Nearly to Serengeti

Hello all, after much driving we are camped at the village of Wasso,
Tanzania, about 2 hours from the northeastern entrance to Serengeti
park. Our itinerary had called for us to spend tonight inside the park
but unfortunately our supply vehicle had a problem with the master
cylinder that took a few hours to repair. We turned around to meet it
instead of sleeping in the Serengeti without tents!!

We are on the way there first thing tomorrow morning. We have had a
couple exciting days at Lake Manyara and Lake Natron/Engaresero.
Pictures coming soon we hope!

On safari

We made it to Lake Manyara National Park today with our
super-knowledgeable guides Rama and Zuberi. Here is the entire group
at the Manyara Hippo Pools. The hippos were to camera left but here we
are standing in front of a few artfully posed zebra and hundreds of
pelicans and storks.

We won't have a prayer of internet or phone
access for a couple days as we are going to Lake Natron but we may
have a chance to update from central Serengeti. Bye for now!

Transitioning

We are at our final night in Moshi, getting ready to go on an 8-day photo safari including the Serengeti. We spent a final day today with the Kilimanjaro Kids orphanage, playing a rousing match of football (photos coming soon, I was on the field the entire time) and saying goodbye.

 

This is a house very close to our guesthouse, I thought it was interesting to note the relative security that we experienced at the guesthouse compared with this:

Marangu Waterfalls

Yesterday we visited another Chagga cave and hiked to a beautiful waterfall. We spent the afternoon playing with the students at the Kilimanjaro Kids Care orphanage in Himo and at lot of time posing for pictures. Getting everyone to look at the camera at the same time proved an impossible task!

We just "fell in"--honest!

At the orphanage

On Sunday five of us visited the small children's orphanage (ages birth-4 years) at Upendo. The students were warmly welcomed by the orphans, who clearly had lots of experience with visitors coming to play and give hugs.

Himo

We spent our first day yesterday moving into the Make a Difference guesthouse in Rau and visiting the kids at the Himo orphanage. We spent some time reading, playing basketball in a rainstorm, and then in a talent show at the end of the day. Today we will teach some geography lessons as well as continuing to practice our reading.

A day at Mweka

Yesterday we visited the College of African Wildlife Management, Mweka. We had a nice lecture and campus tour with Fidel. After lunch in the school cafeteria we walked through some beautiful river valleys to the Catholic mission at Kibosho, where a turn-of-last-century cathedral is a prominent sight.

At the end of the day Kilimanjaro came out of the clouds for sunset. This view is from the top of our hotel: