In November Avril and I impulsively decided to strike out for the Kilimanjaro foothills and see some more of the country that feels so much like home. Another opportunity to enjoy Jehovah’s creation was nigh.
We took our tiny new tent which we were given by Graham White last year and our little stove and off we went, first to Moshi then on a little bus up into the hills. We were headed for Lake Chala, an isolated volcanic caldera filled by underground springs from Kilimanjaro herself. The lake lies astride the border of Tanzania and Kenya.
Uplink to the mothership
Did you see what he’s got?
It’s supposedly really really deep.
Kilimanjaro is hiding in those clouds in the background.
What struck us as extraordinary was the sheer biomass of insects that inhabited the area. When I say ‘biomass’ I choose my word carefully – the insects were both numerous and large! Not a camping trip for the insect-wary, it nearly drove us crazy on the first night. Safe inside the tent, we kept wondering if it was raining; the pitter-patter was actually and endless succession of different insects impacting with the outer wall of the tent.
The scenery was marvellous, though, and the lake beautifully clear and lovely to swim in. We were warned to keep an eye out for crocs though – a tourist was apparently lunch for one a couple of years back.
We also spent many hours looking for Bush Elephants that roam free around these parts. It seems that they had decided on a last minute package holiday and were nowhere to be found. They’d left plenty of poo though – no doubt they were crouching just around the next bush.
We stayed five nights in the end, and had a picnic with our buddy Rebeka Jameson from Moshi and her mate Katie on our final day.
Then, on our way back to Moshi, we got hopelessly stuck in the mud in Rebeka’s car – our efforts to extricate the vehicle only got us filthy with bright red mud. We ended up staying over at Rebeka’s place and finally made it back on the following day.
