So as I said an early start, we all gathered at reception at 6 and waited...and waited...and waited. Finally the truck arrived at gone 7! This we discovered would not be the last time we did not start on time.

I finally met another girl who was on my trip - Tanya from New York but originally from Belarus and we were to pick a guy on the way out of Nairobi and join another truck in Arusha which would be our home for the next 22 days.

The traffic again was horrific - so much so that Jo, our guide, had to get out and get a moto taxi to the hotel to pick up the pther three travellers and meet us on the Mombasa road. This whole journey took over 2 hours and we hadn't even left Nairobi yet!

We finally met up with everyone and were able to grab breakfast before settling down for the journey. It was an almost full truck with people heading south to Cape Town who had already done most our our trip or were just going south and doing the Serengeti as an add on. Tanya and I got to meet Danielle, an Italian guy who said very little who was the third member of our trip.

The rest of the journey was uneventful, crossing the border and arriving in Arusha town to catch some wifi and buy provisions. We arrived at the campsite to meet the other 5 of our fellow travellers only to find that two were on their way to hospital with suspected typhoid!

The first person I met was Stephanie - an American who I took an instant dislike to (unusual for me but an opinion which only worsened with time!) The others were a couple - Ana from Spain and Bubu (real name Tim) from New Zealand. Lauren (Canada - 2 types of typhoid) and Hunter (Canada/America - just one type!) arrived back late and went straight to bed.

Stephanie asked what I like to be called - I said Alison, she said she hated being called Steph and proceeded to call me Ally - henceforth I called her Steph!

With only 8 of us on the truck there should have been plenty of space but the other five had spread out a lot and were trying to compact 50 days of travel!

After a lesson in tent erection from Steve - to be our driver - we had a food and drink and proceeded to get to know people.

Turned in at a reasonable hour with my new tent mate Tanya.