Phewy it is just so hot. The weather here has now turned slightly humid and for the last couple of days it has been too unbearable to venture outdoors in the sizzling sun. Not helped of course by a small bout of EXTREME cramps. However I have now finalised (pretty much … lol) various travel plans between now and coming home.

Alison’s mother is being moved into the Fairseat foundation next weekend and the coming week will be spent chaotically organising the move. The following weekend, Alison and Paul are venturing to the island of Lamu – known now as the more popular choice to Zanzibar the spice island. Zanzibar is the destination for most South Africans going on holiday and has therefore become extremely commercialised. Lamu is on the north coast of Kenya and is relatively near the Somalia border. For this reason they advise that you fly direct to Lamu and don’t drive (because of the car-jacking risks). Once you’re on the island though, you’re as safe as you can be in Kenya and able to enjoy a relaxing break on an island that has no cars. (Similarities could be drawn with the Scilly isles?) Perhaps people are turned off from going to Lamu because of it’s closeness to the Somali border.

Anyway, I have two safaris booked now – one of which I will be going on whilst A + P are in Lamu and the other at the end of February. I then plan to spend the week preceding the Kilimanjaro trek sleeping, stuffing my face with vitamins and healthy foods and doing obscene amounts of exercise. :-D and then it’s off to Kilimanjaro! A week long trek up Africa’s highest mountain is – I’m guessing – going to leave me feeling pretty washed out. So I have a short while of recovery before flying down to Mombassa for a weekend with Alison and Paul. I was planning on visiting Tsavo national park but upon realising that I would not see anything unique to Tsavo (i.e. it’s all in the Mara) I am saving the money and will stay in Mombassa for a couple of days extra. People go for entire fortnights to Mombassa and all they do is sunbathe so I am not going to feel guilty for having two days of perfect happiness lying in the sun on a white beach with clear seas and palm trees scattered everywhere. Bliss or what. I’m on holiday, holidays are all about enjoying yourself! They also have glass bottomed boats which take you out so you can go snorkelling. They stay the beach side of the reef (which is so vast along the Indian Ocean and enables the seas along the beaches to be so still and clear) so you can [safely] view all the local sea life. They do offer diving training but with my fear of deep open water I think I might give that one a miss… Snorkelling though…how awesome would that be. And me in a wetsuit?! Phwoaar I’ll be fighting the locals off… (those who remember Aberdyfi will remember my hysterical struggle to even get IN a wetsuit let alone walk around as if it is a second skin…) and I will be wearing a wetsuit because too many embarrassing stories could come so easily from not wearing one.

SO I would then fly back just 3 days before I fly home again to the UK. When I talk about it all like this it seems that time passes so incredibly quickly (can’t quite believe it has been a month already…) and before I know it I will be back from Kili and Mombassa and on a plane home again to the grey old Wendover.

Despite the heat in the middle of the day, it has only really affected me because of the humidity levels rather than the actual heat. I find myself getting more and more used to the temperatures here, and almost like clockwork – at half past 4/5 o’clock I find myself in need of a jumper because it has dropped down to just 22 degrees!! I mean, how on earth will I cope once back in the UK?!? I’ll be wearing my snow jacket and ski trousers that I have brought with me for Kili. Brrrr just thinking about temperatures in Wendover are making me shiver…

However, despite not being overly homesick, I will be happy to see and live in the UK again. Just a few months make you realise how lucky you are to live in such an overly developed country. I am certain that upon my arrival at Heathrow I will shortly want to turn around and get back on the plane to Kenya… but for now, I miss simple things like having a choice of 20 brands of yoghurt and cheese. SALAD I miss it so much I genuinely am not functioning properly (ok being SLIGHTLY melodramatic there) without a good chicken caesar. Like the one from Pizza Express…mmm. Salad and vegetables in general go off so quickly down here. They grow amazingly quickly but have a very short shelf life. Got very excited this morning as I got to try my first Pawpaw (which is only exciting because of it’s reference in the Jungle Book ‘if you pick a pawpaw….’) etc

Another thing I find myself missing is Hugo, my true love – my red VW Polo car. It became a second room for me to empty all the rubbish I seem to acquire over [short] periods of time and now he is empty and clean and only being driven once or twice a week. Heartbreaking stuff right?!?

Whilst I increasingly find that I am falling in love with Kenya, nothing excites me more than the day I will get to see my mummy and daddy again (altogether now … aaaawww). The day that I left to come here was pretty emotional and I imagine that coming through the arrivals hall will be just as funny to watch as a stranger… If only because most people on gap years tend to go backpacking - yet here I am with two HUGE bags that I can barely lift (all full of clothes) in such a typical Hannah way. Ha ha ha!