Mozambique Day 3 – Tropical rain

Away at 5:15am with the sound of no wind and the light spilling into the though today would be a nice calm weather day and that might be able to go across the island today.

But alas this was not the case as by breakfast time the wind had picked up and and Idris ruled out being able to do any marine based activities. The other activities on the list didn’t take our fancy for today so we decided another relaxing day would be in order.

We though it might a good plan to go in the sea earlier today when the tide was in rather than out. This turned out to be a good plan as rather than the water coming up to your knees you actually had to stand on your tiptoes to stay out of the water. Or Ali who just had to swim. After about half an hour messing about in the water the weather appeared to change quite dramatically. It started to rain…. in the dry season… Only the British would get rain where there isn’t normally rain.

This took us a little by surprise and we had to dash back to the Banda to move our things out of the rain. Inside too because the water comes through the open front of the building. Interesting!

Lunch time came around very quickly and we headed to the restaurant area during a gap in the rain. Lunch was lovely and accompanied by a gin and tonic. Amusingly and quite sweetly, gin and tonic must come with ice, apparently. It caused much confusion when, on being told that the ice hadn’t arrived yet, I said I would have a gin and tonic without ice. There are clearly rules about these things!

After lunch, Mr Snoozyface needed a nap. Then it was time for afternoon tea. Days punctuated only by meals are excellent indeed! After tea and cake, showers were had and cards were played. The weather cleared up and the wind dropped to nothing. Then Jamie set about taking pictures of the incredible stars. With no light pollution at all, these were some of the clearest stars we’ve ever seen. The Milky Way was clearly visible as were a number of planets. The longer we watched, the more stars we saw. And Jamie is very good with a camera, so hopefully we’ll be able to give you an idea of what it was like.

Dinner was a traditional local starter, something like creamed spinach in a samosa, followed by excellent fish cakes and salad, which Jamie actually claimed to like! Jamie eating fish is a newsworthy event in itself! Pudding was fresh papaya. Complete with red wine, it made an excellent meal. Now bedtime. We’ve got so into early starts and early nights, getting up for work will feel like a lie in!