Trip Report - Mozambique(Vilanculos/Bazaruto)

[Adriaan557]

We just came back from a 10 day diving trip to Mozambique and I thought I’d do a review for everyone. I found that information about diving in Vilanculos/Bazaruto is very scarce to say the least, so I’ll try to give as much detail as possible. If you’re not interested in all the small details, just skip to the next section. This report is based on our personal experience, the places we went, the things we did and the local people we talked to.

We went diving in 2 places in Mozambique – Vilanculos close to the Bazaruto archipelago (7days) and Tofu (3days).

It seems that I had a lot to say, and the report has become huge… so I’ll post it in sections.

How to get there:
We live in London, so we flew to Johannesburg in South Africa(booked tickets over the internet) with South African Airways – try to avoid them if you want to take equipment along they allow ZERO extra kilos for diving equipment (20kg luggage max per person). If you have equipment try British airways, they allow 23kg luggage + 23kg diving equipment per person.
From Johannesburg we flew to Vilanculos in Mozambique with LAM (Linhas Aéreas de Moçambique). I don’t know if they allow extra weight for divers, but our bags were 6kilos overweight, and they did not say a word. You can only book 48 hours in advance over the internet with LAM, so I used a South African travel agent to book the flights for us, got very good service and they issued me an e-ticket via email.

If you are interested in the prices:
Johannesburg->Vilanculos $260per person (3hours incl. stop in Inhambane)
This flight stops in Inhambane for 20-30minutes, where everyone gets off the plane and those who need to get a visa will get it here - $32pp(you can pay in US$, Rand, or Meticais). Then it’s back on the plane for a 30min flight to Vilanculos, where there is no immigration formalities since everyone already got visa’s in inhambane.
Vilanculos->Inhambane $120pp (30minute flight)
You have to pay a departure tax of $10pp
Inhambane->Johannesburg $220pp (2hour flight)
You have to pay a departure tax of $25pp
If you are leaving Mozambique from Vilanculos (so you are ‘in transit’ when you get off the plane in Inhambane, you pay $25 departure tax in Vilanculos and nothing in Inhambane.

One thing to note about the internal flights is that as soon as the plane lands, they unload/load the baggage and then the plane departs. In flying from Vilanculos to Inhambane and Inhambane to Johannesburg the plane took off 10-15 minutes earlier than scheduled. Oh, and when you leave Mozambique – they search your bags by hand, don’t ask my why because I’m not aware that Mozambique has anything that you might want to smuggle out of the country…best not to argue and just let them get on with it.

You can also catch a bus (11 seater minibus) from Vilanculos to Inhambane for much cheaper and the trip takes about 4-5 hours, and the mini busses run at regular intervals during the day, the first being around 6am.

 

[Adriaan557]

Vilanculos:
To dive in the Bazaruto archipelago you have 2 options…
You can either stay on one of the islands in a luxury resort ($220pppn upwards) - upside is luxury and close to reef, downside very expensive and nothing to do besides dive, walk on the beach and read a book.
Or you can stay in the tourist town of Vilanculos - upside is much cheaper accommodation with good bars/restaurants, a market, banks with ATM’s and a few excursions etc to keep you busy, downside is a 45min boat ride to the reef… we opted for Vilanculos.
The diving might be more expensive and the boat ride longer, but at the huge price difference in accommodation, you will be much cheaper off staying in Vilanculos if you can live with a little less luxury.

Sunrise in Vilanculos


Low Tide


Locals live in reet houses


Where to Stay:
Accomodation in Vilanculos ranges from cheap backpackers ($10pppn), nice affordable lodges($30-50pppn) to more upmarket places($80-$150pppn).

Smugglers Inn & Palmeiras Lodge:
Smugglers Inn is run by Ian and his wife Joe and they also manage Palmeiras Lodge with Joe’s mother Colleen looking after things at Palmeiras.
We opted for affordable and stayed at Palmeiras Lodge. It is right next to the beach and has nice 2 person bungalows (big enough to add 2 mattresses for kids) with a huge bathroom with shower (ceiling fan but no air-con). Prices were $85 per bungalow per night including breakfast. They also have a self catering chalet that accommodates 6-10 people that has a massive outdoor BBQ/relaxing area at the back with kitchen area. Continental breakfast is served each morning from 7am-10am. Palmeiras is managed by Colleen who lives on the premises and you can pop into her chalet anytime for a chat or if you need something, she’s always willing to give you a lift in to tows or to any of the restaurants (but more on that later). It also has a small pool to cool off, but who needs a pool when the sea is right there.

Chalet at Palmeiras


Smugglers has a nice bar and serves decent food and has good accommodation – small rooms with 2 single beds and shared bathroom ($45 per room per night - looked pretty clean and comfy) They also have double rooms with own bathroom ($60 per room per night). All the rooms overlook a beautiful garden with 2 nice swimming pools. Some have air-con. Guests of Palmeiras can use the pool facilities at Smugglers – so you can go for lunch & a few drinks and relax at the pool.
We actually contemplated moving from Palmeiras to Smugglers because of the nicer garden/pool setting and the bar/restaurant, but in the end decided that the bigger room at Palmeiras and being next to the beach for dive pickups/drop offs was more important.
You can check out their website here: Smugglers - Vilanculos (Mozambique)
I emailed them a few times with questions and they responded quickly. Good thing to know is that both Palmeiras and Smugglers look exactly as the pictures on their website. (Just in case you’ve been a victim in booking on a website with cool pictures just to find a rundown shoddy place which had no maintenance done in the 10years since the ‘cool’ pictures were taken). Cyclone Favio destroyed almost everything in Vilanculos in February 2007, so all the resorts/lodges were rebuild/repaired in the last 14 months, so none of them are really old or rundown.

The garden at Smugglers


Zombie Cucumber:
Looks like a nice decent place to stay as well, has a cosy outdoor bar and the owner cooks meals every day for residents. 3 Canadian girls that went diving with us stayed there and we had diner with them one night – nice relaxed atmosphere.

Pescador:
More upmarket place – beautiful bar/restaurant area with lounges to relax and have a drink, and tables outside by the pool. Very nice food! I did not see the rooms, but they all seemed to have air-conditioning units which you might want to consider if you go in December-February.

Casa Rex:
Also a bit more upmarket, sits on a cliff overlooking the sea. Very nice restaurant with excellent food! Would definitely consider stay here next time – a bit more expensive at $95-$130pppn, but I think it might be worth it if you can afford the extra cash.

 

[Adriaan557]

Where to Eat:
There are a few good restaurants in Vilanculos that have a bar, serve a decent lunch and very good diner meals. We had a feast in the restaurants – seafood, seafood and more seafood. The food is really good and fresh from the sea and not that expensive. On average lunch would be $8-$12(hamburger $8 and prawns or calamari $10-$12) and diner $12-$16 excluding drinks.
Casa Rex does a exquisite seafood platter(crab/prawn/fish/calamari/clams + rice, fries & salad) for 2 persons for $32 ($16each) and I’m pretty sure that was the most expensive dish we saw on any menu – well worth the money. They also do grilled lobster on Saturdays and it’s huge lobsters!
Pescador has a Seafood cauldron for 2 that’s really nice as well for $24 ($12each).
Smugglers always has a good crowd socializing at the bar and then food is good as well. They have a decent burger & fries for $8 and steaks & chicken if you get fed up with seafood. They do a very good tuna salad ($7) and the 'catch of the day' with baked potato is not bad either.
Varanda has a nice setting – overlooking the beach where all the fishermen come back with their catch of the day. They are only open from 4pm onwards.
There are a few other restaurants as well that we just did not get around visiting.
I cannot remember the drinks prices exactly, but it they were relatively cheap.

The services in the restaurants were good, with friendly competent staff, and we never had any problems with the food or mistakes on the bill. As a rule service was quick, but it got a bit slower around 8pm when the restaurants were busy, and the waiters had more tables to attend to.

Seafood platter at Casa Rex


Getting around:
The distances in Vlianculos are vast…everything seems is far apart. Palmeiras and Zombie Cucumber is a 10 minute walk to the centre of town and about 15-20 minute walk to Smugglers which is a 10 minute walk from Pescador/Case Rex. So without a car you might end up doing a lot of walking during the day.
They do not recommend you walk around at night – there are only a few streetlights here and there, and there have been cases where tourists were robbed (worst case wallet & mobile phone). Luckily everyone is prepared for this, and almost all the places are willing to drive you to and from restaurants at night. Colleen took us to any restaurant we wished to go every night, and the restaurant either brings you back or calls a taxi. Junior runs the town’s only taxi service, and he charges $8 per trip. On a few occasions I called him myself to take us somewhere, or pick us up, and he usually shows up within 5 to 10 minutes. Very friendly guy! If you do go there just call him and he’ll come and get you (+258) 824624700 Restaurant Varanda which is a 10min walk from where we stayed had their security guard walk us home one night.

When arriving at the airport, the place you are staying will come and pick you up – Odyssee Dive even offered to give us a lift from the airport to our accommodation. If you want to look for accommodation when you arrive, you can either call Junior to come and pick you up(or get someone to call him), or just ask someone for a lift. The airport is close to town, so walking to town is also an option (20-30 minute walk) although probably not a good idea with all your bags in the heat…

Portugese is the official language of Mozambique, so most of the local people speak Portugese only. If you know a few words, you’ll do good at the market if not (like we do) – sign language goes a long way… All the waiting staff and dive boat crew spoke fluent English. There are a lot of Zimbabewan immigrants working in Vilanculos and most of them speak good English as well.

 

[Adriaan557]

Money:
There are 3 banks in town, and they all have ATM’s - all new generation ATM’s that accept any type of card. You can get 5000Meticais ($200) per transaction and I sometimes did 2 transactions back to back and got 10 000Meticais without a problem. You can pay your accommodation and diving with a credit card (they add a 5% transaction fee), and everything else is normally cash, although you can run a bar/restaurant tab if you are a guest at some of the places and pay by credit card when you check out.
All prices are in Meticais, and daily exchange rates for Rand and US$ indicated behind the bar. So if your bill arrives in Meticais and you want to pay in Rand or US$, the waiter uses the daily rate to calculate the amount. The rates were not too bad – better than the rates at Heathrow airport in Londen, but if you do not want to pitch up with a load of cash on you, the 3 ATM’s in town will never let you run out of cash.

Health & Medicine:
The tap water at Palmeiras and most other places comes from bore-holes, and is safe to drink… My wife did not want to risk getting a stomach bug and only drank bottled water, I on the other hand had a bigggg thirst the first night and we had run out of bottled water…so having to choose between ‘dying of thirst’ and having an upset stomach from drinking tap water I chose the latter and when I was still fine the next day I continued to drink the tap water – so I can honestly say it is safe. But truth be told if I had plenty of bottled water on the first night I probably would not have risked it.

Mozambique is in a Malaria area, and I’m not sure you can buy malaria prophylactics in Vilanculos, so come prepared. We always use Malarone, it is very expensive compared to other prophylactics out there, but because it has very little side effects (zero in our case) it is a good one to use if you are diving.
The type of malaria they get there is not the life threatening and recurring one, so if you think you’ve got it(feel a cold coming on), you can go down to the local hospital where they will do a blood test and know within 10 minutes if you have Malaria or not. If you do, they’ll give you some tablets and you’ll be fine after 2-3 days - or so I’m told by the locals. So yes there is a hospital and apparently they are good at diagnosing and treating malaria – but I got mixed reviews on how they treat more serious illnesses/injuries. But hey, at least they have a hospital which is more than you can say of most African villages.
There is no hyperbaric chamber in Vilanculos, and I think the closest one is in Richards Bay, South Africa. So if you need to get to one you will need to be airlifted – which will be costly, so divers insurance is always a good idea.

The Weather in April:
Mostly sunny and hot (25-28 degrees), and it cools down a bit during the night. The weather was a bit random, and it varied from really hot days with no wind with hot nights where we had the fan running to nice sunny days with a cool breeze blowing from the sea, and a day or two where a strong wind would blow from the sea towards late afternoon, and it would cool down to the point that my wife would wear a jumper at night. When I say random I mean you’d get a hot day, 2 nice days, a windy day with a bit of cloud, a nice day, and then a hot day again…
All in all we cannot complain about the weather.

Sunrise on a cloudy day

 

[Adriaan557]

The diving:
There are 2 diving centres in Vilanculos. Big Blue who never returned my emails, and Odyssee Diving which we ended up diving with. Odyssea - Diving in Mozambique - Vilanculos, owned and run by French couple Sabrina and Denis. They were very helpful in giving us some information about diving in Bazaruto and also some general information about Vilanculos before we decided to book the trip.

They run a professional operation, are passionate about diving and are set on making sure divers have a good time and enjoy their diving. They treat everyone with special care and you get that personal touch that you do not get with some ‘cattle’ operations like Thailand or Egypt where the DM’s job is to get you to the site, in the water, back in the boat and back to land.

Diving is done with 5mm full wetsuits and the water temperature was always between 25 and 26 degrees. Their wetsuits are brand new and BCD’s are a mixture of new and old, but all in good working order, same goes for the regulators. They do not dive with EAN, but are planning to get that in the future. Diving is done from a 8meter RIB that can comfortably take 8 divers for a 2 tank dive with a minimum of 4 divers. They also have a 5meter RIB they use when there are only 2 divers.

We walked to their shop the day we arrived, our logbooks and qualifications were thoroughly checked and we fitted wetsuits and BCD’s – and the next day they picked us up on the beach in front of Palmeiras for our first dives – all our equipment was on the boat, and that was the case every day thereafter.
Pick-up was around 8:40 by boat on route to the dive site, and Sabrina would always phone when they launch the boat, so we could make our way to the beach.

After 45 minutes we reached the islands where we’d have a 15minute break and to do a dive briefing with a drawing in the sand, then another 10mins out to Two Mile Reef for the first dive. Thereafter you return to the island for a 90minue lunch break, where you can relax of climb the huge sand dune for panoramic views or the area. After the 2nd dive you have a 10minute break on the island and then back to the mainland. We usually got back around 3.30pm.

Bazaruto Islands

Crow looking to steal our lunch


Our bottom times varied from 45 to 60minutes. Depending on the size of the group, usually if someone reaches 50bar they and everyone else up to 70bar ascend along the boyie line where they are picked up by the boat and the rest continue the dive with a max BT of 60 minutes. We were never many divers on the boat – usually 4 to 6 with either Sabrina or Denis as DM. Largest group was 7 divers and they split us in two – 4 beginners with Denis, and the 3 AOW’s with Sabrina.

They have very beautiful, colorful and unspoiled hard and soft corals. The turtles, crayfish, groupers and Morays are massive. Not as much reef fish as I’ve seen on the inner reefs in the Maldives, but the beautiful corals make up for it. Visibility started off really bad around 5-8 metres on our first dive but that was because it was full moon the night before and the spring tide stirred things up a bit. 2 days later is was 15metres and by the end of the week we had 20metres. Most dives were between 15-18 metres either over the reef or a combination of reef and sandy bottoms with coral heads. Notable things we saw: 2 reef sharks, a 2 metre guitarfish, Sting Rays, Devil Rays, massive Morays & Turtles (Green & Hawkesback), few trumpet fish, porcelain crabs, nudibranc’s, christmas tree worms, blue spotted ray’s etc. We always dived on the outside of the reef, and depending on the day and site, you had hardly any current, drift with a mild current, or sometimes mild to heavy surge. There were always a few people on the boat going snorkelling, and they would be taken to the inside of the reef during our 90minute surface break to snorkel, and could also snorkel on the reef off the island while we were out diving. Every single one of them always said it was awesome! So if you have a partner that does not dive, you can always take them with to snorkel and relax on the island beach.

We paid 3400Meticais ($140) for a double tank dive (incl. all equipment and reserve park fees), and you get discounts for every dive thereafter. That is a bit more expensive than Tofu, but probably due to the distance to the reef and high fuel prices in Mozambique.

Worth a mention… I told Denis that I liked macro stuff, and wanted to test my new G9, and he arranged for Sabrina to take us to Alan’s Reef one afternoon on one of our resting days. Sabrina picked us up and drove us to the site with all the gear in the car – literary a 10minute drive to one of the resorts south of Vilanculos. Alan’s reef is a very shallow (3.5metres) and small artificial reef consisting out of old tractor tyres and 2-3 old cars on a sandy bottom surrounded by sea grass – at low tide, you walk 5 metres into the water, dive down and you’re there. The reef is a breeding ground for Nudibranc’s, lion fish, puffer fish and numerous others. We saw loads of Nudibranc’s including 2 that were busy laying their eggs. Also saw a few juvenile lion fish about (8-10cm long) and puffer fish as big as your thumb. We dived for 70mins, by which time all 3 of us were feeling the cold (water temp was 23 degrees – unusual for such a shallow site) Excellent place to practice macro photography - so if you are ever in Vilanculos and want to check this out ask them to take you to Alan’s reef.

Note to all - best not to go when there is a spring tide…visibility tends to be bad for 2-3 days around the spring tide, and you cannot go out to Cabo San Sebastian which apparently is an awesome dive where you might see Manta’s, hammerheads, reef sharks, king fish and barracuda’s. (definitely next time then…)

Keep an eye out on the Underwater Photography section, as I will be posting a few pictures there soon.

 

[Adriaan557]

Other things to do:
Vilanculos has a big market that caters mostly for the local people, but you can buy cheap alcohol and fruit and vegetables and material. My wife bought some material at the market, and had a local lady make her some handbags, the Canadian girls had skirts made - good quality work, and cheap ($2-$3 for material and $5-$6 to have a bag/skits/shirt made). There is also a fish market where the locals buy fish – lots of crabs, and small fish, but millions of flies swarming over everything…If want to buy fish to eat, do so on the beach, when the fishermen return from sea. We were even offered fresh lobster on the beach by fishermen one day.

The fish market


I can recommend the horseback riding done by Patrick and Mandy. Mozambique Horse Safari| Horse Riding Holidays in Africa They have horses for every level of rider and take you riding on the beach, you can also ride in the sea with the horses (swim with them), which is lovely on a hot day. They basically schedule the horse riding around you. We called them at 2pm one day and an hour later the two of us were on horseback with Patrick leading us down the beach through mangroves, and palm trees…really beautiful!

Everyone in Vilanculos is very friendly, and all seem to promote and help each others business. Although Smugglers has it’s own bar/restaurant Ian (the owner) was happy to recommend the nice restaurants in town, and ever offered to drive us there whenever we wanted to go – a service we made good use of. They also put us in touch with Patrick & Mandy to go horseback riding and when Patrick heard we were divers he offered to drive us down to the dive shop and introduce to the people. You definitely do not get this kind of friendly and helpful attitudes in big tourist areas where tourists are plenty and you’re just another number.

To summarize:
The Good: We enjoyed Vilanculos very much. Highlights were diving with all that beautiful, colourful, unspoiled and undamaged corals with Sabrina en Denis, the great seafood, and the relaxed and laidback atmosphere and the friendly and helpful people. We will definitely go back there.

The Bad: Nothing really major springs to mind…We are very easy going when we are on holiday and maybe we were just luck not to have any incidents spoil our holiday.
The roads are pretty bad at places, and a 4x4 is advised if you are going to drive around in the area. Driving on the main road to Vilanculos and most of the roads in town with the exception of a few are drivable with a normal car, but if you want to go to the resorts/beaches south of town (horseback riding & Alan’s Reef) you really need a 4x4.

The Ugly: a few stray dogs running around… the odd building here and there destroyed by Cyclone Favio.

My report might be a bit of an overkill and I have to admit it is starting to look like a travel guide, but this is the kind of detail I normally look for when planning a trip – and hopefully it will make life easier for the next guy like me that comes along and wants to plan a trip to Mozambique…

Since there is a lot of information about Tofu on SB, I won’t be doing a detailed trip report on that – might do a brief "what we did, what we saw and how it was" if someone is interested…

Feel free to ask if you have any questions!

 

[AndyT]

There is no ways I could have ever written a better trip report !!! Excellent is an understatement - I will certainly refer back to this when I get around to going up there myself even though I have a few Moz trips under my belt.

 

[TSandM]

Great report from a part of the world we don't hear about very often. Thank you for the time you put into it. This kind of report is a resource for others on the board, perhaps not now, but in the future, when someone searches on the topic, so it's good to have a comprehensive writeup.

 

[AndyT]

Hey mods !!! Why don't we have a separate "Trip Report" sub-forum for each region ?

 

[penti]

Thank you for this great trip report, I dove with Odyssea last July and I 100% agree with everything you said...

I stayed at Zombie Cucumber, nice cozy chalets and great athmosphere, great food as well. They also have a super dorm for solo travellers on a budget.

a few pictures (first half taken in Tofo, second half taken in Vilanculos) there :
Picasa Albums Web - Penti - Mozambique ju...