The north of Mozambique is beautiful and exotic. At least that’s how I remember it from when we first visited there in 2005. This year, we decided to make a ‘site inspection’ trip as it is known in the travel industry back northwards. For Unique Mozambique I prefer to visit all the accommodations and places myself, so I know exactly what I am talking about when I speak to you.

This part of Mozambique has beautiful and interesting sights. Because the roads are very bad and our car is now an elderly man and artritis, we traveled by local transport. Gerry wrote a great blogpost about it; traveling by local bus in Africa has its challenges.

We started in Beira, a large port city with a railroad line to Zimbabwe and a lot of Portuguese influences. In terms of tourism perhaps not the most interesting city, but it has a relaxed atmosphere, nice people, lots of nice restaurants and fine middle-class hotels. It’s a good base for a night or two if need be, before visiting Gorongosa National Park – about a 5 hour drive from Beira. Our local chapela (tuk tuk) driver turned out to speak excellent English, so we found a great guide for you! He was a really nice guy also and we had intense discussions about Mozambican politics, where we always come to the same depressing conclusion. Anyway.

We continued our journey to Gorongosa National Park. The local chapa dropped us off along the National Highway N1, from where it is another 30 km to the park entrance. After hours crammed into overcrowded minibuses, the pickup by comfortable private safari jeep was a real treat and the road to the park entrance magnificent – a taste of what was to come. I had no idea what to expect and had brought our own tent – lodging in Gorongosa does come at a price. But we were received with all honors, were offered a safari tent with nice beds in the main camp and invited to do as many safaris as we could fit in.

We met the passionate PR Director of the park, Vasco, who had wanted to go to Gorongosa even as a little boy when he saw a promotional film about it. He actually showed us the film – complete with VW vans used as safari jeeps!

Vasco told us all about the history of Gorongosa, its decline during the civil war in Mozambique, the restoration afterwards and the numerous community, research, scientific and innovative projects happening there. It was inspiring to see how it has been developed. Now there are professional and cheerful guides, overwhelming nature and landscapes, huge numbers of wildlife, beautiful accommodations and camps, breathtaking colors, peace and silence.

We made some fantastic safaris, laughed with the guides, visited the beautiful camps inside the park, watched the warthogs mindfully walking on the runway for the private charter flights, saw a Pangolin for the first time in our lifes and were educated about this amazing project, had a sunset Gin Tonic surrounded by hundreds of animals, got up very early for early morning drives, slept like a baby with the sounds of the bush, sat by the campfire gazing at thousands of stars.

Just for a brief moment I felt that I had reached a feeling of complete oneness with nature, which made me very emotional.

I can write a lot more about Gorongosa National Park. But you really must experience this for yourself.

It’s special, it’s exclusive, it’s overwhelming and it is certainly unique.

In my next post we travel to the cultural-historical and beautiful Ilha de Mozambique (Mozambique Island), UNESCO World Heritage Site. See you there!