Equateur Flowers

As with your travel to Kenya and the booking of accommodation, so with journeys within the country it is best to make as many arrangements as possible in advance through your travel agent or airline. Apart from the greater convenience, this will often give you the benefit of group prices. Most tours of the game areas are made by mini-buses or landrovers, often specially modified for game-viewing. Read the rest of this entry »

When you decide to visit Kenya you will be following a tradition which goes back thousands of years when the ancient Chinese, Romans, Persians, Greeks, and Arabs made their seaborne journey to the coast of East Africa. Of course, our history goes back much further than that, the earliest man-like remains have been found in Kenya. The history of our people, their migration, and conquests, years of plenty and years of famine, social organisations and folklore, all have an unfolding uniqueness in them. Read the rest of this entry »

On my birthday, we got up about 5, and caught the 6:30 flight from Manaus to Port Vehlo. Richard, an American expat, picked us up in the supplier’s pick-up truck. The pick-up was filled with furniture to be delivered to the supplier’s wife and there was barely room for our bags. We climbed in, with me in the middle, the gear shift between my legs and headed off. No aircon of course. About two cramped and hot hours down the road, there’s a gentle bump and a repetitive thumping noise. Richard pulls off and we see the front tire sunk flat. Okay, so we find a spare buried beneath the furniture…but no jack. Okay, flag a man down (not as easy as it sounds–we’re on a major highway and folks just don’t stop unless, like this fellow, they feel its their Christian duty), borrow his jack, get the car up and the flat off, put on the spare…but the spare doesn’t fit. Read the rest of this entry »

Since travel by air wasn’t practical, we drove north of Santa Cruz about 6 hours. We worked our way along the road, through military road blocks and across a one-lane bridge that alternated between serving both car and train traffic, picking our way through cattle herds that had travelled slowly in the company of a dozen cowboys 500-1000km from Brazil to start a farm in Bolivia. The mill was only 300km away, and the last 150km took nearly 4 hours, with the last 20km or so taking an hour in a four wheel drive truck. Read the rest of this entry »

On our Sunday in Manaus, we arranged for a tour on our free Sunday, and went piranha fishing. Meeting our non-English speaking guide, Augusto, at 7am, we headed off. We stopped first at the market for some fresh steak as bait. The piranhas apparently prefer it still bleeding. We got in a nice tour boat (long motor boat with fold-down benches and a roof) and began to wander up and down through the rivers and swamps. Later we transferred to a dugout canoe for a even deeper penetration into the wild areas. It was an entirely different type of jungle and absolutely amazing to me that just an hour previously we had been in a modern city. Read the rest of this entry »

Shopping facilities and fun activities abound in every part of the city. Get a Thai to take you and show you around. Bargaining is possible on the streets and in the marketplaces but prices are strictly fixed in all indoor establishments. Here is some shopping advice.

Compare the prices of the same thing in several different shops before making a decision. You are allowed to bargain down the prices of most street stall goods and smaller shops. Department stores have set prices and a set of annual sales. Read the rest of this entry »

Before coming to Tanzania you will probably have an outline of what you plan to do and see, even though you may leave the details to be filled in when you arrive. Most of our visitors who come for about three weeks like to spend one week at the coast and one week in the game areas. Read the rest of this entry »

Thai people enjoy eating and drinking to full satisfaction. No beverage or food is forbidden. Interesting snack foods sold by wayside vendors, popular with the Thais make an interesting culinary experience, at very little expense, for the foreign visitor. Fruit vendors abound along the streetside, selling their delicious produce from glass encased trolley-carts. Restaurants abound along the city streets. They feature not only an abundance of hot and spicy Thai food but also a host of other international cuisines which are now available in fashionable dining venues. Tipping is practiced in such places although there is no strict rule concerning this. The invitor, or else the person having the highest position or status in the group usually pays for everyone. Read the rest of this entry »