Zanzibar

Kilimanjaro

Masai Mara Safari

Back in Nairobi

We are now back in Nairobi after spending a week in lovely Zanzibar with lots of sun, turquoise water and white sand beaches. I did my advanced open water diver course and Dan joined me for two dives out on Mnemba Island. We saw a few turtles and tonnes of fish!

We have a day in Nairobi and then head to Vienna for a few days, then back to London for two and home to Vancouver on the 12th!

Successful Summit

At 5:40 AM on Saturday we had a successful summit on Kilimanjaro's highest peak at 5895 m! The hike was beautiful and not too strenuous until the summit day. It was really incredible to experience altitudes like that and their effects on your body - your lungs feel enormous, but you move like a snail.

At the moment Steph and I are in Dar es Salaam, en route to Zanzibar tomorrow morning to join Dan and the other girls from school. I promise I will try to post pictures from there as descriptions won't do the hike justice!

Gone to Kili

Hello. Sorry to be MIA for the last while. We have not had access to internet and I barely have time today to update you since I am off to Kilimanjaro! We had a wonderful 3 day safari in the Masai Mara and saw the wildabeest migration, giraffes, lions, elephants, buffalo, hippos, crocs... With a brief stop in Nairobi I am now in Moshi about to set out on Kilimanjaro for the next six days. Dan has headed to the coast to Mombosa and Lamu and we will meet in Dar es Saleem or Zanzibar. I'm give a proper update when I get down from our hike!

I now own a goat...

This past week we were forunate enough to have two days of clinic visits at Kombewa District Hospital. It was a really interesting experience to visit the HIV clinic, the mother and child clinic and the outpatient clinic. There is a lot of malaria, some malnutrition and a lot of poverty here -life in rural Kenya is not easy. We also had several productive meetings about the sustainable livlihood options we are interested in working on for the project next summer.

Dan's birthday was on Thursday and for a celebration we had a big party at the home we are staying at. Dan bought a goat which was later BBQed along with many other tasty dishes. We invited our friends from GIVE Kenya (a group also from UBC) who live down the road and the family invited several friends as well. We ended the night by camping on the rocks across the street and I was kept up for much of the night by the cries of hyenas!

The following day we went back to the goat market and bought a 4 goats who will live at Vicent's house, where we are staying. Goats are considered an asset and we thought it would be a nice thank you for the family. The market was really fun and we had to leave before we came home with a whole herd of fuzzy creatures. We purchased female goats so that they can be bred and thus there will be more goats. I have named mine Leslie, in honour of my lovely twin sis whom I miss!

Anyways, we are involved in some survey training for the last few days in Kit-Mikayi. On Thursday morning we head to the Masai Mara for a 3 day safari and I am supposed to be climbing Kilimanjaro on the 21st. Dan will be heading to Mombasa and Lamu while I am hiking and then we will meet up and head to Zanzibar for a week.

That is all for today as I am feeling under the weather. Wish my GI system a little luck today (nothing serious, just a little upset). Miss you all!!!