Travellers Lodge Bagamoyo

... not slowing as they passed by, splashing water all over us.

I was wearing my nice brown sandals but since I was up to my ankles in dirty water I gave up worrying about them and instead focused on just keeping them on my feet. Finally we found the street we were looking for, ducking in and out of little shops, apologizing when we decided not to actually shop there.

The walk back was just as bad, all manner of things brushing up against our ankles. I just ...

The title of this entry is actually a quote from an email I received from my mother. It made me laugh, and I guess was the prompting I needed to plop myself down in the internet cafe on a beautiful afternoon and document what I've been up to for the past 3 weeks. I guess I've reached the point where the things I see and do on a daily basis seem somewhat normal now, and I've settled into a nice, but not so news-worthy routine. But... with that said, everyday I look around and am ...

This past weekend marked my 4th week here, and I've got 8 more to go. Most people only stay for 3-4 weeks though, so out of the original 13 in my arrival group, only 5 of us are still here. I have to say, I got so lucky with the people in my group. Everyone is/was so nice, smart, easy going and eager to take in the Tanzanian culture, and after watching a new group of 21 volunteers arrive last weekend, I realized that that is not always the case. Our smaller group ...

Keeping up with a blog is going to prove somewhat challenging, given that the connection at the internet cafe is down every time I come to do it. So I'm a little behind, and have now experienced 2 weekends in Tanzania, the first in town in Bagamoyo, and the second in Zanzibar. Both have been pretty random/humorous (from my perspective at least), so I thought I'd share. The first weekend here, there were only 6 of us (out of 15) in-town. Many people in ...

One of the things I've quickly learned is that internet access down here is very sporadic, it tends to go out for days at a time, and that age old advice of "save frequently" should not be forgotten. I lost this entry a couple of days ago, so I will try to re-create it now. As I mentioned at the end of my last post, I am working at an orphanage called IMUMA, which stands for "Faith, Love, Hope". The day before I started, I met with the founder of the organization, who's name ...

... train station at about 7 am (the reporting time for an 8 am departure). Our tickets didn't have compartment numbers, so we asumed free seating within the first class section (2 cars). This wasn't a bad assumption considering that most internal FLIGHTS in Tanzania have unassigned seating. We picked a compartment and then realized that it had cracked windows, so we moved to another one at this point someone came into our compartment and showed us that she ...

... all second hand equipment and it wasn't uncommon for their vehicles to break down. The thingo that connects the diff to the axle fell off onto the road. Therefore we had no four wheel drive. Matt to say the least wasn't a very happy little traveller!!! However after about 45min we were back on the road and on our way to the serengeti. I must admit we were very lucky to see the big five and ...

... either. So that's what I've done. For the next 41 days I'll be camping and sh!tting on the side of the road as I make my way through Kenya, Tanzania, Malawi, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Botswana and Namibia before ending at the southern tip in Cape Town. I had been told there would be 17 other people on the trip so I was quite happy when there were actually only nine others. However they were not the type of people I was expecting: they included 5 retirees, a ...

The Singida Hospital which is a government hospital is the only hospital for a very large area and needed help with upgraded equipment. A group headquartered in Union Iowa called Outreach Africa was behind the work also arranged for a large group of Doctors, Nurses, other medical personnel, and support people to come to the hospital to do surgery, medical training, and what ever could be done to assist the local staff.

Itinerary for this portion of the trip: 19 July - Drive to Lake Manyara and afternoon game drive. Spend night at Lake Manyara Lodge 20 July - Drive to Serengeti and afternoon game drive. Spend night at Seronera Lodge 21 July - Morning Serengeti ...