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Sofala Province SOFALA The first point of contact for most visitors to Sofala will be Beira Airport, where car hire is available. The route to the city centre is not signposted. At the airport gates, travellers who turn left will enter the city along the Avenida das F.P.L.M. If you take the right hand turn, you will reach the bridge over the EN6 highway after a couple of minutes. Travellers to Beira city centre should take the left turn off the bridge and those travelling on to Chimoio and Zimbabwe should cross the bridge and exit on the right hand side. In the section on the Beira Corridor, distances in kilometres are taken from this bridge so remember to re-set the clock to zero when you get to the bridge. The city of Beira, the capital of Sofala and second largest city in Mozambique, is an important commercial centre and link to the neighbouring country of Zimbabwe. The port itself earned more revenue in 1998 than the port of Maputo and is set for further prosperity in the light of future developments in oil exploration in the coming years. Beira itself is a compact city which was in former times a famous holiday resort and the closest seaside resort to Zimbabwe. Nowadays only the remains of its former glory can be seen - a drive along the coast road (Av. das F.P.L.M) will give you some idea of the scale of tourism. The heavy rains in early 1999 devastated many areas of Sofala province and problems with drainage may discourage pedestrians from rambling around its streets however there are signs that the city is gradually being developed once again for tourism. Most of the central city area can be explored on foot. By day, this can be pleasant but at night the street-lighting is sparse. As with many places outside of Maputo, our experience showed that the names of streets have little or no relevance. We have included a map which gives the relative positions of the restaurants, hotels and other landmarks. MAPS 1. Railway Station |