Moshi - Our Last Few Days Of This Trip

 Today we have a bit of lie in and then get up and have a leisurely breakfast on the terrace.

We have one of the newer garden rooms which are only a couple of years old and very comfortable.

For anyone who hasn’t read my blogs before I will just give a brief explanation about More Than A Drop.

As part of the Swiss foundation More Than A Drop (MTAD), the hotel empowers young women from difficult backgrounds to build a future through professional hospitality training. 100% of the hotel’s proceeds go directly toward funding their education. Guests become part of their journey—from classroom to career.

It’s a great place to stay and it’s lovely to see the girls studying in the classroom and putting what they have learnt into practice in the restaurant, kitchen, garden and with the housekeeping and laundry etc.

We decide to have a lazy day and spend our time relaxing in the garden. MTAD has a really nice vegetarian menu and so today we eat lunch and dinner here.

This evening we see the girls coming back from a sports afternoon.

The next day is Tuesday. Robert is busy in the office so we are free until the evening. We decide to spend the day at Keys Hotel using their pool.

We have a good chat with some German guests over breakfast. I always find that we meet some interesting people when staying at MTAD. However this means we are a bit later leaving and it is now pretty hot so instead of walking we decide to use a bajaji. The first guy who stops already has 2 passengers in the back so we say we say “No thank you”, so the driver then makes one of the guys in the back get out and squash in the front with him and then there is room for us both to squeeze in the back. It’s really only a few minutes drive and he only charges us TSH 1,000 (less than 30p) so it’s fine.

We spend a nice day by the pool, its very quiet, and the majority of the time we have the pool area to ourselves, we even have our lunch down there, pizza and chips….real Mzungu food!!

Lucy is our waitress and she is very friendly. Before we leave she asks us if we can leave a review and mention her. She even has a laminated information sheet - very resourceful!

However mid afternoon the sun disappears and the heavens open. It only lasts about 15 minutes and then the sun is back.

This evening we have arranged to meet up with Paula who we have known since she was a student at ACTT back in about 2012. Robert picks us up at about 5 and we then pick up Paula and drive to KiliHome bar which is a favourite place of ours.

Paula has a 5 year old little boy, Harrison, who has Hirschsprungs disease which means part of his bowel doesn't work properly. He needed an operation about a year ago and then continuing follow up appointments, tests and treatment which we have been paying for. He is still not right but the hope is that he will eventually be able to manage his condition and lead a normal life. I had hoped to see Harrison today but Robert was hungry (apparently he missed lunch ) so wants to go straight to the bar. Hopefully we will get to see Harrison tomorrow.

We have a lovely evening catching up with Paula, she certainly seems to be coping with life better than she was a year ago, though of course life is never easy for someone like her. We are in touch with her constantly when we are at home but it’s lovely to actually spend time with her in person again.

Later in the evening we are joined by Mugo, one of Robert’s friends. We have ordered a big sharing platter which has a large selection of food and a lot of it. We enjoy a lovely evening with some interesting conversations - all good fun.

The next day is Wednesday and we wake up to clear views of Kilimanjaro. It doesn’t look like there is much snow on the top. As the morning goes on the clouds gather but you can still just see it.

At breakfast today we are served by Glory and Agnes. It is their first time doing breakfast so Millie is around directing them. They actually do really well and everything goes smoothly. They both tell us that they are enjoying being at school here and their favourite place to work is the kitchen.

Later some of the girls disappear into the office for a lesson whilst others are on housekeeping duties.

The grounds and gardens at MTAD are actually looking pretty good at the moment.

After lunch we head down to the ACTT offices. Again it is far too hot to walk so get a bajaji. This time we don’t have to share.

When we arrive there are 2 classes going on. Both are aimed at providing young people with the skills they will need when applying for jobs, writing CV’s, preparing for an interview, setting up their own business as well as ICT training and entrepreneurship guidance.

We sort out all our paperwork and finances with Robert. Then while we are doing this, Boniface arrives back from the airport with the latest consignment of refurbished laptops that they have purchased from the U.K. Robert now needs to give them a quick check and assign each to a price band. The staff will then thoroughly check each one before they are actually available to be sold.

Once Robert has finished and everyone else has gone home we drive out to Paula”s home to see Harrison. On the way Pete gets a nice photo of Kilimanjaro from the Water For Life roundabout.

When we arrive at Paula’s, Harrison is asleep. He has been to school today and is obviously very tied as he really doesn’t want to wake up. We have a chat with Paula and her mum but don’t stay too long. Harrison is now 5 years old and seems to be growing well, he is a lot bigger than when we visited last year and actually looks quite tall to me, which is a good sign. He still has plenty of issues but hopefully his condition will continue to improve with further medical support.

As we leave I take a few photos outside Paula’s place and some of her neighbours.

We have been invited to dinner at Robert’s house this evening which is always something to look forward to. Mama Diana, Robert’s wife, doesn’t disappoint us and has prepared a lovely meal. This is a great end to our trip.

Today we are flying home with Ethiopian Airways via Addis Ababa to London Heathrow. It’s been a great trip as always. We have visited 14 schools in Mwanza, Geita, Tabora and Dodoma regions and loaned out a further 16 computers with surge protection leads, 3 printers, 1 laptop and 1 projector. We have also caught up with many friends and acquaintances and met new ones along the way. We have thoroughly enjoyed our trip and we hope you have enjoyed it too. For those of you who have supported us I hope you have been able to see the difference you are making to the lives of the children, teachers and local communities. We will be back again next year to carry on where we have left off. Thank you.

Saturday in Dodoma and Sunday Travelling to Moshi

 Today we had a pretty relaxing day. We spent the morning around the hotel and then met Robert for lunch. We went to one of the restaurants that always has plenty of food ready prepared so there is no long wait. I was very excited to see that along with the normal choices of rice and ugali they also had spaghetti which we don’t often see on our trips. They also have beef stew or liver, beans and greens. It’s TSH 7,000 (£2) for a plate of food whatever you have and I have to say it was all good.

This place is obviously somewhere that the buses stop judging by the number of wash hand basins and the amount of food they had prepared. Luckily no buses arrived while we were there and it was very quiet.

This evening we had been invited to dinner by Robert’s brother Charles so Robert and Aaron picked us up about 6ish. 

We had a lovely evening there and were entertained by Charles’s 2 youngest children Dennis and Dorcas. We had a nice meal accompanied by a very good Italian wine. Opening the wine did cause some amusement as it had a cork, clearly not something Robert was used to dealing with and in the end Aaron had to come to his assistance!

So the following day was Sunday and we were travelling from Dodoma to Moshi. Robert wanted to leave at 7.30 but unfortunately although our hotel said breakfast was served from 7am nothing was actually ready until 7.45! So we grabbed a quick chapati and some fruit and were ready to leave soon after 8. After a stop at the petrol station and then ATM we were on our way.

The road is pretty good being tarmac all the way apart from a few diversions for roadworks.

At the moment the riverbed is completely dry.

Every so often our progress slows right down as we get stuck behind a very slow moving lorry going up a hill and it can be quite difficult to get passed.

This part of the drive as far as Babati is really quite picturesque and we enjoy the scenery.

We arrive in Babati soon after 12 and stop for lunch at another one of these places offering the usual selection of food that is already cooked….the Tanzanian equivalent of Fast Food.

We are on our way again by 1pm. The drive this afternoon does not offer the same nice views.

As we approach Arusha town we drive passed the airport which has been expanded over the last few years and is now able to accommodate some mid size planes.

There is now an Arusha bypass which you can use if going straight on to Moshi but we aren’t using it today as we going to drop Aaron at the Bus Station in town so he can get a bus back to Mwanza tonight. The traffic gets heavier as we drive into town but nowhere near as bad as before the bypass was built.

It takes a little while to locate exactly where to drop Aaron but eventually we work it. We say our goodbyes and drop him off. Robert will now drive the final part of our journey.

We can tell we are getting near the turn off for Kilimanjaro Airport when the street lights appear.

We arrive in Moshi about 6pm. It’s been a drive of around of around 320 miles (512 Km). 

Robert drops us off at More Than A Drop B&B which will be our home for the next few days. We have stayed here many times before and are welcomed back by Jacky and shown to our room.

It’s been a long journey so we don’t do much more than unpack some essentials and then enjoy a cold bottle of white wine and some pasta on the terrace. After 2.5 weeks away from tourist areas we are now back into an area frequented by climbers and safarigoers and the Western menus that are provided for them 😀…..and it made a nice change.