiful on the outside, but on the inside it was old. We also had dinner here and it took them quite a while before they helped us. There was really no one else and they were just sitting at a table themselves. They served us chicken with rice, and while it was basic, it was also cheap and it tasted good for its price.
After we had spent the night in that hotel we continued our journey to the next country. Where luckily almost everybody speaks English.
Mozambique, its people and the Swiss; ‘Obrigado’, and who knows we’ll meet again.
During our first (and actually only) full day in Vilanculos we were looking for a bank who could give us some US$ for our stay in Zimbabwe (the US$ is their only currency nowadays.) Since we heard that cash in Zimbabwe had almost run out, plus we would need some US$ for visas when crossing the border. We didn’t find a bank still open after 15:00. Therefor we decided to find a supermarket to buy some canned food, so we would always have something to eat if we wouldn’t be able to find dollars in time. As you might have guessed, all the supermercados (not really super, more like smallmercados) we could find were closed. Eventually we found a petrol station where we bought some cans and pasta, just in case. When we returned to the hostel the guy at the reception wanted to help us with our dollar problem, we told him we needed around US$600, so he called someone who said he could sell us US$80. After we waited for a short while the guy arrived with a big pack of money. He told us he had US$600 and he gave it to me like it was nothing. I counted it and all 600 were there. He asked us what we needed it for and after we explained that we needed it for 5-6 days of Zimbabwe he tried to sell us more. He even asked me to make the exchange rate, so I used the daily exchange rate, which I found online. He accepted immediately. This smelled a bit fishy to me and we actually didn’t want to take any money from him, since we thought it was fake money. However we decided to take the original US$80 so that he didn’t came there for nothing and to minimize the loss if the was fake money. The guy wasn’t happy about it and he raised the rate plus he asked for Tuktuk money in an unfriendly way. We decided to give it to him, just to be rid of him.
Since this day had turned out to be real shitty one, and we didn’t had time to do a boat trip to the islands, we decided to not leave in the morning to Zimbabwe, but stay for another night, maybe at another hostel. We contacted the Swiss couples to meet up again and have some drinks together, since they were also in Vilanculos. We went to their hostel.
Zombie Cucumber was the name of the Belgium owned hostel where the Swiss stayed. We arrived there by Tuktuk (which almost got stuck in the lose sand roads) and when we entered the gate the Belgium owner welcomed us. He said that we were most welcome to have a drink and that we could find the Swiss at the restaurant. It was nice to see these friendly people again and we had some laughs and exchanged the experiences we’ve had. They showed us their hut and we decided to stay the extra night in this hostel as well.
From the Zombie Cucumber bar 3 of the Swiss (1 went to sleep) and ourselves went to a local club called ‘German Backpackers’ (only in Portuguese of course.) At arrival the club was empty, so we had our drinks on the top floor of the club, where there was also a bar. Around 11 we entered the club below. It was a local club with local music. The guys danced with their feet and the girls with their hips. At one point the girls were standing in a kind of circle as one of them putted a bottle on the floor. She started dancing on top of the bottle, lower and lower. We got told that this was a kind of game dance, where the girls are dancing over and around the bottle in turns and are not allowed to throw the bottle over. It was really a cool thing to watch. Some of them had great dance moves. Also one of the Swiss girls gave it a try and she really managed well. Good job! The night was a really AMAZING! (We called a lot of things amazing that night; it was kind of our joke then.)
We returned around 4, 5 or 6 to our hostel, where we had to check out at 10 in the morning. After we had checked out, we moved our stuff to Zombie Cucumber. This place was slightly more expensive, however we had our own open-air bathroom again, just like in Tofo (at Baobab bathroom facilities were shared.) After checking in we decided to go on the boat trip we wanted to do the day before, also this had actually been the reason for us to go to Vilanculos.
When we arrived at the beach there was a small boat. We stepped in the water and I putted my bag and flip-flops on board. In the process I dropped my phone, in the seawater 40cm deep. At that moment I thought I was my heart stopped and that I was dying. As quickly as I have never been I tried to grab my phone out of the water and putted it into a towel. I checked if it was still working and it was, after that I shut the phone down, so sadly I couldn’t take any pictures of the boat trip to the island.
After a 20min boat trip we arrived on a bounty like island where we got to snorkel. They also had made lunch for us, some rice, salad, curry with calamari and 2 whole crabs per person. We had this nice buffet like lunch right on the beach. It was really awesome and at sometimes I even forgot that my phone had probably died only such a short time ago.
We had dinner at Zombie Cucumber and afterwards we joined the Swiss at another bar for just a couple of drinks. After these drinks we said goodbye to them and went to sleep, because the next day we had a long, long way ahead of us.
We left Vilanculos early in the morning and headed west. The reason for this was that above the Save River there could be rebels shooting on passing cars. The road west however was not a tar road. From Vilankulos to the Chicualacuala border it was around 515km. From this 515km almost 400 km were sand roads, some in good condition, others in bad condition. Alongside these roads there were almost no persons living. The first hour we didn’t see anyone and we rarely saw other vehicles the whole day. Sometimes we saw some huts and cattle. If we got stranded here, it could take days for someone to pass us, with little to no phone connection at some places. We knew that this was the real adventure.
Luckily all went well. This whole trip took us 10,5 hours. We were also lucky to find a petrol station where we could pay with credit card at the end of the sand road, since we had spend almost all of our last cash on the previous petrol station on 1/3 of the trip.
We decided to spend the night at the Old Railroad Station where we could pay for the stay with South African rand. At first she asked 350 rand for the night, when we said that we only had 200 rand left, this was also fine (luckily for us, but we didn’t knew yet then. Later more about this.) The building looked very beautiful on the outside, but on the inside it was old. We also had dinner here and it took them quite a while before they helped us. There was really no one else and they were just sitting at a table themselves. They served us chicken with rice, and while it was basic, it was also cheap and it tasted good for its price.
After we had spent the night in that hotel we continued our journey to the next country. Where luckily almost everybody speaks English.
Mozambique, its people and the Swiss; ‘Obrigado’, and who knows we’ll meet again.
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