First day in Tanzania

Our plane had arrived at just before 10:00am, so despite the fact that we were pretty tired, we still had the whole day ahead of us. Our contact Justin drove us and our new friends Marti and Ryan into the big city of Arusha (pop 500,000). Arusha is typically the main start off point for anybody doing Serengeti safaris.

We stopped at the big Mt. Meru Hotel where we dropped off Marti and Ryan and exchanged contact info. We hope to see them again on Friday. They will be climbing Kilimanjaro a week or so before us, so we are excited to see how they make out.

It was about a 40 km (25 mile) drive from the airport into the city, but it's pretty slow going. 

The local bus.

Oops!

Not sure.

Yes, we drive on the left side of the road here.

The entrance road to the building where we are staying.

The entrance road is pretty rough! But Justin laughed and said "no, you haven't seen a rough road yet!"

The building where we are staying.

Our apartment is on the top floor.

Justin went out and got me a couple of the local beers to try.

We relaxed for an hour and talked over some plans with Justin. He has us scheduled to do the four night Mt. Meru hike starting on Monday morning the 25th. And then a couple of days rest and then the seven night Mt. Kilimanjaro hike starting February 2nd. Justin arranged it so that we would do the summit on my birthday, February 7th!

Then we went out and got some lunch.

Despite being a world famous tourist center, there is not a lot of English spoken by the locals unless they are directly involved in tourism. So Justin has started teaching us the basics of Swahili. It seems like a fairly easy language to learn (as far as that goes!) because at least when you are reading it, the majority of the words sound exactly as they are spelled.

After lunch, we went to run some errands. We stopped at a bank machine to get some local cash. I took out 300,000 shillings ($165 CAD, $130 USD) just to test the system, and was charged the standard 2.5% foreign exchange fee that gets charged anywhere in the world, plus a 10,000 shilling ($5.50 CAD, $4.35 USD) ATM fee. I don't so much mind the 10,000 shilling ATM fee, because a fee of some kind was expected, but I don't like the fact that the machine didn't disclose the amount of the fee prior to completing the transaction. I will try another bank next time.

Then we went to get some internet access. There is no WiFi in the apartment, so Justin suggested we get a cellular MiFi device. He would pay for the device and will be keeping it when we are done with it, and we get to use the 40GB data package that comes with it. The device with the data cost 75,000 shillings ($41 CAD, $33 USD). It would have been slightly more with a new SIM card, but Justin already had a spare he could use.

So, now we can keep in touch with you all! Apparently there is some very spotty coverage on the mountains, so we might be able to post the odd update during those trips, even if it's just to say we are okay.

Next up was to get some supplies for the apartment.

He brought us to a specialized expat grocery store with a lot of goods imported from the UK. But prices were downright ridiculous. As an example, it was 19,000 shillings ($10.40 CAD, $8.25 USD) for a box of corn flakes. We can't figure how they stay in business. We bought some oat flake breakfast porridge that was only a bit expensive, and a bottle of the local hooch that Justin said was a good price.

We learned in Barbados (a very expensive country) a few years ago that the locals survive by eating like the locals. Lots of fruits and vegetables, and beans and rice. Chicken, beef, and pork are actually quite reasonable too, when bought at the places where the locals shop. If you want to live like an expat or a tourist here, it can easily be expensive. 

Buying some rice at the local market.

We bought 3 kgs (6.5 lbs) of rice for 4,800 shillings ($2.75 CAD, $2.10 USD).

Another example is milk. We saw 1 liter tetrapack boxes of milk for 4,500 shillings ($2.50 CAD, $1.95 USD). That's some expensive milk. But the locals use fresh cows milk (yes, right from the cow) and boil it themselves. Justin said he would get us some of that for our tea and hot chocolate in the morning.

We were beat, so Ruth and I went back to the apartment and had an hour nap.

Around dinner time, Francina and Angel came over with Francina's 7 year old son Eugene. Francina owns the tour company Rwalinda Tours that is organizing our Kilimanjaro hike.

They helped Justin make dinner for us!

Dinner is served!

We didn't get to bed until after 11:00pm, and I'm sure we were out when our heads hit the pillow!

Today, Justin is taking us to the nearby city of Moshi (pop 200,000) to rent our trekking gear. We have our own hiking boots, raincoats, hats and gloves), but that's about it! We need sleeping bags, duffle bags, down coats for summit day, and probably a few other things. Should be an interesting day!

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