See link for photos. The rugged South African raises his pinotage to the light and swirls. He saw me coming once, so he made an end run through the forest to intercept me. No easy matter, I muse, recalling spinning wheels in the deep sandy tracks I negotiated to arrive at this remote lodge overlooking the Indian Ocean. Devastated by a civil war from until that decimated its wildlife, Mozambique struggles to compete in the big-stakes safari game. Maputo Special Reserve, for example, still has neither rhinos nor buffalo.
No lions, leopards or cheetahs. All were poached or killed during the war. But tourist infrastructure is being spawned β Anvil Bay opened in as the first lodge in the reserve β and animal restocking, initiated in , is approaching critical mass. The few visitors the country sees may also fly in a helicopter over the teal-blue Mozambique Channel, swirled with carnation-pink sandy shoals; sail on one of the traditional dhows β ancient holdovers from when this coast was a dominion of Arab traders β that ply the channels, their pointy sails slicing the shallows like shark fins; snorkel a pristine reef off Bazaruto Island in crystal waters teeming with parrotfish, Moorish idols and blackspotted sweetlips; or laze at beach-chic Azura Benguerra, a luxurious love-nest with rose-petal-strewn king-size beds and torch-lit gourmet dinners on the sands.
But it is the austere, virginal Maputo Special Reserve that perhaps offers the most satisfaction. In the next five days, I will see only four other vehicles two being dug out of sand , but no lack of game.
Just five minutes into the park, a herd of gazelle bounds across our path. Vervet monkeys scamper along the track. Then five giraffes emerge languorously from the thorny scrub. We stop and I get down there is a benefit to there being no predators and approach on foot through the grass until they turn and lope off.
Two hours into our visit we arrive at Lagoa Xingute. A yellow-billed stork, colourful as Crayola, patrols the edge of the lake with occasional dabs at the mud. Hippos wallow 50 metres from shore.
