Jambo! (That's Hello in Swahili...)

We’ve spent 12 nights in Africa so far, and have moved from Nairobi to Dar Es Salaam in Tanzania. Covering these distances requires spending a lot of our time in the truck; many days we leave camp at 6 or 7 in the morning, and pull into our next camp at 5 or 6 at night. I don’t mind this sort of travel- you get to see a lot while the road passes by, but you can’t help but feel that you’re missing much of what this place has to offer. There are many experiences to be had in Africa, and there’s no question that we’re having great ones, but it’s like listening to a great song, but having the bass line missing. Only hearing the treble allows you to catch the tune, but you’re distinctly aware that you’re missing the soul of it all. While our arrangements are far from luxury, they are still “isolated”- we don’t share local transportation, we don’t eat in local restaurants, and we don’t even deal with local hoteliers. It’s very different to the travel we’ve done before, but when I look around, it seems this is the way it is. Scanning buses full of people shows no white faces, and it’s hard to find hostels and restaurants which we are used to tripping over with our eyes closed. It’s just done differently here. There’s no doubt that you could do it more independently- I’m just not sure that I, at least, have the time or courage to do so….

All that said, the experience we are having here is still amazing in so many ways. Our truck normally holds 16 people (which is already small when compared with most tour companies down here) but two people bailed and we have only 14, plus three crew (driver, cook, and guide). Peter, our driver, is quiet and wears a tshirt that says Mzungo, which means “white person”, and has issues with the clutch on hills, but gets us around with only a few concerning moments. Ebron, our cook, has a cheshire cat smile and an infectious laugh, and is a trained pastry chef who manages to put together both amazing veggie and meat eater meals every night and somehow serves it all hot. It only takes 3 hours. Gareth, our guide, is a young South African with a degree in zoology and earth science, and is a skilled photographer packing a pretty serious lens that we’ve named Big G. Cam was lucky enough to borrow it for an entire game drive and I’m already feeling the dent in our bank account as I’m sure I can only stall the purchase for a while longer… I guess I’ll just be satisfied that he didn’t leave me for the lens… ;)

Aside from the crew we have six couples, and two singles. Brits, Aussies, Americans, us, and one Swede. The age range is 31 to 60-something. Dad actually had his 60th birthday the other night, and Ebron baked a multi layer cake over a fire and decorated it with frosting, including piped letters and rosebud trim. Quite a feat in a dustbowl campsite with no oven…

As for what we’ve actually been up to- after pulling out of Nairobi on the 25th, our first stop was Lake Nakuru, where we suffered a couple of days in the pouring rain. That wasn’t a great start to 2 months of camping, and I won’t lie- moods weren’t awesome… We did have a good game drive through Nakuru National Park where, within 30 seconds of being in the park, our Land Cruiser driver had us in a ditch buried in mud and requiring rescue. Fail. The rest of the day was smooth and we managed to spot rhinos (black and white), a trillion flamingos, lions, and other misc game.

After departing Nakuru we left Kenya and drove to the shores of Lake Victoria, where the sun was shining and a breeze was blowing so our soggy tents and mattresses dried up. At the border crossing, the Kenyan agent looked at my Dad and said “Say Hi to Stephen Harper for me.” Awesome.

Our next two days were driving through the Serengeti- a stunningly beautiful section that, for me at least, exemplified the “Africa” of my imagination. The highlight of a day of highlights was a leopard spotting- we found a female in a tree, lounging on a branch about 25m away, with her impala kill slung over a branch above her. We left her that night and returned in the morning and found her still there, munching on her breakfast. Cam strapped the Big G to his body, pumped it, and fired. Literally.

Our animal sightings became so frequent that we began to filter- “Is it a lion bringing down an elephant? No? Drive on.” “Is it a pack of hyenas playing cards? No? Yawn.” Just before leaving the Serengeti we did stop to watch two male giraffes necking- no, not that - they were fighting, flinging their massive heads on their neck “whips” and smashing them into each others bodies. Seems like the least effective fighting method ever, with more risk of snapping your own neck than injuring your opponent, but who’s going to argue? And all for the love of a woman…

A few more days in the truck, a few more dozen hours on washboard dusty roads, and another game drive in the Ngorongoro crater (where we added cheetahs and servals to our list) brings us to today- en route to Dar Es Salaam and the eden (we hope) of Zanzibar.

As we’ve been driving, we were just pulled over for speeding. Looks like Peter got us out of it. Hard to believe a 19 tonne truck could be speeding in a village where bone shaking speed bumps exist every 3 feet, and even harder to believe that any police force in this country actually cares…

Yesterday’s “Fun in the Truck” started when we ran out of diesel about 10m from the station. Wait for Gareth to take water bottles to the station to fill up. Pour it in. Truck won’t run. Bleed the air from the lines. Sputter across the road into the station. Leave truck running while filling. Take 20+ minutes to fill the tank. Reach 999,999 shillings on pump readout. Reset readout. Keep filling. Final fill volume = 620L. Final cost = 1.2 million shillings (roughly $650).

Anyway, that’s surely enough for now… Hopefully we can post this when we hit Zanzibar, in between avoiding lion-fish induced death and Doxycycline induced sunburns.

Bye for now,
K and C.