We arrived in Tanzania on Tuesday, June 14th and were met by our driver and taken from Kilimanjaro airport to the Mountain Village Hotel in Arusha.  We discovered that in Tanzania they drive on the left - mostly.  Moses did a great job negotiating the traffic and we arrived at our hotel safely and ready for a comfortable first night's sleep.

After breakfast on Wednesday, we met with Allan from the mountain guide company who went over the logistics and last-minute preparations for the trek.  It was at this meeting that we learned how big our crew would be on the mountain: guide, assistant guide, cook, and 13 porters.  For the two of us!  Our kit and medical preparations were all in order, and we said goodbye to Allan and set off for Sinya Camp with Paul, our guide for the next two days.

We passed a market - varieties of produce, clothing, pots and pans etc.  Heading to market were men on bicycles with improbable amounts of stuff hanging from the handlebars, and women with equally large loads on their heads.  Outside of town, small mixed groups of animals - cows, goats, donkeys - grazed between the crops.  Paul talked about Tanzanian tribes, languages and migration history as we drove over progressively smaller roads towards the camp.  We caught our first glimpse of Kibo (Kilimanjaro) above the clouds - with its snowcap gleaming at the top, it looked very far away.

Arriving at the camp, we were greeted by Sylvester, the camp manager and cook.  Sinya is a very relaxing setting - perfect for chilling out for two days before the trek.  An excellent lunch was served.  The other guests - all from Spain - included a honeymoon couple who kept disappearing.  They will not be not climbing Kilimanjaro on this trip.

We took two game drives at Sinya - on the first afternoon and again the next morning, starting before dawn.  Since this is a private concession, we were not subject to game park rules and were in an open-sided vehicle giving a great view of the animals: Thompson's and Grant's gazelles, impalas, dik-dik, wildebeeste, warthogs, giraffes, elephants, zebras, gibbons, ostriches, vernal monkeys, and a great variety of birds.  The Maasai tend their cattle in the area too, so it was unlikely that we would see the large predators at Sinya, and we didn't, but it was a great place to be introduced to the safari experience, far from the crowds we would encounter later at Ngorongoro.

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On Thursday after our morning game drive, we went for a walk around the area near the camp with Lucas, a young Maasai.  He pointed out many plants and described their uses, and showed us where the warriors go to eat meat, away from the women and children.  In the afternoon we visited one of the nearby Maasai villages, where the women, young children and elders stay.  It was fascinating to learn the details of this culture, substantially unchanged and existing alongside the many peoples who are part of modern Tanzania.

In the evening, we celebrated on a hill overlooking Sinya Camp.  Maasai warriors danced, and Greg and Barney were compelled to join in the dancing, a wonderful memory that is saved from being acutely embarrassing by the fact that all the other guests joined in too.  As the sun set, the clouds above Kilimanjaro cleared, and we had an awe-inspiring view of the mountain we would start climbing the next day.

After sunset, we went back to camp for a shower and change then sat around the campfire before dinner.  A geek moment: Greg remarked that we could see Ursa Major (the Big Dipper to Americans) and the Southern Cross in the same sky.