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Published: August 6th 2007
Well my last few days in Moshi were fairly odd....a lot of unexpected happenings. Firstly, after having a day to myself in which I travelled to Marangu, stayed their to long to get a minibus back, and had a mini adventure travelling to and fro until I finally arrived back at the Honey Badger turnoff...from where I had to walk 2km in the pitch black, a particularily scary walk as the lady sat next to me on my final minibus journey had warned me 'Mzungu's get robbed in the dark'....anyway I made it back safely, much to the amusement of the others who had said 'If he's alright he'll get back, if he's dead he won't' and so had decided to drinka nd play pool rather than search for me...mullets. All wasn't jovial though as I soon found out, as today was the day that they had finally delivered their Aid to the Amani Childrens home...and apparently the hadn't been as well recieved as they hoped. Honestly though, what did they expect...a parade....whatever....the fact was I was fairly sickened by having to listen to Jim and Dave prattle on about how under valued they were and how they wanted more Accolades
nd Appreciaition for there act of CHARITY....it was as if they didn't quite understand what this word meant. On the other hand however I can understand where they were coming from as they had slogged a long way, spending a lot, and from what I saw later the American lady in charge didn't really care.
Anyway the next morning Beats and I had decided to get up at 5am to catch the sunrise and hopefully see Kilimanjaro cloud free; so at 5am we awoke and slogged the 2km up the drive to the turnoff on the main road for an unobstructed view.....of a cloud covered Kilimanjaro at sunrise. I was getting pretty down heartened at this point, as coming to Africa without seeing at least a small glimpse of the famous cloud covered peak was a little depressing. The rest of the morning was spent listening to Julie try and convince Jim to visit the Orphanage again, she succeded and we were off....I came along to see what the charity thing was all about and I found nothing like what I was expecting. The new Amani Childrens home is a massive purpose build (with American Money) facility for the street
children of Moshi and beyond, run by American volunteers/full timers and locals. I was impressed, not by the fitness of the female American volunteers however....although Beats and I both agreed at a push we would shag one of them..I forget her name, if I ever knew it. That day we spent nealry 5 hours sorting out the new toys in the playroom, which was nice....my little bit of charity work for this trip done (well apart from changing a Kenyan mans phone from German to English at the Moyale Border Post) and it was hard work sifting through boxes and boxes of toys...especially when I wanted some for myself. I did, rather ashamedly (though I got over it) half inch a bar of Luxury Marks and Spencer's Soap...but I made up for it by making some girls day by directly giving her some donated shoes...this made the Homes volunteers quite angry as we wern't ment to just give things to the kids...oh well. Oh yeh I forgot to say, the local girl/volunteer/worker showing us around...Mary...was gorgeous....Beats would have touched her, and tried his best to swarmily chat her up lol After eating some orphans food, we were offered a meal,
nd getting the grand tour (Julie took particular interest in the Boys locker room lol) we headed off, with the others feeling much better about their charity work being appreciated. From their the aim of the game was food, and after trying Rose's Cafe where they only served 'Chicken...anything else? Chicken!' we ended up a Cafe Chez...a fantastic, if a little expensive, restaraunt right in the centre of Moshi. My first curry in Africa was delicious..if a little un-spicy...oh well I will get better soon.
The following day a little disaster about paying occured....they had in fact massively over charged us by giving us a shit rate of currency conversion and then charging us $12 a meal...for a meal which contained Chicken and Chips....needless to say I got very angry, been the cheapskate that I am and Dave and myself stormed into Mama Lucy's office and got it reduced....however, needless to say, the Honey Badger Cultural Centre and Camping in Moshi is not reccomended by the Butler Beatty Expedition or by me.,...bastard Mama Lucy. At least our Maasi (yeh right) guard was cool, he even let Beats and I have our photo's taken with him...which was fantastic as it shows
just how ridicoulously small he really was.
Finally we were off to Mombasa, albeit via Voi and the Tsavo East National Park; as the others are keen to get a Safari in whilst in Africa.....my time is really being taken up...and I am realising that I am not going to get to see some of the things I wanted to....such as Lamu, or Lake Victoria....but it's all good as travelling with people again is good....stops me missing Tati to much. The drive to Voi was particularily short and uneventful if I am honest; apart from Dave getting a little annoyed when Beats and I kept twisting what he was telling us about the 'No Mans Land' between border....going as far as Beats christening the No mans land between the Taveta border posts as 'Beatania'....he even thought up a National Anthem and language.
Voi itself looked a little run down, considering there was a Safari Park and numerous expensive lodges just down the road...but it was built up enough to have a ATM...which gave me a scare when it wouldn't accept my card. Apparently there was a problem with the machine though, as my money getting ability was unrestricted the next
day....allowing me to withdraw a large chunk of the 250quid my dad had given me in order to buy as many Curios (African Whatnot) as possible; whether he intends keeping it or selling it in the end I don't know....although if he sold it he could make a large profit. Anyway.....we finally decided on staying at the Red Elephant Safari Lodge, as it was the cheapest and allowed camping; which , for me, was impossible as the ground was rock solid red earth....I couldn't get my pegs in an inch....so I slept in the room they had given us to use as a toilet, unfortunetly as I didn't want to give them any reason to charge us I slept ontop of the covers without using the Mosquito net and got absolutely eaten....not for the first time this trip..and more than likely not for the last. The food at the Red Elephant was very expensive....nearly 7quid a meal..although it was three courses and backed up by a very amusing and comical band playing 'traditional African songs'....I suppose it amuses the tourist...me however it pissed off, well actually I laughed the first night then just found it repetitive, even the one guy
who had an un-naturally high voice (I am hoping to get the pictures of Dave). My favourite part of the whole night was the alcohol...they did cocktails....and had Amarula....I was in heaven. Actually thats a lie, my favourite part was when Beats...gesturing at the direction of the Southern Cross constellation....smacked a tray of wine out of a bewildered waiters hands all over the floor....although to be fair I did do almost the same in a Pool bar when I knocked a beer of the table with a pool cue.
Our Safari, though it started late (11am....tut tut....Dave waking up late...although to be fair he did get us up at 5am the next morning so we could claim the last few hours of our 24 hour pass), was very good....in terms of animals sighted, though if I am honest having seen it all before I was a littled jaded to the whole thing...though I must admitt to was fun, especially at the Gate as we had a little lost in translation about not having a Park Smart Card...which went a bit like 'Do you have a Smart Card? No. Ok you need to go the office to get one. Ok. By
the way, do you have a Smart Card? No! All you need to do is give me your Smart Card and you can go. We Don't have one. Do you have a Smart Card. No!' Tsavo East holds a plenthora of animals....including vast herd of Elephants and Impala (my hatred of the endemic Impala continues, though I did get a good photo); alas we never saw any of the elusive big cats or even a Rhino, and it was't until the last hour of our game drive the next morning that we saw any Buffalo...and even then it was only a solitary one sheltering under a tree from the rain watching us with bemused puzzlement. The landscape was a more impressive feature of Tsavo than the animals, in my opinion....especially Mudada Rock...or as Beats called it (reading it from the Map) Mudlands Rock....also Lugards Falls (Laguna to Beats) was fairly impressive, though I imagine spectactular when it's in full flow in the right season. I don;t think Jim appreciated Game viewing so much..as he said 'it got a bit boring when we didn't see any animals for a while'...go to the Zoo then!!!!! Admittedly the lack of animals on the
first day was probably down to Dave speeding back to the gate in time for closing at 60mph....scaring all the animals; nearly killing numerous birds, a few Kudu, a herd of Impala, and a baby Elephant...who, along with it's angry mother, looked like charging us for a short while. Oh well we got back to the gate safe and sound, and before numerous outher Safari trucks. Apart from Beats and I venturing into Voi once the rest of the days were spent lounging around the Red Elephant...and even trying out there mini pool....where I beat Beats numerous times in 2m races...and also left my swimming trunks drying in the room and forgot about them.
After buying 5000 Kenyan Shillings worth of Curio's for my dad we headed off to Mombasa, in the pouring rain...which had somehow got into my tent the night before. The journey was our last long journey in the Landrovers, and my last with the Butler Beatty Expedition...however it wasn't in the least spectactular and was all beautifuly smooth tarmac road...well until we got to a small section which was being 'repaired' by a Chinese compant...which was half dug up and mostly flooded. Oh well we got
to Mombasa safe and sound, after Dave called numerous truck drivers "Cockface', and found the train station with ease; I admired the non desprict colonial building whilst the other inquired about tickets. After a shortwhile we left the city via the Likoni ferry...a fairly boring bogstandard ferry, apart from the cram like 500 people on each one at rush hour...and arrived at our campsite...Twiga Lodge on the beautiful Tiwi beach....it was spectactular...unfortunetly about 20min after we arrived it started pouring down and hardly ever stopped so I never really got time to lounge on the white sands....although I still had no shorts at this point so I couldn't have anyway; although I did get to help Dave and Beats build a sandcastel..actually thats not true...we built a 'Mega structure' as the 25yr old 12yr old Dave called it.
Twiga Lodge itself was very good aswell, and not at all like the Lonely planet describes it...the food, though a tad pricey, is very good aswell....as it the copious amounts of alcohol that can be purchased and at times were...Beats and Jim discovered the joys of white cap whilst i feasted on Guinness Export once again. The nights were teribble though, they
were all 'nights of the great storm' and my poor little tent got a battering...though proudly (like a father speaking of his first born) I can say it stood up to it all without even faltering; unlike Jims canopy and washing line which he and I had to rescue at 2 in the morning....me dressed only in my boxers and him only in his briefs....Julie who had taken the time to get dressed was laughing a lot...my ego was a little damaged lol Dave and Beats being bastards managed to sleep right through the incredibly noisy affair.
Mombasa itself was a very interesting city, though I didn't get to see any of the sights. It is a mixed of Africa and Arabia...Swahili actaully....and completely different to everything I have seen so far. The people were different aswell, there wern't as many people trying to sell me things as there have been...although those that did tried rather hard....like Mike who touted Beats and I on our search for Shorts and Towels (as Beats had lost his aswell)...poor Mike, though he continued smiling, got nothing out of us....and didn't seem to understand when we were trying to let him down nicely about
that fact. Luckily for him he didn't get the treatment Jim reserved for one street urchin who was bothering him 'SOD OFF OR I"LL GET OUT THE CAR AND MAKE YOU!!!!!' the entire street turned around and stared...although weirdly the street child didn't seem to understand and just kept smiling bemusedly.
The leaving bit happened all to quickly to be honest, it was kind of like it was unexpected and just sprang upon me. First Beats left, after deciding things were taking to long to short out he stormed down to the travel agents and said 'I want to leave now'...this was t 5pm, at 7pm he was aboard a Kenyan Airways flight, and bound for the Uk via Nairobi and Doha..so one down. The next couple of days I spent with the Butlers at the Royal Court Hotel (expensive, but paid for by my dads Curio fund...shhhh dn't tell him). Probably the most exciting thing that happened was sitting and getting drunk with a Kenyan Lawyer called Mike at the Hotel's bar...after chatting briefly to some fit American....I was to drunk to realise they had left. Although it is quiet funny, as for weeks Beats had being craving female
ompany and all he had gotten wa empty campsite...yet as soon as he leaves a massive load of American Girls turn up at our table talking about 'selling their cookies'...alas this wasn't an Americanism and they were actually selling Chocolate Chip cookies. Fantastically aswell, the day before I left a laundry (just around the corner from the hotel) managed to wash and dry my massive horde of overland dust covered clothes.....despite the monsoon going on at the time....I am still at a loss at how they were dried...though they did smell faintly of fish...hmmmm
Eventually the time came and I parted company with the Butlers....after rushing my free hotel breakfast (the first place which had bacon and banana in the same meal, allowing me to make a Bacon and banana sandwhich) I boarded the 7-30 Tawakal Express bus to Dar es Salaam and ended my mini epic with the Butler Beatty Expedition...hopefully they will send me some of the photo's they took and I can post them here. Also hopefully there Landrovers will arrive safely, as they are loaded with over 200quids worth of African Curiosities lol I might post a little tribute to the Butlers and Beats when I
get the pictures so satyed tuned.
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Charity
Ah yes, all flooding back to me now, the little conversation about selflessness so on and so forth. good to see it in action! Loved the way the Amani childrens home looks like a prison and sounds like a designer make. The picture of Kilimanjaro looks cool, thought you had gone well past that but must just sound like you have. I'm sure you'll look back on the safari's with a little more fondness when you get back here and witness the wild town foxes and herds of wandering pigeons. Nice range of pictures, cant wait to see all of them on your return. Strangely sincere. Keep trucking x