Nairobi

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Flew to Nairobi on Qatar Airways. It's a wonderful airline, and we'd rate it as one of the best in world. Great routes, decent prices and good service to boot.

We had booked the Hotel Downtown ... well we had phoned them and made a reservation for the night of the 15th. When we arrived, they had no record of any such booking and had no rooms available. Now what? It was just after dusk, and anybody who knows Nairobi (aka Nairobbery) knows how most locals don't walk around much after dark, and certainly not with luggage nor backpacks. So, N.. walked down the street to the Terminal Hotel and, and found they had a triple room for the night. Great!

The art painted on the walls of the Terminal Hotel reminded N.. that he'd stayed there 20 years ago! What a surprise. It's showing much wear over the time and should no longer be considered a decent "mid range" option. But, for just one night, it was OK.

We walked across the street to a busy street side cafe, where there were many locals, for dinner and ended up sharing a table with a wonderful Sudanese man. He buys cars around the Middle East (mainly UAE it seems) and sells them in East Africa, including Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda. He was from the South of Sudan and was looking forward to the upcoming referendum on separating from the North. He was so happy (with our company?) that he surprised us and paid for our dinner - ignoring all our protestations. We exchanged contact info and invited him for dinner at our home when he's next in Doha.

The Terminal Hotel was noisy pretty well all night long, but they arranged transport to Arusha, Tanzania in the morning. Arusha is the defacto safari organizing locale for the Northern Tanzania safari circuit. We just had to find breakfast and show up for the bus by 07:15. "Hakuna Matata" or "no problem" as they say in Swahili.

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