The drive to Same and then to Moshi was supposed to start at 5 to avoid Monday traffic jam, but it started at 6:30, because TIA (this is Africa). In the car was supposed to be me, Kazoka, Joseph, and his driver. Instead it was me, Kazoka, his driver, and his two nieces who were going to Chome, where Kazoka’s family is from, for a funeral. Kazoka told me to sit in the front seat which my legs were thankful for. I later realized it was probably to try to avoid getting pulled over by the Polisi. Well, it didn’t work.
Scenery
We took Old Bagamoyo road up the coast. Bagamoyo was one of the slave trading ports on the mainland. The word means “lay down your heart” because it was from their the slaves left for Zanzibar and then the Middle East.
The drive through the country is very similar through the whole 7 hours. The road is one lane in each direction and every few minutes you drive through a village, and the speed limit goes to 50KPH. Each village has the same core amenities, a bar, butcher shop, nail salon, grocery, auto repair, and lots of people watching the cars go by. So it makes for quite a long journey.
We got pulled over a total five times, for “over-speeding” not to be confused with just speeding. Basically the Polisi stands in the middle of the road and you have to pull over. Here is our track record:
1st time: Paid Polisi Tsh4000
2nd time: Kazoka said I was his wife and we were going to funeral, and we were released.
3rd time: Polisi looked in the back and let us go.
4th time: Polisi looked drunk, said habari, I said nzuri, he said Salama and then waved us off.
5th time: Lady Parisi showed us the picture of someone else’s car and we had to pay Tsh 10,000 anyway.
The important thing is we made it to Same and got to stop in at the Elephant Motel and more importantly see the fabulous structure the students built over there couple weeks in Same.
Homecoming at the Elephant Motel
It is a multipurpose/office building complete with a double roof and windows with shutters. Hopefully it lasts longer than our monument sign from last year! (For more on why I have been going to Same, click
here) Here are a few photos. 
Leaving Same we switched drivers to Peter, who was our driver last year. Great to see him too!
This photo was incidentally taken while we were getting pulled over
And at long last we landed in Moshi around 6pm to see the weary but happy and VERY accomplished Kili-climbing Ewa sitting by the pool. Ewa climbed Kili in 7 days (5 up and 2 down) and she said it was physically the hardest thing she had ever done, particularly on the down-side. She said the multiple landscapes she went through were the most impressive but in true Ewa form had some fabulous photo and video documentation to show me! I was honored to be the first friendly face she saw and shared her trip stories with.
This is Kilimanjaro and if you look closely you can see Ewa above 19,000 feet!
And so the next safari chapter begins!!
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