After to many days on the go it was wonderful to sleep in. Spent the morning lounging around, looking out our open window (the entire front of the hut hinges up) at the beach, and working on my journal. Later taught Amy (and re-taught myself) the east African game of bao and had brunch in the camp's lounge. Spent the afternoon on a long walk into the village of Chitimba - just a few huts and a couple small stores. Still felt like walking some more so then continued walking on to the next village - even fewer huts. While walking back we stopped at a post office to check on postal rates - some of the carvings here are beckoning me. Played with some kids - one of them, "Ledge"?, accompanied us on the entire walk - never saying more than one word at a time. Basically just spent the afternoon walking around and basking in the positive attention - everyone has a smile and a polite greeting for you - a welcome change from Tanzania (where everyone followed their polite greeting with a demand for money). Also tried to change some money but couldn't find anything near the rate we got yesterday - finally found someone who agreed to give us 55 Kwacha to the dollar, but he didn't have the money on him so we'll have to walk down in the morning.
In the evening we hung out in the lounge and had another tasty dinner. We also spent some time quizzing the staff about our transport options from Chitimba on to Nkhata Bay and about our hike to Livingstonia tomorrow. After we arranged a guide for the hike, we finished off the night playing cards, trying to play pool (the table was seriously warped), having a few beers, and just basically relaxing.
