Lake Manyara

We started our day with an outdoor breakfast at the lovely Highview hotel. The food is excellent, lots of fresh fruit and baked goods and you can order an omelette. Then off we went to Lake Manyara park, famous for climbing lions. We never saw a lion of any description.

We did see two types of antelope – water buck and bush buck – a fish eagle, blue monkeys, a silver-beaked hornbill, baboons and a tamarind tree. For some reason I have no photos of any of these, nor do I have photos from Cathy. This is the only photo I took, with Lake Manyara in the distance. It could be that many of the animals were in forested areas and difficult to see.

Maybe I've just been too zealous in deleting photos from my phone.

After Manyara – which was smaller and not as pretty as the other two parks – we undertook the four-hour drive back to Moshi under very strange conditions. On the drive north, the roads were very busy, causing Peter to frequently swerve into passing mode. On the trip back, the roads were empty, even around the busy city of Arusha. There were occasionally army checkpoints. We were mostly waved through – the privilege of being white on a foreign-currency-generating safari.

Why the change? On 31 October, Tanzania held a very undemocratic election, with the ruling party the only real contender. There were massive protests, and massive police over-reaction. Either hundreds or thousands killed, depending on whom you spoke with. Mass graves were found near Dar es Salaam.

The opposition had called for a demonstration today – ironically Tanzanian Independence Day. The government announced that any protesters would be considered part of an attempted coup. People were told to stay at home, which is what they did. It's really sad to see people basically under house arrest instead of celebrating their independence.

Our flight home tomorrow had already been rescheduled to fly through Zanzibar instead of Dar es Salaam, due to government restrictions placed on the largest city.

I learnt that the president is the mistress of the man who was in office prior to her predecessor, an anti-corruption reformer. After the predecessor was poisoned (it took several tries), she was installed to continue the work of the cabal that leeches funds from Tanzania. It's really sad that Tanzanians work so hard and pay taxes to a government that does nothing for them. I learnt that the Chinese bring in their workers and their raw materials to build the infrastructure needed to extract and export Tanzanian gas to China. Tanzania doesn't benefit from these exports, other than the few who control contracts.

It was good to get back to Moshi to resume the job of being a tourist, a nice swim and a shower and another fine meal.

9 Dec.