Doing absolutely nothing in Malawi

The pace of life is so gentle you’ll forget what month it is. What a blessing Madonna didn’t find it

When it comes to holiday souvenirs most people would stop at the T-shirt. Perhaps a fridge magnet. Possibly even a glow-in-the-dark bottle of unpronounceable grain-based spirit that made the fortnight with the kids scoot by but now sits forlornly next to the Nana Mouskouri CD.

Madonna, as we know, is different — her trips to Malawi involved her returning with not one, but two, children. In the “any publicity is good publicity” stakes, the former British colony must be quite happy right now.

Forced to name four connections with Malawi, you might come up with the freshwater lake of the same name, which is 570km long and 75km wide, as well as Dr David Livingstone, the first European to see it in 1859.

Then there’s Hastings Banda, the former dictator whose opponents seemed to be oddly prone to mysterious, fatal car crashes, and who was a pal of apartheid-era South Africa. He also banned long hair, short skirts and Simon and Garfunkel — because Cecilia was the name of his mistress.
Green Spaces: Mumbo Island, Malawi

* Is it safe to swim in Lake Malawi?

And now, Madonna, who adopted a young boy, David Banda, from the country in 2006 and has recently battled in the courts to add a young local girl, Mercy, to her family. Judging from a recent visit that I made there, though, Malawians are having the last laugh with the $13 “Adopt Me” T-shirts on sale at Lilongwe airport.

The former Mrs Ritchie never made it as far as the lake — she was holed up at Kumbali Lodge in the capital — and more fool her, because if she wanted to find a paparazzi-free paradise on which to plonk her Anglo-American bottom while contemplating Kabbalah, Brazilian male models and divorce proceedings then she could do a lot worse than Kaya Mawa on Likoma island, where I spent a rather idyllic few days, and which lies only 4km from the shoreline of Mozambique but, owing to a colonial and missionary legacy, is firmly part of Malawi.

But you can’t blame Madonna for not realising how lovely Lake Malawi is. Before my trip I would never have suspected that such fine beaches of powdery sand could exist 800km from the nearest ocean.

And its remote location, coupled with the economic downturn — one hotelier told me that bookings at his property are down 70 per cent this year — means that she would probably have found that the beaches were all hers, save for a few local fishermen and women fetching water.

Kaya Mawa has ten stylish but simply furnished stone and teak cottages that are enveloped by mango and flame trees, mahoganies and blue gums, and within plopping distance of the placid lake (most have private pontoons).

There are two sandy beaches on either side of a small headland backed by baobab trees that look like wizened old men. This is anti-Sandy Lane — the kind of place where a tired rock star could come for an escape-it-all week with a loved one, a yoga mat and a stack of good books and very easily forget which month it is, let alone the old “is it Thursday or Sunday?” dilemma.

I chose to simply relax in the sun and snorkel in “God’s own fish tank”, fortifying myself with the occasional G&T.

Several guests and I used Kaya’s Boston Whaler fishing skiff for a swim deeper into the lake before being dropped off farther around the island, by racks of chambo and usipa fish drying in the sun. We ambled through the main village, stopping for a Coke at the main bar and restaurant, called the Hunger Clinic.

Near the village is a huge and rather incongruous Anglican cathedral built from stone 100 years ago, to which Likomans troop in their best togs every Sunday protected from the fierce sun by a sea of umbrellas, many bearing Arsenal, Liverpool or Manchester United logos.

As I pottered round, most villagers had other things on their mind, though. They were attending a rally by Dr Bingu wa Mutharika, the President of Malawi, who had dropped in for the morning to open the gleaming new airstrip and say a few words from the grandstand.

He hadn’t gone to much trouble — just the brass band, the bulletproof American 4x4s, the helicopters, a couple of light aircraft and a ferry. Most locals were kitted out in T-shirts and/or skirts with his face printed on them. So as not to feel left out the President wore a natty Hawaiian shirt, also with his face on the fabric.

And a cowboy hat from beneath the brim of which his beaming features smiled benignly. I wanted the whole kit but my requests were ignored, I assumed because they thought, correctly, that I’d just sell it on eBay or use it for a Christmas fancy dress party.

Unfortunately the good doctor couldn’t hang around, and neither could I. I went to Lilongwe by six-seater aircraft, followed by a gentle three-hour drive past donkey carts, coffin-makers (a grim reminder of the country’s HIV problem), potholes, acacia trees, sugarcane-chewing villagers and undulating hills to the backpacker’s haunt of Cape Maclear. From there it was another hour chugging by small diesel-powered boat to Mumbo Island.

If Likoma seemed like heaven then Mumbo (a finalist in Times Travel’s Green Spaces awards last year) takes you even farther into a state of bliss. It’s important to know that the resort, unlike so many, pays more than lip service to eco-credentials — long-drop loos and no electricity are only the start.

Accommodation is in luxurious safari-style tents set on headlands looking over the water. Bathrooms have bucket showers and biodegradable soap and shampoo.

All, apart from one unit, are set apart on a small islet linked by a 30m causeway to a small, sandy beach and thatched dining area. It’s as close to dying and going to heaven as you can get without actually popping your clogs.

During the day I swam in the warm, crystal-clear water (there is bilharzia in certain parts of the lake, but neither here nor at Kaya Mawa) and kayaked offshore, spotting pied kingfishers and otters playing on rocks. After nightfall I chatted with the other guests, who included a London music producer who had relocated to Lilongwe with his family (with no regrets), and a Dutch couple who had come round to the idea of long-drop toilets so much that they booked two extra nights.

Then I sat on my balcony, reading by gaslight and looking out over the lake at the dozens of pinpricks of light that were the lamps used by the fishermen in their dugout canoes. Their chatter and laughter drifted in the darkness until the early hours.

I’m sure, despite the lack of gold taps and Egyptian cotton sheets, Madonna would have probably loved it on Lake Malawi, and should definitely bring her adopted local children here sometime. As she once sang, “If we took a holiday, / Took some time to celebrate/ Just one day out of life,/ It would be so nice . . .” (fade to chorus).

And places to relax, enjoy time with your family and think about what’s really important in life don’t get much nicer than this little corner of Africa.

Need to know

An eight-night trip with Expert Africa (020-8232 9777, www.expertafrica.com) staying for four nights at Kaya Mawa and four nights at Mumbo Island, full board and including internal flights and transfers, costs from £2,309pp. This excludes British Airways flights from Heathrow to Johannesburg with connecting South African Airways flights to Lilongwe, which cost about £830pp and can be booked through Expert Africa. Another option is to stay on the lake at Pumulani, a lodge built and operated by Robin Pope Safaris, and which can be easily combined with a safari in Zambia. Anti-malaria pills are a must. Rainy season lasts from December to March.

Reading: Malawi (Bradt, £13.99).