Nairobi to Arusha. <br>The dusty track less travelled.

In October 2009 I was a single 34 year old woman determined to experience a grand adventure. I saved up my money and climbed Mt Kilimanjaro in Tanzania, worked in an orphanage in Mombasa, Kenya, and visited my World Vision sponsor child in Ethiopia.

This is my account of my experience travelling from Nairobi to Arusha, one of the scariest moments of my life!

The silver bullet smashed through the glass window at lightening speed. It ricocheted off the wall and lay spent, on the well-worn carpet of my hotel room.

The view outside my hotel, through the bullet hole.

“What the hell am I doing here?” my inner voice screamed inside my head? Why on earth did I chose to come to Nairobi, on my own, to stay in a budget hotel in one of the most dangerous cities in Africa?

What the f**k was I thinking?

Thankfully, the bullet had made its visit to my room prior to my stay, however the management’s choice to leave the window in its frame along with its splintered reminder did not make me feel any less safe.

(This was intentionally left out during the “I’ve arrived safely” call to my mother)

The roar of the traffic below was deafening. The muffled beat of African rap found its way into my bones from the pavement below as the horn blaring drivers fought their way across streets littered with rushing pedestrians. The toxic smell of petrol fumes made me light-headed, even from up here.

The hustle and bustle of Nairobi

That evening, I decided to forget the obligatory “cultural experience” of my first ever meal in Africa and I sprinted, as fast as I could, across the road to the Hilton for dinner.

Shame on me.

That evening, as I lay in the suffocating darkness, exhausted from my thirty hour trip, upon the concave bed that had seen much better times, had I mistakenly heard someone enter my room?

Oh my god. There was someone in my room!

Was it room service? The hotel didn’t have any. Were they here to steal from me? Or something much more sinister? As the primal scream left my lungs, whoever it was made their escape. (There's a reason they call it Nairobbery)

With a chair safely tucked underneath the door handle, I finally fell fast asleep.

As I gingerly stepped onto the mini bus the next morning, I couldn’t help but feel a wonderful sense of excitement. I was in for quite a journey. A nine-hour bus ride across some of the driest, most inhospitable countryside that Kenya had to offer.

The trip from Nairobi to Arusha (at the foothills of Mt Kilimanjaro) was the most teeth clenching, nail biting, knuckle whitening transportation experience of my life! Ninety percent of the roads we traveled were dirt or rock, and on many occasions I was sure the driver was about to roll the bus. There were more than a few fishtails and skids, and I’m sure we lost contact with the ground numerous times.

The terrain gradually changed from scattered scrubland to grey dust, a lone tree visible from miles away stood like a beacon for sundrenched animals.

The changing terrain of Kenya

I could feel the grey dust entering my lungs, coating my hair and finding refuge in the lines of my skin. I was caked in the arid land of Africa. People live here. Zebras ate at the small tufts of grass that inexplicably found root in the dust. Masai people walked barefoot alongside our bus, brightly coloured mirages in an otherwise colourless world.

After crossing over the Kenya/Tanzania border, it wasn’t long before the dry and dusty air gave way to humid, fertile land.

After eight hours of travel, when we rounded a bend and glimpsed a new mountain, larger than the last, I was sure I was staring up at Mt Kilimanjaro, but on we drove. When my eyes finally landed on the largest mountain in Africa, my stomach dropped to the floor. In an instant I realized all the others I had mistaken for Mt Kili were hills, compared to this indescribable monstrosity.

I’m climbing that tomorrow. Bloody hell.