Spokane to Arusha

“Time Flies. You Are the Pilot”

   KLM napkin

Our flight path takes us in a straight-line west to Seattle then in an arcing soar east over Iceland dropping us at sunrise in Amsterdam. There’s time just enough to walk from arrival gate to departure gate where the flight to Dar Es Salaam is already in the boarding process. We join the line of almost 300 other backpack-wearing adventurers all dressed in REI inventory.  Our path arcs east again and further south than the tip of India flying above place names that evoke familiarity yet remain as yet unknown: Mogadishu, Nairobi, Mombasa, to land at Kilimanjaro Airport in Arusha, Tanzania. Through the Airbus windows an exotic, mysterious African sunset fills us with anticipation. The pilot uses the length of the runway makes a U-turn and taxis back to where we disembark using a rolling metal staircase directly onto the tarmac.

It’s 8pm and 80 degrees. The warm, moist air cuddles up and embraces us. The huge plane looms in the darkness larger than the tiny terminal. In 45 minutes it will be off again and here we are.

Inside, there are two lines: “I have a visa” and “I need a visa”. We join the have line. Without a word the agent, dressed in military regalia, scans each passport snaps a webcam photo of each of us, takes fingerprints on a digital pad from some of us, then points towards baggage claim. We are here. Africa.

An OAT (Overseas Adventure Travel) rep, Jeffrey, scoops us up out of the moving milieu of travelers and greeters into a van and into the dark for the hour plus drive to the Olasiti Lodge. As he backs up there are several loud hard slaps to the back end of the van. An unseen group loading luggage reminding Jeffery he’s in a crowded parking lot.

We can’t see much, but people are out. It’s Saturday night, time for fun and also haircuts. We pass at least 7 ragged, but busy looking shops where men are getting what appears to be the universal style, short, cropped, nearly shaved. We pass a group of spectators encircling a performer, small open fires in pits, some covered with grates where people are cooking, a discotheque Jeffrey calls black and white where all races mingle, a shrouded glimpse of Mt Meru, Tanzania’s second highest peak. Through the windshield we can see a stately man riding on the roof of a semi-trailer. He sits cross-legged, balanced and composed taking the bumps and turns without evident concern. His t-shirt is decorated with the US flag.

The road is paved and decent. There are frequent “sleeping policemen” (speed bumps) moderating the pace. Even so, skill is required to navigate. Motorbikes run along the shoulders on both sides, their single headlamps shine to both left and right. It’s English style here, driving in the left lane. Jeffery maneuvers, unfazed, even as we slow down to pass an accident, (a small car crushed against the side of a semi). He hands out snippets of info as we go. Gasoline is $7.50 a gallon (someone with a “big hand” is taking large profits), unemployment is a universal problem, (38% unemployed). One man is working and 10-15 others are waiting for his job. The farmers near Arusha grow red beans and maize. Coffee is grown at higher elevations. Tanzanite is mined in the foothills of Mount Kilimanjaro. It is found nowhere else in the world. He tells us our trip will be Super-B. His son, Treasure, (a name all children should hear when they’re called) came home from school with “superb” written on his work. He told his parents he had received a super-b.

We veer off the busy main road onto a bumpy dirt track. At its end two men open tall green wooden gates to admit the van into the lodge parking area. Caesar greets us with a “Jambo Jambo” and a simple meal of soup with warm rolls and butter.

There’s a wedding somewhere near, the drumbeats and singing perhaps go on into the night, but we are soon oblivious, stretched out in a four-posted king-sized bed swathed in a cocoon of mosquito netting soundly asleep.