..... and now some time for rest and relaxation.....

My friend Jenny, noticing my frayed edges due to some of weeks of sickness and not much rest, decided to bless me with a couple of nights away at a lodge.

On arrival at the lodge, staff greet you with moist hand towels to wipe away the dust and fatigue. The delicious glass of pineapple and mango juice is a refreshing welcome, also.

The lodge is set in the Rhotia Valley and has a children's home on one hill and the lodge for guests on the other. The lodge supports the children's home and is very close to the entrance to Ngorongoro Crater. The scenery is breathtaking and serene. Peace is palpable. Huge hills are bathed in long streaks of sunlight and cows, goats and at night hyennas sing into the air. During our stay the rain drizzled down, a welcome thing in Africa, enhancing our feeling of snugness in our cosy tents. These tents are no ordinary tents. They have a roofing structure and en-suite with shower, verandah and fly screens. This is luxury.

For two days we slept, ate, read and chatted, all the while taking in the serene landscape around us. My soul was soothed.

Nevertheless, both the drive there and home again was quite dramatic....

The entrance to the lodge is via 5 kms of dirt road which is very steep in places. With a little rain it becomes a skating rink. The 4wd decided it wasn't working on one of the first hills we came to. Our car began sliding and slipping, no matter how slowly we drove. Sideways, looked like the best way forward at one point. After some more sliding, we approached a valley and after slowly sliding into the soft edges of the road, we decided this angle looked too much for our little car. We tried to negotiate back, then forward - we were stuck. At this point, one of the passers by came over. He seemed agitated and at first we were hoping for help. On the contrary, he began shouting "Thank you mama" in Swahili and hitting the car?? Soon it became evident that he was not in the same world that we were in. He began to pull on the head lights, aggressively - all the while dribbling and muttering. His aggression and fury with us was increasing. Finally, he looked us straight in the eyes, lifted his masai tyre-shoed-feet, up and wiped the 2 inches of mud on the bottom of them across our front grill and head lights. About 6 big lumps of mud adorned the front of Jenny's car - his face saying... "this is what I think of YOU!" Jenny, in the meantime, undaunted, pointed at him and authoritatively told him to take his leave. He was in the middle of another scraping when he looked up at her, stopped what he was doing, turned around and walked away. We giggled nervously and hatched a plan of escape. After phoning the lodge, they assured us that they would be back from Karatu in an hour and would find a place to safely leave the car and give us and our luggage a ride up to the lodge. Quite a crowd had gathered and it was time for us to practice our swahili and them, their english. Always fun! They established where we were from and they apologized for the masai madman.

With our car tucked safely away near the home of a villager we set off for our much needed break in the lodge truck..

Going home, proved equally adventurous...

After motoring along merrily, thankful for our restful time and that our car was safe when we found it, we drove into rain. The rain was wonderful. We watched the donkeys, goats and cows radiating thankfulness as they grazed in the rain.. . Then, we began to notice that there were puddles, in fact, water was streaming down the hillside. Soon the streams became swirling bodies of water tumbling over the road way. We slowed to assess the situation. Dala dalas were stopped, cars waiting. One car gingerly started to cross road that was covered by a torrent of swift flowing water, only to stop and reverse back after a few meters. This made us a little cautious. His 4wd was much bigger than our car. Shortly, a safari vehicle plowed through the water aggressively and made it across without mishap. We noticed that the water was rising. When the next safari vehicle decided to take the risk we decided to follow closely behind him to take advantage of his wake.

Mud sprayed everywhere, water sprayed onto Jenny's feet inside the car. The current was powerful and prayer pulled the little Rav 4 through the flooding. Our relief was short lived however, when we reached 3 more places where water covered the road - each of them as challenging as the last.

All the while laughter and prayer peppered our assessment of the situation.

Faith in God and a healthy love of adventure got us through all the dramas in the end.