It is time for another adventure. After Guyana, just a couple months ago, today we are leaving for Tanzania for our long delayed safari. We have booked everything online including a guide as needed and now we can only hope and pray that all our planning pays off. We start as usual in the Phoenix airport, this time we know that we have to reserve the Sapphire Lounge and we do just that in preparation of the trip.
It takes a bit to enter as they cannot understand our name for some reason but soon we are in and it is time to order from the airstream menu at first and then from the more general amenities.
One of our preferred things to order here is the Sapphire cocktail, this time non-alcoholic as we have a very long flight ahead of us.
The first short flight is from Phoenix to San Francisco where we board our transatlantic flight. We were a bit apprehensive before our flight due to tensions in the Middle East, we are flying Qatar Airlines via Doha to Tanzania and the US is threatening to attack Iran for the last weeks. Not a lot to do than pray that nothing happens during this weeks and luckily it doesn’t, they wait until we return to start the fighting. The flight is quite long, 15 hours, so we settle in watch TV and eat multiple food servings and try to sleep.
We arrive in Doha late afternoon and now it is time to try something that we learned about while researching the flight. Supposedly Qatar Airways provides a complimentary hotel in Doha if your layover is longer than 8 hours and there isn’t a better connection. And our layover is 8:15h and there is no better connection. We even applied for it already and got a voucher but now we have to exchange it into hotel assignments.
This is not easy as there is no clear sign where to do it. We are funneled into the security control and there is no one to ask so we pass it and ask the guard on the other side. He say it is actually prior to the security line and he passes us back into the planeside zone, we lost 1/2h passing through security. But now finally we find the right person, get our hotel accomodations, pass again through the security zone and we are in the airport. Before going to the airport hotel we enjoy a bit the famous indoor garden but we don’t explore it thoroughly, we will have time to do it on return.
The complimentary hotel we received is inside the terminal so no need to exit the airport. It is quite expensive otherwise so we are happy to have received this amenity and to be able to sleep 4 hours and recuperate between two longer flights. With just one more stop outside, we exchange some Qatari riyals to have when we return from Tanzania when we plan to explore Doha.
We wake up early morning or late night, really it is difficult to tell and now it is time to find a lounge. This is because food is not included in the voucher and we are not sure if something is served on the plane. The airport is huge and it has multiple lounges, the one next to us unfortunately it is full so we decide to move to the one next to our departure gate.
On the way we notice a pop up shop for labubus and because our relatives are quite obsessed about them we check it out and mark it for our return to buy some for them.
Our lounge is near the famous Lamp Bear and is also quite full with a long queue but it goes quite fast and we have time to eat a bit before our flight.
We shouldn’t have wondered though, food is served on the flight enough to last us for the day till dinner, luckily.
And then we are in Tanzania, Kilimanjaro Airport, to be exact. Disembarking is quite a wild affair with no one directing us really from the airplane to the airport. But soon we are in line and are trying to decide where to go. Our passports allow us entry without a visa fee but that is not mentioned anywhere in the airport. We shout and wave our passports and finally someone directs us to the line for returning Tanzanian nationals. We enter ok and given this we are relatively fast outside. Still then we lose a lot of time trying to exchange money, there is only one kiosk open and there is a long queue.
And we have an appointment at the exit with our car rental guy. We are communicating with him via Whatsapp and let him know that we will be 15 minutes late and after some searching we finally find him in front of the airport. He is quite nice and agrees to do our Ngorongoro permits now vs tomorrow which really would save us hours the next days. In addition he will drive the car and give us the instructions at their location, which is good as we can get used to it and the traffic without driving it directly.
There is one stop on the one hour drive to their headquarters, a gas station. As they provide the car without gas we have to fill it up on our dime, but again it is worth it instead of waiting till the next day. Then it takes some time to get the permits and do a walkaround of the car to understand all of the quirks and we get the keys and are off. Specifically we drive a short distance to the Arusha Coffee Lodge where we plan to visit the shops and just stretch our legs.
The stores are ridiculously expensive so we just window shop for some time before leaving. If we can as we cannot start the car. The key simply does not turn. We have over 5 keys on our ring and we are not sure which the correct key is. We try and try and finally get the right key and turn it correctly that it turns, phew, that would have been beyond embarassing to call the company to start the car.
There is one more stop for us before the lodge, we want to buy some provisions for the trip. There is a supermarket nearby and we stop there and buy lots of water and some snacks to have during our drive. Downtown Arusha itself is a horror to drive through using old Toyota Cruiser which has a huge breaking distance. And there are lots of cars, people all going in all directions, we are not yet used to the traffic here. Like no one stops for red lights and when we try we get honked repeatedly, really weird.
We are quite happy when we exit the downtown area and are back on relatively quieter highways. Throughout we drive strictly the speed limit, there is lots of police just waiting to catch you making a mistake. Which they do not throughout our trip, phew. And soon we are reaching our destination and accomodation for the first day, the Ngare Sero Mountain Lodge.
