Day 227: Maputo to Marloth Park

We left at 08:00 and had relatively little traffic in the city. Before getting on the N4 highway we refueled with cheap Mozambique diesel and inflated the tyres. At the toll gate, we passed an incoming traffic jam of vehicles a few kilometres long. Where the N4 turns right we also hit some traffic and had an average speed of 7km/h for some kilometers.

We finally left the city behind us and got to the feared Resano Garcia at 10:20. Leaving Mozambique was fast and efficient despite the runners that tried to lure us to the wrong buildings. How does the Mozambique Government allow “VIP Immigration” structures to be set up next to the real Immigration buildings?

On the South African side, our passports were stamped without as much as a welcome back. And there was no inspection of the Hilux at all. All in all, this was the fastest and most efficient border crossing. By 10:50 we were on the road again and that included about 15 minutes of waiting for someone to sign the carnet to state that the vehicle is back in SA (something that wasn’t actually necessary).

We drove to Komatipoort and stopped at the large Spar shopping centre. What a contrast to the past few months. We quickly found a butchery and biltong shop and bought a T-bone steak, biltong, droëwors, rusks and a small platter of South African desserts.

From Komatipoort we went to Marloth Park on the back roads. Caro’s family used to have a house in Marloth Park so we tried to find their old house and then drove up and down some of the roads to revisit childhood memories.

By 15:30 we settled on camping at the Henk van Rooyen Park next to the Crocodile River.

The wind started to pick up and we could barely eat up dinner. By nightfall storm, clouds gathered and we were hit by a thunderstorm yet again. (Kruger National Park is the third park that we will visit and in both Mikumi National Park and Masai Mara it was raining.)