Learning to dive on Lake Malawi

After briefly clipping the corner of Mozambique via the Tete Corridor,

we spent a night in Lilongwe and three nights at Kande Beach on Lake Malawi.

We were told that Lake Malawi is known as Calendar Lake. It has 12 rivers feeding into it – one for every month of the year, and a river draining it that is 365 miles long – one for every day of the year. It’s also 52 miles wide at its widest point – one for every week of the year.

In the two days we had at Kande Beach, I made a last minute decision to learn to scuba dive with Shaun and Karen. At the Aquanuts Dive School we started out with the PADI theory (giggling at the videos which seem to be set in the 80s/90s judging by the hairstyles and the bad jokes alone!) and then did our confined dives in a tiny fishbowl swimming pool.

The lake was surprisingly rough for the duration of our stay [we later found out it was like a mirror once we left!] and we nearly weren’t able to get the inflatable out for our two open water dives. We obsessively checked the conditions every half hour or so, hoping they would improve. On the last day at 3pm, as we were about to give up hope, the wind miraculously died down ever so slightly which gave us just long enough to get the inflatable out to Kande Island.

Campbell, our instructor, tested our newly learnt skills and took us to see the fallen tree,

wooden canoe,

row boat and jeep which the owner ‘drove’ into the water sans engine in scuba gear.

Now if you open up the bonnet, colourful fish emerge from it. I’m not familiar with the fish we saw [aside from a large catfish], but I’ve included some pics of the fish (and a nest) that you can see out on the Lake. Campbell told us he’s seen an otter out here a couple of times too.

Diving photos courtesy of Campbell Louw

Due to the predominantly rough conditions, we managed to complete the entire theory for the Open Water course including our final exam, which we then reviewed over a bottle of Kuche Kuche and Chilli Tomato crisps that stain your fingers red.

This leaves us with only two more confined dives and two open water dives which we’ve planned to do in Zanzibar. Let’s hope the conditions are good!