Part 1. (Realising that our time so far in Tanzania has been so rich, and that thus far we have only covered half the country, I decided to split this blogpost into two parts. The first covering the west and south of the country. The second half will cover the east and the north.)

‘Karibu’, meaning, ‘you are welcome, be free’… this is how I would sum up our experience of Tanzania from the moment we entered the country at it’s border post to the place we rest our heads right now. I cannot tell you how welcoming the people of Tanzania are – the heart of hospitality is, I am sure, the greatest gift they possess as a nation.

We entered Tanzania on the most bottom left hand corner possible at the tiniest, friendliest, easiest border post ever. We didn’t cross until it was growing dark, and we had no idea where we were heading. Dirt road, new culture, no street lights, no internet connection, hungry and soooo tired. We drove straight for 50 km’s until we came to the outskirts of the small town, Matai. We noticed immediately a well lit area. We pulled in, discovered it was a government owned truck weigh bridge car park, and asked very politely if we could sleep there for the night. They conceded as long as we promised to be gone by 6 next morning.

And it was here that we camped for our first night. In fact, they were super kind… they even showed us where a toilet was that we could use. Thankful (I was bursting for a wee), Evie and I went to see. Lo and behold, our first floor loo/ long drop toilet experience (think ceramic starter block type affair with a small hole… gotta get your aim right, no loo roll… just some running water to wash yourself with, in a VERY tight space). Aghast, we closed the door and turned around, deciding that a bush wee would be far preferable.

Taking a big deep breath in, I knew in that moment that we had left Southern Africa, and that we were in for a few new experiences.

Little did we realise that for the next 11 nights we would be camping in a similar manner… but without the well lit arena. It turns out that the western side of Tanzania is exceptionally remote…

Leaving the small town of Matai, we decided to drive up Lake Tanganyika, deciphering that there was a campsite along it’s shore that we could stay at. Thrilled, we headed straight for it. At least here, we could get our head’s around where we were, wash some clothes, maybe even stock up a bit? It so happens that the ‘place’, Kipili was no more than a smattering of houses just in from the lake shore – definitely not suitable for stocking up on anything. And the campsite we had so looked forward to staying at had closed it’s doors for the month… evidently the owners were on holiday. Just fabulous. We tried to contact the owners, asking if we could just stay on their land, as we were completely self-sufficient… if we could just access a tap for some water. They said no, but explained that if we were self-sufficient, we should camp alongside the old monastery ruins on top of the hill. We trundled our way up there, and discovered to our delight that there really were the most beautiful ruins of an old Benedictine monastery, overlooking the incredible Lake Tangyanika. 

(Some background here, we had thus far experienced that even though we were in Africa, it was relatively easy to stock up on supplies… tinned food, long-life milk, teabags, wine… as each biggish town we had come to would have somewhere that stocked these things.)

To continue… keeping our eyes on the map, we decided to drive further up the lake where there were clearly (as far as the map was concerned) some fair sized towns along the way, which was great because our supplies were running worryingly low. 

To our dismay however, each and every town we passed through was the same… many, many stalls selling vegetables, flip flops and dried fish. Not a can of tinned food or a loaf of bread in sight. There were though, an abundance of ladies stirring big steaming metal pots of ‘ugali’ (pap), and lots of people standing by glass boxes half filled with cooked chips. It was on this day we learned that if we didn’t eat street food, we were going to go hungry.

And we made it! For 11 consecutive nights… driving, finding a place off to the side of the road (I will write allllll about wild camping in another blogpost), making dinner, sleeping, waking up, packing up and driving. 

Besides the car park and the monastery, we stayed in abandoned quarries, off the road in remote nature reserves and outside airports of intensely African cities… you name it, we’ve camped there!! The terrain we drove through at this time was simply rural Africa… and we were privileged to cut into that lifestyle as we slowly cruised on by, taking it all in.

It was the first time we saw fields of rice, growing in the low areas. We drove through huge conservancies of nature reserve… silent and still, not a person to be found. We drove by a settlement that had been built up around an area where the prospect of finding gold was clearly a reality – I would say that this was the first slum-like area we have seen so far on our journey. And at last, but by no means least, we drove through giant African towns pulsating with an energy that you just don’t find in the West, where the buzz of the Swahili language and culture resides in the bustling markets, and where COVID apparently doesn’t exist (more on that in part 2).

This ‘wild camp’ frenzy ended in a city called Dodoma – a place where there was clearly more western influence. Here we came upon a pizza restaurant owned by an Italian family (yes, it felt VERY random!), and had the most delicious pizza ever! They kindly allowed us to camp in front of the restaurant, before moving on early the next morning. 

We decided at this point that enough was enough, we needed to find a campsite. We headed south to the city of Iringa (west of Dar es Salaam). We could see on our maps that there was a campsite 50kms on the other side of Iringa, and that is where we headed. And we are SO glad that we did. Without knowing it at the time, we headed straight into an area of Tanzania called the Southern Highlands – so called because of it’s high altitude. The weather here is temperate all year round (but obviously pouring with rain when we were there. 🙄) It is green everywhere you look, and there is abundant growth everywhere you look – potatoes, tomatoes, mangoes, lemons, coconuts, onions, avocados, spinach, pineapples, apples, pears – there is an absolute abundance of fresh produce (if you are vegan, this  place is perfect for you!). Because of it’s climate, there are multitudes of farms (we learnt over time that there are quite a number of expats living in this area). And it really is beautiful. The campsite we stayed at was on such a farm, and it was a place we stayed at for a number of days. Here, Eugene caught up on some work, and the kids some school work. We did lots of clothes washing, and the people here made bread for us (a nice change from the ordinary of the past couple of weeks!) We went to Iringa and stocked up on supplies, and visited the Football for Hope centre that Eugene was involved in building in 2010.

And, we decided to do a day trip to the nearest nature reserve – Ruaha National Park. Now, for those who haven’t read my Instagram/ FB post on the adventure we had that day, here is an in-depth account of what happened (copy-and-pasted from my Instagram post);

“ So depending on how you see it, yesterday was something of a flop…

We have spent the last few days stationary at a campsite after our two weeks of wild camping. We thought that after spending a few days working, we would take a day out to go to Ruaha National Park, which we had heard is beautiful. We left early yesterday morning and took what we now understand to be the impassable route to the Park – 80kms took us 3 and a half hours. But the road was BEAUTIFUL, so we weren’t too perturbed.

We arrived at 11ish, and after paying the extortionate park entry fee (evidently typical of Tanzania’s parks), and having been told which roads to stick to and which ones to avoid (due to it being the wet season), we drove into the park. 

Five minutes after entering, it started to pour with rain, so it’s probably good to mention at this point that we have let go of any high expectations of seeing specific animals… our decision is that we just enjoy the moment we’re in. And so that is the attitude with which we entered Ruaha, despite the rain.

One thing we did expect however was that the roads that they told us would be drivable, would be drivable. 😳

We stuck only to roads they told us to stick to, and had to turn around on almost all of them because of mud. Eventually though, it was just too much, and we got totally and utterly bogged. 😩

We contacted the people at the gate. Then waited for a good hour and half before anyone showed up. In that time, Eugene and the boys (yep, I turn into somewhat of a princess in situations like these 😬), tried EVERYTHING they could to get us out. But their efforts were in vain.

Eventually we heard the distant sound of an approaching vehicle. Looking up hopefully, we saw a huge bulldozer trundling towards us. A vision in yellow. 

To cut a long story short, the bulldozer got us out (it also struggled in the thick black oozy snotty mud). By this time it was 18:30 (gate closing time 19:00). It took us an hour to get back to the exit, by which time we (the royal ‘we’) were covered in mud, darkness was fast approaching and everybody was famished. 

Alas, the nearest town was 80km of TERRIBLE road. We got to that town at 23:00, grabbed some street food (cold unsalted chips… don’t read ungrateful there), and then had to drive another hour back to the campsite. We were shattered, and somewhat nonplussed at the oddness of such a long expensive day in which achieved absolutely nothing! Except for the super cute giraffe and baby elephants that we saw. 

But I’ve decided that in situations like these, it is good to try and laugh about it. Because if you don’t, you might just cry! And that would be an unnecessary waste of energy. 😝 ”

Whilst camping on that lovely farm in Iringa, we met a whole lot of lovely people. There was an American lady managing the place who has lived in Tanzania for 12 years. When she heard what our plans were for travelling Tanzania, she organised for us to stay at her farmhouse at the next town of Njombe. So for 3 blissful nights we slept in beds, sat inside a house reading books and playing games and listening to an amazing record collection in front of a delicious warm fire whilst it was thundering water outside, cooked inside a dry kitchen on a stove top, went to the loo on an actual toilet, and showered in a proper tiled shower with lovely warm water. She asked nothing of us – “Karibu” were the words she used to describe how welcome we were to stay there. 

Whilst at the aforementioned campsite, we met another family from the UK who have been living in Tanzania for 3 years. She is working for a South African NGO called RLabs (look it up – they’re doing amazing work). She mentioned that if we enjoy hiking we should do this remarkable hike she did a while ago down to Lake Nyassa. She said she would put us in touch with somebody. And she did! A Swedish lady called Nora – she and her husband have been missionaries in Tanzania for many years. They have a house in a place called Kidope in the Livingstone mountains (where the hike starts), which they share with a Tanzanian pastor and his family, and they have a plot down by Lake Nyassa (where the hike ends), both of which we were welcome to stay at. So we decided to grab the bull by the horns and do something a little bit different.

We drove the most beautiful 3 hour drive into the mountains from Njombe – the road was largely tar, besides the last 40kms of gravel. The experience of driving into the mountains was remarkable in itself – just when you think it can’t get more remote, there suddenly appears yet another large village, selling all the things you didn’t think could possibly be available this far away from a central area! But up and up we climbed – the air and the water became cleaner and clearer, the vegetation more lush and so, SO green. The roads became more slippery and unmanageable the

closer we got the house of the pastor and his wife. Just as we were getting close (literally around the corner), we came across a truck that had broken down in the middle of the road, and that we most certainly couldn’t pass. We tried to find another route (it was getting dark by this time), each road more impassable than the next. By this time, the pastor had made contact with us and urged us to drive back to where the truck was stuck. Eventually we got there, and half the village was there trying to find a solution for moving the truck – and of course everyone had a different idea! Whilst waiting, we were bought drinks and snacks and greeted warmly by a whole host of people who didn’t know us from Adam… “Karibu” they repeated again and again, with the warmest of smiles. After about an hour of talking and laughter and digging and goodness knows what else, the truck was started and it simply drove out of it’s stuckness. Then we drove to the house where we would be staying, about 200m down the road.

By this time it was dark, and it was FREEZING cold. We had already been introduced to the lovely pastor Adonia, and on arrival at their house his wife Mama Isaya greeted us with the most enthusiastic welcome we have ever experienced! We were led to a humble kitchen where a fire was lit, and there were stools placed all around it. Mama Isaya busied herself cooking food, whilst Adonia and ourselves and one of their children and grandchildren connected, using his broken english and lots of hand signs. The children played games… there was laughter, and delicious African food of rice and beans. Exhausted, we collapsed in to bed with full hearts and basic bags packed for our hike the next morning.

At 5 the next morning, the alarm went off. By 6 we were ready to start off on our hike, on which Adonia would be accompanying us. Now, we did actually have the choice of someone organising a car for us to take us to the start of the hike. But we thought to ourselves… ‘we’re not unfit, we love hiking, we’ll be fine!’ Somehow the fact that it was 15kms managed to completely escape the smart part of our brains. We walked up hills and down hills, through valleys, across rivers, through fields of corn, past houses… and still the start of the hike did not appear. After a good couple of hours and a good few kilometres, we came to a place where Adonia knew a rich man. Luckily for us the rich man was lovely and had a car. So in we collapsed and the rich man’s driver took us to the start of the hike. Otherwise known as the Edge. And so the hike began.

Now, the lady who organised for us to do the hike said that it might be more difficult doing the hike in the rainy season, and warned us that if it was bad weather we might not get the beautiful views of the lake and the mountains. It so happened that we chose the most beautiful day to do the hike on – it was clear, but not hot, the whole day. And splendid views we really did get – it was literally magnificent… we have never seen anything like it before. However. The rainy season takes its toll on the ground – the surfaces we were walking on were unbelievably slippery. And where the rain gushes down the mountain when it does rain, it makes ruts out of the pathways rather than walkable surfaces. Not once on the entire hike was it possible to place our feet down flat. We walked down a mountain into a valley where we crossed a series of rivers. We then ascended the side of another mountain, passed through the most beautiful rainforests, and then down, down, down, down and down towards the distant lake. Unfortunately at the start of the hike I slipped a few times (yep, I can be unbelievably clumsy), and must have unknowingly hurt my knee, and climbing down the mountain became agony for me. But there was absolutely no turning back. So with the help of my gorgeous boys we eventually managed to get down to the bottom of the mountain. A motorbike took us in batches to the centre of the town 7 kms from the edge of the lake. Here, we took a taxi to a resort on the lake shore. Here, we took a boat across a small section of Lake Nyassa to the plot of the generous Swedish family where we stayed in their house, and were taken care of by the wonderful Tereza for 2 nights. We hobbled around resting our muscles, dipped our feet in the warm waters of Lake Malawi, and made plans to take transport back to the house of the lovely pastor Adonia in the mountains and our car and tiny trailer home! To think that climbing back up was something we even considered!!! 😱 I have to say that doing this hike, even one way, makes climbing Table Mountain look like child’s play. 

I just want to mention here, that Adonia at the age of 56 climbed like a mountain goat. We passed Tanzanians – men and women – who had climbed down earlier that morning to do business in the village and were climbing back up to get home by the evening. They weren’t wearing more than flip flops on their feet, and were carrying bulky parcels (bags of potatoes?) that would have proved awkward for me to carry inside the house from the car! Very, very humbling.

bursting by the time it got to us. The 5 of us squeezed into a space 1 meter wide… just remember we are not small people (especially by African standards). All in all there were 19 people inside that cruiser, plus the driver and 2 people on the roof. There was luggage under the seats, in between the seats, in between the people, on top of the people, on the roof, on the back of the car… think mattresses, sacks of rice and potatoes, pieces of furniture. More than once we had to tell the driver to stop because of pieces of luggage that had fallen. For 4 hours we were in that car. It was painfully tight (at first we found it hilarious, but the novelty wore off after about 20mins)… and to be brutally honest it was extremely smelly and gross. We had people sit on our laps, our faces stuck in strangers’ armpits (and vice versa!), and heavy packages hauled past our feet. At one point, we had to stop and get out in the pouring rain because of a queue of trucks that were stuck in the mud. We waited an hour before we could proceed with the journey, when nineteen wet bodies clambered back into the car, and on we went.

We arrived back at the house in the mountains in the early evening. We felt pretty disgusting and (once again) absolutely exhausted and still extremely stiff after our treacherous hike. We had previously agreed that we would cook a meal for Adonia and his family. So we got to work cooking, and once again we gathered around the fire in their kitchen to eat. After eating, they said they wanted to bless us – they sung to us and gave us each a gift – a piece of African cloth that they wrapped around us. This was very, very humbling, and a moment we’ll never forget.

The next morning, we said our goodbyes as they left early for church. We packed up the trailer and began the long breathtaking drive out from the mountains back to Njombe and beyond.

From Njombe to the next large town of Songea, we noticed the landscape changing as we climbed down out of the Highlands area… in fact, it looked more like the landscape we had encountered in Zambia. Passing through Songea, and along the south road close to the border of northern Mozambique we passed though a wildlife corridor. Here we found a flat area a hundred meters off the main road and wild camped for two nights (in the pouring rain of course 😬) and caught up on some work. The south road is a tarred one in good condition, which has clearly been laid for trade purposes, as we passed literally hundreds of trucks carrying coal… each one of them identical. That tar road goes straight through the wildlife corridor, where we had been told we might see elephants. We saw no wildlife at all, except for a hyena that had been hit and killed by a truck. This upset us so much – one thing we despise (even at home) is the effect that tar roads have on wildlife… in our opinion, slabs of tarmac were never supposed to interrupt areas of wild inhabitation (I guess I could write alot here, but I won’t… we’re just as ‘guilty’ of driving these roads as anyone else).

Somewhat tired of the rain and the cold – the soggy lifestyle we’d been leading up until this point, we were eager to get to the coast. So we drove from our place of rest in the wilds of the south, to the coastal town of Lindi at the most bottom right hand corner of Tanzania. It wasn’t raining when we got there – in fact, it was hot and humid. How thankful we were for the reprieve!

And on the coast is where we have been for a few days now, and that is where I leave you for now… I have the rather pressing matter of having to pack for a few days in Zanzibar 😉 See you in part 2!