A Weekend Getaway Day 1: Nkhudzi Bay, Mangochi, Malawi

We agreed to have a Lake trip with my friends this year before the hot season was over and we had some decisions to make before finally settling on Nkhudzi Beach Lodge. It seemed highly ambitious at first and we had no idea how much money we’d be needing per person to make the trip a success. One thing was sure though, we were not doing a day trip. 

As the days drew closer we had to come up with tangible numbers and a tangible plan so we initially agreed on MK25,000 each for the entire trip and that we would plan everything around that amount (that is transport to and from Mangochi, Accommodation, and food). We were going to find whatever cheap accommodation we’d find just as long as we got to go to the lake. We were three people.

This amount turned out to be not practical in the end.

By the time the agreed date was approaching though, our trio was down to two because one of us had to go on a work trip in the North so we had to adjust ourselves. We nearly cancelled because how was it gonna be any fun when the picture we had in our minds included all three of us? But when we prayed over it we felt we could proceed. We also adjusted the numbers, finally picked a destination and made the booking for one night. 

We booked one night because we wanted to leave it open for in case we found some other place to stay after exploring.

I found Nkhudzi Beach Lodge on Facebook and their displayed contact number does work. Booking only took me about 5 minutes and they have a Mo626 (National Bank) payment option so it was very convenient. The price was MK30,000 per night and we split it in half (MK15,000 each) so each of us spent a total of MK30,000 for two nights. We also spent another approximately MK30,000 each on other expenses (transport fare from Limbe to Monkeybay and back to Limbe, including an extra 1,500 each because we got lost...or really we didn’t pay attention to getting the directions to our Lodge first before starting the trip so we missed our stage lol...we must have been so excited to finally be making the trip and overlooked getting directions. Lesson learnt). The fare from Limbe to Monkey Bay was MK9,500 each and from Nkhudzi Bay to Mangochi to Limbe was a total of MK8,500 (that is MK1,500 from Nkhudzi Bay to Mangochi and MK7,000 from Mangochi to Limbe).

The pictures displayed on their Facebook page are an exact representation of what the Lodge really looks like and we were so glad to find that out. I was sure it would look the same as in the photos and we wouldn’t be disappointed but Maness was not so sure so it was nice to not get any surprises. I had gone through their Facebook page, looked at their pictures and read other people’s posts/comments/reviews of the place before deciding on it so I was confident there wouldn’t be any such surprises.

DAY 1: ARRIVAL

The trip from Limbe to Mangochi was 3 hours long and by around 11 we were at Nkhudzi. We got our keys then went and dropped our bags in this chalet...

Our Chalet (Maluwa/Flowers 😊)

The beds with beautiful duvets!

That roof 😊

Then we ordered some food. We were starving! We left home at around 5 A.M so we could make the 6 O'clock minibus (high roofed and quite spacious) and we hadn’t eaten anything. I forgot to bring my biscuits but I remembered an apple, an orange and a 500ml bottle of water. I’d been meaning to do some fruits shopping a few days before but it didn’t work out...

We had to wait for about an hour for lunch to be ready so we went and made ourselves comfortable by the beach as we waited...

But first, a little video clip to show the overview of the place

The restaurant area

When our host came and told us food was ready I let out a loud yay and immediately rose up to go and eat! No time wasted.

 And the food was AMAZING!

Well cooked local chicken with plenty of soup for the rice, and the veggies were awesome. 

First meal- thoroughly enjoyed!

When lunch was done we were also done. The exhaustion from waking up so early and traveling for 3+ hours caught up with us so we went in for a long nap. Ah was that nap so satisfying! 

At a few minutes to 5 P.M we set off to look for a market somewhere, wherever. After knowing their meal prices we decided we’d need to do some cost cutting and buy dinner from outside. We didn’t know where the market was but we decided we'd just go and look around and we’d find it- without asking the staff at Nkhudzi and we found it. Turned out to be not so far away too.

We found shops where we could buy bottled water (at MK250 for a 500ml bottle which would have costed us MK500 at Nkhudzi), some snacks (biscuits and corn snacks) and some fresh home made baked buns from a certain seemingly shy, quiet, but cheerful woman as well as some yoghurt for breakfast. We also got chiwaya (fries) for dinner as we didn't see any other options available.

We were so proud of ourselves.

To avoid creating an overwhelmingly long post I have sectioned our trip up into 3 parts so please do look out for a post on Day 2 and then Day 3 to conclude.

Feel free to leave me comments, questions, etc in the comments section below!

Cheers!