Sitting around the fire last night- more for ‘atmosfire’ than the need for heat, as even the nights here are extremely warm – we commented on how peaceful it was. We are less than a stone’s throw away from the local village; there are no fences, no big dogs and no security. Probably our only slight concern might have been the ellie that wonders down to the river to drink. In S.A. we would probably think twice before camping in our own back yard – that’s an exaggeration but I wouldn’t camp in the park area outside our back fence.
The 100km drive down to the Riverside Camp was short and pleasant, barring the badly rutted road. The Riverside is extremely pleasant, with green lawns, shady trees and nice ablutions. Although we are the only campers, there are a number of tented bandas (thatched tented chalets) that are occupied. The place is fairly busy and most of the thatched boma areas are occupied by students. The main attraction of the camp is that they offer Swahili language courses. Students can take anything from 1 week to a 4 month course in the language. Most of the students are from the USA, Britain and Germany. They seem fairly taken by our rooftop tent and we have had comments like, “look at that cute little camper” and “neat house”.
After sorting out our accommodation, we headed 14km back up the ‘dreaded taxi’ hill into Iringa – thank heavens, this time, without incident. We did a bit of shopping and headed into the tourist – Art and Craft centre for lunch, this must rate as our worst meal in Africa so far.
We returned to Riverside and worked out our route for the next 2 weeks. We are seriously ahead of schedule and would press on North if we didn’t have the whole meet up in Dar / Zanzibar with the kids thing planned. Killing two weeks is certainly worth it, if it means having them with us. The last thing we want is to have to spend it in Dar, we have not heard great reports about having to stay there as a tourist for any length of time.
Our rough planning is to head off to Kilwa Masoko, a beach resort on the coast, south of Dar. It is roughly about a 600km trip but we have set aside 4 days to get there, with some pretty rough out of the way accommodation through some pretty remote parks. I sure hope it is worth it!!!!
We went to the dining hut for a buffet dinner and met most of the Swahili learning students. All except one were missionaries, here to study the language and then go into the country to save the local people. It is amazing how many missionaries we have met in Malawi and Tanzania, there are apparently some 700 missionaries in the Iringa area alone. They all drive around in fancy new vehicles advertising their specific cause. The cost of the 4 month course comes to around R35 000, all funded by the church organisations. There is a lot of church money floating around, forgive me for being cynical and I know there are some good projects out there but I wonder how much money is wasted. A missionary couple arrives, is given a new 4x4, spends R70 000 learning the local language, goes out into the community and sets up a school or a church, feed some starving people and 2 years later they are back in the US telling their mates how they saved the people of Africa – but what happens to the schools, churches and starving people who have come to rely on their support once they leave? For the third time in the last 10 days Gray has landed up sitting next to a very vocal US missionary and on 2 other occasions, vegetarians – he says all he wants is to have a couple of beers and a chunk of meat, with his mates, and not feel guilty.
We also managed to chat to the owners of the camp, they say Kilwa is definitely worth a visit but they don’t recommend we take the route that we had planned. Our alternative is to take the road up to Dar and then south, adding about 700km onto the journey. I guess it’s back to the map and drawing board.
Our 'neat house' at Riverside
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