Day 1

Blog – Day One 9 /7/15

Chris Whitford

 

The plane ride to Doha was six and a half hours of film watching and waiting. This was fine and expected, what was not expected by me was the heat and humidity in Doha. Getting off the plane was like entering sauna. However, the heat was forgotten when we saw the inside of the largest airport in the world and, more importantly, had a coffee ahead of the next leg. Before we boarded our next plane to Dar Es Salaam, which was a five hour flight, taken up by sleeping. When we arrived into Dar Es Salaam we met our drivers and went to the mall to buy our lunch. Brad and Myself went to the supermarket to buy some sandwiches and crisps, and met a lovely man called Cherry who shook our hands and asked us where we were from. When he heard we were from England he kept telling us how much he would love to come, to which we told him that Tanzania was better for the weather and heat. This made his day. When we arrived at the hotel all of the luggage was taken to our rooms. And we spent the rest of the afternoon swimming and relaxing, until tea on the beach, followed by a game of charades on the beach near the fire. It was a great start to a great trip. 

The Traffic on the roads is mental, and I noticed that you mostly drive with your horn, and be ready to dodge a truck driving down the wrong side of the road. Also the other interesting thing was the gap between the poor and the rich. When on one side of the road was a house with gold plated gates and a swimming pool and on the other was a child walking home from school with no shoes on. This was very surprising to me as you never here of the rich people of Africa.