coffee plantation outside Arusha City
Sunday, 19th August 2012
Leaving Arusha City, we drove past coffee plantations with nice lodges within the estates. Our guide, Noel, a native Tanzanian, reported that all these coffee plantations belong to Indian Tanzanians, who also dominate most of the other sectors of the economy which is tourism and mining.
The road we drove on was a good metalled 2-way highway. The coffee plantations grow the famous Arabica beans and at higher altitude, they grow the Robusta beans. Further out of the city, we passed corn and wheat farms. Agriculture is one of the pillars of the Tanzanian economy. Noel, our guide, said that of late, Chinese businesses have made their way here and they are involved in road construction as well as in mining concessions.
corn plantations
wheat farms
good metalled highway
and a local intercity bus
art for sale along the highway
After about an hour or so we passed by a district called Mto Wa Mbu - according to Noel, it means, 'the mosquito river?'. According to Noel, this district is somewhat swampy and wet and as such tends to breed a lot of mosquitos of the Anopheles and Culex species. The Anopheles mosquitoes transmit the malaria parasite and the Culex, the elephantiasis worms.
It is a requirement when one travels to East and Central Africa that one takes the 'yellow fever' vaccine - a disease also transmitted via mosquitoes. As a prevention against malaria - we also started taking the malaria prophylaxis (preventive) medicine, Lariam, one week before the trip and once every week for the duratin of the trip until up to 2 weeks after our return.
the mosquito river village
Passed the village of Mto Wa Mbu - the highway started to ascend and midway we could see the Lake Manyara in the distance. The vegetation became less green with brown shrubs, cactuses and baobab trees.
a baobab tree
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