Beira to Machipanda

Twice a week a train leaves Beira, on the Indian Ocean, at half past seven in the morning and reaches Machipanda, on the border with Zimbabwe, at eighteen minutes past seven at night. It covers 318 kilometres in just under twelve hours, calling at forty-four stations and halts on the way, through the low country of the Púnguè, up to Chimoio and into the hills around Manica. It is CFM's own train, and an everyday one: the state railway runs it for the people who live along the line.

For most of a generation there was no train at all. Passenger services stopped in 1997, when the line had become too degraded to run them. The railway was rebuilt between 2019 and 2023, with new rails, concrete sleepers and fresh ballast, at a cost of 200 million dollars, and on 23 November 2023 the presidents of Mozambique and Zimbabwe reopened it by riding the last stretch from Manica to the border. The scheduled train followed on 11 December 2023. It runs on a railway that was built to give the interior, now Zimbabwe, its road to the sea.

The train leaves Beira at 07:30 and spends its first hour among the port city's outskirts, calling at Manga, Inhamizua, Povoa and Nova Macieira before Dondo, at 08:47. Dondo is the junction where the Sena line turns north towards Moatize and Malawi; the Machipanda line keeps west.

The Púnguè lowlands

Beyond Mafambisse the line crosses the wide, flat country of the Púnguè river, the river that reaches the sea at Beira. The station at Ponte Pungue comes just before ten, then Tica, Muda and Lamego, and at Nhamatanda, at 11:22, the train stands for a quarter of an hour. The afternoon is a long run inland through Inchope, Amatongas and Gondola, where it stands again, to Chimoio, reached at 15:09, the capital of Manica province.

Towards the border hills

West of Chimoio the train calls at Tembe, Matsinhe, Vanduzi and Revue, and the light is going by the time it reaches Manica, at 18:30, below Mount Vumba. Machipanda is 22 kilometres further on, at 19:18. The railway continues across the frontier as National Railways of Zimbabwe's line to Mutare; the passenger train does not.

The line and its trains

This is the Mozambican end of the old Beira Railway, begun in 1892 at a narrow two-foot gauge and through to Umtali, now Mutare, by 4 February 1898. It was converted to the 1,067 mm gauge in 1900, and it is still the railway between Zimbabwe and the port of Beira. The rebuilding finished in 2023 was meant to cut the time of a train over the line from eighteen hours to twelve, and to let it carry three million tonnes a year.

The locomotive on this page is CFM diesel D 332, in the company's red-and-white livery, at the head of the green-and-white passenger coaches on the reopening day. Between Beira and Chimoio, CFM also runs a shorter morning train on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays.

CFM runs the through train twice a week in each direction, leaving at the same time from both ends.

Beira to Machipanda

Machipanda to Beira

Eleven hours forty-eight minutes each way for 318 kilometres. The intermediate calls, from Beira: Manga, Inhamizua, Povoa, Nova Macieira, Dondo, Outeiro, Mezimbite, Mafambisse, Ponte Pungue, Tica, Muda, Souglides, Lamego, Nhamatanda, Nharuchonga, Cica, Montes Siluvo, Jasse, Metuchira, Inchope, Doeroi, Zimpinga, Amatongas, Maforga, Gondola, Bengo, Cafumpe, Noia, Babiolakis, Chimoio, Tembe, Matsinhe, Almada, Vanduzi, Belas, Garuso, Bandula, Elvas, Revue, Vumba, Manica, Chainça, Edmundo and Munene.

Beira to Chimoio only

Planning around it

Out on Monday, back on Tuesday is the shortest round trip, with a night at the border end. Leave Beira on Saturday and the return is the next day. The shorter Chimoio train makes the lower half of the line a day out from Beira on a Tuesday or a Thursday, with a night in Chimoio before Wednesday's train back.

As of November 2026, from CFM's live timetable on cfm.co.mz (opens in a new tab), which matches the notice CFM issued when the service resumed in December 2023.

Tickets are bought at the station window before the train leaves, in meticais. CFM publishes its fare table for the southern lines out of Maputo but not for the central region, and no price for this train has been published since it returned in 2023, so the fare is the one the station asks on the day.

It will be low. CFM states that it pays 85 % of the cost of every passenger's ticket, and at the reopening the president promised a fare within reach of the people who live along the line.

No rail pass covers this journey, and none covers Mozambique. Interrail's Global Pass is valid in 33 European countries and Mozambique is not among them, nor does any One Country Pass reach it. CFM sells no network ticket of its own.

Nothing is lost by it. CFM pays most of the cost of every ticket, and the fare is bought at the station window on the day.

Checked against interrail.com's Global Pass page, November 2026.

The line runs from the coast to the highlands, and the three places worth a night are spaced along it: Beira at the start, Chimoio halfway, and Manica under the hills near the border.

The train leaves Beira at half past seven, so a night in the city beforehand is the practical start. At the far end it arrives after dark: Machipanda is a border village, and Manica, 22 kilometres back down the line, is the nearest town.

The return leaves Machipanda at 07:30 the next morning, which suits a night close to the border. On the shorter Chimoio train, Chimoio is the night stop.

Planning this trip and stuck on something, or spotted a time, fare or detail that has changed? Send us a message about Beira to Machipanda. We read every one, and we update this page when something has changed.