Touched down at Kilimanjaro Airport about 8:30 pm Tuesday (last night). Very excited - my seventh continent! It was warm and muggy stepping onto the tarmac. Very tropical here on the equator.

We were met by Tobias, a game driver from Voyagers, who drove us to the Dik Dik hotel, close to Arusha National Park. Driving is on the left. Paved road, one of just a few. People walking in the dark alongside the road, some with flashlights. Coke and Pepsi signs are numerous, as everywhere in the world. Speed bumps mark the village borders, constructed in an effort to keep reckless African drivers from killing pedestrians. A police car on the side of the road makes doubly sure.

Deb notices that the crescent moon is tipped over more, here on the equator, than it was when we saw it two days ago in New York. We travel between Mt Kilimanjaro and Mt Meru, but see neither in the darkness. The breeze coming through the land rover feels good. The air smells earthy, fragrant, and alive. Not like NY.

We turn down a dirt road, and a guard opens the gate to the Dik Dik Hotel. Even in the dark we can see that colorful bougainvillea line the drive. As we check into this posh place, they give us a welcome beer, and escort us to the dining area outside, where we meet David and Michelle from California, already arrived from Nairobi. A nice young couple, they run a consulting firm near San Francisco.

We are served a seven course meal: two appetizers,soup, salad, sherbet, entree, and dessert. Much more than we expected! Very good food, and somehow we manage to eat most of it. At 10:30 they showed us to our bungalows, complete with electricity, flush toilet, shower - again, more than we expected. The bed has a mosquito net around it, although we have yet to see one. No sheets, just a comforter. But we're tired, and drift off easily. I woke in the night for a few hours, in the blackness, not adjusted to the time change. Finally made it back to sleep.