A wonderful time in a dhow in Mozambique. What is a dhow? Click here to know more!

Hello everybody, today let's jump in a boat and discover one of the great adventure I had recently in Mozambique!

We stayed at least a week in Tofo, not that we had actually planned it, but we really enjoyed the atmosphere and the vibe. Tofo is a small settlement close to Inhambane, on the coast. The beach in awesome an not very crowded (probably more tourists in December as it is South Africans holidays). I really advice to stop there if you are travelling around! It's good for surfing, diving, relaxing and partying !

Sunset on Tofo beach

One day we decided to explore around Tofo and we drove to Barra to have a better view of the Inhanbane Bay. It was so pretty! Long stretch of sand and the ocean almost all around us. This bay is home of dugongs, which are quite rare underwater creatures.

Sand, sand and sand everywhere

We had a walk, got caught by the high tide and had to finish some sections by crossing the sea. Hopefully, it was shallow enough to walk and was quite fun. Further away in the bay we saw a dhow. A dhow is a sail boat, made from wood that the locals use for fishing or for transport. Transport of people or transport of merchandise.
From town you can find a few operators that offer cruises and package. My boyfriend, fascinated by boats, look at it with attention and told me that it was going toward where our car is parked :"let's met him and try to have a free ride!". It sounded quite fun, so we started to hurry up to cough him.

That's also a dhow. They can be quite large depending the purpose. NB: That's not one of my pictures, photo credit :http://pirateyarns.blogspot.co.za/

We managed to get there when the small sail boat arrived. They were dropping off some people. We asked them if we could have a ride. The captain told us he was doing shuttles from an isolated island to the land and that was his last round.... but ok why not. He asked for some money (it was four times cheaper than if you book one of the organized tour), we accepted the deal and jumped into the wooden boat. There were other locals, from the remote island, who couldn't understand English.

An other dhow was passing close to us

The friendly captain told us we will cross the a part of the bay to go to his island, he will show us around and come back. It took 30 minutes to cross. The wind was blowing a bit but otherwise the boat was moving smoothly. We could hear the wood of the boat cracking.

On the sea, always happy

We arrived at the island. It was extremely rustic. Houses where made mainly of palm tree, there was no running water and originally no power. Our guide explained us that the government gave them solar panels to produce electricity. I smiled when I heard some music, even with limited resourced, they managed to at least have some kind of sounds system! Well it is Africa, music and beats are always there! Then, my boyfriend had a quick lesson of "how to climb a palm tree". It was very high, so I passed !

My boyfriend climbing this long tree, but didn't touch the top

We met the chef of the village, he said that I could stay there if I marry him. It's a pretty place but I nicely refused. His house was made of cement and not from palm tree, and it was painted. That's apparently a sign of power. Our guide showed us the school and then the place they used to collect rain water. Unfortunately, everything got destroyed after the passage of the cyclone Dineo in February 2017.
We slowly got back to the boat, it was sunset time. We got the most beautiful view on the way back and I really enjoyed this moment. Because the captain kindly took time for us we gave him a present. We had a pulley block on the car, not used for anything but quite valuable (it's a boat part used for ropes) . We gave it to him, as the one on his boat was quite damaged.

The view was amazing when we left the boat

Special moment are often the ones you haven't planned !

I hope you enjoyed it, thanks to read me.
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Cheers
@isa-za

Copyright on all pictures except specified, Isabelle Sanfillipo