Goodbye Kenya, Hello Tanzania!

We were able to "sleep in" this morning to be ready to leave our lodge at 8. We got all packed up, had breakfast, and then were off! We drove through Amboseli National Park one last time, and then left the park on our way to Arusha, Tanzania to catch our flight to Tarangire National Park. We drove for a couple of hours until we reached the border town, and stopped for a bathroom break. While there, we got a flat tire and pretty soon, we had drawn a crowd to watch the excitement of the broken down white people and the changing of the tire...






After the flat got fixed, we headed to the border and got our exit stamp from Kenya and then drove the distance to where we met with Tanzanian immigration and got our entry stamp in Tanzania! We said goodbye to Dennis, and were greeted by two new Micato staff members, our driver and our guide to Arusha. We piled into a new vehicle and drove to Arusha! It took about another two hours. The road was paved but was undergoing a lot of construction, and every time there was a construction zone, we would be diverted off the road onto the dirt and would have to drive the length of the construction zone, which were sometimes several miles long. Eventually we made it to Arusha, where we passed the Rwanda Tribunal on our way to the John Wayne hotel for lunch. It was named that because that was where he stayed when they filmed the movie Hitari. After lunch we were driven to the domestic airport where we waited for our plane to arrive. The plane arrived and we met six more travelers who joined us for this next leg of the trip. They are two couples, each with a teenage child. We flew to Tarangire National Park and on the way, Skylar (one of the teens) got sick in the plane. Other than that, the flight was fairly uneventful, and only took about 25 minutes. Here we met our new driver and guide, piled into new safari vehicles and were off! They are keeping the groups separate, and it is still just the four of us (Mom, Blake, Megan and me) in our vehicle. We drove through the park to our lodge for the night, seeing the usual suspects along the way. Eventually we made it to the lodge, checked in and had a cocktail party before dinner. It was a good way to meet the new folks. Three of them live in Texas (the father, Keith, is actually from Shreveport) and the other three in Ohio. After the cocktail party we had dinner and Blake, Megan and I decided to keep the party going afterwards, talking and drinking for an hour or so before bed. A long travel day, but we will see what tomorrow brings!


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