Today we had a gentle introduction to the black continent at a distance with a bus trip from Nairobi to Arusha. The bus took roughly 5 hours, half the time it takes to go from Dar Es Salam to Arusha, and strangely enough 5 hours didn’t seem like a long time. I usually like to read on such long trips but the scenery outside was even more appealing then the best book I’ve read in a long time. The morning’s skyscraper view from the hotel seemed very far away from the poor state of villages leading to Arusha. At last the place started to look like Africa.

The central attractions of the journey were the Maasai, the most renowned tribe in East Africa. You'd have to be completely blind to miss them because the colourful dress that wraps their thin body stands out in stark contrast to the soiled background. Surprisingly, the Maasai were quite common not only in the barren land they are usually associated with, but also in the several villages we passed through.

During the journey we stopped at a large Souvenir (curio) shop so we went in search for our Kenya souvenir. The most reasonable souvenir so early in the holiday was a small colourful plate with jumping impalas, but for such a small thing we were asked $15. At that time $15 seemed very expensive so I tried to haggle down to $10 but reached no compromise. My better half wanted the plate so badly that I had to agree to pay $15 but since I didn’t have exact change I handed the attendant a $20 bill. This confused the youngster because he didn’t have change, so I took added a larger plate for a total of $20. Not knowing what else to do the attendant agreed and called me to a corner out of the way and asked me to hide away the plates in my backpack. This curious action didn’t quite feel proper but at least I got a good deal.

Before arriving at Arusha we had to cross the border from Kenya to Tanzania, so we had to pass through customs. At the immigration office everybody was issuing a VISA for Tanzania however we were privileged enough not to require a VISA. The list of countries that required no VISA consisted mainly of African countries and other remote countries like Fiji. The only three European countries in the list were Cyprus, Romania and Malta. It seems that this was such a rare event that the bus driver was very enthusiastic about us and he jokingly advised us not to leave our mother country because we didn’t need a VISA for Tanzania.

Thanks to the advert on our bus we decided to stay at the Impala Hotel in Arusha and it turned out to be a culinary delightful place. The rooms were spacious and clean and the service was good, but nothing matched the food they served here. Today four weeks after that day I’m still salivating at the thought of that delicacy. At the Indian restaurant I had Lamb Tandorri which was served in a brass dinner set that added just the perfect tot of atmosphere to accompany a perfect dinner.

Once we arrived in Arusha we had to solve the holiday's biggest dilemma – choosing a tour operator for the safari. Thanks to pre holiday research we limited our choice between Sunny Safaris and Bobby Tours, but choosing between them was still a difficult choice. Both operators were very helpful in replying to our probing e-mails before the holiday and both had excellent customer relationships. The advantage of Bobby Tours was that he was cheaper than Sunny, but on the other hand some posts by customers on The thorn tree didn’t seem very satisfied with their tour operator. On the other hand all those who went on safari with Sunny Tours all were very satisfied, and I personally knew somebody who went on three safaris with Sunny Tours, so that tipped the balance in favour of Sunny. After a long discussion with Sunny tours boss we struck a deal at $855 but with a day less then the tour with Bobby Tours. Read on to check whether it was the right choice or not…