2/13/2010 – Mt. Kilimanjaro Journal
LyttleBryan March 21st, 2010
This is part of a series of posts from my Mt. Kilimanjaro journal. The contents may, or may not, have been affected by serious altitude delusion. I’ll leave that for the reader to decide…
2/13/2010
Well, we’re here! We arrived in Tanzania at 11:30 last night. The flight was probably the roughest flights I’ve ever been on. I guess it wasn’t too bad, but after 26 hours of airport/airplane, I was ready to be done!
Our driver from the airport to the hotel was a native by the name of Joe. I got the feeling that wasn’t his real name, but who knows. I did notice something odd about driving in TZ. They use their blinkers to signal the cars behind them that there are cars coming and it’s not safe to pass. they also do something with their brights, but for the 45 minute drive, I couldn’t figure it out.
Anyway back to my internal monologue. I was a little disappointed we got in at night because I couldn’t see the mountain from a distance. Adam had echoed the same sentiment. For now it’s time to see what exploring we can do.
(later that day) Our hotel in Arusha is pretty cool. It’s decorated in traditional African decor. Actually I wonder if it’s just designed to look like what foreigners expect Africa to look like. Adam says it looks like a Disney style hotel. Like the Disney Safari what’s-it-called. Maybe he has a point. Anyway, time will tell I guess. Soon we’ll be out of the tourist town of Arusha, and into the trail town of Marangu. I guess that’s still a tourist town, just a different kind of tourist town.
P.S. I had liver for breakfast. I don’t know what animal it was from, but we’re calling it elephant liver.
(later that night) Well the days about to end and the most physically demanding thing I’ve done so far is wander around the hotel between our room and various areas. We tried to walk out into Arusha to explore, but we got a lot of attention. it wasn’t negative attention, and I never truly felt threatened, but when you’re a people-watcher like me, it’s disconcerting to be the one being watched.
Since our exploring Arusha failed, Adam and I found ourselves with a few hours to kill. It didn’t take long for us to find a few comfy chairs and a list of African beer! The beer we had was rather cliche in name (Kilimanjaro, Serengeti, etc.), but it was pretty good. I preferred the Serengeti as it was a little darker and richer while Adam liked the Kilimanjaro. We passed the time with good beer, good conversation, and Chinese food. The Chinese food in our African hotel was a very, very, good. Don’t ask me!
After lunch we were in the lobby with our KE Adventure duffel bags when a woman noticed them and inquired. It turns out she and her boyfriend were on the exact same trip. They had arrived in town the night before on a slightly later flight. We sat in the lobby for a while chatting and waiting for our ride to Marangu. Eventually our guide and KE representative arrived and we began the painfully long 3 hour drive. It was on the drive that I got the first glimpse of “real Africa.”
As far as I can tell there is no middle class in Africa. you either live in a walled Plantation, or you live in a shack. This may be generalizing a bit, but it’s what I saw in the areas between Marangu and Arusha. I’ll be honest, some of the things I saw made my heart ache. i simply cannot fathom what living in these conditions must be like. It made the fat wallet I was carrying feel like all the wealth in the world, and that left me feeling more than a little guilty. No matter how much I told myself my presence there supported the economy, I know that tourists are not what these people truly need. My religious opinions aside, I have a new found respect for Missionaries.
We arrived in our hotel in Marangu around 5:30pm. The hotel was in a walled and gated area that reminded me of a compound. It is an AMAZING hotel. Everything except the rooms were open air. This was especially awesome as the sun went down. Now I’m sitting in the open air sipping a glass of tonic water listening to bugs and enjoying the breeze. the hotel has a beautiful garden out back and I got some great pictures of various flowers. I’m hoping I can stump Maya with these foreign flowers. Now it’s off to get some (hopefully) good sleep before another long drive and our first day of real hiking.
- Backpacking , Hiking
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