Days 43-49
We left our friends at Lake Shore Lodge after a couple of very relaxing days, and began our journey to Morogoro. Suma needed to fly out of Dar on 17th July to head back to the UK to fetch our 2 kids, returning on 20th July. A bit of a hectic turnaround but circumstances were as they were.
The drive from Kipili to Mbeya was long – it took all day and was uneventful. We stayed at the swanky Royal Mgwasi Hotel in Mbeya, where we got to catch up with Sumas cousin Joffrey. The hotel is brand new as of 2023 and is as good as any high-end hotel in Europe. The price was very cheap at 120’000 Tsh (about £35 GBP).
The food in the restaurant was very nice but took 2 hours to be cooked. I was getting ansty as the Euro final UK vs Spain was about to start and I wanted to head to the hotal bar to watch it whilst getting a few beers in me. Suma headed to visit her cousin Rehemma in hospital with her young son while I pretended to watch the game and made a new friend, who happened to be from Kandete (where Sumas dad grew up). Despite a significant language barrier we managed to have a conversation, and I didnt watch much of the shit football match (which we lost). At the end of the evening my new friend insisted on paying the bill, which was extremely kind and well appreciated. Tanzanian hospitality!
Next morning we got up early and had a huge drive to Morogoro. We left around 8.30am and arrived in Morogoro well after dark.
There were plenty of trucks parked upside-down in the roadside ditches, as per usual in Tanzania. Fresh crashes are usually surrounded by people pilfering the goods which spill everywhere. We could have filled our truck with slightly bruised tomatoes, but we chose to drive on instead.
The infamous Kitunda pass was pretty easy going. We negotiated it just before dusk, when all the crazy inter-city coaches had long passed through. We only had to deal with crazy truck drivers. Fully loaded trucks travel at a snails-pace. Empty trucks are driven like go-karts on a race track. Empty fuel tankers are the worst.
The road from Mbeya to Morogoro goes through some very beautiful scenery. Food grows everywhere, so we made quite a few stops at the roadside stalls to load up on fresh food to eat while we stay at Grace’s house in Morogoro.
It was great to see Grace and all the family/friends again. The next day we completely emptied the car and gave everything a good clean. After 6 weeks of hard travel, everything was in need of a deep clean. I made some adjustments to the canopy, attempting to make it dust-proof.
Suma got the new high-speed train to Dar Es Salaam for her flight the following day. I relaxed and caught up on work emails.
