Traveling with Fr. Evandro and Francesco was a different experience for me…we flew. Every time I have traveled to the parishes by Lake Victoria, I have driven the 1,100 km each way. Since Fr. Evandro was on a tight schedule, we could not afford to spend 4 days in the car, so Fr. Daniel drove us to Dar es Salaam, where we caught a flight to Mwanza. There, Fr. Andrzej picked us up and drove us to Buhemba.
The airport in Dar es Salaam has three terminals, one of which is only a few years old, so it is a state-of-the-art facility. The other two terminals are old and rather small. One of these smaller terminals was our departure point. The airport in Mwanza is, of course, even smaller. There were some spectacular views that Francesco captured on film.
One of the more magnificent photos he was able to take was of Mount Kilimanjaro, which is the tallest mountain in Africa and the fourth tallest mountain in the world at 5,892 meters. He was able to take some other great photos of the east coastline of the country on the Indian Ocean.
Fr. Evandro and Francesco flew into Dar es Salaam when they arrived, but they were flying back to Rome from Zanzibar. So, that meant that after Fr. Andrzej drove us back to Mwanza, we flew to Zanzibar, where I stayed overnight before continuing my journey back to Dar es Salaam. One crazy detail was that it took an hour to drive to the airport and 2 ½ hours waiting in the airport for a 22-minute flight to Dar es Salaam! But who am I to complain about this after getting to spend a day in Zanzibar!
Zanzibar, an island in the Indian Ocean, is about 35 km off the coast of Tanzania. Zanzibar joined with Tanganyika to form the United Republic of Tanzania in 1964. It has an area of about 1,554 square km and has a population of about 730,000 people.
Zanzibar is a tourist-resort island with beautiful beaches that attract people who like to boat or parasail, fish, scuba dive, swim and relax. It is very hot, but the air conditioning in our motel worked well. The beaches are beautiful and the water warm and shallow.
As you walk along the beach, you must run a barrage of young Maasai men who are selling everything you can image.
In the afternoon we took a taxi to the northwest part of the island in order to see the sunset. We also were able to watch some incredible gymnasts.
One sign I saw provides good advice for all of us: “NO TRASHY…STAY FRESHY.”
More to come on www.resurrectionists.ca
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