Day 18 - Isanga Bay, Lake Tanganyika, Tanzania

Today was a glorious day of doing nothing. After that long torturous trip down to the bay it was great to know that we didn't have to go anywhere or do anything.

We had a late lazy morning and a late brunch. I spent at least half an hour scratching around in the snapper boxes trying to find the coffee that I had stored in the boxes. We had consumed  so much coffee in the first week of the trip that I had kept the rest hidden so that we could at least last until Nairobi where I could buy some more. I am personally not a coffee drinker so it wouldn't worry me but the rest of the gang are coffee addicts and I didn't want to hear the moans when there was no more coffee so I must admit I hid the rest of the supply, the only problem is that I hid it so well that I couldn't find it again when I wanted to. I did however really get to know exactly what was where and refreshed my memory on what I actually have stored up there. I think this will make Ronel and Fritz laugh!

So after brunch we had a real clean up time... It reminded me a little of boarding school when everyone had to clean and tidy up. Ernest of course took a little bit of encouraging (and threatening) but once all was done we headed for the beach and a bit of sun and reading time. Dirk the lodge manager put the kayaks out for us to potter around in the water with and he also had some goggles and snorkels to go see some tropical fish which are in great abundance along the rocks. Nicolene and Dirk have been managing the lodge for nearly 4 years now and they are very helpful and make our stay as comfortable and easy as they can.

  

Kim, Ernest and I paddled out and around the rocky promontory and we saw the most gorgeous fish and even a couple of otters. In the afternoon we went for a boat ride way up the lake as far as the Tanzanian border. Even in this area there has been a huge population explosion and as I have said before just tons of kids.

We had hours of debating on whether to stay here an extra day, as we were already running a day late and we know that getting out of here is  not going to be easy so it might take us a little longer to get into Katavi, the reserve in Tanzania where we are headed next.  We  eventually decided by mutual consensus  that because we took so long to get down here, it would be worth it to stay another day, who knows if we will ever come back here again or whether it will still be here to visit with all these people putting pressure on the land.

So we are spending day two here, just reading and swimming and trying to get blogs caught up with and I managed to get an internet connection so we managed to sent out a few pictures.

Just some interesting data which Ken was telling us around dinner last night about the flights that landed at Shiwa Ngandu. The planes that used to come out were old Vimmys bombers from the First World War. The pilots were in an open cockpit and there were 8 passengers in the fuselage all seated in wicker chairs with no air hostesses. The journey used to take up to two weeks and there were numerous stops at places like Khartoum, Nairobi, Shiwa Ngandu, Lusaka, Entebbe and Bulawayo - still beat the slow ship journey out to Africa. On the first experimental flight out, the aircraft actually crashed in Bulawayo but there were no passengers on board and nobody was killed.  Oh yes another bit of trivial information is that the aircraft had wooden propellers. The full story is available on the net at  www.orafs.co.za.  It’s a good read!

In the afternoon Ernest wanted to get the truck out of the campsite and turned around onto solid ground. He was panicking about the soft sand and getting stuck as there are certainly no tractors to pull us out if we get stuck. So Steve, Kim, Ernest and I spent some time digging out the soft sand, putting down rocks, wetting the sand and then Ernest got in and drove it out.

He was in such a hurry however and so nervous about getting stuck that he just went too fast and hit the side mirror on the passenger’s side and smashed the mirrors. The mirrors are still in the frame but in a hundred pieces I am afraid. Oh well, when he uses the mirror now he has to realize that there is only one car he is looking at and not twenty or thirty. He did say that he really underestimated the capability of this truck, it didn't miss a beat and although the trip was torturous down the mountain it was totally able to cope with it.

Singing off for now, until tomorrow!