It's official - we're going! This week I booked plane tickets and made a down payment on our safari! Yay!
Here's what everything looks like. First of all, the plane tickets. Nathan and I are flying separately since I get a ticket through work.
Amber's Flight:
August 21st - Leave and fly Rochester to Minneapolis to Amsterdam to Dar Es Salaam (total travel time: 26 hours and 10 minutes). My team all stays in Dar Es Salaam on the 22nd and then we'll be traveling to Arusha together on August 23rd.
Nathan's Flight:
September 19th - Leave and fly Rochester to Minneapolis to Amsterdam to Nairobi, Kenya, to Kilimanjaro (total travel time: 27 hours)
We're flying different flights on the way home, so, as Nathan's mom pointed out - we can race - just like on one of my favorite shows, The Amazing Race:
Amber's Flight:
October 9th - Kilimanjaro to Amsterdam to Detroit to Rochester (total travel time: 27 hours and 20 minutes)
Nathan's Flight:
October 9th - Kilimanjaro to Nairobi to London to Chicago to Rochester (29 hours and 30 minutes)
Yes, Nathan got the worst of the two schedules, but surprisingly our flights are suppose to get to Rochester within 1 hour 15 minutes of each other. Assuming no one gets stuck in Kenya, London, Amsterdam, Chicago, or Detroit. How much do you want to bet someone will get stuck somewhere?!! :)
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Secondly, the safari. I did my first foreign wire transfer last Friday to book it. Here's our itinerary:
9/20 - Nathan arrives & Amber's program finishes
Kilimanjaro Climb
9/22 - Arusha to Machame Camp (9850 ft) - Register and start our Kilimanjaro climb. Hiking mostly through forest today.
9/23 - Machame Camp to Shira Camp (12,600 ft) - Alpine Terrain
9/24 - Shira Camp to Barranco Camp (12,950 ft) - Extra day for acclimatization
9/25 - Barranco to Karanga Valley Camp (13,900 ft) - This will lead us to Kilimanjaro's ice fields
9/26 - Karanga Valley Camp to Barafu Camp (15,200 ft)- Terrain gets really sparse and we don't stay here long as we start our summit attempt at midnight
9/27 - Barafu Camp to Summit (19,340 ft) to Mweka Camp (9,840 ft) - Summit day! Hopefully no one is too sick to get to the top! Highest point in Africa, here we come!
9/28 - Mweka Camp to Park Gate - We stay in a really nice hotel with a shower tonight!
Safari
9/29 - Arusha to Lake Manyara
This beautiful park has lush vegetation and tropical forests of giant fig and mahogany trees. Elephant, giraffe, buffalo, zebra and a variety of antelope inhabit the park as well as a variety of monkeys and a large population of hippos. There are also tree-climbing lions and, for Nathan, flamingoes, pelicans, hornbills and plenty of forest bird species.
9/30 - Lake Manyara to Serengeti & Olduvai Gorge
Afternoon game drive in the Serengeti with a stop at Olduvai Gorge, the cradle of mankind where the Leakys found evidence of human life's start in Africa.
10/1 & 10/2 - Serengeti
Two full day of game drives in the Serengeti. Depending on the time of year and the migration of the herds you can expect to see wildebeest, lions, elephants, giraffes, zebras, monkeys, baboons, hippos, rhinos, antelopes and many birds and other species.
10/3 - Serengeti to Ngorongoro Highland (Walking Safari)
Walking safari through Olmoti Craters, which is off the beaten track. We're likely to see the local people known as the Masaai grazing their animals in the crater.
10/4 - Ngorongoro Crater
Morning game drive at Ngorongoro Crater. This is the one place I've heard everyone say is not to miss. As very few animals migrate in and out of the crater with its 2000 ft. high walls, you can expect to see lions, elephants, giraffes, zebras, hippos, flamingos, jackals, rhinos, antelopes, many birds and other species.
10-5 - Ngorongoro to Tarangire
Drive to Tarangire, Tanzania's third largest national park and sanctuary for an unusually large elephant population. There is a great diversity of wildlife including lion, leopard, cheetah and up to six thousand elephant.
10-6 - Tarangire to Arusha
End of the trip
We don't leave until 10-9, so we're also entertaining the idea of going to Zanzibar, an Indian Ocean island right off the coast.
Sunday, May 25, 2008
The Hills are Alive...and so is Medora
I've gotten pretty used to Medora over the last six months. The extreme lack of people, the town gathering place (a.k.a the Post Office) being the only thing open, no restaurants for 15 miles and no good restaurants for 25, making up your own fun, and an extremely harsh, barren landscape only beautiful to those who can view it from inside a warm car.
However, all that changed when I rounded the bend into town for the last time yesterday. What did I see? Cars! Hundreds of them. All of the shops and restaurants are now open and all this happened in a matter of days.
The drive through the park is getting really interesting. Things are just turning green and there are baby animals galore. Including these young owls who now live in Campsite 39 (see if you can find them):
The hills really are starting to turn green and just in time for us - we leave in a week:
It's been a fun six months and I think I'll miss coming to Medora this summer!
However, all that changed when I rounded the bend into town for the last time yesterday. What did I see? Cars! Hundreds of them. All of the shops and restaurants are now open and all this happened in a matter of days.
The drive through the park is getting really interesting. Things are just turning green and there are baby animals galore. Including these young owls who now live in Campsite 39 (see if you can find them):
The hills really are starting to turn green and just in time for us - we leave in a week:
It's been a fun six months and I think I'll miss coming to Medora this summer!
Weekend In Madison
Last weekend Nathan came home for his brother Justin's graduation. We packed the weekend full of all kinds of fun and not-fun stuff.
What did we do first? Went to the car dealership to drop off the Alero - again - it needed a new suspension - again. (All I can say is that I think there is a reason why Oldsmobile is no longer around.)
Second stop? Doctor. I got my stitches out and Nathan had to get three shots for our travel to Tanzania. I knew this might be a problem as Nathan refuses to give blood since he claims needles make him feel gross. Sure enough, after he was in his appointment for 20 minutes, the immunizations nurse came out and told me that I might want to come back - Nathan was feeling light-headed. In the back I found a grown 6-foot tall man sitting on the bed with a tiny apple juice-box made for someone no more than 6 years old. Wish I had a picture. Despite the fact that Nathan had a small fever all weekend (perhaps he actually got Yellow Fever?), he's doing fine. That's my husband, if he can survive three shots, he can survive anything, right? :)
As a reward for surviving the shots, we went to The Redwood Room in Rochester - my all-time favorite restaurant: Redwood Room Menu. If you ever find yourself in Rochester, MN this is something you shouldn't miss.
The next day we drove to Madison and had lunch with our friends Irina & Michael. We ate at Buraka, an East African restaurant to celebrate the whole Tanzania thing. We also talked about their upcoming parenthood. Scary, that makes three of my friends who will have kids now.
It was absolutely one of the best weekends to hang out in Madison. The weather was perfect and most of the students were gone (no offense to the students, but the Terrace can get pretty crowded when you're here). It was great - we got to go shopping, have Babcock Hall ice cream, see all of Nathan's family, and eat at Famous Dave's. All-in-all a great time!
Since I am writing about what some call the Socialist Republic of Madison, I am suddenly in the mood to write about politics. Stop reading now if you think this will just make you mad.
I want to comment on Hillary and the Democratic race. From a Democratic Party member standpoint, her persistence is a bit unsettling - a piece of me wants her to get out of the picture already and let Barack start the McCain butt-kicking. However, from the standpoint of being a female, I'm proud of her. What she's telling every young female today is that even though the odds may be stacked against you and everyone's telling you to quit - don't do it! Her persistence may not pay off, but that is an extremely powerful message to young women around the world. So, thanks, Hillary.
What did we do first? Went to the car dealership to drop off the Alero - again - it needed a new suspension - again. (All I can say is that I think there is a reason why Oldsmobile is no longer around.)
Second stop? Doctor. I got my stitches out and Nathan had to get three shots for our travel to Tanzania. I knew this might be a problem as Nathan refuses to give blood since he claims needles make him feel gross. Sure enough, after he was in his appointment for 20 minutes, the immunizations nurse came out and told me that I might want to come back - Nathan was feeling light-headed. In the back I found a grown 6-foot tall man sitting on the bed with a tiny apple juice-box made for someone no more than 6 years old. Wish I had a picture. Despite the fact that Nathan had a small fever all weekend (perhaps he actually got Yellow Fever?), he's doing fine. That's my husband, if he can survive three shots, he can survive anything, right? :)
As a reward for surviving the shots, we went to The Redwood Room in Rochester - my all-time favorite restaurant: Redwood Room Menu. If you ever find yourself in Rochester, MN this is something you shouldn't miss.
The next day we drove to Madison and had lunch with our friends Irina & Michael. We ate at Buraka, an East African restaurant to celebrate the whole Tanzania thing. We also talked about their upcoming parenthood. Scary, that makes three of my friends who will have kids now.
It was absolutely one of the best weekends to hang out in Madison. The weather was perfect and most of the students were gone (no offense to the students, but the Terrace can get pretty crowded when you're here). It was great - we got to go shopping, have Babcock Hall ice cream, see all of Nathan's family, and eat at Famous Dave's. All-in-all a great time!
Since I am writing about what some call the Socialist Republic of Madison, I am suddenly in the mood to write about politics. Stop reading now if you think this will just make you mad.
I want to comment on Hillary and the Democratic race. From a Democratic Party member standpoint, her persistence is a bit unsettling - a piece of me wants her to get out of the picture already and let Barack start the McCain butt-kicking. However, from the standpoint of being a female, I'm proud of her. What she's telling every young female today is that even though the odds may be stacked against you and everyone's telling you to quit - don't do it! Her persistence may not pay off, but that is an extremely powerful message to young women around the world. So, thanks, Hillary.
Wednesday, May 14, 2008
Birthday
Today is my birthday - the big 2-5. I've been alive for an entire Quarter Century and I've got to say, it's been a really good 25 years! I've had a pretty amazing life, have gotten to travel a ton, and have done more in 25 years than I could have asked for in a lifetime. I am lucky, because somehow, even through the years that Bush has been in office, where I've learned that the world doesn't always move forward towards a better tomorrow, but yet gets there in a series of forward and backward stints, I am very happy to say that I still haven't lost my naive optimism that we will, kind of like the stock market over a loooong period of time, always move forward as a species. I even think we can solve global warming.
Given that it's my birthday, it's only fitting that yesterday, Nathan gave me a "present" in the form of unsolicited knowledge. It turns out that the organism I fear the most is quite prevalent, complete with daunting fangs, in Tanzania:
King Baboon Spider
I can't help but think that perhaps my fear of spiders will actually serve me well for once!
Given that it's my birthday, it's only fitting that yesterday, Nathan gave me a "present" in the form of unsolicited knowledge. It turns out that the organism I fear the most is quite prevalent, complete with daunting fangs, in Tanzania:
King Baboon Spider
I can't help but think that perhaps my fear of spiders will actually serve me well for once!
Friday, May 9, 2008
Miscellanium
It's been a loooooooooong week.
My team lead at work is leaving our team after something like 12 years. This is definitely a case of good news/bad news. The bad news is that Billy is a genius who knows everything about anything related to our department's work (practically) - he will definitely be missed. The good news (I think it's good news anyway:) is that I'm going to take over his team lead responsibilities. The bad news about that is that there is a LOT to learn. I got practically none of my own work done this week.
On Tuesday, I had a mole removed. It was extremely minor surgery - so minor that the doctor and nurse were making fun of how nervous I was. However, just like when I got my wisdom teeth out, I came out of it saying "I feel great", although I was not at all loopy this time and understood what had just happened. I had four internal stitches and four external stitches. They'll probably leave a scar, so please post some ideas of really cool lies I can tell people as to how I got the scar. Unfortunately, the scar doesn't look much like a shark bite.
On Wednesday, I went back to the doctor to get my Tanzania shots. I got three for traveling: Yellow Fever, Typhoid, and Hepititus A. Luckily I had Hep B already, since you need that one too. One of them made my arm sore for two days - I have no idea which one it was as I got a total of four shots that day.
Thursday, I attended the Rochester Badgers Founder's Day event where we awarded 10 $1500 scholarships to deserving Rochester Area high schoolers. Professor Jim Leary, Director of the Folklore program at the UW, told jokes the whole night and had us in stitches (pun intended for me). Congrats to the 10 scholarship winners!
Today, I settled on a company for our safari. I haven't booked it yet, but we're looking at a 15-day Mt. Kilimanjaro climb + safari to Lake Manyara, Serengeti, Olduvai, Ngorongoro, and Tarangire. If anyone knows anything about Swala Safari Company, please do share!!
My team lead at work is leaving our team after something like 12 years. This is definitely a case of good news/bad news. The bad news is that Billy is a genius who knows everything about anything related to our department's work (practically) - he will definitely be missed. The good news (I think it's good news anyway:) is that I'm going to take over his team lead responsibilities. The bad news about that is that there is a LOT to learn. I got practically none of my own work done this week.
On Tuesday, I had a mole removed. It was extremely minor surgery - so minor that the doctor and nurse were making fun of how nervous I was. However, just like when I got my wisdom teeth out, I came out of it saying "I feel great", although I was not at all loopy this time and understood what had just happened. I had four internal stitches and four external stitches. They'll probably leave a scar, so please post some ideas of really cool lies I can tell people as to how I got the scar. Unfortunately, the scar doesn't look much like a shark bite.
On Wednesday, I went back to the doctor to get my Tanzania shots. I got three for traveling: Yellow Fever, Typhoid, and Hepititus A. Luckily I had Hep B already, since you need that one too. One of them made my arm sore for two days - I have no idea which one it was as I got a total of four shots that day.
Thursday, I attended the Rochester Badgers Founder's Day event where we awarded 10 $1500 scholarships to deserving Rochester Area high schoolers. Professor Jim Leary, Director of the Folklore program at the UW, told jokes the whole night and had us in stitches (pun intended for me). Congrats to the 10 scholarship winners!
Today, I settled on a company for our safari. I haven't booked it yet, but we're looking at a 15-day Mt. Kilimanjaro climb + safari to Lake Manyara, Serengeti, Olduvai, Ngorongoro, and Tarangire. If anyone knows anything about Swala Safari Company, please do share!!
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