Vwaza National Park - Description and Landscape (Leo, Anouk and Floor's photos)

Vwaza Marsh Wildlife Reserve (text excerpt from the book Spectrum guide to Malawi)

This beautiful and all too frequently overlooked reserve is well worth visiting. Much of extent or 986 square kilometers area is a flat and ill-drained alluvial plan at about 100 meters. A few rocky outcrops of hills break the general flatness of the landscape.

The reserve is cut by numerous tributaries of the river Luwewe which flows largely north to south. This dominant channel joins the South Rukuru River at Zaro Pool in the southwest corner of the reserve and then flows west to east along the border with Zambia. There is a wonderful mix if vegetation Vwaza: forest and grassland, thin woodland and marsh. It is rich variation n habitat that attracts such a splendid range of birdlife. Here and there are scattered stands of deciduous mopane woodlands found in Malawi only in Vwaza and the Shire lowlands of the south. The leaves of the mopane have the frustrating habit of turning edgeways to the sun and so providing very little shade for those on a walking safari.

Vwaza Marsh Wildlife Reserve in on the Zambian border to the northwest of Mzuzu. After passing town of Rumphi minor road is rutted. It is best to maintain a steady but modest speed. The path is across the plains which, except in the few months of rainy season, have almost desert-like dryness. Vegetation is sparse although trees survive by sending their roots down to the water table. Unfortunately the desert character of the landscape; literally spills over the road.

Small groups of huts, mango trees and low bushes area scattered across the lowland which has as its backdrop low hills encircling the plans. This is in fact the valley of the South Rukuru River, almost invisible from the road.