Mount Mulanje Cultural Landscape

Randi has now covered our visit so I will cover some practicalities.

Lodging

We stayed at African Wild Truck, it is on booking.com. A great place to stay, nice location and very friendly staff made our stay comfortable.

The lodge is about 20 km beyond the town of Mulanje. Google maps doesn’t show correct route for last few km’s so a more precise description is required. The lodge doesn’t appear on maps.me.

Getting there

There are regular flights to Chileka Blantyre. From there it’s round 100 km to the African Wild Truck lodge on the south side of the mountain range. We asked the lodge to arrange transport, but a bit of poor communication made us find transport on our own. We got a car driver who took the job for USD 70 (which is better than the USD 115 the lodge suggested). I’m sure its possible to make an even better bargain.

The roads are good (only a few potholes) and we needed a vehicle to get from the lodge to the trail start the next day - so in retrospect a rental car would be better.

Guide
We recommend having a guide to understand the OUV. We were very satisfied with our guide, good English speaking and knowledgeable. He was arranged via the the lodge, but his contact details are Comestar Supuni. He runs his own company, Guidestar Adventure Tours
Phone number/ whatsup +265 881474895.

Entrance fee to the park is 2500 qwatcha for two persons, about € …

Visit July 2025.
When the nominations and evaluations for this year’s World Heritage session were published, we decided to carve out time in our itinerary for a short visit to the Mulanje Mountains in southern Malawi. On our way from Dar es Salaam to Johannesburg, we managed a stopover in Blantyre and booked a place to stay—as there aren’t many accommodation options near the mountain.

No sooner had we pulled into the lodge than the World Heritage session began—and just hours later, Mulanje was officially inscribed. Talk about timing. From our lodge, we had a stunning view of the mountain range, with vivid green tea plantations spread out in the foreground.

The next day, we set off on a day hike with a local guide.

Mount Mulanje is best known for its dramatic peaks, deep forests, and rich biodiversity. But beyond its natural beauty, the mountain holds deep cultural significance. Rising steeply from the plains to 3,002 meters at Sapitwa Peak, it is considered sacred by many of the local communities living around it.

Most visitors come here to climb the mountain—it’s usually a three-day trek—but we opted for a one day hike. Interestingly, Mulanje was not inscribed for its natural features or geological value, but for cultural reasons.

For the local Lomwe people, the mountain is deeply intertwined with myths, ancestral spirits, and traditional rituals. It is seen as a dwelling place for spirits and a source of spiritual guidance and protection. Certain sites on the mountain are used …