Tanzania

I got up at 5.30am monday morning in Kigali to get the bus to the Tanzanian border. I have a lot of travelling to do in the next 2 days to get to Arusha, so I wanted to get started early. I litterally got the last seat on the bus. It was a small foldout chair in the asile right near the door. My large pack was on the floor in front of the door which was really annoying because anytime someone got on or off the bus, I would have to pick up my pack, which isn't that light. Thankfully we didn't stop that much. The road was good all the way there and in 3 hours we were at the border. It was 9.30am Rwandan time but as I crossed the border, it was 10.30am Tanzanian time. I had no problem crossing the border and after eating 4 chapatis for breakfast, I was in a minivan heading for Kahama.
The road to Kahama was pretty good, better than I expected. The landscape was mostly scrubland and some trees but became drier the further I got from Rwanda. I arrived in Kahama at 4pm and wanted to keep travelling so I would have less distance to cover tomorrow but there was no bus leaving to Singida now, it was too late in the afternoon. I would have to overnight in Kahama. Kahama is a small, dusty town that doesn't even get a mention in my guidebook. The bus passed a few hotels on the way to the station and I checked into a very nice room. It was self contained, hot water and TV. I ate at the hotel and had my first Kilimanjaro beer. I went to bed early because I had another long day ahead of me.

I got up again at 5.30am and by 6 was in a minivan heading for Tende. I was on my way to Arusha but had to switch to a large bus at the Tende junction. We reached the junction before 8 but had to wait till 8.15 for the bus coming from Mwanza. I met a local guy, Titus, and sat beside him. He helped me get the real price for my ticket and not the Mzungu price and saved me $4. The bus was ok, it wasn't crowded but it was a piece of shit. We had to stop to fix a flat tire and then numerous other times for small repairs of what, I'm not sure. We reached Singida at noon and stopped here for lunch. After that we left the tarmac for a horrible dusty and bumpy road. The landscape was very dry and clouds of dust would enter the bus anytime traffice passed us in the opposite direction. There wasn't much of anything along the way. A few small towns and that's it. Like yesterday, we just passed a lot of uninhabitated open space. Tanzania is vast and spread out, such a contrast to Rwanda where every piece of land is cultivated.
Night fell and I still wasn't in Arusha. We finally arrived at 9pm. It had been 15 hours since I started travelling, my longest travel day on this trip by far. I was so glad to arrive. I took a taxi to a hotel. There were no bodas here. I didn't think the room price was fair so I looked at a few other places and found a room at Minje's for $6.50, without bathroom but it was clean and quiet. I ate at the African Queen, chips and chicken washed down with a tasty and light Kilimanjaro, a 500ml bottle costs $1.20.


Safari shopping
I was out of my hotel by 7.45am. I only had limited time and wanted to get on safari as soon as I could. Dominic, a local guy/tout who I met last night, was outside waiting for me. Without asking he took me around to a bunch of tour operators. It is low season now and difficult to find a group to join. I had 4 to 5 days to do a safari and my ideal safari was 2 nights in Ngorongoro crater and 2 nights in Serengeti but it looked like this wasn't going to happen. There are standard safari circuits and since I'm only one person, I would have to join group doing one of these. Once I found out the price of a 5 day safari, it was clear I would only have enough to do a 4 day safari. The typical 4 day safari was the first day in Lake Manyara national park, sleep in a room in a small village near the park, second day drive to Serengeti, passing through the crater, camp in Serengeti. The third day was game drive Serengeti in morning and then drive to Ngorongoro crater, camp on rim of the crater and the last day was a game drive in the crater before returning to Arusha in the evening. I talked to numerous operators and they all had the same itenirary. It was just a matter of finding one who was going soon.
While looking around, I met Darco, a Serb, who was also looking for a tour, but only 2 days. He was having trouble and joined Dominic and I. I was exhausted by walking around and looking so much, so I left Dominic and Darco and took a siesta. Dominic would keep an ear out for my safari while he looked with Dominic. He came back in the afternoon and had a promising tour. I went with him to Annex hotel whose in house safari company, Safari Planners, had a group of 4 people leaving the next day for a 4 day tour. I could join them and the price was the average price. I was still sceptical, so I only paid for half the tour and would pay for the rest tomorrow morning. Safari Planners would be picking me up from my hotel at 9am. I went out for breakfast at the African Queen and was ready and waiting.