No directions. No map. No reservations.

The plan for spring break was essentially not to have a plan, at least according to the boys: Phil, Brett and Pete. Masha and I on the other hand were quite keen on having at least a rough plan, so before leaving for our 10-day trip, I wrote an itinerary with a schedule and all important phone numbers and addresses. Once we arrived at the airport, and Brett told me that he printed the itinerary and driving directions, but left them at home, I knew that I was embarking upon an adventure. We started in Cape Town, flew to Durban, then drove through Swaziland to northern Mozambique and back without directions, a map, reservations at hostels, or much of a plan...


Day 1: Cape Town to Durban

Masha and I learned to love, or at least tolerate, the back seat for the whole trip, since the truck was manual, which only the boys could drive.  The truck, which they loved more than life during our trip, was also the boys' pride and joy, and it kept us safe on the many bumpy, dirt roads in Mozambique and our self-guided safari in Swaziland.

Day 2: Durban

The boys taking a break from surfing in Durban, which was very humid and rainy, a drastic change to the near perfect weather we were used to in Cape Town.

Day 3: Durban to Swaziland

Crossing the Swaziland border was simple and easy, something that we took for granted at the time, but learned to appreciate later when crossing into Mozambique.

The typical scenery in Swaziland included grass huts like these and large open fields with mountains in the background.

Once we finally arrived to Hlane National Park in Swaziland, we were happy to find out that they not only had space for us for the night, but that the basic room rate landed us in a two-bedroom cottage with a kitchen and bathroom in the middle of the park. At night, I truly heard nature and nothing else.

Day 4: Swaziland to Maputo

He's hard to see, but this monkey got me out of bed in the morning. I heard rustling in the trees, opened my curtains, and saw several monkeys playing in the trees right outside my window.

On our self-guided safari, we saw more impala than we could ever have expected. Pictured above are female impala. Side note: the boys ate impala burgers from the national park's restaurant the night before, which seemed a bit twisted.

This giraffe was our first real sighting of one of the Big 5 animals of Africa. We stopped our truck and watched him for a while as he walked from one side of the road to the other with a brief stop to stare at us in the middle of the road.

We almost missed seeing these zebra until someone spotted them in the distance behind the trees.

Not exactly what I would consider a big wildlife animal, but this dung beetle caught my attention in the road as it was rapidly running along and pushing the piece of dung in the road to somewhere in the grass.

Like I said earlier, we saw impala everywhere. Pictured above are male impala that have antlers.

Day 5: Maputo to Tofu

In Mozambique, there were very few cities. Driving in the country, we saw many small communities and everyone seemed to walk from place to place. I finally felt like I was in Africa when visiting Mozambique, since living in Cape Town reminds me so much of living in Los Angeles, or really any major city in the U.S.

We stayed in Maputo for one night, but quickly left the next morning after the manager at the hostel told us that there was nothing to see in Maputo except for a crowded, dirty city. So we decided to drive about seven hours north to Tofo, where everyone who has ever visited only has positive things to say about the piece of paradise.

We drove on the same road straight up the coast for hours and hours, mostly seeing small villages like this, and children walking to and from school along the road. All of the children were very friendly, and when they saw our obvious foreigner car blasting music with surfboards on top, they smiled and waved.

Day 6: Tofu

We finally arrived in paradise after many wrong turns, back tracking and stopping to ask for directions, since we had no directions and Phil's Blackberry, which we were using as a GPS, stopped working in Mozambique. We instantly knew the long, bumpy drive was worth it though when we saw our hostel on the beach, Fatima's, which is pictured above.

Masha and I ventured to the town market in Tofo during the day and ended up buying fresh prawns that were caught that day and agreeing to pay a little extra to have the fish vendor's mother cook us dinner in the market square. A man we met at the hostel in Maputo told us that this was a typical gesture and if we wanted to taste the best seafood in the world, we should have a local cook for us. These were by far the best prawns I've ever had in my life. She cooked them on a braai and served them with rice and onion and tomato slices. We happily drank Savanna with our meal and wished that the food would never end. The woman who cooked our food was very nice, but we couldn't tell her how delicious the food was because she didn't speak English. We did learn how to say "thank you" though in Portuguese, the official language in Mozambique: "obrigado!"

When we didn't eat out, we cooked our own food in the hostel's kitchen and enjoyed our food and drink at the outdoor tables. Everything at Fatima's, except for our beds, was outdoors without walls, but in a place like Tofo, one always wants to be outside and experience the beautiful beach life.

Day 7: Tofu

Tofo was the closest to paradise that I have ever visited.

Masha and I walked to and from the market along the beach.

Day 8: Tofo to all over Africa to Durban

Unfortunately, I don't have any photos to document this day. We left Tofo in the morning and planned to drive a couple hours south of Maputo to ensure that we would be in South Africa for the night and only have to drive a short distance the following day in order to catch our flight in Durban. However, after being pulled over by the police for I'm not exactly sure what for, paying the police officer a bribe as he demanded, then continuing to drive for many hours as it became dark, then paying our way over the border, because the border patrol officer was not going to let us back into South Africa any other way, we stopped to fill up on gas at the first station over the border only to find out that we took a wrong turn and crossed the wrong border. We were 12 hours away from Durban near Kruger National Park on the other side of Swaziland, no where near our original destination. Luckily, none of us freaked out, because there was not much we could do without directions, working phones or a map. So, the boys stocked up on snacks, coffee and Red Bull and drove through the night.

Day 9: Durban to Cape Town
Completely safe and alive, we arrived in Durban early the next morning only to find a dreary, partially raining city. We were all too tired to care much about the weather and simply walked around the chilly beach until our flight left in the afternoon from the Durban airport. Our trip was truly an adventure, but we were ready to head back to Cape Town. We saw a lot, bonded and learned to never take a long road trip in a foreign country again without at least a map.