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Dar - Arusha road
Even on the main roads, further away from Dar there is hardly any traffic at all With the car finally on the road, it was more than time to go on a road trip. Fortunately there was a Bank Holiday weekend conveniently scheduled at the beginning of December. So we tried to round up some people and find a destination. First contestant was Ellen, my second new housemate. She is a Norwegian nurse, who was a friend of someone Sara had VSO pre-departure training with and who was looking for a place to stay, so we took her into the Femina flat. Through Ellen some other Norwegians were supposed to be part of the group as well, so we met up a couple of days before for dinner ammunitioned with guide books. The choice came down to going South to Kilwa, which sounded a bit complicated to get to in the Lonely Planet, so the decision was made to go up North to Lushoto. Some 500km in the Usambara Mountains for some hiking. The size of the group kept on fluctuating and we thought we’d be twocars, but then a Norwegian couple dropped out on Friday afternoon, as one of them got ill. So we were down to five: Ellen, Rita (a Hungarian VSO), Benedikte (another Norwegian,
Usambara Mountains
On the road up from Mombo who I only got to meet, when we picked her up on Saturday morning), Kejtil (a Norwegian guy, who I had met at least on the planning evening two days before).
We set off early Saturday morning and the 400km on the road in direction Arusha went pretty well. Smooth tarmac road, little traffic once you got beyond the wider outskirts of Dar. We stopped for lunch in Mombo, where we had to turn off the main road, at the Mombo Motel. Food was quite good, cheap and very fast, thanks to counter service. We thought we’ll reach Lushoto by mid afternoon, as there wasn’t much distance left to cover. But the road was pretty steep and it was about 35C, so pretty hot as well. As it turned out too hot for the Musso, so we had to stop after a short while, when the engine thermometer was close to red and steam came from the cooler. So we waited for the engine to cool down to be able to refill water in the cooler. You can’t open the water tank in one go, as it’s under high pressure. You have to open the screw top little by little,
otherwise the boiling hot water will spray at you. After that we had to do several more stops, from now we didn’t let it get that hot, that we had to refill water. So we only reached our accommodation in the late afternoon.
Following a colleague’s recommendation we decided to stay at Mueller’s Lodge, some 10km or half an hour beyond Lushoto. Idyllically set on the mountain side with gorgeous views, it’s been run by a German family, who’s been here since the 1970ies. There is a lot of German history in and around Lushoto, it was a favourite holiday hotspot during German colonial times and was then knows as Wilhelmsthal. Not surprising, as the landscape somehow reminds of the Alps and the climate is a lot more pleasant than down on the coast.
After the long drive we were keen on some exercise and wanted to go for a nice evening walk before it got dark. Mueller’s provided a booklet with recommended hiking routes, so we picked the short one hour round trip starting at the lodge. We should have just enough time to get back before dawn at 6.30 - 7pm. The instructions were slightly dubious: We
Group pic with the hot car
Benedikte, Rita, Kejtil, myself were supposed to turn off at a point of the creek, where women sometimes wash laundry and the likes… The path through the woods was quite overgrown as well, so it wasn’t always clear, where there actually was a path. Darkness slowly started to settle in as well, so we got a little worried about finding our way back. We discussed, if it’s better to continue or try the same way back, but settled for continuing in the end. Some of our little group were getting quite nervous, but then we finally spotted the lodge down the hill - now we only had to find a way to get there. Now it was completely dark, but at least we had our torches and we saw the lights from the lodge, so we stumbled through the thick woods and were very relieved, we made it.
After dinner we packed out our wine and congregated in front of the fireplace in the garden. As hot as it was during the day, now you could feel, how high up we were: It had cooled down drastically, so we hurdled up hulled in cardigans, moving closer and closer to the flame.
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