Villagers ringed us at breakfast, including two redheads with pale skins; all were dressed in a sad assortment of rags and aid clothing – over the last few days in Burundi and Tanzania we've seen some of the poorest dressed people of the whole journey.
Nested under an oppressive sky, the grey broken only by a slash of blue on the horizon that seemed to grow smaller as we approached. Only rarely did the sun peek through the canopy and add a touch of warmth. We drove through almost flat land with gentle rises and our potholed and rutted road sloped gently up and down. We passed clusters of two or three huts surrounded by vast fields of rice, corn, potatoes, sunflowers and millet being planted and harvested and tilled. We saw lots of cattle on the road and many of the villages had plank and wire cattle pens.
Finally bumped into the town of Geita where we stopped to shop, rummaging through all manner of Chinese manufactured goods, beautiful fabrics, and cheap fruit and veg.
Late in the day we spotted the southernmost finger of Lake Victoria, its shoreline lumpy with boulders and overgrown with trees stained white with bird droppings. Jumped a long queue of trucks to catch the last ferry across, enjoying a beautiful view of waterfront villages, boulder hills and pirogues loaded with sugarcane. We stopped for beers when we reached Mwanza on the otherside and Vicki chatted with children at the back of the truck; Kelvin brought out his mask and Geoff his plastic snake.
Camped with cows in a big green paddock well off the road. Nikki set up her travelling hair salon and I ate a delicious dinner with a new haircut.
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