“Leston, put that gun down,” teases Mary Anne, smiling at Leston cradling his M16, “and come and pick up a paint brush with us.” Leston blushes bashfully and continues scouring the murky forest that lies between us, an Art Safari group painting the sun setting on the African bush, and the safety of our camp here in Liwonde National park. A hyena gives off a lonely howl; a hunt is in the air.

“The hyenas whooping so the impala run away from it,” explains Mary-Anne, “straight into the jaws of four or five other hyena, who’re probably waiting somewhere over there…” she points her paintbrush at the forest. 

Lesson one; if you hear a hyena whooping in wild Africa, walk towards it. There’s only one of them waiting for you in that direction. Unless you’ve got an armed guard like Leston, of course, in which case you can lie back and…

“Arghh, it’s poo!”

“That’s either impala or waterbuck,’ Mary-Anne says, poking her finger into the mound in which I just lay my head, ‘they’re eighty per cent efficient when it comes to getting nutrients from their food, you know.”

“Nice,” I say.

“You’ve got bits stuck to you,” she continues, “in your hair…”

Herds of impala, backed by the palms that indicate this area was once an Arab slaving post, snort and stamp as territorial scraps rage between males. A warthog trots to within a few metres of me and glares. I edge away uneasily.

“Don’t worry,” smiles Leston, “it’s only a pig.” I’m not so sure. The last time I saw a warthog this close its tusks were ripping through my tent trying to get at my food stash. A troupe of baboon roars across the clearing, scattering the impala. Behind them, just visible among heavy vegetation, the ears of an elephant flap lazily. Innocent, a teenage Malawian artist whom Art Safari is sponsoring to accompany us, sits next to me with wide, astonished eyes.

“I’ve painted elephant hundreds of times,” he whispers, “but I’ve never seen one before in real life, I can’t believe I’m here.”

Our brushes work fast as gusts of cool evening air breathe life into the animals. We’re absorbed, silent and meditative. I paint like a three year old but that’s ok. My approach to art is similar to my approach to outdoor activity. I’m not bothered by rules about how I should be doing something or what gear is currently in vogue. None of that matters at all. I’m only concerned with forgetting the past and future and just touching the present as cleanly and deeply as I can.

An owl settles in the Fever tree behind us and the moonlit bush begins to pulsate and crackle with the calls of tree frogs, Mozambican nightjars and a background buzz that’s so densely indecipherable it could be one species of insect or a thousand. Soon after this we hear the first hippo grunts. It sounds like we’re sat between it and water, and that’s a place likely to get us in serious trouble. We move cautiously back to camp, tip-toeing past skittish silhouettes, straining our eyes, trying to marry the snorts and calls and stamps to the flitting shadows. Nobody has a torch and most of us fall through the hard surface crust at least once, sinking ankle deep into black oozy mud.

The next morning, sitting by the Shire River, a monitor lizard waddles past me towards the water, swaying its great meaty tail. Beyond it a crocodile yawns, its massive jaws pointing in the direction of about twenty snorting hippos. This stretch of river is one of Africa’s most densely populated waterways for hippo and crocodile, and today it shows. We set out by boat, planning to journey high upriver to visit Livingston’s Tree, where the great explorer camped when he passed through this way during his first Zambezi expedition. It isn’t long though before our progress is hindered by a herd of sixty or more elephant, most knee deep in reedy water, purple flowers at their knees and white egrets on their backs. Two powerful bulls are squaring up tusk to tusk, making an almighty noise. We urge the boat skipper ever closer, until I can hear the herds’ ears rustling and bellies grumbling less than three metres away. Over the next half hour horse flies draw blood from our ankles, the sun fries our heads and teenage elephants mock charge the boat but nobody complains and paintbrushes are kept busy. The sight of two boisterous youngsters sparring next to us and a wise elder wading in to place a gentle trunk between them is one I’ll never forget.

“I’ve never seen such a large herd of elephant,” I say, “conservation here is bang on.”

“It didn’t used to be,” our skipper replies, “but the poaching was stopped by a South African who’s ex Special Forces. He made real progress.”

“Were his methods…orthodox?” I ask.

“Well, it’s the law of the jungle out here you know…”

We motor on through Malombo lake to Livingstone’s Tree, a great hollow baobab swathed in vines. Fishermen play cards in its shadow. Nearby are very fresh elephant tracks - dark muddy craters with lakes of dirty water at their bases. A warthog family sprint from our path, tails pointing high, and ominous growls rise from the long grass.  I half want to experience an animal charge, just for the fun and excitement, which of course would only follow should I survive. I strain against the glare, searching for movement; it’s so hot now my eyeballs feel like they’re melting.

Being on foot gives me an understanding of a landscape that a Landover safari has never achieved. How amazing it is for the animals to be able to run full tilt on this muddy surface riddled with hoof prints and hippo pot holes, when it’s all we can do to keep upright…

We stop every few hundred metres to sketch. The wildlife that scatters and falls silent as we approach begins to come alive and naturally active again within minutes each time. Impala, saddle billed stork, baboon and vervet monkey drift across our pages, filling the gaps between palm and hibiscus bush. Grunting hippos lure us over a rise, from where we spy a pod of thirty which snort, flip back their ears and sink below the surface as some of us, in our excitement, foolishly get too close.

Flamingos flap low over the river. Goliath herons stand deadly still.

“Can we swim in the river,” I ask, “it’s so hot!”

“Sure,” says the skipper, “for one minute. That’s how much time it’ll take the crocs to decide to eat you.”

A few days later we’ve left the hippo-ridden Shire and are camped on Domwe, Lake Malawi’s largest unpopulated island. The moon’s risen blood red over Mozambique, the monkeys have stopped crashing about overhead and have settled down for the night, and fishermen’s lamps dot the great dark lake. The slap of their paddles on the water’s surface (the fish are attracted by the lamps and scared into the nets by the paddles’ noise) competes with the gentle buzz of cicadas. I understand why Livingstone named this ‘The Lake of a Thousand Stars’. The diamond studded sky is reflected perfectly by the lake’s surface. Occasionally the sense of being in Eden is broken when the wind brings the dull thud of fake R&B over the water from CapeMcClear. Years ago I knew the Cape as a quiet paradise. Still, it was never realistically going to last. Not with people like me writing about it, inviting all-comers to come see the beauty, dragging business opportunists in their wake. Funny how most of us writers can wisely repeat the old saying ‘We always kill that which we love’ and yet few of us can resist continuing to shout about the places that impress us. Instead we make up some cowardly tosh about our presence being of some financial value to the locals, thereby judging their needs by our own standards, as if they’re as greedy and dumb as we are. The ‘music’ turns up a notch and momentarily drowns the cicadas. I vow that if ever I find Eden again, it’ll remain my little secret…

At dawn I shower under a converted tin bucket, borrow a kayak and set out on a three hour circumnavigation of Domwe. The moon sets behind the blue tinted western mountains and a fierce wind, known as the Mwera, races across from Mozambique. I dig the paddle in hard as I feel myself being lifted by the white waves, catch the crest and then sink into the depths. The nose of the kayak meets the rising sun. I squint as the next wave and bout of frantic paddling begins, readjusting the rudder every few seconds as the currents threaten to twist me broadside into capsize position. Fish eagles, sitting on rocks, utter shrill cries -  the last audible remnant of free Africa  - as I pass.  

After a sweaty jungle climb to catch the view from the summit of Domwe I paddle two hours across a flat calm to Mumbo island, which is the perfect image of old Caribbean shanty chic. A rickety wooden bridge spans the cove where I beach next to a lady who’s sat in the surf laughing, having just had a rather close face to face with a six foot monitor lizard. Taking a snorkel I trade bright horizons for the underwater world. Lake Malawi is a constant twenty eight degrees and contains more species of fish than any other lake in the world, more even than in the whole of North America and Europe combined (about 800, almost all of which are endemic). I round a rocky bend into glittering streams of light, slanting left to right, dissecting a great natural cathedral. Hundreds of small fish mill around, larger backlit shapes shadow them. To my right the pale blue and brown boulders fall away into a deep blue nothing. I turn another bend, into the sun now, and thousands of minute silver fish race straight at me, splitting into two groups just as they’re a foot from my head, racing either side like lightening streaks.

Later I slip on a scuba tank and go deeper. At twenty five metres an enormous catfish rises up out of the darkness, whiskers twitching. Startled I gulp in a mouthful of the lake and think how nice it is to be able to swallow it and not gag on salt, as I do whenever I dive in the sea. The divemaster raises his spear gun, eager for some sport. I’m glad to see the spear bounce clean off the fish’s head. Spear fishing’s illegal here and even if it wasn’t it’s still a pretty mean thing to do if you don’t need the food. I swear the fish flashes us a contemptuous glance as it fins back into the unknown. I follow it for a while before getting distracted by a cave. I poke my nose in and as my eyes adjust to the darkness remember Mary-Anne saying

“There’re probably no crocs or hippos in this area, although, of course, one never can be too sure…”

Thinking of Going?

I flew to Malawi with Kenya Airways. Good service and free and easy with the drinks. You can contact them at…

Web; www.kenya-airways.com

Email; ukres@kenya-airways.com

Tel; 01784 888222

Art Safari can be contacted at...

Web; www.artsafari.co.uk

Email; info@artsafari.co.uk

Tel; 01394 382235 or 07780 927560