This weekend we went 'camping' at the camp for African People and Wildlife run by Laly and Charles (aka Buddy). I say 'camping' because I guess technically we were "in the bush", but I slept in a king bed, used a flush toilet, and took a shower, so it's hardly roughing it. They are a community based conservation group that does a lot of work in the nearby village of Loibor Siret which we were also lucky enough to visit. The drive was long - I think longer than we anticipated. After about 20 minutes on the road outside of Arusha we took a left and were on dirt roads (and calling some of it a road is a bit of a stretch) for the next 4 1/2 hours. We barely saw a handful of other cars the entire drive. We passed through several small villages each more remote than the previous until we finally passed through Loibor Siret and then to the camp at Noloholo. It was gorgeous sitting at the top of a hill with the park boundary to Tarangire just in the distance. At night we could hear all sorts of wildlife (hyenas, bush babies, frogs...). Each family had a big tent and a little 2-3 person tent. I was lucky enough to get the king bed which I shared with Anderson and Matt slept in the tent with the girls. Between our tent and the Bank's tent there was a nice pit toilet and just past our tent was a shower which the maasai filled with warm water when we wanted to shower. We were also give hot water in the morning to wash with in a makeshift sink (which I now want for all camping trips).
Saturday we had a relaxed breakfast and then Laly and Buddy took us into Loibor Siret to show us (mostly David and Matt) some of their community projects. Matt and David met with a group maasai from town while we just hung out. I think the kids enjoyed the ride down there in the back of Buddy's truck as much as the rest of the visit. The local children followed us around and were just as shy as ours were to them. Anderson was fascinated by the animals (baby cows and goats mostly) - they didn't stand a chance. One of the women from town, Mama Juma, was very outgoing and kept trying to hold the kids which as you can imagine didn't really go very well. Cole did the best and gave her a giant hug. I have several photos of Anderson trying to squirm out of her arms before Matt finally got one of him smiling. Apparently momma juma (??sp?) is a very progressive Maasai woman and is very outspoken (was even shushed by the others during the meetings). She is even 'divorced'. I have a feeling that I'd like her a lot.
Later on Saturday Buddy drove us even further into the middle of nowhere and we climbed to the top of this ridge. It was a gorgeous overlook on both sides. We heard elephants trumpeting below and eventually spotted them with the binoculars. We drove back to camp in the dark and stopped next a water hole and listened to the deafening croak of the frogs - really amazing. We also so a serval cat run across the road into the bushes.
Ashlyn fell in love with Laly and was actually crying when we got back on the paved road because she wanted to go back. I love it when she attaches to someone like that.
Sunday was a long day again in the car, but the kids were exhausted from the weekend and slept a lot. When they weren't sleeping they were counting maasai bomas or trying to spot wildlife. We did get to see a dung beetle doing it's thing and rolling poop into a perfect circle - kept the kids entertained for a while. short video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2smhWdgZBug
(all the pics are in a separate post and I think you have to open it up to read captions...or they are here: http://tandapictures.shutterfly.com/1900 )
In regular life news, Tierney is about to lose her first tooth. It is very loose and she's carrying her tooth fairy pillow everywhere just in case it falls out (yes, it really is that close). You can see the adult tooth coming in behind it which she just thinks is so great. Any idea what the tooth fairy brings these days? Tierney tells us that there are two tooth fairies for every country in case two kids lose their tooth at the same time. "He's not like Santa ya know?" I wonder if one of the Tanzanian tooth fairies brings the same things that the American ones do (one boy, one girl in case you were wondering)
We are hearing that our shipment may be here by week's end which would be good because Matt and David are off to Kenya next week and I don't want to have to deal with it's arrival by myself.
The best news is that my sister got to hear her baby's heartbeat for the first time last week (due on my birthday, too - how cool is that?). Nothing I do here can compete with that. Congrats to Joanna and Mike!
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