The lions arrive at Mwabvi

Life at Butterfly is very pleasant, but I don't feel that I'm doing anything very useful. I spend most days in the computer room (despite my solemn vow that I wouldn't work with computers while in Africa!) tidying up the system, preparing some teaching plans and giving lessons in basic Word and Internet usage to the locals. Unfortunately they have recently installed Linux to try and avoid viruses, and I'm not familiar with this operating system, so I can't do as much as I could if they were using Windows. Luckily I have been joined by an Israeli girl called Iris who does know Linux, so between us we have been able to make a few improvements. I've also managed to spend a few mornings at the nursery school which I really enjoy.
In my "free time " I have done my first SCUBA dive for 15 years, which was great fun and not expensive (Aqua Africa in Nkhata Bay is reputed to be the cheapest in Africa if not the world), and I also spent a day kayaking on the lake with a couple of the girls from Ripple.
Unfortunately the planned Grand Opening of the lodge at Mwabvi didn't happen. However, Gaynor made her trip over, and the big excitement of the month was the arrival by plane of two lion cubs from South Africa. I had originally booked a four day safari in South Luangwa National Park in Zambia for 26th March, but this turned out to be the very day the lions were arriving. Luckily I was able to put the safari back a week and join Gaynor and Barry at Blantyre Airport.
It turned out that Iris was also traveling down to Blantyre, so we decided to take the night bus down to Blantyre together. I didn't relish the idea of traveling all night on a bus, but then at the last minute two other volunteers, Nikolas and Anne from Germany, announced that they were going down to Blantyre the same day and would we like a lift - yes they actually have a car! This was a great opportunity not only to travel in comfort, with good company, but also to give my German a bit of an airing.
In the event we got off a bit late and couldn't make it all the way to Blantyre, so we decided to stop off at Mabuya Camp in Lilongwe. I had a day in hand (this was Monday and the lions were due to arrive on Wednesday) so it wasn't a problem. Mabuya is a well known backpackers' lodge and most travellers stay there when passing through Lilongwe, but until now I have always gone for the luxury of the Kiboko hotel. However I am keeping a closer eye on my budget now, and Mabuya is significantly cheaper (MK800 for a tent as opposed to around USD50 for a hotel room - big difference!).
At Mabuya we met Marcel and Johanna, and their two daughters Ronja and Julia, also from Germany, who were traveling south in a fire engine which they had bought from the German fire service and done out as a mobile home - or rather they were trying to. Unfortunately the fire engine had broken down and they were stuck in Lilongwe waiting for some rather esoteric spare parts to be delivered from Germany. Amazingly they told us that not only had they been passed by another German fire engine,but they had also heard of yet another traveling somewhere in East Africa. There must be a special offer on German fire engines at the moment!
Lauren from Ripple also popped up at Mabuya (it's amazing how you run into people in Malawi) as she was meeting her father from Canada and also Geoff the Ripple director from England (of whom more later). Iris went off to bed early and I ended up with a whole bunch of Germans plus Lauren for a beer drinking session.
On Tuesday we carried on down to Blantyre, where Iris left us to climb Mount Mulanje and then to continue south to South Africa for the World Cup. Niko and Anne and I went for a very nice vegetarian curry in Blantyre.
On Wednesday I was up bright and early to be picked up by Gaynor, Barry and Kristen at 6:30, who had already driven the the two hours up from Mwabvi. The plane was due to arrive at 8:00 but they wanted to be at the airport in good time to sort out the paperwork.
There was great excitement at the airport, and we could see the staff peering into the box to see the lions as soon as it was unloaded from the plane. They had not been sedated for the flight and a vet was on hand to check that they had not suffered any ill effects, so the box was opened as soon as it was brought into the cargo area, to the great delight of the rest of the airport staff. There wasn't as much press presence as we would have liked, but several people from the Wildlife and Environment Society of Malawi and the Malawi Environment Endowment Trust were there taking photographs by the hundred and they have press contacts so hopefully there will be some coverage.
The lions were duly declared fit and healthy. They were also a good deal larger than expected - Barry had been told that they were about 8 weeks old but in fact they are about 3 months, and very playful. They certainly weren't going to sit on our laps in the vehicle as we had thought they might, so they went back in the box
The journey to Mwabvi was uneventful, although Kirsten had written "Lions on board" in the dirt on the back window, and everywhere we stopped people queried it, and when they found out it was actually true wanted to have a look. Most Malawians have never seen a lion, or indeed any other non-domestic animal, entry to wildlife reserves being way beyond their means. In many cases they have not even seen pictures.
Our arrival at Mwabvi was greeted with great excitement by Adele, Courtney their other daughter, and Selwyn, Barry's Dad, who was visiting from South Africa - his first time in Malawi. The two cubs (whose names have not been finally decided yet) seemed happy with their new surroundings, and we spent the afternoon playing with them. However, they soon decided that there were lots of interesting places to explore outside the site, and had to be physically hauled back several times (you see the picture of Barry carrying the male - I ended up doing the same with the female, but no one had a camera at the time so you'll have to believe me).
I think they had planned to keep these sweet 8 week old kittens in the house to start with, but that obviously wasn't going to work, so temporary accommodation had to be hurriedly set up in the vehicle workshop until  a proper compound could be set up. Meanwhile Adele went off to Bangula to buy several kilograms of goat for their supper.
Although the official opening of Njati Lodge (Njati is Chichewa for Buffalo) had been postponed, they were expecting their very first guests as it was WESM's annual weekend at the reserve. Normally a few of them come down every year and camp in the reserve - for many years just about the only visitors the reserve ever got. This year they were offered the options of a real bed in a lodge or a camping at a proper campsite, plus an encounter with two lion cubs, so attendance was a little higher than usual. As always with such events several things were not quite finished, and I was quickly drafted in to help put the final sheets of mosquito mesh into the windows and make up the beds, and despite the usual set backs, by the time the first guests arrived mid-afternoon on Friday we were just about ready. There was no actual catering available, but there were cold drinks in the fridge and lots of firewood on the braai and everyone seemed very impressed.
Barry has done wonders with the place since I was here last. He has a staff of around fifty local workmen, and has not only built the lodge virtually from scratch (it had been started when he arrived but needed a lot of reworking) and done up the campsite, he has also started a massive road building programme so that visitors can do proper game drives and actually see some wildlife (we saw a beautiful male Kudu on the way back from the lodge one evening)
I spent Saturday and Sunday morning helping Barry erect a fence to provide a proper compound for the cubs, who were getting pretty fed up of being stuck in the garage. The long term plan is to set up a predator breeding programme, so eventually the entire site will be fenced. The cubs are only slightly related and are quite suitable for breeding, but they will not reach breeding age for a couple of years yet.
The other good news is that I asked if I could be useful at the reserve in the longer term, and Barry and Adele said yes, so I am going to leave Butterfly and be a volunteer at Mwabvi for a while. It's an excellent time to do it, both in terms of the reserve, which is now ready to receive both guests and volunteers (several volunteers are booked in over the next few months) and of the time of year - Mwabvi is down in the rift valley and gets extremely hot, so this cool time of year is the best time to be there. Whether I'll still be there in October and November when it really gets hot remains to be seen.
I managed to get a lift to Blantyre with one of the WESM guys, and, even better, a lift to Lilongwe with another. So far I haven't had to use public transport at all, although getting a lift back to Nkhata Bay might be a bit trickier. As I write I am back at Mabuya lodge in Lilongwe (with a throat infection!) and off to Zambia tomorrow for my four day safari in South Luangwa National Park. Then it's back up to Ripple to meet Geoff, deliver some medical supplies kindly donated by Mark, and check that Charles' place at Likoma boarding school and Annie's driving course are all sorted out. Then I'll go back to Butterfly to pick up some stuff I left there, and provided I can still get everything into my rucksack I'll be heading south again to Mwabvi.
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