Mozambique - Maputo

Arrived on Thursday. Immediately the atmosphere changed. Friendly again. People in the street say hi and point you to the backpackers place without being asked. Had a nightmare with accomodation. First place had messed up our booking so we ended up camping on a concrete roof somewhere else.

First night of many in a tent.

Went back to the first place in the morning to move into our room and they'd stuffed it up again, but we got a nice room in a hotel on the 8th floor in the end. The 8th floor is just about the tallest building around here so it's a nice view.

After eating brekkie at the most well stocked cake shop i have ever been to anywhere, we went to the markets and for a walk around town. We also visited the art gallery. Vicky's viewing time = 45 mins. Phil's viewing time = 5 mins. The architecture here is really mixed up. There are some lovely art deco houses and buildings. Then there are some buildings with balcomies the way you imagine New Orleans houses. And then there are some really decorative buildings, I don't know what it's called but it's the kind of detail you get on royal palaces and things like that. The best is when they mix it all together in one building. There's a Mosque here where they've done that and it looks really odd.

We went for lunch on the waterfront. We'd done 3 or 4 hours of walking and I almost ran there to get fed (PB). We went back for showers and then headed out for a night on the town. I felt a bit knackered and had a couple of cokes to start the evening off. The result of which was that Vicky drank the first bottle of wine herself. She felt a little rough this morning.

Anyway, we had Tiger prawns for dinner. The UK supermarkets are lying to you all. Prawns are the same size here. But medium prawns are a bit bigger than king prawns in the UK. Queen prawns are huge and Tiger or King prawns are THE SIZE OF YOUR HEAD!!! See the photo.

There was a live band on, but they were playing chill music to eat by so we asked them where the local Jazz cafe was. They sent us to Gill Vincente. Top night. Really good music,and a lively crowd, Jazz is excellent live.

Pretty Flowers here too.

Also went to the national art museum. They have statues of 'pile on people'. They're quite cool and look just like a group of deformed people with long faces, beer bellies and big saggy boobs would look if they all piled on top of one another. Vicky enjoyed the museum, but I thought it looked lake a group, of art students had made everything last summer. There was nothing older than 1980 there, so If you want to be a national artist come to Mozambique, there isn't that much competition.

There was also a lovely bakery, could have stayed all day to eat our way through the 20m long counter of cakes.