Off to Mombasa

Mombasa is one of the most beautiful beach resort towns in East Africa. Posh hotels and restaurants scatter along the Oceanside. Camels walk up and down the beach to attract the attention of tourists by either taking photos with them or riding them. On the weekends, locals gather along the beach playing loud music and swimming in the beautiful warm, crystal blue Indian Ocean. Although, I was some-what tired of being on the mosquito ridden beaches of East Africa, I decided to head on the 8 hour bus ride along a dangerous road ( where just a week before bus had crashed killing all the passengers) hoping for a safe journey.

Just a little background - Public transportation in Africa
The experience of riding on public transportation can be both gruesome and adventurous. Sometimes, you have to wait 2-4 hours for a ‘Dolla Dolla/Matatu’ (mini van) to fill up completely to leave for your destination. Other times, you can break down on the side of the road for hours, without any idea of what’s going on (especially when you don’t speak the language). A driver can also decide that if they feel they don’t have enough passengers to the final destination to just end the journey and drop you off in small town. Then again you have to hope and wait for another ’matatu’ to come. Sometimes if it’s Sunday or late in the evening, you‘re chances are very scarce. Other times you end up on a route, where the driver is chewing mirra ( a stem of a local plant that keeps you awake for many hours), hasn’t slept for a day and is driving you to your destination. Even though its over 100 degrees with humidity, most buses won’t have AC. . Every once in a while, there will be a large bus, that has a time schedule that leaves on time. As I started, most bus rides can be gruesome or adventurous, you pick.

After a long hot bus ride and the lunch stop in the middle of nowhere; we made it to Mombasa. I had the information to contact Marcia at Bombolulu, and would contact her the next day. It was Sunday, and I would spend the rest of the evening on the beach.