The trip

We left home at the end of February with a return ticket to Rome, five weeks off work, and the idea of going to Africa.  Now that we're home, we can finally finalize our itinerary!

Here's the trip that happened:

February 28 -- Leave for Rome

February 29-March 6 -- Rome, Italy wandering around the ruins, tour of Colleseum and the Forum, eating, sipping, people watching in piazzas, finding a travel agent, booking a ticket to Tanzania with a stop in Dubai, changing the stopover to Doha.

Hotel:  Hotel Lancelot, a restful and comfortable oasis, down the street from the Colleseum, hosted by the Khans and a lovely and helpful staff.  ($120 US for the room, including a stunning breakfast of cheeses, cold meats, breads and croissants, cakes, fruits, yougurt, juices and all you can drink coffee with hot milk)

March 6-8 -- Doha,Qatar starting at futuristic skyscrapers, searching for falcons in the Sudanese animal market where the city meets the desert, eating Moroccon food in the souk at night, watching people from everywhere going by in the dark, slim Quatari men in long white robes and red and white head scarves, migrant workers from Africa and Asia

Hotel: Merwab Central, luxurious bedding and red drapes, the call to prayer, view of the sandy city ($120 US for the room including a massive breakfast buffet of hot and cold foods, Western and Arabic)

March 8-10 -- Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania, flying over the desert watching episode after episode of The Killing, driving around with Anthany, the navigator of chaos in the streets, luxuriating at the Sea Cliff Hotel pool, figuring out how to change money, 11 hour bus ride to Arusha

Hotel: The Palm Beach Hotel, a few palms and nowhere near the beach, a garden restaurant with tasty food and traffic speeding by, power outages and gossip and voodoo drama among the staff and guests ($100 US for the room, including a dodgy little breakfast of bread, meat and salad we didn't eat, a bit of fruit and a small pot of coffee for everyone)

March 11-13 -- Arusha, Tanzania, aggressive men trying to sell us stuff, possibly the best Indian food in the world at Bigg Bites, Raul the owner and his advice and tips, booking a safari at Roy Safaris

Hotel: The Jacaranda, a leafy oasis in a leafy part of town, Abdullah in the restaurant and the fun women at reception, connecting with Connie from Oregon about books, movies, TV, her work at a girls' secondary school and our search for a safari, our "suite" on the second floor  ($55 US for the room, including breakfast of an omlette, fruit salad, toast and homemade jam and all you can drink coffee and hot milk)

March 13-17 -- Safari!, exploring Manyara National Park, the Serengeti and the Ngorongoro Conservation Area and crater, staring at lions, leopords, elephants, rhinos, buffalo, baboons, all kinds of antelopes, giraffes, hippos....., connecting with Habib, possibly the best safari guide in the world, awed by the landscape, the wildlife, the sights and the sounds

Hotel:  Serena hotels, owned by the Agha Khan, luxurious, designs that fit the landscape, amazing food and wildlife all around  (cost included in the cost of the safari ($1500 for everything for 4 nights and 5 days), food (Western and Indian) too bountiful and delicious too indescribable to get into....)

March 18-20 -- Arusha, rest, laundry, sharing safari stories with Connie and the hotel staff, internet cafe, back to Bigg Bites for more great Indian food and to say good-bye and thank you to Raul, flight to Zanzibar on a small plane

Hotel:  The leafy Jacaranda of course!

March 20-22 -- Stonetown, Zanzibar, hot!, the labyrinth of the old town, covered women, shopping for cloth, watching the sun set at Livingstone's, connecting with Doris who works there

Hotel:  Tembo Hotel, managed by the lovely Abdul, a gorgeous room in the restored old part of the hotel, tile floors, black mahoghany furniture, wooden shutters, bright white bedding and mosquito nets, delicious air con ($117 US a night, including a great breakfast of loads of tropical fruit, coconut juice out of the coconut, crepes, eggs, eaten outside on a tiled patio beside the beach)

March 23-29 -- Matemwe Beach on the east coast of Zanzibar, endless white beach with turquoise waters, women harvesting seaweed in the mornings when the tide is out, men leaving at high tide in outrigger boats to fish, coming back in the evening when the tide is in again, swimming in hot water at high tide, sunsetters with Andrea and Theo from Germany, the milky way every night, a shooting star

Hotel: Matemwe Beach Village -- gourmet food, cool breezeways, hammocks and beach beds in the shade, Nelson, the main dog and Mrs. Nelson the friendly stray ($144 US including really yummy and creative breakfasts and dinners)

March 29 -- Stonetown, Swahili dinner, quick and successful shopping, packing for the trip home

Hotel:  Back to the Tembo of course!

March 30 -- a  long and hard journey back to Rome, starting with a ferry to Dar Es Salaam, watching the President speed by, a few hours at the airport waiting for our flight, an exhausting stopover in Doha airport, busy and noisy and bright in the middle of the night, welcoming ourselves back to Rome with cappucino and pastries

March 30--April 1 -- Rome, long walks all over the city, eating big dinners, sleeping in, searching for olive branches (instead of palm leaves) on Palm Sunday at the Vatican, a city that was empty three weeks before is now packed with tourists and school trips

Hotel:  back to the Lancelot of course!  ($160 US for the room, it's high season!, but we also got upgraded into a room with a balcony)

April 2 -- home (Susan the next day)

The journey home begins

This morning we left  Zanzibar on the Kilimanjaro III,  a very nice new passenger ferry that takes two hours to travel to Dar Es Salaam.  The morning sun lit the old Arabic and Portuguese buildings as we sailed out of the port, passing by Freddie Mercury's restaurant (he comes from Zanzibar).  We arrived here in Dar Es Salaam and got a taxi driver to take us to the aiport.  As we  were leaving the port, we were held up briefly by the President's convoy of vehicles speeding by.  I wonder what it's like to be a president and always get to speed through city streets without any traffic...

Our last night in Stone Town was perfect.  We returned to the same room in the Tembo Hotel, savouring the air conditioning, the big wooden four poster beds, the carpet and the blue tiled bathroom.  We also savoured one last sundowner at Livingstones with our friend Doris who works there, and then a really nice Swahili meal of kingfish and rice spiced with Zanzibar spices.  Yum!    Howli, the taxi driver we used on  Zanzibar gave us a free ride to the ferry and we had a touching good bye with him, with many wishes for luck and happiness all around.

Now we retrace our steps to Rome, through Doha on Qatar Airways.  I'm personally really excited about watching the last episode of the Killing, a really good series that I've watched completely on airplanes -- half of it on Air Canada on my last work trip before vacation, and the other half between Doha and Dar Es Salaam.

We return to the Lancelot Hotel in Rome for a few days, including Palm Sunday which might be interesting.

We are very happy travellers.

A place for rest and relaxation

 Our bungalow                         

The hammock

Add caption

Nelson waiting for us to come to breakfast

The beach at Mtemwe on the east coast of Zanzibar

Nothing higher than the trees...

Beach life on the Indian Ocean

Sunrise is just after 6. Gradually the sky lightens and the clouds blush pink and orange. A small table on the beach holds coffee, tea, hot milk and homemade biscuits, an offering for the early risers. The tide is high and one by one the fishermen gather and head off in their dhows for the day. The tide goes out quickly and far. By 10, the women are sitting in small groups in the shallows, collecting and bundling the seaweed for sale to faraway cosmetics producers, their laughter reaching us in the shade on the beach.. 3 pm, the tide is in again and we swim in water that feels like a hot bath. The fishers return with their catch of snapper, barracuda, tuna.  We walk down the beach for a sundowner with Theo and Andrea from Germany. Back for another divine dinner. Some time with the Milky Way, and bed to the sounds of the bushbabies howling.

Zanzibar

After a couple of days of wandering the maze of little alleyways here, bargaining for cloth and stopping to sip cold drinks and stare out at the turquoise sea, we are heading off to find a bungalow on the beach for the next 6 days.  We've got some good recommendations and a great taxi driver named Howli who brought us from the airport to help in our search.

They say the rains are going to start.  Yesterday there was a loud bang of thunder, just one, right on schedule they say.  If they start we hear there will be short periods of rain till April.  We imagine ourselves reading lots, relaxing, and coming back to Stone Town on the 28th.  We've got ferry tickets for the 29th to Dar and to our long flight back to Rome.

Post safari bliss

Back in Arusha, enjoying a rest day before heading to Zanzibar tomorrow.  Still feeling moved by the sights, sounds and experiences on the Serengeti and in the Ngorogoro Crater.  Wildebeest and zebra as far as you can see in any direction.  The sounds of zebra tails swishing in the grass, vast herds of wildebeest grunting in harmony, the huffing and puffing and deep breathing of the hippos.  The pure entertainment provided by a cheetah using a line of jeeps as cover while scanning the plain looking for prey, while tourists snapped photos furiously above his head.  The young male lion sleeping under the only acacia tree in sight, lazily opening one eye to give us a look.  The elegant giraffes loping across the road.  It was heaven.

Saying good-bye to our guide Habib was hard.  We teared up, he teared up.  We had shared such a great few days together, we all felt lucky to have ended up together.  It's challenging feeling so privileged and connecting with someone who in material ways at least has so much less than us.  But as Susan says, he is a rich man in many ways.  His work is in these beautiful places.  He has five children and a wife he adores.  He is skilled and well regarded in his jobs.  He has super human eyes, able to spot and name animals that we have trouble seeing with binoculars.  "African eyes" they're called.

Will post more when we have a chance.

And where we are right now...the view from our room into Ngorongoro Crater

Tomorrow we descend into this soul expanding spaciousness...

Leaving the Serengeti

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                          

                                                                                                             

                                                                                                                         

                                                                                                                                                                            

                                                                                                                                           

Some shots from today....highlights were being in a river of wildebeest and among 300-400 zebras!

Where we are....

Everyone needs to come here

Sitting on our little balcony in the middle of the Serengeti. It's just past dark, light fading quickly. Sounds of the night. The day before yesterday there was a leopard at reception at this time. We need to call for an armed escort to take us to dinner!  Three days of bouncing around in a Toyota Landcruiser looking at lions, leopards, cheetahs, buffalo, hippos, elephants, and more giraffes, wildebeest, impalas and warthogs than we can keep track of. It's moving and overwhelming. Our guide, Hadid, is our age and awesome.  We are stunned by the beauty of this place.

Following in the steps of the first of us

Arusha is leafy and cooler than Dar es Salaam.  We're settled into La Jacaranda, a small hotel in a garden with a lovely outdoor restaurant and super friendly staff.  Arusha is close to where the first of us (humans) ever walked, it's where Julius Nyerere released the Arusha Declaration, outlining Tanzania's approach to socialism in 1967, and it's the launching place for the Serengeti and the Ngorogoro Crater.  Kilimanjaro peaked out at us yesterday as we neared the end of our 11 hour bus ride.  Tomorrow we'll sort out our safari with one of the several operators in town. Today's a rest and laundry day -- and a day to enjoy the luxury of high speed internet in an air conditioned internet cafe. It might be Indian food for dinner!

Falcons and futuristic skyscrapers

Impressions of Doha...

A lunar landscape where people have placed a grid of wide streets full of luxury vehicles being driven by neatly bearded sheiks in white head dress and designer sunglasses,  cell in hand...

The scene is like a black and white movie on a background of sand with the occasional turquoise taxi, state owned like the buses.

Our search for falcons took us to the animal market on the outskirts of the city where Sudanese tribesmen waited on stools in front of pens of sheep, goats, and rabbits, ducks and chickens in the bird section at the back. We found four hooded falcons perched forlornly there. A stark contrast with the beautiful specimen on the arm of a regal Qatari on his way into the airport lounge.

The city is staffed by migrant workers from all over the world. Our taxi driver was from Kenya, the women hotel staff from the Philippines (a million Filipinos work there). Qataris don't work, they collect a salary from the government, like royalty.

Doha it is!

Who knew? Canadians currently need a visa in advance of travel to Dubai. This is something we learned at the airport when we weren't allowed to board for Dubai. Today was spent trying to sort out our travel. And, tomorrow we leave for Doha. Why not? The silver lining is the wonderful dinner we had with some Germans (the liter of wine was about $5.50, and there was a big salad, lasagna, chicken, mineral water) in a restaurant with red checkered tablecloths and waiters who hollered.

Lobby of the Lancelot

Imagine classical music playing and a cup of really good coffee..

Possibly the best lunch ever

Susan and I have figured out the perfect way to eat. We share one dish of every course. Today we found ourselves an hour or so out of Rome in a narrow side street inside a medieval Umbrian village, Ovieto. Rick Steves has been guiding our culinary adventures perfectly and today was no exception. We started with nigi, "folds of fresh pasta enveloping warm gooey pecorino cheese sweetened with honey. ", as he describes it in his guidebook, along with a lovely light and fresh salad. Then chicken cacciatore flavored with olive oil and rosemary. Creme Brule for dessert. A local Chianti and a big bottle of local mineral water.  Sigh...

Dubai Bound

Fabrizio is our new best friend. He is the handsome Roman travel agent who found our tickets. We leave Sunday for Dubai, spend three nights in an over the top hotel there, and then carry on to Tanzania for three weeks.

The Hotel Lancelot

Breakfast time. And incredible array of pastries, cheese, cold meats, yogurt and fruit. Wonderful coffee with warm milk.  In a beautiful dining room - marble doorways, chandeliers, antique furniture, fresh flowers on the tables. A decent way to start the day!
                     
"The Irish aren't coming anymore", we hear from one of the Khan family owners, "they used to be our second biggest country and now there are none. The recession is everywhere." Yesterday the metro and bus drivers were on strike in the morning and the trains in the afternoon. It didn't affect us at all                                                                   though it must have been hard for the people.

Today we'll immerse ourselves in history in the forum and view the city from an open air bus. We are in aawe by the scale of what Roman life was - from the architecture to the infrastructure to the luxury and the excess. Hmmmm, a lesson for our times?

Sipping prosecco in the cozy lounge on the ground floor of the Hotel Lancelot. Susan was waiting for me this morning when I arrived. Today we walked from the Spanish Steps to Trevi Fountain (where we threw coins in and wished for a safe and healthy trip), to the Pantheon where we ate lunch in the sun and watched people go by, and back past the forum and the coliseum to this great little hotel, first recommended by Ron Crawley. We are mastering the metro here and love that it costs only one euro. The sun is bright and warm.

Giggles

Hello. We are Jacob and Caitlin. We have just set up Cathys new blog! She is out shopping for her trip to Africa!! How exciting!

Stay tuned for some awesome posts from Rome to Africa!!!

- Susan Boyle