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| The Crocodile-Filled River |
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| On our bikes! |
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| One of the cutest little kids EVER! |
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| Liz and I in the Caves |
The weekend started on Friday after Swahili Class when we took a five hour bus trip to Tanga. Our bus was extremely nice by Tanzanian standards (air conditioning and a tv that played the same music videos over and over). We thought the TV was great until we heard Shakira's Waka Waka song 5 times in a row. We made it to Tanga at about 7:30 and caught a daladala to the Hotel. The hotel was nice and served us dinner when we got there. I had fish curry and rice! We checked out our rooms after dinner and boy were they sweet! Chelsea, Abby, and I shared a room with one single bed and one king bed. We had our own bathroom with a flush toilet and a shower, and we even had a balcony with a futon and chair. It was great. Plus, the rooms had air conditioning!!!! We slept wonderfully, especially with the sound of the fan drowning out all of the animal and street noises we are used to hearing. When we woke up, we headed to breakfast which consisted of tea, coffee, toast, omelettes, and bananas. Then, it was off to the bike shop to rent bikes. We had sweet old style cruiser bikes with no gears and only semi-functional brakes. We rode about 3 miles to the Amboni caves where our guide gave us a tour of two different caves. There are no walkways or lights in these caves so we had to bring lanterns and explore them ourselves. We saw tons of bats! The second cave was...err...interesting to say the least. It was named, "the gender cave" because aparently, all of the rock formations in the cave look like male and female genitalia. Our guide pointed some of these formations out to us and we couldn't help but laugh! After the caves, we biked to the hot springs, which involved stopping and parking our bikes at the nearby village, and crossing the river by dugout canoe. These were the coolest canoes I have ever been in-they were literally huge logs that were carved out by hand. We crossed in groups of 4 or 5 with the guide and then hiked to the hot springs. Along the way, we all had to try climbing the huge palm trees (they cut notches in the trees so locals can climb up and get the coconuts). We even saw one guy climb a palm tree without any notches or footholds. The hot springs smelled of rotten eggs and were the strangest blue-green color I have ever seen. Supposedly the springs will cure any skin ailment. We biked back to the hotel and then ate linner (it was like 5 oclock by this time!) at the Food Palace. I got a cheeseburger and fries! Real cheese :) And to think that I don't even like cheeseburgers in the U.S. We hung out at the hotel and chatted before heading off to bed. The highlight of the evening was when the power came back on and I was able to take my first warm shower in 3 weeks. It was heaven.
Sunday we woke up and had breakfast (the same as Saturday). We went to the market and store and then trekked to the bus for our ride back. It was a long and sticky ride to Dar and it took nearly 7.5 hours. This bus was packed and there wasn't air conditioning so we were hot nearly the entire time! We had spring rolls, sambusas, falafel, and other fried goods for lunch. The best part of the trip was that I got to hold a darling little African baby for 2 hours on the bus! She was so cute and she even fell asleep in my arms. I definitely got my kid fix today. When we were at the village by the river on Saturday, we also played with the kids and they were great fun. We took their pictures, and many of them were afraid at first, but after we showed them their pictures, they wouldn't let us stop! They were so much fun. Anyway, that was this weekend. Now it's back to work....this week is death week. We start Human evolution and ecology classes this week, which means we have class every day from 8:30-4:45. It's going to be rough but I will be so smart once it's over! Well, that's all for now, adios!
Erin
Swahili Word of the Day: Mamba (Mahm-bah)-Crocodile
P.S. Although we didn't see any, our guide said that there were crocodiles in the river that we crossed!
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