Truck Day 16 – Vilanculos Xai Xai District

Well rested we leave for the Xai-Xai district at 8am. It’s a drive of 450km today so will be a long day. Hopefully we’ll arrive in time for a walk on the beach before the sun goes down. It’s another truck day where we’ll oscillate between reading, sleeping, eating or gazing out the window taking photos as we chew through the miles en-route to our next destination.

We stop for lunch by the side of a completely empty main road. We all make a sandwich and enjoy the opportunity to stretch our legs. Some photos of daily Mozambique life taken whilst on the road below.

We get back on the road and soon after we’re all settled back to our truck routine one of the truck tyre treads comes off one of the rear inside tyres. With 70km to go, we’re advised that Parra our driver will reduce speed and attempt to nurse the truck into Xai Xai our next destination. Within a couple of minutes it becomes apparent that this is not going to work and the truck pulls over to the side of the road and we all pile out. Parra and Deon work hard to replace the damaged tyre whilst we sit by the side of the road in the shade. We’re back on the road in under an hour, well done boys.

In Mozambique when they’re replacing tarmac they use chunks of trees and palms instead cones to indicate road under repair – a quite genius eco-friendly solution.

We arrive at our accommodation at 5.30pm and it’s blowing a gale and the sky is grey. No beautiful sunset for our last night in Mozambique sadly. We’re camping atop a cliff on the coast and all the camping areas are sandy with palm thatched roofs. They look quite rustic and not a bad place to pitch our tents. That is however until we discover that a colony of crabs have taken a liking to our area and spend most of the evening either scratching at our tent, digging holes or chasing us across the sand as we scramble for the toilet. Brownie puts her eye shades on and her headphones in. This is her worst nightmare. Fingers crossed for a good night’s sleep.