Hey Everyone, The past couple days I've been really really sick but I don't know with what. I'm trying to stay away from the doctors. This past weekend I went on a 3 day safari. Being that sick made it really not fun for parts but I'm still glad I went. The first day we went and visited a Maasai camp. It was so amazing to see how they live. In t...

We're done... finally. It felt great to descend the final few hours through the rainforest and arrive at the gate. There, we collected our summit certificates, proving to the world that I had indeed made it to 19,345 feet! Whew, it seemed like a long time ago that we began this journey. And indeed it was, because we started back in November and ...

Okay, so back to last Wednesday! We had our box lunch picnic. PB^J sandwiches *not as good as the States(, cooked chicken *they are scrawny here(, a hard boiled egg, a muffin, and an apple. We all hit the bathroom and got ready for out trek to the Ngoro waterfall. First we hiked through the rainforest, very lush with banana trees everywhere, pas...

Ed Viesturs, the 1st American to summit each of the world's 14 peaks above 8000 meters, said: "Mountains are not conquered and should be treated with respect and humility. If we take what the mountain gives, have patience, desire, and are prepared - they may permit us to reach their highest peaks." Sid Sharfi, the FL-based accountant / philosoph...

The last day of the trek involved a long 5 hour steep down hill trek to the Mweka gate through the moorland and rainforest. Before we set off from millennium camp all 20 porters and guides sung the tradition Kili song and danced which was a great way to start the final leg, I even busted a move when prompted by one of the guides. The guys were p...

I have included a little description of the tourist scene in the smaller town where you can book safaris and treks, since I spent a number of days here trying to sort this out. I chose Moshi over Arusha because of the description of touts (i.e. independent travel "hustlers") in my travel guide. Arusha sounded a lot busier and bigger and more agg...

Welcome to our first blog on our travels around the world. Cameron and I have finally made it to Africa. As leaders of a group of 31 participants our journey has not been the usual ho-hum of boarding planes and catching buses. The coordination of meeting the group members in Brisbane, then more in Sydney, then Singapore and finally one more in N...

Habari (Swahili for ... hey what's up) We are officially starting stage 2 of the trip. We left Kitongo today, and it was by no means easy... :) Nothing in Africa ever is! Anyways about a week ago we had one of the guys who is a manager of the center tell us that he would organise a car to take us to the airport today... 2 days ago he told us tha...

Well, where to begin... It was an extremely long flight over. 18 hours of fly time and a total of 26 hours of travel. All flights went well and my luggage arrived with me! Trish and Taryn met me at KIA. Our days since have been a blur. The manager of Uhuru has scheduled us to see every Lutheran project in the Northern Diaoce - we've been to a st...

A sorta-short entry to say we have arrived, and, amazingly enough, all bicycles and baggage also arrived, intact, on time. Considering the flat-out sprint through the Minneapolis airport, we're very impressed. 24 hours in the air travel system is quite enough, so we're wandering around Moshi, Tanzania today stretching the legs. Tomorrow we'll co...