Nairobi

We said an affectionate goodbye to most of our travelling companions who were leaving the tour to go directly to Zanzibar by bus. We stayed with the tour bus to go to Nairobi, accompanied by Sharon, Barb's cousin, and Barbara and Carole, the two Swiss women.

The trip was brutal. Most of the highway was under construction, with bone-shaking endless detours. We arrived exhausted. Fortunately, our hotel was comfortable, if a bit of an anachronism. The dining room decor was straight out of the sixties, quite well preserved. Moreover, they had decent food. Most of the two days we were there we spent relaxing, but we did go out for dinner at a fabulous restaurant. called Carnivore.

Their forte, needless to say, is barbecued meats. They do advertise that they have game meats (farmed, not hunted) but the onlty exotic meats we were offered were ostrich and crocodile.

Still, it's a great concept, and well exec uted. A waiter comes to the table with a rack of searing hot cast iron plates, and sets one in front of each diner.

Other waiters, wearing Zebra-striped aprons, are circulating around the dining room carrying flame-broiled meats on spits. They offer the meats at each table, and slice it by placing the end of the spit in the middle of the plate in front of you and carve until you tell them to stop. Many waiters come by during the course of the meal, one with a whole turkey on his spit, one with a leg of lamb, one with a whole roast of beef (rare and tender!), one with pork spare ribs, one with crocodile chunks, and one with ostrich, the liver and meatballs.

They place a carousel in the middle of the table with various sauces and fresh vegetables. There is a paper flag in the middle of the carousel. When no-one at the table could eat another bite, the diners lower the flag (in surrender). Then the meat waiters stop coming and the table is cleared. Then there is a decent selection of desserts with South African port.

We went back to the hotel to nap for a few hours because we had to get up in the middle of the night to get to the airport. Our flight to Cairo was to leave at 5:00 am. Apparently there are no night-time noise abatement bylaws to worry about in Kenya.

The cab ride to the airport was a memorable and spine-tingling race through the darkened streets of Nairobi.. Even though there was no reason to hurry, and the cab needed a new suspension and probably a brake job, our cab driver seemed determined to set a new land speed record. Fortunately, the traffic was sparse, but many of the vehiocles that were on the road were weaving erratically. The cab driver explained that the other drivers were likely drunk as he flashed by them. Mercifully, the lights on the instrument panel were burned out, so I couldn't see how fast we were going.

Our flight left ten minutes early. The aging EgyptAir A320 lumbered and shuddered as it wheezed its way skyward. This plane was so old it still had working ashtrays.

They did serve food, though the menu evoked gales of laughter from the cheap seats (ours). Maybe we were just giddy from fatigue. We were served a poached egg, a leaden pastry filled with dry cottage cheese and fenugreek, a hot dog, a potato puff, and two rolls with butter and fig jam. There was tapioca pudding for dessert.

We slept away the balance of our five-hour flight.