Tuesday, 20th March 2007

To: Bush Camp Tanzania 01 (In Karema village, just past Kondoa)

This morning, I caught an early bus toward Kondoa. I boarded it at 7:30 a.m. I knew I'd miss our group, even though they were only 10-15 km away, because they all leave by 7:30. So, I was headed to Kondoa to meet them. But boy was I wrong about missing them. When we got about 15 km outside of Babati (which took over an hour, because of the muddy road condition), I heard somebody on the bus say "African Routes". I thought, "What? That's our tour group!" So, I looked out the window and saw our trucks and several of our people! It was a joyous moment. I felt like I was seeing my family!

My next sight was the one in this picture. THIS is why Jack had told me last night that there was no way I could miss them! Everybody was stuck in the mud, nobody was moving. In this picture, you can see the people trying to clear away a pathway for that truck to get through. We were just waiting. Just sitting there. Apparently, they'd been sitting there since the night before. So, I got off our bus and walked up to Janet and said, "Hey! Fancy meeting you here!" And she said, "Aaahh!" and gave me a big hug. Even after I arrived, we ended up stuck behind that mud for about 2 hours. I got my stuff off the bus, though, and put it on one of our African Routes trucks.

When we finally got through, I was on Thor's truck with Vivian, Sarah (who was terribly sick), Dean (also sick), and David. Funnily enough (and kind of sad, I thought, it made me feel bad), one of them said to me, "Did you like your bus ride?" I said, "Yes, it was fine. The people were friendly." He said, "Why didn't you just stay on the bus, then, rather than come with us." I didn't know how to answer that so I just sat there.

When we finally made it to Karema village, it turns out that one of the women I'd met earlier on the bus was from that village! I'd chatted with her on the bus and given her some water, so we had become a bit friendly. When we showed up in Karema, she came up to me and said, "Hi." I said, "Oh! Do you live here?" She said, "This is my home," with a big smile. It turns out that she was a primary school teacher there.

Tonight, Adrie and Nels had their bikes stolen. We ended up getting them back but had to pay for it. Long day for everybody, especially the staff.

------------------------- TODAY ------------------- TOTAL

Cycled ------------------ 0 -------------------------- 3,487 km (2,189 mi)

Sagged ----------------- 92 km (58 mi) ----------- 2,114 km (1,427 mi)
Total ------------------- 92 km (58 mi) ------------ 5,601 km (3,616 mi)