Being friends with the editor of FT Alphaville, the Financial Times’ award winning markets blog, has its benefits. Like for example, borrowing Kaya MJ – his ‘mud hut’ in Africa – in exchange for knocking up a quick marketing website for it, so he can rent it out. Mud hut may be how Paul describes it, but by the time we come to leave he has excitedly provided a 19-page essay on the house, the car, the staff (of which there turn out to be four), the beach, the local amenities and the restaurants around the area of Barra, on the southern coast of Mosambique.

Reading it though, I can’t help but feel like I already know the place well. We’re tasked with finding out if Rita, the night watchman’s daughter, is still unwell, and what’s wrong with her. How the building work next door is progressing. What they’ve done with the resort down the road which Paul’s neighbours sold up recently. Whether the pool table, recently loaned to said resort, has been returned.

We’ve got potted histories of all the major players in the village, instructions for repairing punctures on the car (the spare is apparently from an entirely different model of car, and doesn’t fit), and even stuff on Maputo and the Kruger national park as well.

Waiting around at the airport we try to find some gifts for the village kids – pens or crayons or something like that, and I have the idea to get a guestbook for Kaya MJ. But we can’t find either in the departures lounge at Heathrow T3.

I’m travelling with Nick, a university friend of Rob’s and presently also his lodger. He works for HSBC, and is a loyal fan of Alphaville, so is immediately approved as suitable by Paul.

Flight boards uneventfully, but is delayed on the tarmac at Heathrow for a full hour. We begin to worry that we’ll miss our connection in Johannesburg. This is a delicate affair, since ou can’t fly directly from London to Mozambique, so we land at Jo’burg at 7:05am, and then have to clear immigration, collect baggage, get money and take a 90 minute taxi ride to Lanseria, a private airfield north of the city for a connecting flight to Inhambane, the closest Mozambican airport to Kaya MJ. That flight is at 9:30am. Actually it’s scheduled at 9am, but the airline has been browbeaten by Nick into delaying departure until we arrive, provided we do so before 9:30. You may be getting the impression this is a small airline, and you’d be right.

Virgin, being a rather larger airline, lay on an on-demand film selection, which whittles away 11 hours fairly easily – I watch The Visitor, Wall-E and Iron Man. As we’re approaching Johannesburg it becomes increasingly obvious that we’re going to be a least 40 minutes late. We persuade a cabin attendant to allow us to move forward to the front of the economy cabin so we can disembark as quickly as possible, but stil, by the time we hit the jetway, it’s already 8am.

Worse, it’s 8:40am by the time we have cleared immigration, collected our bags and got enough money for a cab. We can only hope the 90 minutes to Lanseria is an exaggeration.

At 9:30, we’re still in the taxi. Bitterly disappointed and frustrated, we start trying to plan alternative options. Perhaps we could fly to Vilanculos later in the day, and then take the bus to Imhambane. Or go back to Jo’burg and fly to Maputo. We opt for the former and carry on to Lanseria anyway. Our taxi finally pulls in at a few minutes to ten. A woman rushes out of the polished terminal building to shout “are you guys from the UK? Nick?” We answer yes. “Come quickly, we’re waiting for you”.

Hurrah. Best news we’ve had all morning. And even better, the rest of the passengers (of which there are eight) are not bothered in the slightest by the hour delay.

We go from taxi to plane in about 7 minutes flat, and find the aircraft a substantial downgrade on the 747 that brought us to South Africa. Specifically, I can’t stand up straight in it. Every seat is both a window and an aisle seat, and the pilot cheerfully gives us the safety briefing himself before scrambling back into the cockpit area (not quite a cockpit since it doesn’t have a door), to fly the plane.

It’s a two hour hop – just enough time to re-read Paul’s extensive notes, fill in Mozambican entry forms, realise that we’re clean out of both rand and US dollars so have no way of readily paying for the Mozambican visa, and eat the snacks that have been provided. With the Kruger national park laid out beneath us the view was worth taking in as well.

On landing, we quickly locate Artur (pron Arrtoo), Paul’s ‘man on the ground’. He takes us into town to get money and do some shopping. The first bank he presents us with is Barclays, which amusingly is my bank, though since I’ve not told them that I’m travelling to Moz, they certainly wouldn’t give me any money. Nick’s card was also rejected, because the machine did not support mastercard. The third bank was successful in dispensing 6,000 meticals (at an exchange rate at time of writing of about 50 to the pound). We buy fruit and veg, some basics like rice and potatoes, and head for the house.

The house doesn’t disappoint. It’s huge, with a deck right on the sand, and a reasonably fully equipped kitchen, in which we cook a spanish omelette for lunch. We go for a wander along the beach while Artur sorts out the car, and get showered and changed. When Artur returns it’s dark and blowing a gale outside, but Artur insists it’s the perfect moment to teach me how to drive a 4×4 in soft sand. It quite patently is not the perfect time – I haven’t slept for 36 hours, have never driven in soft sand during the day, let alone in pitch darkness, and am hungry to boot. We manage to drive into town anyway, and I find some of the route quite enjoyably challenging, though I’d rather do it when I can see where we’re going.

Back at the house, we sort out dinner – and discover that the cooker is woefully underpowered, so we resolve to ask Paul about that tomorrow.