So from the craziness of the few weeks before Christmas and the Kenya - Uganda - Rwanda - Uganda - Kenya loop it was time to cross into Tanzania and experience some real African wildlife moments. From our base in Arusha we took a three day trip to the Serengeti and Ngorongoro Crater as a wonderful introduction to Tanzania. The Serengeti of course is one of the most famous National Parks in Africa and its huge 14,000 sq km size means it was always going to be an exciting adventure to see what animals we were going to meet there. We [View Full Entry]

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Firstly apologies that this is going to be a mammoth blog but this last few weeks has possibly been the most adventurous and fast moving of the trip so far! Although my gut reaction is to start with what was always going to be one of the main highlights of this trip - the gorilla trekking - in the interest of keeping the route in order and up to date with where I've been, I'll start from where I left off! And so into Kenya where we were to endure some of the worst roads so far - gravel, bumps, sand [View Full Entry]

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So I've now been in Ethiopia for over two weeks and almost set to leave for Kenya so even though I've only just updated a blog I thought I'd better update on the third country on my trip and my favourite so far (although of course still quite a few to go!) as I'm likely not to have internet for a few weeks and so would then be really behind on my updates! The country is so beautiful, a far cry from the images of poverty and hunger that we are used to associating with Ethiopia and the way the media [View Full Entry]

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Before leaving Luxor and going onto our last week in Egypt we paid a visit to the Sunshine Children’s orphanage where we spent the morning playing with the children and seeing their home. It was set up 13 years ago by an English lady (who was a Methodist) who came to visit Egypt many times and noticed the amount of street children there were without parents. She decided to sell her home in England and use the money to come out to Luxor and set up the home and they now have over 80 children in their care. Despite them all [View Full Entry]

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Since my quick blog in Cairo, it seems that we’ve been traveling for weeks with the amount of things I’ve seen and done, possibly one of the most exciting being meeting the truck for the first time (named Nahinda meaning power and strength in Swahili) which is to be our home, transport, storage and portable camping accessory for the next four months . It’s a bright yellow Scania lorry that’s been adapted with coach seats that run down either side and has been kitted out with lots of storage, a ‘beach’ area at the top where you can sunbathe, cool boxes [View Full Entry]

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Well, thought I'd do a little blog entry to mark the start of my 5 month adventure and before we head out to the desert tomorrow for the first of our many days spent travelling on the truck and nights camping out under the stars! The week in Cairo's been pretty amazing, lots of chances for sightseeing, relaxing and getting to know my fellow travellers. The first couple of days were spent walking around the streets and soaking up some of the bustling atmosphere in the souks, getting used to the haggling culture and madness of the streets (fearing for your [View Full Entry]

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Well this will be my last blog from here :( I've had the time of my life and can't believe I've done so much within this month! My last few days have been fantastic (just like the rest of the trip!). We did what was meant to be a 2 day tour to Kruger National Park and the Panorama Route but it actually ended up as a 3 day trip due to the car not starting on the second day so we were forced to stay another night in the lodge in Nelspruit and just ended up having a big party [View Full Entry]

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Thought I'd send another update now before I go to Kruger at the end of the week just in case I don't get chance to do another one before I leave on Monday (but will try and update you on Kruger and Panorama Route- and maybe my last Friday out in Hoedspruit- if I can!). It's been another action packed few days as always! Firstly on Sunday we did rifle handling which was pretty cool with a .22 rifle, I managed to not hit any of the targets (not even the paper surrounding them!) but did it in the fastest time [View Full Entry]

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Hi guys Well, had another fab week here, thought I'd better do another update even though the last one was only a couple of days ago as then I may only do one more before I come home a week on Monday (can't believe how fast it's gone - really don't wanna come back!!). Last week we did a trip to see Jessica the Hippo, she is absolutely gorgeous and is the only tame hippo in the world. She was washed up onto land when the river flooded when she had literally just been born (umbilical cord still attached!) and so [View Full Entry]

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Hi all, OK, so I guess I'd better tell you a little about the volunteer work we're doing and the lectures - this week has been more ordered and we've got down to more of a work pattern as a lot of people left this week so they were fitting all the trips in last week! The usual pattern of the day is to get up and do a couple of hours work from 7.30am. We've been helping to collect sand to help Uncle Tinus build his house (he lives at the camp and I actually have his roundowel now and [View Full Entry]

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