North and Northwestern Tanzania

Its somehow true that appetite comes with the food, however it does not mean that without food there is no appetite... so we hope you have not lost your appetite for our stories, just because you are not being fed...

Our trip took us past the 3000th km. and in the skirts of Mount Kilimanjaro, the highest peak in Africa at 5895m (which we have decided to come back and conquer :), Mt. Meru (the second highest), to the beautiful hills of Lushoto, where we hiked with little Jonathan and tried local bier distilled from sugar cane which you should avoid even at the threat of loss of face; Arusha, the Geneva of Africa (well not exactly... and there is no lake nor fountain but a large office building which houses the International Criminal Court for Rwanda), where we were so overwhelmed with Safari offers that we did not do any but we went for a night out with our new friends Geofrey and Salome to a real African disco with great music and great moves. We tried to go through the Serengeti and Ngorongoro National Parks but their fees have become prohibitive (as Peter says) and we took the looooong way around. Bumpy roads, dusty villages and images of the endless streams of women carrying wood, food, suitcases, anything on their heads and babies on their backs; horse, donkey and ox-drawn carriages; colourful patches of buckets and clothes around the water pumps; Enter the 21st century!

The scenery changed so many times, with salt lakes and blue lakes, rocks that come out of the earth in the middle of villages, big Baobab tress, red, white and grey soil which defines the colour of everything around, mountains, hills and plains.

Along these roads we made it to Mwanza, on the Great Lake Victoria. Luckily it does not look like Darwin's nightmare ;) but the fish we had was really quite bad... We plan to go to a little island called Ukerewe, which is supposed to be quite off the beaten track (well, that is not so difficult as this region is very isolated and sees surprisingly few travellers).

on the road again...

hello from a wonderful beach on Zanzibar

Our 20 USD place

lazing the day away

fun...

for those of you who can not be on the beach :)

the end of Ramadan is well celebrated

famous Zanzibar doors

practicalities...

Irente Viewpoint

Eating with Austrian friends on the Irente Farm (cheese, brown bread, topfen)

Waterfall on the way to Lushoto

Zanzibar

We are now on Zanzibar almost a week. We spent a couple of days in Stone Town (I have to put links as technology does not allow to upload our pictures...) http://www.zanzibar.net/zanzibar/webcam/. This is a world heritage sight with small, small streets where even Peter gets confused :) It is very oriental, most women wear veils and the man traditional white gown (which I secretly call pyjama ;) and a little hat. The town is incredibly nice and lively, kids run on the small streets up until midnight, people walk up and down the whole day and especially after Ramadan finished yesterday, everybody is very festive with new clothes, henna, smiles. And if you manage to get away from the tourist stuff which is all the same wherever you go there is actually beautiful art and friendly shy faces. It's a place that can send you dreaming, cafes, restaurants, gardens, sunsets. You can indulge in this link below of the most beautiful and expensive hotel www.236hurumzi.com (in which of course we stayed (not) ;)
And the beaches! White sand and hundred shades of blue of the Indian Oceans, knotted beds and four days without shoes, it was just beautiful but I will not go on about this as I guess autumn is knocking on Europe's door ... Tonight is the beginning of Eid and there will be a big celebration which goes on for three days and of course there is a lot of food.

Sadly, it is not only pretty Sheherezade stuff, the island grew rich on the Slave trade and was the main export port for slaves to the East. Nearly 600 000 slaves have been solved through Zanzibar between 1830 and 1873. And then there is the poverty everywhere, houses falling down, bad roads, lack of schools and hospitals... paradise does not exist, its always built on someone else's suffering...

We are taking the night ferry back to Dar and tommorrow heading off to the old capital Bagamoyo and then further north towards Arusha, Ngorongoro and the Serengeti.

unpublished... our car flying

Tanzania

We crossed into Tanzania in the morning of 30 September and just a few meters accross the border seems like someone pressed the FFW button, we were in a country at least 15 years ahead! There were good roads, the towns actually had asphalt streets, there were shops, not only shacks and a much bisser variety of things to buy, the people looked chubbier and healthier, with newer clothes and happier faces. The secnery also changed dramatically, from the dry reddish bare scenery to lush green plantations, beautiful tea estates (picture below), banana plantations, corn, etc. Looked like somepone was actually working the land and was making a decent living out of it.
We made our way slowly North with amazing and changing scenery. The small town of Iringa surprised us with a lovely busy morning, the market full of people, women of all kinds of tribes in beutiful colours shining in the sun.
We are now in Dar es Salaam (Place of Heaven) its the biggest city we have seen so far in Africa with a lot of traffick and constant construction. However, amid the rising new concrete buildings (quite ugly...) are hidden nostalgic 18th century buildings with carved facade and tales of the past.
We will be heading for Zanzibar tomorrow, looking forward to relaxing a couple of days on the beach and plunging into 1001 night into this former sultanate. Its wealth came mostly from slave trade though, which puts an uneasy feeling...

Images...

Under the waterfall

Overheating - go slower!!

Colorful...

... as the landscape.

Roadside vendors!

We did a hike through the roadside just before sunset.

That is what you get if you take the road through the Park.

Little people on the roadside...

Elephants and missionarries

Obviously elephants :)


Elephant fight


Hipo-hipo-hipo




View from Livingstonia down to lake Malawi

After leaving the lake once again we headed to another real Africa adventure, elephant spotting :). We drove with our little sirence car (white bulgarian cheese) into the park shortly before sunset to see a large heard of elephants not even 100m away from us, not a care in the world. It was a fantastic welcome! Soon it was time to go and the heards slowly went down to the water and away into the forest, right in front of our eyes! When the show was over, we made a fire and cooked our food. It was now 7.30 pm and completely dark! The unfamiliar noises of wildlife were rather disturbing. The night was lit by an almost full moon and beautiful. In the morning we rose at 5.30 am to a beautiful sunrise and off we went on a walking safari, we saw hippos, kudus, bush barks and all kinds of other small animals. Then we came back and had breakfast, what a way to start the day.

Livingstonia was our next spot, where we spent a great couple of days walking and enjoying the scenery. The town was established by Catholic missionaries high up in the mountain to flee from malaria. It has the only stone house in the country and apart a place of great beauty is inspiring with the will and determination those people had. And the strenght of their faith...

We had decided to skip the Nyka Plateau and head for Tanzania!