Day 38 - 39 - Moshi / Arusha

Day 38 (Acacia day 35) – Moshi
We woke up early in Dar and went out for a long drive to make it all the way to Moshi which sits near the foot (think it’s about 20 or 30 clicks away) of Mt. Kilimanjaro. At one point traffic getting out of Dar was so bad it took us somewhere in the realm of 4 hours to go about 70 kilometers… But we were on our way and made it to Moshi uneventfully. Unfortunately we weren’t able to see the peak of Kilimanjaro but that’s no surprise given that the mountain is the highest point In Africa and is more or less constantly shrouded in clouds. It is significantly cooler here but also a lot greener and lusher. We met a few people who were either setting out to climb or had just climbed Mt. Kili. Definitely something I would like to do one day but we’ll see what happens.

Day 39 (Acacia day 36) – Arusha
We got to sleep in a bit today since we only have a short drive down the road to Arusha. We stopped a couple of times on the way to get food for the next few days. This included a real supermaret as well as a coupe of road side stops for fresh fruit and vegetables.

The camp ground at Arusha (actually Meserani just outside of Arusha) is called the Snake Park. They catch and look after injured animals of all sorts (but primarily snakes) and have a small little zoo area. The Maasai tend to kill any snakes they find since they are so harmful to the animals. So instead the park asks them to let it know and they will go out and catch them instead. They have mambas, cobras and all kinds of snakes as well as the odd vulture, owl or other animal that has been injured. There are also a couple of crocodiles.Part of the park is also a Maasai village museum and several huts where Maasai ladies make and sell various jewelry, carvings and other things.

However the real draw for the park is that it is the launching ground for trips out to the Ngorongoro Crater and Serengeti. We just hung out, took it easy and got our stuff together for the trip out to the Crater. A couple of easy beers, few rounds of darts and an early morning…