Av. Marginal Bike Ride

Saturday I went for a bike ride along the Avenida da Marginal - it's the road that follows the coastline through and away from Maputo. [You can see a track from my GPS if you expand the Google map on the left.] Riding a mountain bike with knobby tires on African roads with African drivers is a bit different than pedaling my road bike from Decatur to Stone Mtn. Still, I managed to put in about 20 Km, with stops along the way for caril do camaraos (shrimp curry) at Restaurante Costa do Sol.


Heading back towards the city, I saw some local fishermen in sailboats.

Judge

I'm currently staying in a house called "Casa do Judge" (see map in previous posting). The namesake, Judge, is a rather large harlequin great dane (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_dane). He loves to walk and I've taken him for a short jog - a bit faster than my normal pace is barely a trot for him. Today we headed down to the beach so Judge could run free a bit (I am nervous about letting him get too far away, since it's clear that I'll never catch him if he decides to run off).

TDYer outings

TDY is a government abbreviation for "Temporary DutY." Christine, Sheila, and I are often called TDYers, since we're in Mozambique on temporary duty for a CDC program called IETA (http://www.cdc.gov/cogh/training/IETA/Default.htm). In our first few weeks here, we've shared several outings.

Starting with our orientation to the CDC office in Maputo.



Two weeks ago, we visited the Museu Nacional de Arte and the Museu de Historia Natural, a somewhat bizzare collection of stuffed specimens and elephant fetuses.

After the musuems we stopped at Mundo's for some prawns. [Important lesson: when you put your camera in and out of your pocket several times, the settings can get changed without your knowing it. This shot was taken using "scenery" mode, not appropriate for indoor flash shots, since it forced a slow shutter speed!]

A few days later, more prawns at Miramar Restaurant - this time the people and the food are in focus.



On the 4th of July, we attended a picnic at the the USAID Miramar Housing Compound hosted by the Embassy Marine guard unit. There was traditional American food, croquet, ping-pong, and volleyball. Unfortunately, there was no fireworks display, as the event broke up before dark.

Google map of places I've been (updated 11 July)

View Larger Map

Here's a "click-able" Google Map of Maputo, with pushpins marking some of the places I've been (including the walking tour described below). If you switch to satellite view, there are amazingly high resolution images of Maputo.