Swaziland was another country that I didn't know too much about, but as it was on the way to Mozambique I thought I may as well pop in and say hello.
I had a vague notion of heading to the capital, Mbabane, to get a Mozambique visa so after a painless border crossing I followed the main road in that direction. The country was similar to the places I had recently been, through less scenic than Lesotho and less developed than South Africa. Still it was nice enough to meander through. With no definitive plan of where to go or where to stay I got myself a SIM card from a mall and plugged myself back into the grid that I had been (shock horror) unable to connect to for at least 3 hours! As luck would have it there was a backpacker/campsite literally round the corner so I went and checked myself in.
With beers less than a pound a bottle I figured my budget could stretch to a couple (especially as I was saving money on food by only eating bread and peanut butter). Sat out on the terrace, I got chatting to a couple of friends from South Africa. Simon was a couple of days away from flying to the UK to start a job managing a hotel down in Devon and had come to Swaziland in a desperate last attempt to get the authorities to sort out his Swazi partner's birth certificate, and Janet had just come along for the ride. We had a few drinks and a good laugh (including a random night time drive to explore the nearby game park and waterfall), and then the next day whilst Simon went in for what would turn out to be a day long battle to get the bureaucratic machine to do what was needed, Janet and I took a hike up to Matenga Falls. We made it through to the top, and after a dip in the rather bracing water wandered back down to get some food and what was quickly becoming my signature drink of this trip - a chocolate milkshake.
After reading up a bit on border formalities I decided I could just as easily get a visa on the border, so after saying our goodbyes and asking Simon to give my best to the UK, I made for the border, only to find out that maybe I should have got that visa in advance after all...
I had a vague notion of heading to the capital, Mbabane, to get a Mozambique visa so after a painless border crossing I followed the main road in that direction. The country was similar to the places I had recently been, through less scenic than Lesotho and less developed than South Africa. Still it was nice enough to meander through. With no definitive plan of where to go or where to stay I got myself a SIM card from a mall and plugged myself back into the grid that I had been (shock horror) unable to connect to for at least 3 hours! As luck would have it there was a backpacker/campsite literally round the corner so I went and checked myself in.
With beers less than a pound a bottle I figured my budget could stretch to a couple (especially as I was saving money on food by only eating bread and peanut butter). Sat out on the terrace, I got chatting to a couple of friends from South Africa. Simon was a couple of days away from flying to the UK to start a job managing a hotel down in Devon and had come to Swaziland in a desperate last attempt to get the authorities to sort out his Swazi partner's birth certificate, and Janet had just come along for the ride. We had a few drinks and a good laugh (including a random night time drive to explore the nearby game park and waterfall), and then the next day whilst Simon went in for what would turn out to be a day long battle to get the bureaucratic machine to do what was needed, Janet and I took a hike up to Matenga Falls. We made it through to the top, and after a dip in the rather bracing water wandered back down to get some food and what was quickly becoming my signature drink of this trip - a chocolate milkshake.
After reading up a bit on border formalities I decided I could just as easily get a visa on the border, so after saying our goodbyes and asking Simon to give my best to the UK, I made for the border, only to find out that maybe I should have got that visa in advance after all...
