breathtaking holiday and Dar

Hi everybody...so sorry iv been being so poo and not keeping up with ANYTHING!!! :S The week after safari we didnt really do that much....we had the monday off for bank holiday so we all headed down into town to go the Rwandan Crime Tribunal. After much persuasion, we managed to get the guard to let us in in 'slippers' (flip flops!!!) and headed to the court room where the priest is on trial...this guy apparantly ordered for his church to be bulldozed with 2000 people in it, which it was and then, when people ran out from the rubble, he stood on a balcony gunning them down..there are lots of witnesses and his defence is that god told him to!!!! Craziness!!
OK, so we hit easter holidays and had arranged to go to Pangani with the rugby guys to stay in one of their private beach houses...Pangani is a beautiful sea side resort with amazingly white beaches and hot weather!! We were only going there for the weekend though and then me, cat, martyn and flic were heading off to Dar es Salaam to stay with some people that we met in Zambia who are volunteering there too. Pangani was as we had been told it would be...absolutely beautiful. On Easter Sunday we went off on a little dhow trip where the boys did some fishing (consequently catching....nothing!) and we visited a little island called sand island. We all jumped out before we got to the island and snorkelled for a bit...saw lots of little zebra fishy things and some 'dori's (see finding nemo) then jumped back on the boat to be taken to the island itself. When we reached it, there was almost nothing left of it! It was almost completely submerged in the water so we had fun on it until there was actually nothing left of it and made our way back.

Dar was HOT! We managed to stumble across a subway on our first day which was VERY lucky so in we popped...it was nice to have a foot long and crisps and fanta AND cookies!! :) yey!! That evening we found a very local little bar and popped in to watch the footy, what with being with martyn and craig and brendan..all HUGE footy fans, we couldnt really say no! The next day we trekked all around town lookin 4 somewhere 2 change my travellers cheques....how come all the beaurea de change's in Arusha change travellers cheques but NOWHERE in Dar will?! craziness! We ended up popping into the massive very posh hotel to see if i could change them there...it turned out..i could!!! we sat ourselves down and soaked in the posh-ness (is that a word?!) of the hotel...bought ourselves quiche and a doughnut and sat down! as we were about to leave cat gave our seats away to two men who, after we had finished talking to them, we discovered was the lead singer of the jazz band that plays in the bar there and the Libyan ambassador! They, along with the hotel manager who joined the conversation late, invited us to join them for a drink on Thursday night which we promptly agreed to...of course! That afternoon we hopped in a taxi and went to the water park. 'Kunduchi wet 'n' wild' I think it's called. When we arrived there was NOBODY there!! For a moment we thought the park was shut but then we saw a little family of four playing and we realised it was because it was a week day and the easter holidays in Dar had started a week earlier and, therefore, finished a week earlier than us so everybody was back at work/school. We had to ask for the water slides to be turned on; a bit of a pain really cos we just wanted to run around the park and go on whatever we wanted but kinda cool...the park was so empty that they didn't even have the water slides turned on! Got lots of photos of cheesy poses etc. and pretty much got to do whatever we wanted! Found a very cute little birdy who was being attacked by the crows and saved it, it was very stubborn athough, didn't really want to be saved so we let it go in a saffe, sheltered place. Went to watch the footy again that night...honestly, boys!!!!

On Thursday afternoon the 'Dar' crew went off to school as they had been doing all week and, for some reason, we all slept in till very late. I was the first to wake up, (!!! that should be a whole blog post in itself...yes, i woke up before three other people!) went outside to the toilet and, to my dismay, had to come back inside because i couldn't even walk acrossthe yard to the bathroom! The sun was beaming down and it was uncomfortably hot. By the time I'd finished hopping around and whinging because of the heat, i went back in side and the rest had woken up. Me and Flic came to the conclusion that it was way too hot to do anything at all and that our only option was to stay indoors and sit under the fans they have on the ceiling. However, the electricity cut out so we decided we would go and sunbath outside in the yard but, under no circumstances, were we going anywhere in that heat. It was bad enough lieing down in it, never mind walking around! Cat and Martyn, however, said that they needed to go into town so off they went, walking out of the house, to mine and Flic's smug sniggers : ) That evening off we went to the Movenpick (the hotel mentioned above) as promised. We stopped via subway so we could fill up our stomachs and do our hair and make up as the electricity had cut out at the house! Anyhoo, we arrived at the hotel and, before long, we had clocked the 'rich men' and been invited to sit with them. So we all went over; me, martyn, flic and cat and sat down to chat with them. The jazz band were brilliant, really good and everytime we just mentioned between us "oh, i wonder if he's going to play this song...i love that song" next thing we know the manager has asked the band and they'r playing the song we were jsut discussing! We had the full VIP treatment, which was nice. A few (!!) drinks later and me getting up with the jazz band to sing summertime and we decided it was time to go. A very very good night though with results of possible free nights at the movenpick when we are flying home from Dar!!!

Me and Flic went home the next day, Martyn and Cat stayed to experience the Dar nightlife which, apparantly was very good. Me and Flic went to a party at the AS house (African safari, aka Brad and Geoff's house) for Mike's birthday and celebration of winning the rugby cup. Dont think anything that significant happened that night...cant remember and, as cat wasn't there, i cant copy it off her blog...dammit!!!

Adele's last weekend night on the saturday so we went for a meal with her and her mum. Cat didn't make it, though, her and martyn got stuck on the coach which broke down about a bgillion times (See cat's blog) ...hahahaha!!! Was a good night though, and off we went to masai camp and colobus afterwards.

Safari madness!

O.K, first of all, I'm sooooo sorry about the scatiness of my blog-updating!! I'v just been so busy in the last two weeks that iv struggled to keep update!! Bit here goes, I'm just warning u, its goin 2 b a long one!!

Friday 31st March, went on Safari. We got picked up at about 6:30am by this really cool guy called musa! he then took us all down to the mt.meru hotel to meet the rest of the houses. We then set off to the Lake Manyara National Park. This was our first day of game viewing and my god the animals were all over the place!!! We saw loads of elephants, babboons, zebras, giraffes, hippos and impala and we saw a mini warthog family!! That night we stayed in a lodge in the hills with a BEAUTIFUL view of the lake. We had our dinner and then got evening entertainment aswell!! I bought a kanga (a piece of material that is worn as a skirt but can be made into pretty much whatever you want) its lovely, havnt had it cut yet cos im not quite sure what i want to do with it!

The next night we went off to the serengeti. To do this we had to drive through the Ngorogoro crater but we didn't actually go down into it. After driving for about half an hour around the rim of the crater, our driver had a phone call to say that one of the cars had broken down! A lot of messing around and waiting later, we were driven to the wildlife lodge inside the National park to wait for the other truck to be picked up, towed, and taken to the garage to be fixed. We were all sat in the lodge and looking at the views off the balcony when Kerry decided to teach us a game that she learnt at uni...its the BEST game ever!!!! Its called mafia and involves pretending to be in the mafia and the rest of the peopl having to work out who is in the mafia!! That passed the time quite well so, eventually, when we decided to all split up and have an extra two people in each car, we set off back towards the serengeti. As it was late, we didn't really have a chance to see much...we had our first lion spotting from which we saw quite a few lions after that!! That night we spent the night in a tented lodge just outside the serengeti. As we pulled up the sun was setting over the serengeti....amazing is all i can say!

The third day was spent in the serengeti and, although we didn't see very much, we did see a leopard!! It was just lounging around in the 'V' of a tree not too far away from the road. I didnt get a photograph cos my camera is poo but, luckily, cat has a camcorder with some ridiculous amount of zoom on it so we got some good footage on that (into which were going to make both a safari dvd and a 'africa' dvd!) also, flic got some really good pics too! Other than that we didn't really see much that was that interesting...we saw some gay giraffes (!!) and loads more dikdiks/impalas/deer-esque animals. After lots of driving and not much game viewing, we headed off back to our accomodation for the night...we were staying in the serengeti wildlife lodfe. It was beautiful. When we arrived we were given hot towels and some fruit juice, then we were briefed about when breakfast and dinner is served. We went to our rooms and then went to the garden bit through the resteraunt for the outside bar to watch the sunset whilst enjoying the luxuries of happy hour!!

The fourth day we headed to the crater where we were going to spend our last day. As the Serengeti is so vast it took us the whole day to get to the Ngorogoro so we did a bit of viewing on the way. We saw more lions and what looked like every single wildebeest on the PLANET migrating! There were THOUSANDS of them!! That evening we arrived at the Ngorogor wildlife lodge. The views from all the windows and, in particular the balcony that came offf the restaruant/lounge area were absolutli breathtaking. And the food was also fit for a king (or a queen...which i am..of course!!)

On our last day we went down into the crater. As there are only a limited number of cars allowed in to the crater, we were only allowed 6 hours down there but, by the end of our six hours, we had seen all 5/6 of the big 5!!! Elephants, buffalos, rhinos (from a distance!!), lions, cheetah (crossing the road right in front of us!!) and leopard! Apparantly, according to everyone else (including cat which must make it true!) if u see either leopard or cheetah it counts!

Wow, Thursday=birthday celebrations! Was worried that nobody would be able to come cos so many people went away yesterday but it was packed!! Met everybody at masai....cant even begin to explain the night! It was good, thats all i can say!!! I have photos to jog everybody's memories!

Just wanted to say, before i go, thank u soooo much 2 people who sent me things! It's always nice 2 get post especially when u know the people who sent the stuff went a long way 2 do so! It made my day...

there....up to date!!!!

Miss u alll tonz and love u lots, next update in about a week probably, very quiet week this week!

love al xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

drowning and more to come!!

Oh yes...white water rafting...so there we were, me and martyn at the front of the boat, cat and ellen in the middle and charlotte and steph at the back with melvin, our guide. we started at rapid 10 because it was high water so we couldnt start from the beginning...everything was cool until we reached rapid number 16b....'The terminator' as it was called. This was the worst rapid of them all, it was a 4.5. Keeping in mind the highest rapid you are legally allowed to raft on is a 5!!! We got to it and melvin shouted "FORWARD!" so we were all paddling forward until we hit a big wave and, as i was at the front, the boat tipped forwards and i tipped out!! it was funny at first!! i was just laughing at how much of an idiot i was until i realised that i was miles away from the boat within seconds!! I remember looking at cats face, frantic with fear, trying to get her paddle to reach me and then i remember being underwater and wondering why my life jacket wasn't working. I had my paddle in my hand and i was trying to stick it out of the water so that they could see where i was...why i didn't just let go of it i dont know!! i finally reached the top of the water after what seemed like HOURS!! the cute guy in the canoe came and picked me up and told me to let go of my paddle (which, for some reason, i refused to do!!) and i had to wrap my arms and legs around the front of the boat. He then took me over to the boat and cat and martyn pulled me in. Cat was having a heart attack as i got in the boat!! hehe!! it was quite funny in a touching kinda way...i was in a complete state of shock and had no idea what was going on!! It was all fun and games though, and i'd do it all again!! :S I did jump in the pool when we got back though and completely freaked out at the sound of water when i was underwater!! Maybe a bit more practise of swimming underwater and i'll get over it!
We arrived back at jolly boys and met a group of lads who are volunteering in dar es salaam!! We got chatting 2 them and they taught us a new drinking game;Hoochy coochy! Planning on meeting up with them in Dar in a couple of weeks...cheap holiday and free accomodation!!! :) Woop!
Got the bus home from Lusaka to Dar on Monday...didnt know that existed...couldv done that on the way and spent more time in Zambia!! Ah well...we've learnt!! You have to learn from your own mistakes!
Arrived back in Arusha on Wednesday night...and off on safari on Fri. Will put that on my blog 2moro as i have...yet again...no time left!! This damn computer has been SO slow!!
Lots of plans 4 the week...doing a pub crawl down our local road and then off to masai in aid of my birthday!! :) massage off charlotte and gettin my hair cut and coloured...not sure how yet...might go crazy!!! hehe!! :)
Love u all...safari madness coming up 2moro!
Love al xxxxxxxxxxx
P.S-if this blog comes up all underlined...dont ask me why, i didn't have time to fanny around with it trying to make it normal!!! Sorry!