56. Tanzania: Dar es Salaam to Moshi

This blog is mostly taken up with our inefficient hitching experience from Dar es Salaam to Moshi, the city near the base of Mt. Kilimanjaro. This was just after a major crack down on black marketeers so there was supposedly less traffic on the roads, particularly of people of Asian descent who were allegedly the main targets of the crackdown.  We had our longest wait for a ride on entire trip, over 24 hours, so had to camp by the side of the road. We were also bent on climbing “Kili” on a shoestring, by carrying our own tent and and food.

Detail of our route through Norther Tanzania.  Yellow is hitch hiking and red is rail travel.

Dar es Salaam - Korogwe, Tanzania, Tuesday, 7 June, 1983

(HELENA) We left our lodgings at about 7:15 and started out of town on the road Dan somehow knew was the right one. I never did get my bearings in “DAR”! It turned out to be one of those cities whose edge never arrives. For a short stretch we actually got a fee ride from a taxi-van, but aside from that we walked for two hours before we found a spot that would simply have to do. We were a bit out of sorts by then because no one had wanted to pick us up, and it looked as though we had misjudged the “hitchability” of this particular road. Just before we settled down, we stopped to buy a few oranges for the trip.

We must have been installed in our place for half an hour when two wazungus in a Peugeot station wagon drove by. I do not think they really wanted to pick us up, but they felt sorry for us. About all we found out about them was that they are two Dutch middle-aged men. As we got in, the driver asked us our nationality, told us that hitching is not the safest way of traveling, and then asked if we minded if he and his companion continued to converse in Dutch. Naturally, it was fine with us; such a relief to be out of the hot sun and moving. Particularly the driver had a very kind face, so we felt comfortable in spite of the fact that he disapproved of our mode of travel. Dan thought maybe our driver was a missionary and that his companion was a visitor (there were two bags with fresh airport tags in the back, and the driver did a bit of explaining different landmarks).

They were going to Morogoro, so they were only able to drop us at a junction 109 kms. down the road.  Still, we were out of the big city and on our way. This time we bought two of the nice big pears we have been seeing lately and then walked down the road a bit to sit under the shade of a banana plant. Here we started to lose hope again because the few private cars that went by had no interest in us. As usual, we had chosen a spot near a school, so we got a lot of attention as the students went between their weed-cutting tasks and the school. We are thankful that their attention is a little less exaggerated than the endless staring we got in Rwanda; obviously they have had more tourists around here.

Finally at about l2:30 a yellow van drove a little past us and stopped. More wazungus, this time a Danish woman and her little daughter and a Danish couple, all here as volunteers for two years. They were carrying a fair amount of stuff, but they made room. The woman who was driving knew the best English, so once again there was not a lot of conversation between them and us. We did learn that the couple is replacing the woman and her husband (and several children) in some sort of small-scale agricultural project because one of the children has had a continuing problem with malaria. They are now mov­ing to a place in the mountains.

The most memorable thing about the ride was the beautiful big cocker spaniel the couple had just had shipped from Denmark. He was one of the prettiest I have ever seen.

Our Michelin map shows the highway from Dar es Salaam to Moshi as a bright red, wide, major paved highway, but it has been neg­lected by any road crews there might be. Whole stretches are now dirt while others are full of holes. The countryside was flattish, a few rolling hills but with abrupt big hills every once in a while.

They were going to a place on the road to Tanga, so once again they dropped us at a junction. We got a ride immediately, this in the back of a Land Rover pick-up driven by a black Tanzanian. They were going to the town we had set as today’s goal, Korogwe, which was only 17 kms. away. It was during that stretch that we first became aware of the big, mostly untended sisal fields.

We drove into town at 16:00 with plenty of daylight to find a place to stay. I remained with the bags while Dan went in search of the Catholic mission. He did not have much trouble finding it as they occupy a whole hill, but the priest said that pitch­ing a tent there was an “impossibility”. He never would say why we should not, so Dan came away from that rather disillusioned. There were several guest houses in town, but they were expensive and not terribly appetizing. He decided to try the Anglican mission. This time (he was gone an hour and a half) he was greeted very cordially by Miss Archi­bald (pronounced in a very British way). She said it would be fine for us to camp on their front lawn, use her rainwater and her outhouse. We later learned that she first came in 1936 and is now 75.

Dan came back to collect me, but before walking the good distance, we shared a plate of wali na ngombe (rice and meat) at the Intercontinental (cough, cough) Hotel. We did not get too far when a young Dutch engineer rattled up in his Land Rover and offered us a lift. Dan said we were not going far, but he insisted on taking us. He had lived there for a year but had never been to the mission. He missed the turn-off Dan knew, so we ended up going on into town and making a series of wrong turns traveling pretty fast up very rutted roads. We were amused when he said his Land Rover was terrible: “It started falling apart after only 500 kms.” After all, he only took those rutted roads as though he were driv­ing down Main Street in Winfield, Kansas. Eventually we found the place. At least we got a tour of Korogwe (the “old township”) and learned he is an engineer with some small industry here. We set up our tent and had a good cuppa before hitting the sack.

Korogwe - Bompa, Tanzania, Wednesday, 7 June, 1983

(DAN) Some of our gear had gotten wet during the night, so we took our time breaking camp. Miss Archibald (Agh-chi-bohl) came by and chatted for a while. She seems to have her hands full. The Tanzanian government retires people officially at 55, but she has stayed on “because there is always something to be done”. She came here a few years ago to manage the convention center here. Then the church treasurer “went schizophrenic actually”, so she is doing THAT. Then last week the “aging” white bishop suffered a heart attack and was brought to her to nurse, and to cap it all off, “my boy went and broke his arm”, so she is training a new one.

Korogwe turned out to be another extended town, so it was another 90 minutes before we were on the outskirts for hitching. We had a long wait here, but it was in a truly beautiful area. We are in a green corridor with rather steep rocky cliffs on one side and sloping valley rising to hills about 7 kms. away. All the flat land in the valley is in corn while the upland is in sisal.

Last night while we were in the vehicle with the Dutchman, we saw the train called the Tanga Express.  It is an ancient steam locomotive that uses “oil” instead of coal. Later in the evening we heard it chug up the valley into the mist, and every so often it would blast its steam whistle --most folkloric.

We waited 90 minutes for a ride, and then it was only for 10 kms. The Land Rover dropped us at a gas station, and while we were shouldering our packs, we were approached by a tall young Britisher. He was the driver of the nearby Overland Encounter (all painted and sleek) truck. He was going empty to Dar es Salaam to meet a group, and did we want a ride to “Dar”?  It was almost enough to persuade us to turn around and go back just to get a ride like that. But after a nice chat, we hoisted our packs and started walking till we found a shady area of the road and settled in to wait. That was 1130.

By 1700 hours we were beginning to get desperate. Even though we were at a permanently shady and damp place, every time a vehicle would rumble by, it would leave us in a cloud of dust. There was a lot of local traffic --many trucks with stuffed cabs and a few infinitely packed buses. The bus traffic is supposed to be way down since the crackdown. By 1800 we decided we would start looking for a place to sleep.  We only found one person who could speak more than a few words of English. There were “no missions or places to camp in town”.  We proceeded to walk well out of town, and after a few kms. we found a sufficiently secluded sisal field. It was very badly kept and had actual trees for weeds. We walked down a row and found a place between two of these trees where we were sheltered from sight on all sides and pitched our tent. A sisal field is about as painful as a cactus field, so once we picked our way into our “briar patch,” we felt completely protected for the night.

The mosquitoes were so bad that we got everything ready and then cooked our meal and ate it inside the tent. The tent makes a perfect, well-ventilated mosquito net. The sunset was beautiful seen against the sisal plants (they look like large yucca or century plants) with the cliffs on one side and hills in the distance. We had a good, restful night.

 

Overnight in a sisal field wating for a ride.

Mombo - Moshi, Tanzania, Thursday, 9 June, 1983

(HELENA) The people who saw us climbing out of the sisal field must have wondered what in the world we were doing. Among the various nice things about our rather unique camping site, it was helpful to walk just a few meters before plunking our packs under the only shade tree in sight, a thorn tree. We waited for a couple of hours before a wazungu took pity on us and let us ride in the back of his Land Rover pick-up on top of several boxes of bottles (beer and sodas). He said he had seen us trying to get a ride yesterday. “Tough luck, huh?” Unfortunately, he was going only ten kilometers along our route.

He left us off at a small, nameless town on the railroad that mainly seemed to furnish housing for sisal plantation workers. For breakfast we had only had our café con leche and our second big pear, so we were getting a bit hungry by the time we started to walk through the town, so we bought a big bunch of sedita bananas. There were several rest­aurants, but we decided we would rather look forward to a good meal at the end of the day. At the other end of town we found an ideal hitching spot --under a huge shade tree, not too many people passing by (enough, of course) and that patch of the road was paved. It is a good thing it was such a good place because we were there for AGES. We went through our bananas (I think there were 16). The last ones were our consolation prizes when a likely ride passed us by. There was plenty of traffic, but the private cars were either too full or did not feel like stopping.

After a couple of hours we were joined by three little boys who were supposedly tending a herd of goats and sheep. I am afraid they ruined the image that I got from Heidi of the gentle, kind goatherd. The biggest boy would tie a rope to the smallest, tie the other end to a sheep (around its body, near its hind legs) and then the little boy would pull with all his might until the goat would buck or he himself would fall down. Senseless cruelty!  We were right at the edge of a banana plantation, and the kids blithely played around while the goats destroyed some six small banana plants. I am afraid I did not feel very sorry for them when the owner of the plantation came steaming down the road and confiscated one of the goats. The boys got out of there FAST. The owner waited there a while with the goat until the head goatherd came back. How I wished we could understand what they were saying because the boy told some sad story and apparently convinced the man that the destruction was not their fault. Ha!

About 1500 an older man (gray hair) came by with a heavy load of sugar cane. He was dressed very raggedly, so we were quite surprised when he started talking to us in a very propah  British accent, using complicated words. He told us he had worked with the British when they were surveying the roads. He wished us luck several times before he finally moved on.

Shortly after that a Toyota Land Cruiser (luxury model) heeded our thumbs and stopped. It only had the driver and his wife in the front seat, but the back seat and the back part were piled high with stuff. Dan said it was not necessary for them to take us since they were so heavily loaded, but they said they would be glad to take us. After waiting for a ride for more than 24 hours, we could hardly turn it down, so we piled our packs in on top of their stuff and squeezed into the front seat with them.

They were Pat and Esther Scott, Seventh Day Adventist missionaries from Canada. They have only been here in Arusha for a year, and their car was so full because they were returning from four months of Swahili study in Morogoro. They are a very attractive couple in their forties, and we learned that they have four children --23, 22 (a daughter who came with them and has been teaching a small school for missionary children, including her younger brother), 19, and 11 (an adopted Canadian Indian). Talk about friendly! At first it looked as if they would not be able to take us as far as Moshi because they thought that they would have to leave us at the main road to go pick up their daughter and son who were thought to have gone to “the mountains”. Luckily for us, they found that their children were not in “the mountains,” so they took us all the way into Moshi.

The countryside was by then pretty arid and flat with a mountain or hill sticking up here and there.  We drove into Moshi at 18:00, before dark, and the Scotts insisted on going about 8 kms. out of their way to take us to the hospital where we had a semi-con­tact. They dropped us off at “Casualty”, gave us their address in Arusha, and invited us to stay with them.

You cannot win them all; when Dan went looking for our contact (some Mennonites we met in Kananga, Zaire, gave us this name and said this doctor would be glad to help us arrange a hike up Kilimanjaro) we hoped they might let us pitch our tent in their yard. Dan hinted broadly about our tent, but they were eating supper, and the man told him to check about Kilimanjaro at the YMCA.  Dan did not get good vibes.

It was pretty dark by the time we headed back into town, so we took a bus to the YMCA. Lodging there was pricey, but after three days without a bath, we decided to splurge. Bed and breakfast cost us (at the official rate) about $18. We took cold showers and splurged again by sharing a three course meal down in the dining room at $4.70. I felt a bit discriminated against because none of the women’s W.C.s had lights. We were also a bit displeased to see we did not have towels. For that price...!

Moshi, Tanzania, Friday, 10th of June

(DAN) We were more than slightly disgruntled when at about 0200 hours our room was invaded by mosquitoes, the most operatic anopheles yet. There was no way we could sleep, so we finally lit two mosquito coils and got rid of them. In the morning we found two large holes in the screen. Pretty inexcusable when our cheapest hotel had both good screens and provided mosquito nets. (Ed: reminds me of a bit of Carttar family folk history: my dad once sat up all night in the lobby of a YMCA because the bedbugs were so bad in his room.) Breakfast was good --bread, unlimited chai, an omelette, and a slice of tomato.

Checkout was at 1000, so we had to pack up and store our things before going out on the town. We wanted to inquire into climbing Mt. Kilimanjaro, get some food, and find an alternate sleeping site. We found that there are a German couple with two children and a New Zealander who want to go as well. We checked with the “Travel Service” at the “Y”. They organize 5-day trips up the mountain for 1,413 shillings or roughly $140 apiece. This includes “everything” but gear and food. It includes for example 1.3 porters per person and a shared guide. We came away with the feeling that we could go much more cheaply on our own. One problem is that the gate to the park is an hour away by bus followed by a 5 km uphill walk. Allegedly, one can make arrangements there.

Next we headed for the bank and the market. The market is pretty well stocked, but only with certain commodities. We are planning to make granola for the 5-day trek but found the market to lack such basics as peanuts and honey. They did have corn flour, grain sorghum flour, coconuts, and pears. We plan to dry out the pears as they are plentiful, reasonable, and good.

Next we went looking for the furnished camp ground that is supposed to be 2 kms. out of town toward Arusha. After walking an hour, we found the place, but it has obviously not been operating for several years. A young man happened by and explained that the roofs had been stolen, the plumbing ripped out, etc. If there had ever been a fence, it had been removed as well. He also warned that there were a lot of “bandits smoking guns” that were liable to attack us.

We had our best meal yet here in Tanzania, a green plantain soup with vegetables, meat, and a little tripe (well washed). We met with Chris at 1300 hrs. to see what each of us had discovered about the climb --nothing new. We went back into town to look for another place to stay and had a most disappointing afternoon. What we found was not cheap enough to warrant changing from the YMCA. Finally, we decided that spending entire days trying to save money is a poor pastime, so we decided to return to the YMCA for two more nights. This would give us a chance to wash our clothes (last time in Mwanza) and possibly there might be a way to make granola. This terrible decision made, we decided to seek solace in a soft drink. In spite of the many old signs visible, neither Coke nor Pepsi, like peanuts, is to be found in Moshi. However, here in Moshi there is wheat available, and we splurged on two $.40 buns.

Back at the YMCA we asked for a mosquito-proof room and were shown to one with towels and bedspreads as well. Improved our spirits completely!

Chris found some information that indicated we could not climb Kilimanjaro for less than 1,050 shillings ($100); however we agreed that day after tomorrow we would just go to the gate ourselves and make our own arrangements. Helena and I are of the mind that if one has to hire porters, one should stay home in bed!

We ran into the Germans, and they are going up tomorrow, YMCA all the way. We had a quiet evening and a wonderful night’s sleep.

Moshi, Tanzania, Saturday, 11 June, 1983

(HELENA) We awakened in good spirits and went full speed all day.  It was having such a big decision hanging over our heads that kept us so miserable yesterday.  After another good breakfast we set off for the market to buy the ingredients for our granola. Dan had checked with the head man in the kitchen. He said fine, but we would have to pay for the charcoal.  We intended to buy our own charcoal, so it was all set up. Yes­terday afternoon we had already started the big process with Dan cutting up seven pears and placing them on one of our big plastic trash bags to dry.  I washed some of our heav­ier clothes while he did that. There was not much sun, so the pears were practically fresh this morning. A big swarm of ants got onto one of the slices, but the rest were untouched by any sort of varmint.

Yesterday we had already been fortunate to find cans of Tanzanian honey in one store. We got there before 9:00 so went into the market to buy additional corn and red grain sorghum flour (we bought some of that yesterday along with some small beans that we set to soaking overnight) a nice big coconut, and two cans of charcoal.  Our store was still closed, but luckily we found another place with honey. We bought two 500 gm cans --one for the granola and one to use as sweetening, mainly for lemonade. We bought ten lemons for our fruit.

We had learned that the German family would be going up to the gate of the Kiliman­jaro Park, and since their friend would be driving them up, Dan decided he would take that opportunity to get a ride up to Marangu gate, inquire about prices, and get a ride back to Moshi. They had said they would stop by the YMCA about ten-ish to pick up their guide, so Dan went on back with our huge bag of stuff whi1e I mailed a couple of letters and I bought $2 worth of freshly roasted peanuts. It was a great extravagance but would make the granola just a tad more edible. After all of the mounds of raw peanuts we saw in Mwanza, the only ones we have seen here are roasted and cost $ .10 for a flattened soda bottle capful. We thought the small cans they used to measure peanuts in Zaire were ridiculous; these are laughable.

While Dan waited for the German family to appear, I finished washing most of our clothes (all except our sheets which are still a bit icky from our train trip from Mwanza to Dar es Salaam) and hung them on our fourth floor wooden railing. The YMCA is built in such a way that the rooms open onto a garden on the bottom floor. It is quite fancy. The family still had not come by noon, so we ate a couple of manzano bananas (fat, red) and started in on the granola. Dan mixed the stuff with his hand inside one of the big plastic bags we got in Las Palmas. Oh, and before that Dan did an expert job of cracking open one of the nicest coconuts we have ever seen. It took a good while to chop it up with a jackknife, but since we do not carry a grater (we had to stop somewhere).... It soon became apparent that the concoction was too liquid, but there was nothing to be done about it. We took the bag of wet granola, our charcoal, and our two little mess kits and went down to the courtyard by the kitchen.

The head man was most ingratiating (“I’ll help you and you’ll help me”) and had some of the girl students who help there set up a burner and fire for us. Almost before we had set our things down, the man was admiring our shopping bag (old, holey, rat-eaten) and a little later he “‘lowed as how” Dan had a very nice tee shirt (his most used-looking one). We just said “thank you”, but it really bothered us to know that he wanted us to give him those things.

We had planned to use our little pans, but fortunately we asked if we could borrow one of his big pots. At first we were certain we had a huge mess on our hands because the mush started to stick madly, and we could not stir it up fast enough. Dan eventually got the fire a little cooler, and we developed a rhythm of stirring that kept most of it from sticking. But, boy did it take a long time! In the end we did it in two batches, and it did not quite dry out, but it was quite edible. Naturally, all of the girls who help (students who help for their board?) around the kitchen were terribly curious about our stuff. One girl in particular made us seethe inside because she came to stir and stir and then to “test” it she would pick out the precious peanuts. There were few enough to begin with, and they were the most expensive item in there! We did that all afternoon, and every so often I would run up to the fourth floor to check on the clothes: turn them over, put them in the sun, etc. Finally at dusk we decided that it had to be dry enough. All that time, Chris was sitting calmly in the lobby reading.

We splurged and had a good three course meal to get us set for the big hike tomorrow. Before we went to bed we had repacked with our necessities in our packs and the rest in two of our big white trash bags to leave. Heavy! In spite of our determination to get a good night’s sleep, I did not turn off the light until midnight.

First view of Kilimanjaro from the Moshi YMCA.