Frazer Potani, AfricaNews reporter in Lilongwe, Malawi
He was a visitor with big appetite for climbing mountains and had already hiked the Great Himalayas in Asia. However, he failed to reach the top of the 3,000m Mulanje Mountain also highest point in Central Africa.
The man was discovered dead by local villagers who had gone up the mountain to cut grass after missing for 20 days and a team of about 40 people almost gave up a manhunt for the missing tourist.
And as his remains arrived from the mountain, all natives stood up in their normal culture paying their respect to him. Then their chief, policemen, forestry officers and Mulanje Mountain Conservation Trust (MMCT) officials walked closer to see the deceased’s remains as they were being pushed into a waiting ambulance.
Late 23-year-old Brazilian tourist Gabriel Buchman hit local and international news headlines after he went missing in Mulanje before his corpse was discovered by some local villagers. “Buchman told me he would go alone up the mountain from Chambe peak to Sapitwa,” said Lewis Maudzu, a porter who had earlier hiked the mountain for six hours from Likhubula Forest Lodge to Chambe with Buchman.
“He [Buchman] sent me back, saying he has hiked greater mountains such as Everest, Kilimanjaro and Himalayas without a tour guide and that he would do the same with Mulanje,” said Maudzu with agony in his voice.
He said those going to Mulanje’s highest peak, Sapitwa spend a night at a camp in the mountain before proceeding. “But Buchman said would go to the peak and come back the same day,” he said adding that the tourist’s plan was impossible. Sapitwa is the highest of the Mulanje’s seven peaks.
“It takes at least nine hours to reach Sapitwa Peak so I argued with him for sometime that I would not let him go alone. But he was adamant. I descended and reported the matter to the Department of Forestry,” said Maudzu.
Buchman was second foreigner to miss in the mountain because few years ago Dutch national Linda Pronk, a volunteer nurse who was working at Mulanje Mission Hospital also went missing on September 13, 2003. While Buchman’s body was discovered however, Pronk is still missing up after searches for her identification failed.
Tourism in Malawi is glued to Lake Malawi hence tourists’ attraction to Mulanje like iron pieces to a magnet proves that Malawi tourism is rich and diverse.
In fact, despite Buchman’s misfortune authorities in Mulanje reported that visitors’ figures to Mulanje Mountain shot to 150 within few weeks after the incident.
Village Headman Nesa from Mulanje however warns anyone planning to climb the mountain without following instructions from authorities. “I want to advise people going up the mountain to listen to our advice because the mountain keeps our ancestral spirits,” the chief was quoted in the local media.
Feared but friendly
The archives however, reveal that although the mountain has been feared it is friendly and even no mention of climbers missing. Writing in “Guide to the Mulanje” Nassif Frank Eastwood disclosed that the first recorded climb of Sapitwa was made in 1894 by then Acting Commissioner Captain (later Brigadier General) Marning and party.
“Their climb started from Fort Lister and took the party four days. They camped on the ascent in the Ruo Valley and on the Thuchila shelf, and on the descent on the Lichenya plateau. Their route seems to have taken them near Litakala and Namasile peak, crossing into Ruo Valley near the pinnacles on the south side of Chagaru-not the easy route even today,” said Eastwood.
He added that the party then appeared to have left the Ruo basin between Nandalanda and Khuto, and they finally ascended Sapitwa from east climbing.
“The actual size of this party was not mentioned in the report, but it seems to have been quite a large one from comments such as ‘The Mountain Machila [local stretcher] with which we were supplied’ and ‘Our Carriers were always well up,” said Eastwood.
He disclosed that Marning’s climbing team Machila consisted of 12 yards of Calico with a loop at one end in which the climber inserted his body, allowing the Calico to encircle his hips. “…and at the other end there were six to eight strong men to haul the climber up. The fatigue of climbing is absent even when ascending the steepest gradients,” said Eastwood.
He further said the above mentioned party, and another one which climbed Sapitwa in 1897 were most impressed with Lichenya plateau. “Lichenya plateau did, in fact, subsequently become a hill top station in a small way in the 1920s,” he noted adding interesting areas around Mulanje were Likhubula, Chambe, Lichenya, Thuchila, Sambani, Madzeka.
While natural resources that attracted visitors were Mulanje Cedar, flowers, mammals, birds, snakes, butterflies and lizards.
“The first written mention of Mulanje appears to have been made by David Livingstone who saw it in August 1859 from the vicinity of Lake Chilwa,” he stated.
Eastwood further said in the late 1800s two forts were built close to Mulanje Mountain, Fort Anderson sat the southern end and Fort Lister at the opposite side of the mountain in the gap between Massif and Michesi Mountain.
“No doubt some of the personnel stationed at the forts made excursions on to the slopes of the mountain and probably also to plateau level,” said Eastwood.
Thickest bush
Ian Howell also flew into Malawi in the 1970s from Nairobi, Kenya, and climbed Mulanje Mountain and fought against some bushes to ascend the mountain.
“On the morning of the 19th April 1977 I attempted to climb Matambale by a direct line from Sombani hut to the summit. I had to fight through some of the thickest and most entangled African bush which I have ever encountered,” said Howell.
“Being a complete adventure and perhaps a massonist it so happened that I enjoyed the experience,” he said adding that Matambale is one of the many attractive peaks. “Everyone who goes up the mountain bring back a memory of their own favourite experience-swirling mists round rocky heights, far views over distant plains, stars on a clear night, or the challenge of body against mountain and there is always a wealth of vegetation, slopes of Brachystegia, a fire with spring leaves, meadows of everlasting flowers and sometimes a secret surprise of irises, purple against dark rocks,” stated Howell adding that Mulanje has also many moods.
“The moods are chiefly caused by sudden and often violent changes in weather. So respect her for the serious mountain she is, and never quiet believe what she promises,” says Howell however adding, “But don’t be afraid of her-go ahead and explore with joy.”
On her part travel writer Vera Garland in Guide to Blantyre and southern Region of Malawi said most travelers will see the Mulanje Massif many times from a distance before they get a close view may be from the top of one of Blantyre’s mountains- Mpingwe or Ndirande.
“…or may be from Zomba road or Zomba plateau. That Mulanje is big will be obvious, but there is a tendency to forget how many miles away it is from these view points. Other earlier travelers saw it like this too. Many must have cast longing eyes at its rock walls and wished they could climb them. One such was Rev. Robert Cleland, a Blantyre Missionary who lived and worked at Chiradzuru,” she says adding that Cleland visited Mulanje often during 1888, looking for a possible site for a mission station.
“He was obviously tantalized by the mountain and on the last day of 1888 he set off to climb it. There was no previous experience to go on and he had to try various routes, sometimes scaling rocks, sometimes making his way round them, until he reached a plateau,” Garland said adding, “There he found himself ‘in a new world and a new climate’.”
She disclosed that the first official visit to Mulanje was in October and November 1891 when Alexander Whyte was sent by then Governor Harry Johnston on an expedition on Mulanje to explore its natural history. “He first went to the same plateau as Cleland ‘through which the Lichenya [River] flows’ and found an enormous range of vegetation. He found a tree, seen but not recognized by Cleland, and classified it. It was named Wildringtonia whytiel commonly known as Mulanje Cedar,” stated Garland adding that Whyte also measured a dead one. “…and it was 140 feet long and over five feet in diameter. Altogether he spent two weeks on the mountain collecting hundreds of different species of plants,” she said.
Former Malawi’s Chief Information Officer David Tattersall in his book ‘The Land of the Lake, a Guide to Malawi’ noted Mulanje Mountain is a place where any tourist from elsewhere can not afford to visit.
“The splendid scenery and great agricultural potential of Malawi are probably nowhere seen than at Mulanje, where the great mountain rises abruptly 2,100 m above the surrounding tea estates,” said Tattersall.
He added that however, the mountain has been associated with superstition. “Long the subject of legend and superstition; mount Mulanje(3,000 m above sea level) is the highest mountain in Malawi and has been described as one of the finest sights in Africa,” said the journalist. He further stated that even Rider Haggard took inspiration from Mulanje Mountain for his book ‘People of the Mists’.
“Even the well-known author Laurens Van der Post wrote an interesting-though some what melodramatic account of an expedition to its [Mulanje] plateau in one of his early books ‘Venture to the Interior’,” he said.
Tattersall further discloses that roads linked with Mulanje are rich in history including a route by Great Scottish Missionary David Livingstone. “For example, Kapichira Falls make southern end of the Shire River cataracts, which extend up stream for 112 Km. It was here that David Livingstone stopped when he first traveled up the Shire, for further progress in the Ma-Robert and discovered that it was impossible to proceed,” said Tattersall.
He added: “16 Km beyond Chikwawa the road forks. The right hand fork leads to the grave yard of Richard Thornton, the talented, young geologist on Livingstone’s Zambezi Expedition, who died of fever in 1863. The grave is marked by a marble cross erected in 1905.”
He was a visitor with big appetite for climbing mountains and had already hiked the Great Himalayas in Asia. However, he failed to reach the top of the 3,000m Mulanje Mountain also highest point in Central Africa.
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