After my adventures in Southern Africa it was time to head north.
I left Livingstone with a guy from Australia and another 6 hour bus ride (that took the usual 12 hours!) and we were in Lusaka the capital of Zambia. This is a weird city, there are no tourists - or indeed travellers but it wasn't a great city, very little to do. The people in Lusaka have not yet seemed to have worked out that white people are treated as cash cows in Africa! From Lusaka I decided to go to Malawi for a bit and see what all the hype was about going there!
When I arrived in Lilongwe (the Capital) the woman at the reception of my hostel announced that I was the 30th Scottish person staying in that hostel that night. Needless to say I decided to leave Lilongwe as soon as possible. Not that I don't like my fellow Scots its just that I can see them anytime back home!The one very interesting thing I did in Malawi was visit the tobacco factory where farmers from all over Malawi bring their tobacco cash crop to sell. The taxi driver who took me round told me that the farmers get on average in a very good year about $2 for a kilo (that's about one pound) and when I told him the price of cigarettes in the western world he assured me I must have made a mistake in his maths. I told him no. The buyers are white businessmen from all over Africa who then sell on again to America and Europe.
This is an interesting situation as the farmers are harvesting a cash crop in order to make money to buy things that we have in the 'western world' and then when they have spent that money they often don't have enough to eat as they have no crop that they have harvested themselves to eat! This is the the same with tea in India and coffee in Africa. This is the basis for why we need fair trade and ok what I described here is a very simplified version of it but the basics are here.In a lot of ways it makes me mad as why should we call them 'developing countries?' what are they developing into - USA? UK? if they develop into a westernised country then something very special will have been lost. On the other hand we cannot help influencing other countries and to be fair I met one guy who worked for Starbucks Coffee and he said that his job was to ensure that coffee farmers in Africa are paid a good price for their cash crop.
I left Malawi and took a 2 day bus across the border into Tanzania and arrived in Dar Es Salam (the capital). I managed to sleep on the bus and at the border we found out what the foul smell on the bus was. The driver insisted all bags were taken into the bus and not put underneath as underneath he had stacks of fresh animal skins........! Needless to say the smell was awful and we had to put up with it for 2 days. When I say 'we' I met a guy from South Africa on the bus and we travelled for a bit together. Will had been travelling for 23 months and avoided all questions about how he had afforded it! Dar Es Salam is a melting pot of culture and I would totally recommend it! I didn't see another white person except Will for 3 days as everyone gets to Dar and then gets straight on the boat for Zanzibar. I met a lot of people who went there and they told me that although it was beautiful and had nice beaches it was very much a holiday destination and there was no culture there just a lot of Mzungu - kiswahili word for 'white person who wanders apparently without purpose'.
Dar is full of people from all over the world - except for white people and there are mosques and Hindu temples and its fantastic!
From Dar we caught a bus to Arusha, me so that I could organise another safari and Will so that he could join a trip he had organised. We stayed in a very rough part of Arusha and I didn't have a clue what they meant when the hotel owner said to us that out room will be ready in an hour until Will reminded me that budget hotels often double as brothels......Arusha was the place where I found out about Coinage - pronounced conyagee. It hit me like a car would have done. Nuff said!
I arranged a 5 day safari in Tanzania (pronounced TanZANia) and I went to the Serengeti and Ngorogoro crater and lake Manyara. We also went to the Olduvai gorge where the first footprints of man were found! (another thing for the list!)The Serengeti was where legend met reality. It was just full of animals! We saw all of the 'Big 5' including at least 3 leopards, loads of lions, 2 cheetah and we also saw lion cubs which was a big thing for me to see as I really wanted to!We also surprised a hippo at 5am one morning at the side of the road and I have never been so close to a hippo and OF COURSE I didn't have my camera out!!The other great thing that happened was in the campsite at the Ngorogoro crater. In the evening when we arrived we saw 2 elephants standing at the bottom of the campsite. The camp was the same as the Serengeti in that there was no perimeter fence in the campsite as there had been on my previous safaris!These 2 elephants in the course of 2 hours actually walked right through the campsite pulling down branches of trees for their supper and putting on a great show for us all! Me and Michael (the guy from NY on safari with me) sat outside out tent with a beer and 20ft away these 2 male elephants were pulling branches from the tree as the sun was setting (see pics for further detail!!!)
After my safari I decided that this would be my last, simply because I was getting blase about it ie we didn't even stop at the giraffe, or zebras or wildebeest any more. Weirdly enough we saw the tail end of the migration out of the Serengeti into the Maasai Mara and there were huge herds of wildebeest everywhere - man they are an ugly animal!Not only that but I was told that they wont reach a vantage point in the Maasai Mara for another 3 weeks and by then I would be a long way away!
From Arusha I headed to Moshi, I had decided not to climb Kilimanjaro simply due to the quality of the guides I had found in this part of Africa. I don't want to go into detail here but safe to say that I did not fancy trusting one of them with my life on Kili!I decided to treat myself when I got to Moshi and stayed in a nice place. For 7 quid a night I got my own room with en suite bathroom and tv! I was really sick of dorm beds with 10 to a room and shared cold showers. Also hostels are not that well known in Tanzania. My hotel also had a rooftop bar and it was here I got my only view of Kilimanjaro. I have to say I was pretty horrified at the very small amount of snow left on it. Global warming!I also had a day hike to the first hut on Kilimanjaro on the Marangu route (also known as the Coca Cola route as its so popular). Most people and guides I talked to told me that the best route to climb Kili was actually the route that starts from the Kenyan side as its a slower ascent and you acclimatise better - must keep that in mind for my next Africa trip!
Next blog is Kenya - my last country!
I left Livingstone with a guy from Australia and another 6 hour bus ride (that took the usual 12 hours!) and we were in Lusaka the capital of Zambia. This is a weird city, there are no tourists - or indeed travellers but it wasn't a great city, very little to do. The people in Lusaka have not yet seemed to have worked out that white people are treated as cash cows in Africa! From Lusaka I decided to go to Malawi for a bit and see what all the hype was about going there!
When I arrived in Lilongwe (the Capital) the woman at the reception of my hostel announced that I was the 30th Scottish person staying in that hostel that night. Needless to say I decided to leave Lilongwe as soon as possible. Not that I don't like my fellow Scots its just that I can see them anytime back home!The one very interesting thing I did in Malawi was visit the tobacco factory where farmers from all over Malawi bring their tobacco cash crop to sell. The taxi driver who took me round told me that the farmers get on average in a very good year about $2 for a kilo (that's about one pound) and when I told him the price of cigarettes in the western world he assured me I must have made a mistake in his maths. I told him no. The buyers are white businessmen from all over Africa who then sell on again to America and Europe.
This is an interesting situation as the farmers are harvesting a cash crop in order to make money to buy things that we have in the 'western world' and then when they have spent that money they often don't have enough to eat as they have no crop that they have harvested themselves to eat! This is the the same with tea in India and coffee in Africa. This is the basis for why we need fair trade and ok what I described here is a very simplified version of it but the basics are here.In a lot of ways it makes me mad as why should we call them 'developing countries?' what are they developing into - USA? UK? if they develop into a westernised country then something very special will have been lost. On the other hand we cannot help influencing other countries and to be fair I met one guy who worked for Starbucks Coffee and he said that his job was to ensure that coffee farmers in Africa are paid a good price for their cash crop.
I left Malawi and took a 2 day bus across the border into Tanzania and arrived in Dar Es Salam (the capital). I managed to sleep on the bus and at the border we found out what the foul smell on the bus was. The driver insisted all bags were taken into the bus and not put underneath as underneath he had stacks of fresh animal skins........! Needless to say the smell was awful and we had to put up with it for 2 days. When I say 'we' I met a guy from South Africa on the bus and we travelled for a bit together. Will had been travelling for 23 months and avoided all questions about how he had afforded it! Dar Es Salam is a melting pot of culture and I would totally recommend it! I didn't see another white person except Will for 3 days as everyone gets to Dar and then gets straight on the boat for Zanzibar. I met a lot of people who went there and they told me that although it was beautiful and had nice beaches it was very much a holiday destination and there was no culture there just a lot of Mzungu - kiswahili word for 'white person who wanders apparently without purpose'.
Dar is full of people from all over the world - except for white people and there are mosques and Hindu temples and its fantastic!
From Dar we caught a bus to Arusha, me so that I could organise another safari and Will so that he could join a trip he had organised. We stayed in a very rough part of Arusha and I didn't have a clue what they meant when the hotel owner said to us that out room will be ready in an hour until Will reminded me that budget hotels often double as brothels......Arusha was the place where I found out about Coinage - pronounced conyagee. It hit me like a car would have done. Nuff said!
I arranged a 5 day safari in Tanzania (pronounced TanZANia) and I went to the Serengeti and Ngorogoro crater and lake Manyara. We also went to the Olduvai gorge where the first footprints of man were found! (another thing for the list!)The Serengeti was where legend met reality. It was just full of animals! We saw all of the 'Big 5' including at least 3 leopards, loads of lions, 2 cheetah and we also saw lion cubs which was a big thing for me to see as I really wanted to!We also surprised a hippo at 5am one morning at the side of the road and I have never been so close to a hippo and OF COURSE I didn't have my camera out!!The other great thing that happened was in the campsite at the Ngorogoro crater. In the evening when we arrived we saw 2 elephants standing at the bottom of the campsite. The camp was the same as the Serengeti in that there was no perimeter fence in the campsite as there had been on my previous safaris!These 2 elephants in the course of 2 hours actually walked right through the campsite pulling down branches of trees for their supper and putting on a great show for us all! Me and Michael (the guy from NY on safari with me) sat outside out tent with a beer and 20ft away these 2 male elephants were pulling branches from the tree as the sun was setting (see pics for further detail!!!)
After my safari I decided that this would be my last, simply because I was getting blase about it ie we didn't even stop at the giraffe, or zebras or wildebeest any more. Weirdly enough we saw the tail end of the migration out of the Serengeti into the Maasai Mara and there were huge herds of wildebeest everywhere - man they are an ugly animal!Not only that but I was told that they wont reach a vantage point in the Maasai Mara for another 3 weeks and by then I would be a long way away!
From Arusha I headed to Moshi, I had decided not to climb Kilimanjaro simply due to the quality of the guides I had found in this part of Africa. I don't want to go into detail here but safe to say that I did not fancy trusting one of them with my life on Kili!I decided to treat myself when I got to Moshi and stayed in a nice place. For 7 quid a night I got my own room with en suite bathroom and tv! I was really sick of dorm beds with 10 to a room and shared cold showers. Also hostels are not that well known in Tanzania. My hotel also had a rooftop bar and it was here I got my only view of Kilimanjaro. I have to say I was pretty horrified at the very small amount of snow left on it. Global warming!I also had a day hike to the first hut on Kilimanjaro on the Marangu route (also known as the Coca Cola route as its so popular). Most people and guides I talked to told me that the best route to climb Kili was actually the route that starts from the Kenyan side as its a slower ascent and you acclimatise better - must keep that in mind for my next Africa trip!
Next blog is Kenya - my last country!
posted by Amy | 4:23 AM
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