Zambia to Mozambique: are there any new/easier travel options??
 

When I look at the map, South Luangwa and the coast of Northern Mozambique look temptingly close....
Other than tranferring back down to JNB or up through NBO does anyone know of a way to transfer from Zambia to the coast of Mozambique? We would really love to combine a safari with diving in the islands of Northern Mozambique.

One possibility I was looking at was a charter from Mfuwe to Lilongwe, but I can't seem to find flight schedules for Air Malawi or LAM between Lilongwe and Mozambique.

Any ideas or new flights that someone knows of? I am guessing it will only be a matter of time before some new flights are introduced, as the coast of Mozambique grows in popularity.

I was talking to barry at LRL about this, and it is not simple at this time to get to Mozambique from Zambia. I think you have to take a screwy flight route that is quite expensive.
Someone else may know better, however!

I went to south luangwa and malawi last year and took a side trip to mozambique, although it was on the Lake Malawi shore, not the ocean.
Still a great way to see the beach after the safari.
Jakamaka Express and other Lilongwe based charters fly from Mfuwe to Lilongwe and also on to Likoma island, which is a Malawi island in Mozambique waters. From there you can take an easy boat ride to Mozambique side, which is stunning.
We stayed at Manda Nkwichi Lodge, near Cobue -- one of the most incredible places I have seen.
To get to the Indian Ocean coast, I think you'd need to go with Air Malawi (jokingly refered to as Air Where Are We) from LLW to Moz. There was a charter company called Nyasa Express looking at the same routes, but I think they are now stillborn.
Hope this is helpful. . ..

Tripster-
Thanks so much for your response.
Did you do a trip report? The website for Manda Nkwichi looks great...I would love to see pics if you have them.
As for Air Malawi, their website does not show any scheduled flights to Mozambique...otherwise that would be a great solution.

Thanks again

I'm still working on the trip report!
Malawi is great and Nkwichi was even better. If you did choose Lake Malawi, you can do a day or two at Kaya Mawa on Likoma Island, which was also idyllic.
I went with my mom (who was celebrating her 70th birthday) and she kept on saying she thought she was in a French movie!
As for the Indian ocean coast, don't Air Malawi go to Nampula? I think that is on the Moz coast. . .
If you can get Jakamaka on the phone, they are very helpful. The main guy is a belgian named Jan. If anybody is running charters he would know.

I think Raniresorts has some nice safari options in Mozambique......i remember reading one of the threads a while ago.

Hari

ttt

Crusinred, I'm so happy to help you on this as I've taken your advice so much over on the Asia board!

In 2000 we did a charter from Mfuwe to Lilongwe. We then took a ferry up
Lake Malawi into Tanznia and overland to Dar by truck,train and combi but that's another story!

Anyway, we had bought a package that included a charter Mfuwe to Lusaka and when we substituted Lilongwe it didn't add much to the price which surprised me I think it was between $100 and $200. It was an easy flight and arriving on a private charter internationally felt very high end! They walked us across the tarmac to the costoms and immigration lots of VIP treatment.

I would checck on the charter costs, they may be less than you imagine. However, I know that Zambia has gained enormously in popularity since 2000 and the prices may have grown to match.

Hope this helps!

welltraveledbrit-
You are my Africa travel idol! wow, sounds like quite a trip you took back in 2000. I would love to do a trip like that at some point. Thanks for the advice about charters; I will look into that.

Cruisinred

Glad it helped.

We did a crazy trip in 2000. It was our honeymoon and we took nine weeks. First we went overland including a river trip, camping and hiking with a small group from Senegal to Mali and Timbuktu a quick couple of days in Ghana, then we went upscale stayed in fab places in Capetown and drove through the wine country in SA, visited friends in Zimbabwe, a fly in safari with several different camps in Zambia and after the overland portion we relaxed in Zanzibar. We billed it as Timbuktu to Zanzibar!It was definately a blow out trip.

I used to go to southern Africa alot and lived there for several years but the 2000 trip was the last time we were there.