I was so disappointed when I published our blog from yesterday. We have intermittent internet and Syd and I had written for over an hour to give you a taste of our first day experiences – the writing was brilliant (!) and nothing had been saved except the beginning of the first paragraph.Arg! Our M-F routine is up at 6:00 (OK, 6:30 for Syd), have breakfast(usually eggs, fruit, oatmeal and juice) and be on the vans at 7:30 as we head out to our assignments . Often we are awakened earlier by the sounds of roosters, dogs barking and perhaps the Muslim call to prayer at 5:45. The main streets in Moshi are paved but the side streets are another matter altogether. I find that my Kathmandu experience prepared me well for much of life in ... read more

Today was the first morning of our placements. At 7:30am we hopped into our assigned vans for transport to our assignments. 45 minutes later, after dropping off other volunteers at their placemments we walked into Step Up. The school is located in a home that the director founded. She lives in 2 rooms in the back and the remainder of the house is the school.... read more

We are settling into Africa. The rhythm is much like Hawaii . The people are sweet. The native Moshi folks talk about how cold it is and work in winter coats while we sit in short sleeves or perhaps wear a long sleeved shirt. We are not far from the equator so sunrise and sunset are both about 6:30.The roosters crowed and a monkey chattered to us as we fell into sleep last night. The presentation from the tour company last night was awesome. There is such an abundance of wildlife in Tanzania – 17 National parks. We learned that we won’t make it to the Serengeti – it is a 7 hour drive just to get to the gates and at this time of year we would have to spend a second day driving to ... read more

It has been a long travel day with one more leg ahead of us. We experienced some excitement here at Jomo Kenyatta airport concerning our luggage and boarding passes but thanks to several helpful Kenya Airlines employees and an airport angel named Felix, we are all set with an hour to spare. Dave managed to get some sleep on two flights. Syd and I are catching up on movies – John Carter (don’t bother with that one), the Intouchables (wonderful!My only complaint is that it is subtitled and my eyes kept closing so I’d have to go back and catch what I missed) and The Vow. Everything in Zurich was green and lush and then the Alps – simply magnificent! On the Swiss Air flight (we are big Swiss Air fans now) they kept us hydrated ... read more

Hujambo! It's a beautiful blue sky morning and we are headed to DIA with 3 fifty pound suitcases and lots of excitement. Yesterday when attempting to checkin online I was told I had to call United. Then, the nice agent informed me that we hadn't paid for our tickets. I had a moment of disquiet and then I remembered to breathe. I called our travel agent and was told that all is well. We are hoping that this is our biggest airline story! This morning all is well and we're ready for blast off. Sharon Last night we had a wonderful early fathers day dinner with the family. Then we called our loved ones one last time to say our "see you in three weeks!" I talked to mom and dad, the sister, and my bestfriend. ... read more

Here is a link to a map of the area we will be staying. http://goo.gl/maps/8kht... read more

We thought you might like the google map to Moshi, our home base for 3 weeks. If you zoom out just a little you'll see the Ngorongoron Crater and surrounding lakes and parks where we hope to safari (Swahili for travel). Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE ... read more