A couple of weeks ago everyone from our organization that lives in Tanzania had to head out to Nairobi for a meeting. So all of us in Dar loaded up two SUVs and took a road trip across Tanzania and into Kenya, which we did in 2 days. It is absolutely beautiful driving through Tanzania. The terrain changes quickly going from flat land to mountains, green to desert-like, etc in a matter of seconds. We had a lot of fun driving through the country. We thought of games that we played on road trips in America, like the license plate game (that one would be quite difficult here) or the alphabet game using words on billboards (that one would be too easy, they have signs everywhere). Since we couldn't think of a game we just talked about anything and everything. I'm not exactly sure what all we talked about for almost 9 hours (that was just day 1), but the time went by fast. The only thing that was eventful was when we had a blow out. Whit was driving one of the Beasts (as we so affectionately call them) and somewhere along the way the tire was punctured and we had to pull over and change it. At least it all happened in a beautiful spot and we could reflect on the beauty of God's creation. So we were there trying to get this tire changed which took a good while because the jack wouldn't raise the SUV high enough to get the old tire off and put the new one on. And while all 10 of us white people stood there, kids started coming out of the woodworks to watch us. I think by the time we left there were about 10 kids and 15 cows watching us. But the men got it changed and we moved on to Moshi, the town we were staying in that night. And the next morning we got up and finished our drive to Nairobi. I can't remember anything taking place during this day. We headed to the border, stopped there to do all the paperwork, which was a lot...exiting Tanzania, then registering the cars, then entering Kenya, then signing the car in and making sure we had Kenya insurance for the car, and I'm sure there was a lot more, but thankfully I didn't have to do it all. We did have to say no to a lot of persistent people trying to sell us things while we were at the border. Finally we were registered and on our way to our meeting, which was held in Brackenhurst, a little outside of Nairobi. But we made a pit stop at Java House for our very late lunch. It was well worth the wait though. I ordered a burrito and it was amazing, tasted like home. It was nothing like a Freebirds burrito but still incredible. And then we arrived at our meetings...somewhat late, but hey we live in Africa.
A bit of the scenery on our trip through Tanzania. It was very green for a lot of the trip, but would change constantly.
One of the many mountains we saw on the trip. Nope this is not Kilimanjaro and although we drove by it on our trip we could not see it because it was too cloudy.
As we were waiting for the tire to be changed. It was Whitney's first blow out. We didn't change it though.
They changed it instead. We had to keep telling Paul to pull his legs in so they wouldn't get run over by another car. Everyone would drive by and flash their brights like we could do something more to get out of their way, or maybe it was just to tell us that they were coming by and were not going to slow down.
One of the many kids who stopped to watch us. That's a goat in his arms.
Some more of the kids watching us. They were on the other side of the road, too afraid to cross I think.
Yes, everywhere we go we make new friends. He jumped in our picture and then tried to get us to pay him for being in it.
That's the proud mother
And the proud father, Glenn
And the definitely proud grandparents
Us silly girls expressing our excitement about being at an actual park on a perfect day.
A park must have a fountain, why not us?...oh wait, there already is a fountain there. Oh well, others are already staring at us because we're white why not give them a better reason to stare?!?
