It’s the capital city of Mozambique, it has a little over 1 million of people and it locates the financial pole of the country. That’s the city where we’ve found more Brazilian people so far, due to an administrative division of the company Vale. That allowed us to meet a wonderful family from Minas Gerais, which lives currently in Maputo, we even had a delicious barbecue.
In Mozambique, the official language is Portuguese (from Portugal), very similar to Brazil, it as easy to understand and communicate there.
The city is big, we stayed there for few days, but we could visit a lot of touristic attractions and enjoy some places.

MAPUTO DOWNTOWN

During a walk through the city, we visited some touristic attractions in downtown, such as the Cathedral of Maputo, the statue in the middle of a square in honor to the first president of Mozambique, Mr. Samora Machel.
We also tasted a typical coffee of the city, at one of the many bakeries existing there. We met Taverna Doce, a very nice place, with delicious products and a reasonable price. We had a great breakfast there.
In the late afternoon, we visited Shopping Maputo, with a lot of stores and movie theater. We tried two local beers at a pub and they were rather iced and perfect!

POLANA HOTEL

Like in all of the cities, in the first day, we always go out to explore the place and get information about tours, markets, bakeries and shoppings. We were recommended to ask for information at the best hotel in the city, Polana Hotel. Even Luciano Hulk stayed there. They have a lot of suggestions about amazing tours and, according to our researches, they were cheaper than other companies. It’s right in the center of the city and there are awesome bakeries nearby, and we visited one named Taverna Doce, very refined and with great products.

SPAR SUPERMARKET

We super recommend that supermarket. It has a reasonable price, located on 25 de julho avenue, we used it very much during our stay in Maputo.
As it is a net, we found a lot of known products, besides accepting international card, local currency and dollar.

FEIMA – HANDICRAFT AND FLOWERS FAIR

We visited it and saw a lot of stores selling their sculptures, of several shapes and materials, fabric crafts, tunics, bags and a lot of flowers and plants, and there are also two big snack bars, and tables under the trees for you to drink and have your meal.

CENTRAL MARKET

That market is very busy and we went checking there, everything was well organized, and there are a lot of stalls to sell fish, meat, fruits, vegetables and spices. There are also a lot of accessory stores, at about the back-exit door. Tip: Always use the main entrance, because the back ones are always crowded of people and street sellers.

TUNDURO BOTANICAL GARDEN

If you need touristic information, you’ll find right at the entrance a house with a lot of tips about what you can do in Maputo. A very nice place visited by us is Tunduro botanical garden, which has trees, flowers, gardens and rest areas. In that place, we had an unexpected experience, once there was a community of bats in some trees, but nothing to worry about. It’s a good place to relax and spend time.

SAFARI

A lot of people come to Maputo, for being next to Kruger Park, and can find here a lot of options of prices, for different amount of days that they will visit, and companies, and just research companies, but when you get into the country, remember to request a multiple entry visa, as the park can be accessed only by South Africa.

KATEMBE FERRY

It’s not a ferry, but a boat, for people to cross by the canal that links Maputo to Katembe. Buying the ticket is very simple, in the pier entrance there is a seller and you will pay out only 10 Meticals. From Katembe, to get to downtown, it’s necessary to go by chapa.

POST BUS AND JUNTA

Junta is the local bus station, where you can find the ranges among next cities. We’re going to use that means of transportation a lot, they all have quite affordable prices.
We were recommended to use the buses of the mail (postbus), which had best prices and would take us to Vilanculos.
We dealt with PostBus from Maputo to Vilanculos, and the price was 190.00 reais for the couple, with no-air conditioner, no restroom and almost no stop, not even for lunch, and it’s not clean.

MEANS OF TRANSPORTATION

There’s almost no bus system (few lines), the most used ones are the chapas (vans which take people to different points of the city), very cheap, and My love are pick-ups, which have protection against sun and rain, and everyone goes holding tight for not to fall from the car.
There are taxis and tuk-tuk, always deal before starting a trip, because they don’t use taximeters or price charts.

SAFETY OF THE CITY

We thought it’s very safe during the time we stayed there. We saw some cops, but we were said that they are very corrupt, and that if we had questions, we should ask the population, for us not to be charged a juice, as they say there. The population is very friendly and helpful.

CURRENCY TYPE

The local currency of Mozambique is Metical, and the exchange in dollar for February/2019 is $1,00 to MT63,00. We recommend to exchange the currency in a safe place such as an airport or at Exchange, a bank in the city. It’s always good to have the local currency, because they may accept dollar, but you lose in change or conversion. And it also assures that the coin is not counterfeit.

EXPENSES IN MAPUTO

Our expenses in currency (REAIS) in Maputo during 4 days for the couple were the following:

Feeding: R$118.00 (market, snacks and drinks)

Tours: R$10.00 (Ferry Boat)

Transportation: R$210.00 (chapa, bus, tuk-tuk)

Lodging: R$186.00 (airbnb)

Mozambique Visa: R$386.00 (coupe)

The days were nice for resting and tours. We liked that city, and we suggest one week for who wants to visit it. It’s possible to enjoy a lot of places for attractive prices. And we also tasted the traditional coffee at a bakery and local beers.

And don’t worry about the language, because, in Mozambique, everybody speaks Portuguese!