I forgot to say this in yesterday’s post: assuming this is like last time and I have no reason to believe it isn’t, we won’t have any internet connection while in the Okavango Delta. We leave Tuesday morning (in a few hours) then return to Maun on Friday morning.
From there we fly to Cape Town, then Washington DC, then home late Saturday. So it’s possible I don’t get going again until Sunday. I’m hoping to do at least some during layovers but we will see.
Here are a couple of posts from our last trip. We will see how this compares. The water for sure will change the look and feel of it.
We got OK sleep but were both still reeling a little bit from yesterday’s excitement with the police. We were hoping to make it through the day unscathed from that perspective.
We made a final visit to the steam room, then breakfast, then made our way to the airport.
We made it all the way to immigration with no problems. And then they asked for our visas. Oops: they were in our day pack, which was now in checked luggage. We weren’t sure what would happen for a moment until Ash pointed out the multiple Mozambique stamps already in our passports – a total of 5 others at that point. They correctly reasoned we couldn’t have gotten that many without having visas, shrugged, and stamped us for a 6th and final time. Thank God.
We are now sitting peacefully in an otherwise empty lounge, enjoying some decent coffee before we board our flight to Johannesburg. We catch a connection there to Maun, where we will be staying the night before we head to the safari lodge.
On the jetway to board we were approached by a young guy, maybe 25. “Are you American?” He was a Marine from Fresno, assigned to be Embassy Guard for the State Department. He just finished a year in Maputo and was headed to Bosnia.
He asked how our visit was. When we told him about the police activity he said “yeah, it’s bound to happen sometime. How much did they get from you?” We told him and he said “yeah, that’s where the fake cash comes in handy.” He didn’t elaborate on how one acquired such things.
We had a nice conversation in the slow moving line to the plane. It was oddly comforting and disturbing at the same time that our experience was not unusual. “Next time just call the Embassy” he said. Let’s hope there isn’t one.
We had a transfer in Johannesburg that took every bit of the hour we had to go through Immigration and walk to the other side of the airport and go through security again for a 12:05 departure.
We landed in Maun about 1:40 and walked into our room right at 3pm. Not bad at all!
We will have great weather while we are here. This is definitely colder than last time which was first week in June 2023. I think the lows were like mid 50s then, which felt much colder in moving open aired vehicles at 6:30am.
Since we have water this time, we are supposed to be in mokoros which are like canoes. So still moving in the open air. Those 40s will feel like 30s. And we packed for that.
Ash booked this on points so we paid for an upgrade, and got the exact same room we had in 2023!
Complete with the same bug sprays as last time. The blue can goes on your skin; the green can is used for crawlies in your room. And the pink can is just an air freshener.
We got settled and went out to the patio for a bite to eat.
The view from the edge of the property. There was no water in that river the last time.
Maun has a population of about 50k and its nickname is The Gate to the Okavango Delta. It is situated along the Thamalakane River which is fed by the Delta. That’s the river in the photo above. I’ve been following a Facebook group that reports on the flow of water, which comes from northern Angola and makes its way down here before it dries up and starts again the next year. That last few years there hasn’t been much water. This year it got here about a month ago and people were super excited.
The patio was cool and lovely with the river in the background. It’s more crowded than it looks, everyone else is to the right of this photo, about 12 others. We split a chicken, artichoke and olive pizza. It was very good.
We figured that was a sort of late lunch / early starter for dinner. For that we decided on Marc’s Eatery. We made reservations for 6:30pm. Since it was already after 5 and Google was saying it was a 1.5 hour walk, we started moving in that direction.
Meet George from the hotel. He lives just by Marc’s. He usually takes a taxi to/from work but for some reason he decided to walk with us. We welcomed the company and enjoyed our visit with him along the way so much we invited him to join us for dinner.
A beautiful sunset along the way.
It was admittedly a longer walk than we anticipated. We had been walking almost an hour and had another 30 minutes to go when Ash decided he needed a restroom. George assured us we could get a taxi easily and we did. Ash made it just in time!
There were cows crossing the path as we walked up to the restaurant.
Meet Marc. Originally from Germany, he was sent to Botswana in 1981 to explore the feasibility of starting safari lodges. We know how that worked out since that’s a significant industry here. He was successful in that arena then “retired” by opening this restaurant 8 years ago. It was a great place – terrific menu and a comfortable, fun atmosphere.
It was pretty dark by then so we struggled with the lighting a bit as we sat farthest away from any lights.
Ash got a shrimp dish, I had impala stew. It was a teeny bit gamey but the cous cous smoothed that out to make it a delicious dish.
A final pic of us with George as we left. He helped us secure a cab for the ride back to the hotel.
Tomorrow we head to the Delta, staying at Moremi Crossing as we did in 2023.
So – what about this Eswatini prince? I know at least one of you has been wondering about that.
We were hoping it would turn into a more interesting story but it ended up not going anywhere.
We met Prince Lusuku at dinner our first night at Summerfield. We didn’t know who he was at the time, but was there celebrating a family member’s birthday.
The staff here made a big deal about birthdays. We witnessed this twice that night. The first one, oddly enough, was a Zulu prince who was at the table next to Suku. Zulu is an indigenous royal family that has been reigning since around 1840.
Then came Suko’s family member. It was his cousin or the sister with him, party if 3. But maybe because they were members of the Eswatini royal family, the staff made an even bigger deal about this one.
Before all this, Suku had already gotten our attention. We were at the table on the other side of him and could hear his quite animated conversation, at one point about Beyoncé. Now, IYKYK, but straight men and gay men just don’t talk about Beyoncé in the same way. So we knew right away he was gay. Note: it is still technically illegal to be gay in Eswatini, they just stopped prosecuting. So no rights and lots of stigma.
As we were leaving, Ash walks up to him and says “next time one of us has a birthday we are calling you to plan the party.” Mind you, we just think he’s some random gay guy.
Ash introduced himself, and me as his husband. Suko gets up and greets us enthusiastically, saying “it’s an honor to meet a couple such as you” – like maybe he never met a gay couple before? Totally possible. He asks about our travels and offers to show us around, etc. He then pulls out his card.
That’s when we found out who he was. I ask if we should refer to him as HRH. He says “You can call me Suku.”
He said he would be in Maputo this weekend for his sister’s wedding and maybe we could connect then.
And in the end, that’s all it was. We exchanged a few texts after that but nothing ever came of it. Now that we are far enough away to say nothing will, it was time to tell the story.
I was kidding Ash on the way here: Harry & Megan used to spend a lot of time in Maun and the Delta before the kids, maybe we will run into them? It could happen…
I don’t think I’ve ever been this glad to be back in my hotel room.
The entire day was filled with various cash and currency problems. I could spend the entire blog talking about all of that and I really don’t want to so I’ll highlight a few things and figure out how to summarize all that at the end. 
The agenda for the day was Maputo National Park. At a mere 665 mi.², it is a 10th of the size of Kruger in South Africa, but where that one is inland, this one is next to the ocean. So a completely different vibe. 
It sits south of Maputo. We finally got a chance to drive over this bridge which you saw in photos the other day. And you’ll see again later in this blog.
We made it to the entrance after about an hour drive. 
There is a parking lot at the entrance where we left the car and met a driver that we hired through our city tour guide the other day, Flavio. This guy’s name was Shinito. We needed both him and his vehicle, because from this point on you must be in a 4 x 4. It was another two hours of very slow and bumpy driving to get to our lunch destination which we got to about noon.
On our way in, all we saw was a few birds and this crocodile. 
Lunch was at a resort called Montebelo Milibangalala. Talk about remote: the only way to it is by 4 x 4‘s or helicopter.
But really incredible views.
For starters, Ash had a smoked salmon salad. I had a traditional Portuguese soup with chorizo. It was kind of chilly and the soup was perfect for that.
Here are the photos we took of each other while sitting there. This includes Ash’s main dish, which was a shrimp pasta.
I had veal with Parmesan cheese and some vegetables. I ate all of the cheese and all of the vegetables, but it was a lot of meat and I couldn’t finish it. It was delicious.
We bought lunch for our driver, but he chose not to eat with us. He sat with other driver friends.
We started to head back about 1:45 PM. A couple of shots above of the view for four hours, two hours each way. Just to give you an idea.
I sat in the backseat, so I also had a lot of this view. But if you notice in the bottom photo, there is an elephant in the middle of the road.
And a baby elephant at that. Mama came up not too far after and we watched them walk away into the brush. She was 3 to 4 times the size, but I couldn’t get a good photo of her because of the glare of the sun and the brush.
Shortly after, we came across this monkey picking through elephant dung. Probably that mama’s. Elephants have horrible digestion systems. So lots of other animals are interested in eating what came out whole.
We also saw some Impala.
We made it back to our room about 6 PM after some errands, I’ll say for now, and tell the rest of it later. We decided to return to Dhow for dinner. 
There was a beautiful store associated with the restaurant. Ash had eyed a couple of things when we were there on Friday and we returned not only because the food was great but to see about getting those items. And we did.
Still my favorite view of the trip. This might be even better at night. But Ash wrapped in a blanket in front of it is perfection. Blankets were readily available for anyone that wanted them. The restaurant doesn’t really have any walls. It was about 60° and breezy; even I was cold. I had changed into jeans and a hoodie.
We started with crab samosas, which were incredible. They came with three sauces: ketchup, mayonnaise, and a staple at every Mozambique table, peri peri. Sometimes piri piri. It is crazy hot. But a tiny dab of it with the mayonnaise on the Samosa was amazing.
Ash had shrimp and salad for his main dish; I had a hamburger and fries. Primarily because I remembered how terrific the fries were when I was here on Friday. Some of the best I’ve ever had.
For dessert, we had what they called the Saint and the Sinner. Warm chocolate sauce with cashew nuts poured over vanilla ice cream. It’s the San Sebastian chocolate again, the third time now we’ve had it here. It is a very distinct flavor to it, but I don’t think I’ve had anywhere else.
They even poured the sauce right at your table.
When we were done, we headed back to the hotel. We made a beeline to the spa area, but they were already closing. They let us in anyway, but the steam room wasn’t very hot so we didn’t stay very long.
I set an alarm so we can pack in the morning and get out of here by 7:30. We have a 10 AM flight to Johannesburg and then from there to Maun, Botswana. 
So now you’re wondering about the police shakedowns, aren’t you?
Although not a police incident, we encountered similar behavior, we feel, the day we arrived here. We had made a reservation for a Rent-A-Car. They confirmed they had it and a car available. When they ran our credit card, they said it was declined. We knew that was impossible because it’s the card to travel with, and not 10 minutes earlier we had used it to pay for our visa to get into the country.
We had them try both another POS machine as well as another travel card. Four different times they said the transaction was declined. Again, we knew it was impossible. Especially when their solution was for us to go get cash, to include an amount that would cover the insurance they wanted to sell us. The reason we purchase the rental with the travel card is because the insurance is covered. So we weren’t going to do that.
We went to the rental car booth next-door. They understood the predicament. Ran our card ahead of time and it went through fine. And they had a car available for about $150 less for the week than the other guy. We were good.
When we went to the main market in Manzini, we were told by a woman with a clipboard that we were gonna have to pay 12 American dollars to park for every 15 minutes. That is so ridiculous in this particular economy I don’t even know where to start. So we just left. We wanted no part of any of that because it felt like a sign of what was to come if we entered the market.
Here is a good news story that happened today. The deal for our driver in the park today was 4000 MT, or about $70. Which we thought was ridiculously reasonable. When we got there, we learned that that was just for the driver. That quote didn’t realize that we needed the 4 x 4 as well, they thought we would have our own vehicle. The price then went up to 15,000 MT, which included the fees to get in the park. Which was fine, except no one there took a credit card and we were not prepared with that much cash.
Thankfully, the restaurant took a card so that’s how we paid for lunch. But because the driver and the driver’s boss know everyone in the park and also know Flavio, the deal that we made was we would get the cash to Flavio and he would bring it to them. So that kid spent six hours with us driving in very treacherous terrain. We did have 1000 MT to tip him with and he was super happy with that. When we got to Maputo, we went to the bank and we were and able to draw the 15 K we needed and at Fabio‘s request we left it for him with a specific person at the hotel. He will pass the money to them and they will pay the fees at the park tomorrow or some other day. 
So it’s a good news story because everybody trusted everybody and it all worked out.
Just after we crossed back over the bridge going back into Maputo, we missed a turn. We were concentrating on the map to see how we would get back on track when suddenly there are cops standing in the road waving us over. They’re just standing in the road. There’s no vehicles, there’s no sirens, none of that. They did have radar equipment up to make it seem legit. And maybe it was. We realized later the speed limit had dropped. But we were concentrating on the map and missed that. They weren’t happy that the only license Ash had was a photo of his. And said that they were going to fine us. Ash simply asked: how much? 2000 MT. We said great except we don’t have that much in MT right now. We actually hadn’t gone to the bank yet for Flavio. But we did the conversion and it was about $32. So we gave them $35 and that satisfied them. They handed us a small document and made Ash fold the cash in a particular way so that when we handed the document back, you couldn’t see the cash. So really legit. But they sent us on our way and we were glad of that.
Then we went to the bank, the hotel, and dinner.
On our way back from dinner, we did an improper lane change and once again we managed to do it right in front of policeman. We were maybe three blocks from our hotel. This one was super unhappy about Ash‘s drivers license situation. We told them we have our passports at the hotel and at first they wanted us to take them to the hotel so they could see the passports for themselves. Him and one other actually got into the backseat of the car. Instead, they said you have made a serious mistake and we are taking you to the police station. They had us make a right turn, opposite the direction of the hotel. And then had us pull over, oddly, in front of the same bank we had just left not an hour and a half before. They said: you want to end this in a friendly way, give us money. Fine, how much. $300. And honestly, that blew us away. Not because we couldn’t have come up with it, but because it was nearly 10 times the amount the last guys asked for. At first they suggested we go to that ATM but somehow we got out of that. We literally emptied our wallet of everything we had in Mozambique and American currency which in total was maybe $120. Thankfully, that was enough to get them out of our car.
Ash said later that those two stops made up for the $150 we saved on the rental 😎
And I remembered later that Ash actually has two drivers licenses: one with the Sacramento address, one with the San Francisco address. And one of them is in my wallet right now.  🤪
So yeah, we’re happy to be getting out of this country tomorrow. 
I’m glad I was able to get some rest, getting up a little before 5am. Because I was going to need it.
The goal for the day was Kruger National Park, over 7500 square miles of wildlife that is mostly in South Africa but also spills some into Mozambique to the east and Zimbabwe to the north. It was where Ash did his first Safari in 2015 and he was looking forward to me being able to see some of it. Note: when he did it, he was already in South Africa.
We knew it was at least a 2 hour drive, although our guide from yesterday, Flavio, assured us it was an easy drive under 2 hours.
He never once said anything about the border.
We got an early start by getting to the steam room right after 6am when it opened. The hotel gym is a nice one and is open for membership for locals, which is why the locker room is so big.
Men and women have their own spa areas. This included showers, jacuzzi, sauna, and steam room.
We had breakfast and were on the road by 7:20am. We figured we would get to the park by 10:30, although Google was saying 9:30 but we didn’t believe that for one second. 
You might as well grab something to drink and settle in for a story. 
Now would be a good time to talk about the general uneasy feeling I’ve had driving around in this city. Thankfully, Ash isn’t bothered by it At All; he’s driven in much more chaos than this. And is doing an amazing job driving a stick with a right side steering wheel on the left side of the road.
All of that adds to my anxiety about the whole thing. He loves it. Usually I’m the calm one so it’s a nice reversal of roles.
The traffic itself is fairly organized as far as lights and signs go. Here’s what complicates it:
People just crossing the road every which way, often right in front of you
People trying to get you to buy something or sometimes just outright ask for money, which they have time to do because traffic is slow
And it’s slow because of the people, walking in the middle of the street trying to wash your windshield for money, crossing carrying baskets of things on their heads, etc.
Or cars just stopped blocking traffic because there is so little parking
And that’s in town. All of that increased 10x at the border.
Remember the last border crossing? A stop in both countries for passport and vehicle registration checks? This was that x100.
It was roughly the same process. But So Many People – in the lines to get across, trying to sell you stuff, now including currency exchanges and SIM cards.
We had probably been at a crawl for 20-30 minutes in this chaos by the time we approached the gate around the Mozambique immigration buildings. Liking to document things for the blog, I snapped a photo before we passed through the gate.
That was the wrong thing to do.
A guard noticed, approached me and asked for my phone. “Why are you taking a picture of me?” He found the photo and sure enough he was in it. I said “I’m sorry, I didn’t know you were in it, we are just travelers documenting our trip. I will delete it.” He stood there and watched me do it, making sure I went into Deleted to remove it from there. Then waved us on.
You may recall the other day I mentioned my irrational fear of border crossings. I say irrational because in over 30 of them nothing has ever happened. So far so good.
But my adrenaline shot through the roof.
We were supposed to park and go inside. The parking lot was chaos and the line to get into the building was way out the door. A random guy waves us over to park in this random space and says he will get us in and out quickly for 300 rand, South African currency. We didn’t have any of that so agreed on 500 MT, the Mozambique currency. He takes us into the building around the back and through the exit then asks for the money. We’d used our smaller bills on the roughly 300 MT we paid in tolls to get this far. The smallest thing we had was 1000 which he took, saying he would need extra to pay the bribes. Ash watched him pay the woman at the counter to stamp our passports showing an exit of the country. And also watched him pay the guard when he stopped us on our way out. We got in our vehicle and continued the trek.
We were on our way. But it took another 20-30 minutes to go maybe only 300 feet to reach the South African side of this process. We found a place to park pretty quickly, but once we got behind the fence, we saw that the lines to get into the building were even more ridiculous than the Mozambique side. Again, a local person identifies us as Americans, asks for $5 to take us to the head of the line. We agree since it worked the last time. He asks for another $5 for the bribes. That all made sense to us. By the way, Ash had just told me that this is how he has gotten through other tricky borders in way worse areas than this so none of this seems unusual to him. What do I know? This is all new to me.
Dude literally takes us to the front of the line and has us crawl through the barrier and says to go to counter three. It is so obvious that we are cutting people start complaining. And understandably so because again, the lines were stupid long. Short version: the guy at the counter was not going for it, asked us to identify the guy that we gave money to, and of course he was gone. So he sent us back to the end of the line. Not before I had visions of us in handcuffs. For the 2nd time that hour.
At that point our estimate was it would be another two hours at least before we got to that window again. By this time it was after 10:30. And we’re probably another hour to the park assuming we made it across the border. We asked if there was a way to just turn around and the guards were actually quite helpful on that subject.
The number of cars going the wrong way made it tricky but we finally got to the Mozambique entrance counter where there were very few people. We explained that we never actually crossed into South Africa, we gave up and we’re just going back to our hotel. They shrugged and stamped everything they needed to stamp and we were on our way again. At this point, it’s about 11 AM. Over 3 1/2 hours on the road and nothing to show for it except we spent some money for nothing. What can I say? We are always happy to contribute to the local economy when we travel.
Us at 11:09 AM. Still smiling.
For the most part, the trip back to the hotel was uneventful except for a good couple of miles on and off of the same kind of chaos with people as described above. This was when the window washers really came out. We noticed that we hadn’t seen any yesterday, and we realized it was because they were boys out of school for Saturday. And they were out en masse.
My not great attempt at trying to capture the people walking every which way. The window washer is right in the middle of the street. Just a random street corner. Many areas look like this. Thankfully, not in the neighborhood we are staying in, which is pretty calm in comparison. 
When we got to the hotel, the parking lot was chaos again. Lots of people out, dressed in traditional Eswatini garments. Ash asked one of them if they were performing, because they reminded him of the dancers we saw when we were there. But I had a feeling this is just how they were dressed and it was for some an event.
Remembering our encounter with the Prince, who said he would be in Maputo for his sister’s wedding, we asked if they were here for a wedding and they said yes. Still more on that story later.
We waded through lots of very rich people in the lobby, dressed in both the Eswatini garb as well as very dressy western clothes. We dropped off our passports and Mozambique visas and made our way out again. We were in search of lunch and pedicures.
Txhapo Txhapo again
We had said at dinner last night that we would return to that place and so we did. The same guy that helped us last night was there again for lunch today. He was just as kind and helpful as he was the night before.
Ash got a salad with grilled tuna on top. The guy recommended the steak for me, with potatoes and carrots. It was really good. I don’t know what was in that sauce other than a lot of garlic, but it was wonderful. The kind waiter agreed to a photo as we left. 
We asked him his name: Vasco. Well, of course it is. He spoke the most beautiful English I’ve ever heard.
We made it to the nail place a little before 3 PM. It’s in a beautiful neighborhood right in the entrance of a gorgeous park. It was very crowded, but we were happy to see there were other men there waiting. I had wondered out loud if it was culturally weird for men to get pedicures here, but that made me feel better about it. So many African countries are so very anti gay that I just wonder about these things. We made an appointment for 5 PM.
This was the view at the edge of the park. We stopped at a very cool place called Bean for coffee and dessert on our way back to the hotel. 
Ash got a coffee and brownie, I got a latte and a cookie.
My view as I wrote much of the above from our hotel balcony.
It is now approaching 430. We’ve enjoyed a little rest in our room while I wrote the blog up to this point.
We left about 10 minutes later to make our way back to the nail salon. We noticed this time how friendly really everyone in our neighborhood is. And what’s been true everywhere, even those who are maybe even being a little annoying trying to tell you something, are doing it with a smile. Nobody is angry when you say no and send them on their way. So as to not leave you with the wrong impression, we’ve been very pleased with how well we’ve been treated and how friendly everybody is. With the exception of perhaps a couple of border guards. 
We passed this elephant 3x before I really saw it on the 4th pass.
This was on the wall opposite it – a little about the artist and the process. Up close is pretty interesting.
The pedicures were a huge success. We typically get them once a quarter or so. Ash had gotten one in Lisbon about 6 weeks ago but I was long overdue. As the lady who got to work on me shared with her co-workers in Portuguese!
Like our haircuts, we had been saying for weeks I would just get one here so I had looked for something near the hotel before we even left home. It looked nice in the photos with good reviews and fairly close to where we were staying.
It turned out to be a very high end place about a mile directly south of our hotel. They sat us next to each other. And so much for my worries about them thinking it was strange for a guy to be there: there were 5 of us out of 10 chairs!
This nice Portuguese guy was across from us with his wife and teenage son in the 2 chairs to the left. He spoke perfect English and offered to translate for us if needed. Their 6 year old (or so) joined them later, he had been playing in the park you saw earlier.
The best part? We each got a mani-pedi for a total of $50 including a very generous tip for these parts. Wild.
One final comment about the people. Despite all the chaos, I definitely get a sense that these are just some very poor people trying to eke out a living the best way they can. The average daily wage for Maputo citizens according to some sources is about $33 a day. We tipped the girls at the salon, all four of them, the equivalent of $3 each. it was pretty clear from the smiles on their faces that they were not used to that. It just reminds us how blessed we are. 
Above and below: big digital billboards at this one intersection.
Spicy Thai was on our way back to the hotel. We had passed it earlier and decided then we would have dinner here.
We shared chicken and mushrooms, and cashew chicken. They were both really good.
It was a nice place and we sat by an open window enjoying a nice breeze.
We talked about our day on the way back to the hotel. Ash admitted that the drive this morning was exhausting. The people stuff in the city doesn’t bother him, but he said the border stuff was a bit much even for him. When that guard was pissed about the photo he thought we were going to get arrested. I’m glad it wasn’t just me! Apparently, this is our week to piss off border guards.
We did a nice round in the steam room once we got back hoping to sweat out the adrenaline hangover that at least I still had. We are glad to be back safe and sound. I’m sitting on the balcony, enjoying the breeze and Ash is already in bed. I will get there soon.
Tomorrow the plan is to go to the Maputo game reserve. You’ll have to check back in to see how that goes. 
I woke up at 3 AM and was unsuccessful getting back to sleep so I gave up about 4. Ash managed to sleep until 5:30. I went down to the steam room when it opened at 6 AM. We went for breakfast a little after 6:30.
This is the courtyard that leads to the entrance of the spa where the steam room is. The sun is just starting to rise on the left. That same area from a different angle to pick up the beginning of the sunrise. I started with a nice plate of fruit while Ash had an omelette. Then I got an omelette, along with some porridge, and Ash had some fruit as well.I finished with a pastel de nata, a Portuguese egg custard tart, which will always remind me of Vasco (our foreign exchange student from last year) and the ones he made for us. It was just a little bit better than those. 
This is probably a good time to talk about some Mozambique history. Vasco da Gama discovered it in 1498 after he first circled the Cape of Good Hope. Portugal colonized the area and ruled it for essentially the next 500 years. It did not gain its independence until 1975. The name itself is related to an Arab leader named Mussa Bin Bique that was in place at the time, but the Portuguese couldn’t pronounce it and it became Mozambique.
Portuguese is still the only official language and you hear it everywhere. Schools also teach English because it leads to better paying jobs for those that learn it. Some private schools speak only English to learn through immersion. There are currently about 35 million people in the country, and about 1.5million in the city of Maputo, which is the capital.
After breakfast, we went for a walk and ended up logging over 4 miles. 
This is the entrance to our hotel, a the Polana Serena.We came across the congressional building. We were walking on that side of the street at first but an armed guard made us cross.This Mozambique sign reminded me of the one in Puerto Vallarta.There were several more hotels about a mile down. The one on the left is the Radisson Blu which is one Ash considered before deciding on where we are. An interesting tree as we approached the beach.Another tree on the beach and a guy gathering lots of shells.
The above photo and the couple that follow are just more pictures of us walking around the beach area.
This photo and the one below were taken from the same spot. This hotel casino reminded us of the Bellagio, but without the fountains. It’s another one that Ash considered before deciding on where we are. He was glad to find these and confirm that he made the right decision. Ash haggled with this street vendor for, if you’re me, an uncomfortably long time. We ended up getting this mask for $20 which was about 40% off his asking price.We went back to the hotel to change clothes, freshen up, and get some cash. Ash thought the money was pretty so we took a photo. Our tour guide, Flavio, picked us up about 10 AM. Our first stop was a fortress. This was built by the Portuguese several hundred years ago to ward off attacks from other European countries. Old weapons and artillery still around on the wall.
This art piece symbolizes the accord that was signed in 1975 at Lusaka in Zimbabwe. Many other already free African countries assisted with the negotiations between the Mozambique people and Portugal. 
Our next stop was the train station. Since this was built by the Portuguese, it looked like many of the stations we have seen in Europe.The Central Market was our next stop. This begins to capture the size, but not really.We bought some nuts, spices, and a gift for one of Ash’s SF tenants who does a lot of favors for him. We stopped at the Hotel Cardosa for a coffee break. It had a lovely patio café.With a gorgeous view.Next was the cathedral, The Cathedral of Our Lady of the Immaculate Conception. Flavio had said it was really old, but I thought it looked pretty modern. We learned it was built in 1936.Above looks to the front of the church, below looks to the rear. It was pretty modest as Catholic churches go. Ash liked this building on our way to the botanical gardens. It was a beautiful park and I took more photos than I’m going to include, but here are a couple of them above and below. 
There was an odd chirping coming from our right and we started moving in that direction. Fazio asked us what we thought the sound was coming from. Ash said birds, but I assumed from the way he asked the question that was too obvious and answer so I said monkeys.
The noise was coming from bats. It was actually a little unsettling. 
Can you hear the chirping?
A beautiful pergola covered with Bougainvillea. I love seeing lots of local people around a park and enjoy enjoying it. It helped that free Wi-Fi was available.
We had lunch at a restaurant called Dhow. It was Flavio‘s recommendation, but also happened to be on our list so it was perfect. https://dhow.co.mz/?v=6ee58d337915
This was the view from my seat. Ash at our table with some of the restaurant behind him.I walked around a little bit after we ordered to take some other shots of the incredible view. This one is now my Facebook cover photo. Our table is just to the left of the swimming pool.  Chicken and corn samosas on the plate that were extraordinary. That other dish is actually made of bullets. And on top is a creamy crab dip baked in a coconut shell. It was terrific, especially with the 2 kinds of bread they brought to eat with it. The two of us with our tour guide, Flavio. Ash had a fruit salad with shrimp for his main.
And a little bit of story time first. You may be familiar with the New York Times game called Connections. I typically play it on our morning walks and ask Ash for help when I get stuck. The other morning there was clearly a category that had something to do with cuts of beef, but I couldn’t figure out the fourth one. So I blew the game and when the answers were provided, I learned that Tomahawk was the missing cut. I had never heard of it before.
So when there was a tomahawk steak on this menu, I felt compelled. It was pretty delicious. The meat around the bone reminded me of ribs my mother used to make. 
Flavio dropped us back at the hotel after 3 PM. We both took naps and then went out again and search of a haircut. Google directed us to one about a half a mile away walking. 
It was called the Gentleman’s Barber Shop, and it had this whole vibe that was actually pretty cool. We were offered beer or whiskey as soon as we walked in which of course we politely declined.
It was pretty busy which we thought was a good sign, so we had a bit of a wait. They took me first and then Ash. We each got a haircut and a shampoo. I got a 15 minute neck, shoulder, and arm massage. Ash got a complete shave plus a nose waxing. All for the low, low price of $27. This is why we intentionally wait to get haircuts for when we travel because they are so much cheaper than what you have to pay in the US.
Above and below: before and after.
After the haircuts, we went across the street for dinner.
Txhapo Txhapo is the name.It’s a small place but had a great menu and a very friendly atmosphere. Ash got a tuna burger and I got a pulled barbecue pork sandwich. We shared a chocolate cake with vanilla ice cream and chocolate and caramel sauce. We’re pretty sure the chocolate sauce is the same sauce that was used on the cheesecake we had last night. It’s got a very distinct flavor. Our hotel at night as we returned. 
Talk about a full day. We were out and about for roughly 11 hours and logged over 8 miles of walking. And enjoy every minute of it.
Tomorrow we venture out to Kruger National Park.
PS: i’m still learning how to do this from my phone. It had some photos jumble around and repeat in the middle. So there’s a couple of repeats that I didn’t intend. I’ll get the hang of it one of these days. 
After two nights in a row of 10 hours of sleep for both of us, we both woke up about 2 AM this morning and couldn’t go back to sleep. It was bound to kick in sometime.
We drank coffee in the room and watched stupid things on TV which is all there is at that time of the morning. Breakfast opened at 6:30 AM and we were there on the dot. The big agenda item for the day was driving back to Maputo and we were on the road before 7:30 AM.
This time the border crossing went smoothly. We figured out that the military guards who sent us back to the border on Tuesday radioed the guard there and probably gave him a hard time about letting us get through without stopping. Because he was quite agitated with us when we got back there on Tuesday. We were wondering if he would be there today.
And he was. He was the last stop at the gate to collect what they called the Gate Pass, which indicates all of your paperwork is in order. We hand it to him and he looks at us and smiles and says “at least you didn’t cause any trouble today.”
We got back to the hotel about noon. This is where we stayed Monday night and are back for four more nights before we head to Botswana.
Our room is next-door to the room we had the other day only a little bit better. It’s laid out so there’s more open space, and the balcony jets out the farthest of any so we have an unobstructed view on either side.
This is Ash on the north end of the balcony. The room we had Monday night is just behind him to the left. Looking south. Since our balcony is the farthest out, we have an unobstructed 180° view.The calm and beautiful Indian Ocean to the east. I have a feeling we will appreciate this view quite a bit the next four days. 
But I’m a little ahead of myself. Our room wasn’t ready yet when we checked in so they held our luggage and we got something to eat first.
This is the same hotel restaurant where we had dinner on Monday night. Our breakfasts are in the same area.
Our lunches were pretty simple. I had a chicken sandwich with french fries. Ash got an Indian dish that he was pretty disappointed with, but it was still tasty. Just not what he expected. Let’s just say masala is not masala everywhere. 
This was my chicken sandwich. I forgot to get a photo of Ash’s dish because at first I thought he was gonna send it back. 
We got settled in, including unpacking and some ironing. Ash took a nap and I started working on this and made some progress on a different writing project I started this morning when we had a bunch of time to kill.
We decided on a place for dinner, showered and made our way out about 5:30. It was about a 25 minute walk along the road that runs below our balcony.
That’s our balcony, the one that is sticking out. 
This avenue had some pretty pricey real estate on it, including several embassies.
Our destination is a restaurant called Salt, about a mile walk from our hotel and on the ocean. There weren’t a lot of reviews on either Google or TripAdvisor but what was there was very good and they were correct. Ash is writing a TripAdvisor review as I type.  This was our best meal of the trip so far. 
The entrance. To the left of us is the ocean, but it’s so dark you can’t see it anyway.We saw this on the wall as we exited. They won a Best Restaurant in Mozambique award in 2024. A really beautiful dining room.Our waiter offered to take this for us. And Ash took this of me. I appreciated that he took his time with it. I don’t usually like his photos of me, but I’m good with this.
Some of the reviews that we read raved about the garlic bread so we had to try that. Imagine a quesadilla with mozzarella and garlic inside cooked over an open fire. It was stupid good.
This is springbok carpaccio. It was fun to see it on the menu. I had this at my very first meal in Africa, in Johannesburg in 2023. It was so good I had it the next night as well. This was just as good as I remember it. Springbok is a very small antelope. This is a very delicate meat. It was prepared beautifully with arugula, olive oil, and a kind of nut I couldn’t identify. (And an amusing discussion with the waiter at the end of the meal that offered no clarity on the nut question!)
Ash had the shrimp which he said was delicious.
I had the filet mignon. The red sauce is a gorgonzola sauce colored by beetroot. In the bowl is a wonderful risotto. All of it pretty incredible.
For dessert we shared with they called San Sebastian cheesecake. That’s a very tasty but somehow light chocolate sauce dripping all over that puppy. It was spectacular.
We had ambitions about walking around a bit after dinner, but by the time we got back to the hotel, we were pretty done.
I did go sit in the steam room for about 20 minutes and had a fun conversation with the attendant there about American politics. Let’s just say we saw things the same way.
We booked a tour of the city highlights tomorrow which kicks off at 10 AM. That’s as much as we have planned so we’ll see what else we come up with. 
I actually slept until 8 AM, getting 10 hours of sleep again. Ash was up a little before me and was ready to go so we went out for breakfast pretty much right away.
I had the English breakfast, which is pretty typical when we travel somehow. It’s the only time I ever eat pork and beans, even though I ate them a lot as a kid. Ash had an omelette. Breakfast was in a different location than the restaurant we were at twice yesterday. This is much closer to our room so it was an easy walk. I took this shot on our way out. At that point it was empty, although it was full when we got there.There were peacocks on our porch when we came back from breakfast. 
We made our way to the first thing on our list for the day, which was the Swazi Cultural Village about 25 minutes away.
If you are not familiar with the history: Eswatini used to be known as The Kingdom of Swaziland. It was formalized as a kingdom in 1881, then was a British protectorate from 1903 to 1968. It has been independent since September 6, 1968. They changed their name to Eswatini in 2018. And it is actually always referred to as the Kingdom of Eswatini. We actually met a current Prince at dinner last night. He asked us to reach out to him and we did. If he ever reaches back, there might be a story to tell there.
This is the entrance to the cultural village, and also a nature reserve. This was about 20 km west of where we were staying.
We stopped here to pay for the entrance and to get instructions. It was about a kilometer drive down to the village.
There was a lovely stream on our left most of the way down. 
The visit consisted of a tour as well as a performance by the local dancers. A young local man met us to give us the tour. He was quite articulate about the history and the traditions of Swaziland culture that still exist today in rural parts of the country. Let’s just say it is a very male dominated culture, where the expectation was that they had at least two wives. Wealth was measured by how many cows they owned. Today, most modern citizens practice a more western culture and are Christians.  so far we haven’t encountered anyone who doesn’t speak English. He said they start learning it when they are five years old. 
This is an example of one home of a man. Each hut has its own purpose. Each wife actually gets three huts, which are used for specific things: one is the bedroom, one is a kitchen, one is essentially a brewery. Plus he has a set, and his mother has a set. So it’s a lot of huts in one home, enclosed by the fence.
The mountain you see in the background is known as Execution Rock. When someone was found guilty of a crime whose punishment was death, that was accomplished by making them jump off the top of the rock over to the steep side. The fall was so steep and so far that it would surely kill them. The bodies were left to be eaten by wildlife. In this culture, bodies were buried in the ground within the home as laid out above. So they weren’t allowed to be brought back in because they didn’t want the bad spirit coming with them. 
I made a visit to the medicine man’s hut. He gave me my fortune by reading the bones that he threw. I have a very good future to look forward to, according to him, which didn’t surprise me one bit. We were entertained for about 45 minutes by local dancers. It was actually pretty mesmerizing and I didn’t think to take any photos or videos during the main performances. Then they came and grabbed people from the audience. One of the women made a beeline for Ash. Twice.
I am doing this from my phone again with limited bandwidth and I can’t seem to get the videos uploaded. I will try to remember to do them when we get back to Maputo. 
A couple of the women posed with us after the dance was over.
The other thing to do here was to walk about 10 minutes to a waterfall.
We just stopped at the first sight of it and decided to not go any further. You can see it in the middle of us there.
At that point we had been there about two hours and we were pretty done. We headed back into town, which was about 15 km on the other side of where we were staying. We made it to the main market, which was on everyone’s list of things to do. But it very quickly felt like a place for tourists to be swindled and so we decided to move on.
We ended up going to a mall about a half a mile away figuring we could find something to eat there. And we did.
This was called Bloom Café. It shared a space with a flower shop called Fresh Cutz. Ash got a chicken and mushroom pasta dish, and I had a chicken salad. We shared them a little bit but mostly ate what we ordered. 
The 3 women there were sweet, but it took them 45 minutes to make a very simple lunch. It was pretty tasty and only cost us about 19 American dollars. It’s a good thing we weren’t on a schedule. After this, we came back to the resort and I am right now, sitting by the pool, listening to the waterfall and enjoying the lovely weather. Ash is taking a nap. I’ll finish this up when we go for dinner.
There was a male peacock roaming around where I was. He came right by me and I got a video of him, but perhaps I can get that uploaded later.
We heard back from the Prince. We’ll see what happens with that. Perhaps we will meet up with him in Maputo.
We returned to the same restaurant for dinner a little after 6 PM.
They had an impressive non-alcoholic drink list which we had somehow missed on our first two visits. We don’t usually take advantage of that anyway, but decided we would tonight. We landed on piña coladas and are glad we did. They were amazing.
Ash had the same starter that he had for lunch yesterday, the rissoles.
I finally got the snails which I have been wanting to try since our first visit here. This is our third and will be our last visit so I decided to do it. No regrets. That garlic Parmesan sauce was amazing. Ash had a seafood salad for his main. He went light for dinner since he had a heavy lunch. I did the opposite. I had a sirloin option that I had somehow missed the first two times. It came with polenta cakes, which were sort of dry, but that garlic sauce helped. Same vegetables as my last two meals here. Which was OK by me.
Remember, it is winter here. It is 59° now and it’s supposed to get down to 49 by the time we get up in the morning. So we figured out the heater and turned it on before we left for dinner. It should be nice and toasty when we get back.
Ash got the chocolate mousse for dessert. I had one spoonful. My meal was super filling. But he said it was very good and I was glad he enjoyed it. 
It is 7:31 PM and we are done. We will head back to the room for some TV and maybe an early bedtime. We are not looking forward to the drive back to Maputo tomorrow which was pretty stressful yesterday. At least this time we know how to handle the border. We will see how it all goes. 
It has been a long time since I’ve blogged from my phone, but I don’t have my laptop with me now and since I do have a connection on what’s been a sketchy day on that front, I’m gonna take advantage of it while I can.
We both slept a much needed 10 hours, waking up about 4:30 AM. I got the blog up while Ash went for a walk.
The beginning of sunrise from our balcony just before 6 AM. That is the moon and what we think is a star called Sirius – the southern hemisphere version of the North Star. 
We met for breakfast in the hotel around 7 AM. It was a pretty typical hotel buffet breakfast; I didn’t even take a single photo.
We got on the road a little after 8 AM and did not get to our destination until about 1:15. There are two primary reasons that made the trip take about an hour and a half longer than anticipated:
Potholes: good Lord. And that’s all I’m gonna say about that. But only on the Mozambique side, which was about halfway through from a miles perspective. The roads in Eswatini were significantly better.
We had heard this could be quite an affair because of the manual process, taking up to a couple of hours. So we were very surprised that there was nothing to it – no guards, no signs telling you what to do or to stop you even. So we just drove straight through. Thinking that’s kind of odd. Until about 20 km in we get to a military stop. And they turned us right back around. So this time we stopped on the Eswatini side. They look at our passports. They’re looking for a Mozambique stamp. We said we got one yesterday they said no what about today? So we had to go about a block further back and stop at the Mozambique office to get an exit stamp. Then back to the other one to get our car registration for Eswatini and pay a fee. Then back to the military guards who were happy that we had finished it all. And very quickly waved us through.
I have an irrational fear about things going wrong at border crossings, and this played into all of that. We learned a lot and in the end, it turned into nothing. And at least now we know what to do on the way back.
As of today, I am at 27 countries. Mind you, my first international trip was 2013. Ash is at 66.
It was at least an hour before we got to our destination: Summerfield Luxury Resort and Botanical Gardens. Ash booked all seven nights of these two hotels using Chase points. So essentially free. They offered us an upgrade for about $115 a night. We agreed to it before we saw it, but she said we should see it first.
It is literally a house. We think about 800 ft.².What a dump!Ash said that mirror must’ve been picked out by a gay guy because no one else would pick out a mirror that fabulous. This bedroom is bigger than the one we have in our master at home. Beautiful bedroom and super comfy.
Needless to say, we took the upgrade. 
Above photo and the next several that follow were just of the grounds on our way to the restaurant for lunch.
This is the outside of the restaurant as seen from the other side. You can’t see Ash sitting at the table because his view is blocked, but that’s where we were. Bread to start with three spreads. That orange is peri peri and super hot. the yellowish one is a buttery spread with peppers and other flavorings that was wonderful. The red is really a fancy ketchup. We split the starters equally. This they called puff prawns, with a great sweet chili sauce. This was the star of the meal. Prawn rissoles.  Think crispy patty with a creamy cheesy shrimp inside. I was even moved to take a photo of the inside.Ash had a fish called klingpen. It was very good. I had oxtails which were also really amazing. They even brought a bowl of warm water with the understanding that you were gonna use your hands on this gravy laden dish. 
After lunch, we walked around a bit on our way back to the room.
Notice the Jade surrounding this tree. I had never seen jade the green before. See the close-up below. When we returned to our room, they had left some fruit and a bottle of champagne. We are going to take the champagne as a gift for the folks at our next day.
It was about 3 PM when we got back to our room. We just relaxed for the next couple of hours. I think Ash managed to sleep about an hour or more. I rested, but didn’t sleep.
And then all of a sudden, we lost both our cell phone connection and our Wi-Fi. Everything just stopped working.
I had set up to start working on the blog from the dining room table, but couldn’t get a connection there either. It makes for a pretty photo that doesn’t it?
This is our front porch, which looks better at night than it did during the day. 
Somehow, we were hungry again by 7 PM and went back to the restaurant for dinner.
It’s about 60° outside so this time we sat inside. They initially sat us in the bar while they found us a table. The dining area is downstairs and upstairs in the background there. We were seated upstairs.
Ash had a Bengal shrimp curry that he said was really good.I had a rump steak with the same spinach and sweet potatoes as lunch. Rice instead of regular mashed potatoes. But the hit of this plate was the garlic sauce on the left. I could’ve drank it. For dessert, we had a spice cake with a warm vanilla custard sauce. This was pure heaven. 
And that is our day. It’s been a long time since I’ve posted just as the day was ending. I might have to do this phone thing more often. 
We have in some ways been planning this trip since we first went to Africa in 2023. That was the first time we’d used National Geographic’s travel arm, going on a 10-day safari which included the Okavango Delta, something that had been on Ash’s bucket list (but which at the time I’d never heard of).
We made 2 decisions on that trip about future travel:
We would definitely use National Geographic again. While I was shocked with what we initially paid for that trip, when it was over I was like “and it was worth double that.” The level of the experience so far exceeded expectations on every level – including lodging, food, and maybe most importantly the experience of the guides – that we were completely sold on the model. We’ve done one other trip using NatGeo since then (Machu Picchu & Galapagos last year) and have 4 more booked through 2027.
We would return to the Okavango Delta. A UNESCO World Heritage Site, it is an amazing expanse of protected wilderness in Botswana. When we were there in May of 2023, there was no water, which was disappointing but still provided a stunning experience, just one that was different than expected. Why the water wasn’t there then is a complicated answer that I’ll skip for now. Suffice it to say it has to do with changing climates and increased civilization upriver. The timing of this trip was influenced by 2 factors: as far into the season as we could go to help ensure the presence of water, pushing against the school schedules of the family members who will be joining us for that portion of the trip. More on that when we get there. And yes: there is water now. So we will see when we get there how that changes things compared to last time.
So that’s why this trip at this time. We will only be in the Okavango for a few days at the end of the trip and are starting in Mozambique and Eswatini. No particular reason for those choices other than: we hear they are beautiful, have great food, and haven’t been there before. So, let’s go!
We left our home Saturday evening just before 6pm. We wouldn’t get to our first stop until about 4pm local time on Monday, which with the time change would have been 7am Monday at home. That’s 37 hours total of travel, of which about 23 was spent in the air. That makes this the longest travel day for me, and 2nd longest for Ash. And it started with our friend, Mark, driving us to SFO in San Francisco where we began. He’s also housesitting for us. This was our drop off.
We had access to a lounge through Priority Pass. It was pretty big and had an OK food selection, which was good since our plan was to have our dinner there. We boarded on time for a 10:35pm flight to Atlanta. We’d hoped to sleep on this leg but neither of us did. We had a 3-hour layover in Atlanta, lounge access again, then had a 10:30am flight to Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. This leg was 13.5 hours although it seemed longer. We were grateful to have business class seats. It was an older plane so not the swankiest we’ve had but certainly better than economy. Ash had found business class all the way using miles.
The first leg was on United. The next two ere Ethiopian Airlines. We were presented with a menu which described the choices we would have for meals. This leg had full meals at the start and end, with a snack in between. I could spend a lot of time talking about the food, with photos, but decided that, at least for this leg, while it was very good, it wasn’t that interesting. Since the flight is originating in Atlanta, it’s catering to an American taste profile. Exceptions noted below.
They started the first meal with local snacks, which included a bowl of roasted grains and what they called crackers. Both unique to us and tasty. But the real hit was a list of non-alcoholic drinks on the menu. We both got virgin pina coladas which were amazing and, at least for me, the best taste of that leg. Great flavor and super creamy.
The menu also included this whole story about the origins of coffee. A goat shepherd from the province of Kaffa Ethiopia noticed his goats acting strangely after eating coffee beans. Monks from the monastery thought the beans must be from the devil and threw them into the fire. They were entranced by the aroma which led to brewing, which led to them being able to stay focused longer through prayer and meditation. That lead to sacred culture around having coffee that still exists today. This story didn’t include any dates, but a little research suggests the legend of the goatherder goes back to about 500 AD.
All that to say: The coffee service on this leg and the one that followed was very satisfying.
We had a beautiful sunrise on this leg, thankfully muted by blue tinted windows.
We always like to follow the flight map when available. Ash was very excited to be flying over the Nile River. We landed in Addis Ababa mostly on time. The landscape was a beautiful patchwork of green and brown. Addis Ababa has a population of 6million.
We landed a little later than scheduled which made what was supposed to be just a 50-minute layover go very quickly. We got to our gate just as they started boarding, which included a bus ride to the plane way on the other side of the airport. We boarded from the tarmac.
On our final leg we were presented with another menu from the same template as the other, but different choices. This was more local which we appreciated. Starting with smoked salmon on the left. We were then presented with traditional Ethiopian options, what we would call comfort food. This was what I was hoping for, being a fan of Ethiopian places I’ve eaten at back home. In the middle – you could pick as little or as much as you wanted from the options in the cart. I got everything but the lamb – so chicken and vegetable choices. Ash got everything that wasn’t spicy. It was served on injera bread, seen in the last photo, which is more like a pancake than anything. You tear pieces off and use that to eat with. This was very satisfying.
We landed in Maputo, Mozambique, on time about 2pm locally. We got through customs fine after having to pay for a 30-day visa, which we expected. We had a whole thing about the car rental which I’ll skip, but which ended up with us using a different agency than planned. We were just thankful the one next door had a car available, and a lovely woman working there who was super helpful. On the left, she is going over the small Toyota (a model we don’t have in the US) with Ash.
We got to our hotel a little before 4pm. We are staying here just one night, then 2 nights in Eswatini, then will be back here for 4 nights. This is the lobby in the center, with a photo of the center of a long veranda which extends the width of the property. You’ll see that fountain again in a bit.
The bell guy walked us to our room, which we were glad for as it was quite a winding way from the lobby. They put us in room at the far end of the property and somewhat detached from the main hotel. But these came with their own verandas which we will enjoy quite a bit, including watching the sunrise already early this morning.
We essentially dropped our bags and went out to explore.
At the center of this photo is that fountain again, just seen from the far end by the water.
On the left, Ash enjoying the beautiful Indian Ocean. There’s an incredible breeze coming off of it that’s almost like nothing I’ve experienced, although reminded me of the breeze in the Galapagos which was also amazing. There’s a quality to the air – both in texture and temperature – that’s comforting in a way that’s hard to describe.
Just to give you a little idea of where we were standing on the planet at that moment.
The formal dinner time was 7pm. It wasn’t quite 5pm yet but we were so tired we didn’t think we’d make it until 7pm. Neither of us got much sleep on any of the slights, although both of us slept the most on the last one. Thankfully, the restaurant is open all day, so we were able to get a table with a great view.
Ash had the seafood soup to start, on the left. I had a Caesar salad on the right.
We shared a grilled seafood platter meant for 2, which included lobster, shrimp, clams, mussels, calamari, fries and rice, and a variety of vegetables. Perfect.
And that is how we began. We are happy to be here and excited about what’s coming. And glad that you are coming with us!
And by the way, if you haven’t checked out the Home Page of my blog recently, please do. I’ve added a fun interactive map and an improved menu that helps you zero in on where you want to go. I’d love to hear what you think.
And, if you’re a regular reader from Facebook but have not subscribed, please do! That has been made easier, as well. (See the big Subscribe button in the menu bar….) Eventually I may move away from Facebook, so I want to make sure we stay connected.
Sunday, July 6, was the last day of the convention, closing with a “Big Meeting” at the stadium from 9-11am. We left the condo to make our way there about 7:30am.
This time we sat in a section that provided access to the larger screen. The crowd dynamic was significantly different than that first meeting Friday night and we were able to get seats closer to the front. Greg #2 met us there, resulting in the photo on the right.
All 3 speakers were very good. There was also a presentation of the 43rd millionth Big Book to the warden of Dorchester Penitentiary in New Brunswick which was quite touching. They’ve been allowing meetings to be taken behind the walls for over 75 years. Recordings were played of current and ex inmates who testified to how life changing that was for them.
After the meeting we walked over to Davie Village for brunch at the Fountainhead Pub.
We shared cauliflower bites to Start. Ash, Mark and I got the Power Bowl with Cajun chicken, a cold dish of quinoa and vegetables that was not only tasty but very filling. Greg #1 got a brisket hash dish and Greg #2 got a benedict.
After brunch we all split up: Greg #1 and Mark went bike riding, Greg #2 went to spend the afternoon with other friends, Ash and I went for a walk down by the beach essentially across the street from our condo (which is on Beach Ave.). The next few shots are photos from that walk.
There was a gathering of naked bike riders at the beach. Not something you see everyday. They were getting ready to take off as we walked by from the sidewalk above. I’m not sure which was more entertaining: them (in the middle), or the gawkers lining up to catch a peak (on the left and right). Which I guess at that point included us.
We went back to the condo for naps. I was down for about 90 minutes and Ash was already up when I got up. I started working on photos, eventually Greg and Mark got back from their ride. Ash and I spent several hours trying to check-in to our Air Canada flight which had been purchased through United. Let’s just say there was a glitch on the Air Canada side and for a while it was so unclear whether or not we had seats that we booked an alternative flight for later tomorrow evening (for a much higher rate!) just in case. After nearly 3 hours of phone calls back and forth, it got fixed and we were able to check-in to our original flight. Ash cancelled the other tickets while we were at dinner.
For dinner we went to The Sandbar on Granville Island, which is just across False Creek from us but not easy to walk to so we took a Lyft there and back. It made for some beautiful views.
We started with a crab and artichoke dip, and an ahi poke stack. We were split on which was one was better but both enjoyed by all. Ash got the salmon, a steak for Mark, I had halibut, and Greg got a hotpot (clockwise).
On the left is a photo Ash took of us at the beach which I snagged from his phone at dinner. Greg took the one of us on the right just outside the restaurant to capture some of the view.
I took this standing just passed where we were in the Greg took. It’s probably my favorite scenic photo of the trip.
And that is it for us. We will make our way out about 10am today for a direct flight home. This has been an amazing trip. We enjoyed the convention activities we partook in and felt like we did enough there. For us the trip was also about getting to know Vancouver, and we enjoyed that so much we’ve booked a place to come back next summer already. Everything about it was wonderful: the views, the cleanliness, the lovely people everywhere we went, very diverse and perfect weather. Add to it the community we shared with close friends and lots of others, and it was a great experience of how blessed we are, something we acknowledge to each other nearly every day of our lives.
While we had Vasco, the foreign exchange student we had for 10 months, we weren’t able to leave the country with him. So, the rest of the year we catch up on our international travel: Africa the last 2 weeks in July, Paris in October, and an Amazon River cruise for the December holidays. And Thanksgiving week in NYC while we’re at it. We hope you join us!
Finally, here’s a post I made on the Alcoholics Anonymous subreddit yesterday morning.
I attended the International Convention of AA this weekend. As an extreme introvert, I find these events challenging and make choices to manage my energy, but always appreciate the experience. This was no exception. Some facts and observations from the weekend:
Fellowship opportunities were everywhere. Roughly 35k alcoholics gathered downtown from 89 countries, and conference badges made us easily identifiable. It was like running into friends everywhere you went. Especially coffee shops.
At the closing meeting this morning, the 43rd millionth copy of the Big Book was presented to the warden of Dorchester Penitentiary in New Brunswick, where the message of AA has been taken behind the walls there for over 75 years.
At the big meeting last night, there were over 250 folks with 50+ years of sobriety, 12 of whom were selected randomly to speak for a few minutes and that was the highlight of the meeting.
And all of this from two guys sitting at a kitchen table 90 years ago.
I will have 34 years next week. Along with the 4 folks I’m traveling with, we have over 100 years together.
The language of the heart has been spoken all weekend and I have been moved to tears many times, especially when you realize how many of us would be dead if it wasn’t for AA.
And it suddenly struck me as so odd how many people come to this sub to talk about how AA doesn’t work. It’s like coming into my home and trashing my house.
This weekend provided overwhelming evidence that it is working for millions of people around the world. I’m one of those who would be dead without it and will keep coming back.
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