Mountain air

Very tempting to head off again for a weekend at the beach, but I still have so many places I want to visit in this country. The huge benefit of being the family decision maker is just that - I get to decide what we're doing.

So we all piled into the car for just under a 3 hour drive up into the Eastern Usambara Mountains. Our new med student, F, training in New Zealand, gamely came along to join the adventure. Which meant a long journey in the boot with our talkative youngest child!

I really hoped the recommendations for Lushoto, and higher were worth the effort. 

Thankfully, they truly were - we were treated to an Alpine summer climate, with pines and green meadows and grazing cattle. Our bed for the night at Irente Farm (German in beginnings) was basic, but idyllic. 

We all enjoyed petting the very un-African pigs. It is hard to explain our excitement at the simple fare of fresh bread with real butter, cheese and homemade jams. 

We only stayed 1 night as I wanted to head higher, up to 1900m to Mambo View Point to stay at an ecolodge perched on the edge of cliffs.

My navigation didn't go quite so smoothly and another 2 hours later I was really hoping it was worth the extra drive (all on the bumpy dirt tracks we have become so used to). We had many pauses to ask amused boda boda drivers whether we were heading the right way.

Once again, my worries were unfounded and it was a spectacular destination. I shared L's concerns as we turned the corner to see little huts built on a vast rock overhang. It was so cool, the air was dry and the views as if we were at the end of the earth. You could literally see Africa stretching endlessly out from beneath us. 

Last night we had little pots of fire burning beneath the table to keep us warm and we snuggled up under duvets. L in fact slept in 3 layers of clothing with her hood up.....at 22c I'm a little concerned she'll need ski wear for our return to the British summer. We woke to clouds beneath our toes - a vista of white rolling candyfloss spreading outside our windows, with the glinting peak of Kilimanjaro 160km away in the distance. 

Remove the oppressive heat and the children once again start moving - skipping and running along the little paths and gamely agreeing to a walk/scramble along the cliff edge to a view point. Though not sure M nor I enjoyed the feeling of our precious family sitting on boulders balanced at the top of a 1km drop!

Family harmony can't possibly last a whole weekend, and a 4.5 hour drive back down to the hot plains put paid to any illusions of angelic children. F got a pretty good close up of 3 squabbling passengers on the back seat.

We are safely back to sweating in Muheza, though a peony coloured sunset thick with swooping bats greeted us home. After a weekend of feasting, supper was all I had in the cupboard - marmite toast, and some of the cottage cheese I brought back from Irente. And so we enter our last 3 weeks....