Travel deep dive
The Southern End of Lake Malawi: Rock Fish, Islands and Long Beaches
At its southern end, Lake Malawi has sand beaches with fishing villages on them, rocky islands a paddle offshore and fresh water clear enough to watch shoals of bright fish from the surface. Cape Maclear, at the tip of a hilly peninsula, is the base for Lake Malawi National Park, a World Heritage site for the lake's cichlid fish, most of them found nowhere else. The long beaches of the Mangochi shore, and Senga Bay further north, are stays for the sand and the swimming. The lake is the usual first stop on the road trip through the south, before the wildlife parks and the mountains.
Updated 2026-10-05
A freshwater sea in the Rift Valley
Lake Malawi fills a long, deep trough of the Rift Valley along the country's eastern side, and from its beaches it looks like a sea: a horizon on the water, waves when the wind rises, sand that runs on for kilometres. It is fresh water, with no salt and no tide. Its eastern shore belongs partly to Mozambique and, in the north, to Tanzania, where the lake is known as Lake Nyasa. At the southern end the lake divides into two arms around the Nankumba peninsula: Cape Maclear lies at the peninsula's tip and Monkey Bay on its eastern side, and at the foot of the eastern arm the Shire river leaves the lake at Mangochi, flowing south towards Liwonde National Park.
The road in by Monkey Bay
From Lilongwe the southern lakeshore is about three to four hours by road. Monkey Bay, a small harbour town on the eastern side of the peninsula, is the last town before Cape Maclear, and from near it a side road crosses the peninsula's hills to Chembe. Minibuses run as far as Monkey Bay, and the lodges at Chembe can arrange a pick-up for the last stretch. Cash in kwacha is drawn in a larger town on the way, since much of what is bought in a fishing village is paid for in cash.
Chembe, the fishing village on the bay
Cape Maclear is the headland; Chembe is the fishing village along its bay, and the place where visitors stay. Guesthouses and lodges stand on the sand between the houses of the village. Dugout canoes lie pulled up on the beach, small fish dry in the sun on raised racks, and after dark the lamps of the fishing boats dot the bay. The beach is the village's harbour and washing place as much as a place to swim, and people are asked before they are photographed. Chambo, the lake's tilapia, is grilled at the lodges and in the village.
Lake Malawi National Park and its rock fish
The national park takes in the tip of the peninsula around Chembe, a scatter of islands off it and the water around them, and an entrance fee is charged. Its fish are cichlids, and the ones a snorkeller meets are the mbuna: small rock fish in electric blue, yellow, orange and bold stripes, most kinds found nowhere but this lake. They graze the algae on the boulders and many keep to their own patch of rock, so a snorkeller floating a few strokes from the shore watches them at close range. African fish eagles hunt from the trees along the rocky shores and the islands, and their call carries across the bay.
Kayaks, boat trips and diving
Kayaks are hired at Chembe, and Thumbi West, the nearest of the park's islands, is a short paddle from the beach; Domwe, larger and further out, makes a longer day on the water. Boat trips arranged through the lodge or guesthouse take snorkellers out to the islands for the day, often with fish grilled on an island beach at midday, and shorter trips go out on the bay at sunset. Dive schools at Chembe lead dives along the boulder reefs of the islands and teach courses for beginners in the warm fresh water. Wind can raise waves that keep the kayaks and boats on the beach for a day at a time.
Swimming on local advice
Bilharzia, a parasite of still, reedy shallows, is present in places in the lake, so a visitor swims where the lodge or local people say and asks a travel clinic about a check after the trip. Crocodiles and hippos keep to river mouths and reedy shores, not the open sandy beaches, and the same local advice covers them.
The beaches of the Mangochi shore
South of Monkey Bay the road runs down the eastern arm towards Mangochi, past long sand beaches where hotels and lodges stand in their own grounds along the water. A stay here is about the beach itself — swimming, walks along the sand, a boat out on the lake — rather than the village life of Chembe. Mangochi, the district town at the foot of the arm, has the markets and shops of a larger town for restocking on the way in or out.
Senga Bay, the nearest beach to Lilongwe
Senga Bay lies on the central part of the lakeshore, east of the town of Salima, and is the stretch of lake beach nearest to Lilongwe, close enough for a weekend away from the capital. Its long beach is shared by the fishing boats of the villages along it and by lodges and hotels set back from the water. It is the lake for a first or last night on a trip that starts and ends in Lilongwe.