The 315 start was hideous but soon we were crammed, with our bags, into a taxi, driven by one of the hotel's chefs, in his stained whites, and heading out of town for the Nyngezi bus station. Station was an overstatement, carpark would have been more appropriate, and which ever bright spark decided to locate the public transport hub 20km outside the city centre was obviously also the brains behind the rest of Tanzanias inefficient public transport network.

Chaos already reigned at 430 am as we paid the chef double what we'd expected and unloaded our bags into the darkness, lit only by the lurid advertising boards and the cooking fires at the edge of the carpark. We tracked down our bus, a huge multicoloured beast, and joined the melee surrounding the guy with a clip board who barred the door. He was not a happy man, but neither was I as a stream of single-minded, jabbering locals, who needed a stern lesson in British queuing, jostled to thrust their tickets in front of his feeble pen torch.

Eventually I managed to get the conductor to notice my scrumpled scribbled tickets and after a very complex double check we finally received our seat numbers. We wished our bags luck as they were rammed into the last few available square feet of the dusty hold before boarding to secure our seats.

The battered workhorse had either originally been built as a school bus or had been accidentally fitted with 20% too many seats, as leg room was non-existant. Faces stared up at us out of the gloom as we shuffled down the narrow cluttered aisle, dodging all manner of random produce which had been dragged aboard. Bob settled in with Charlie and Hattie at the back whilst I headed back out to watch the baggage compartments for light fingers.

Charlie soon joined me, partly for company and partly to stretch his legs in a less foetid environment. 5am came and went and it was nearly 6 before it looked as though the bus might move off. Some of the delay could have been due to the thievery of a gentleman's laptop by a suspicious looking character who Bob noticed shifting seats on the bus, needless to say we kept all of our possessions close. My seat was a few rows in front of the others but after some wheeler dealing, Bob managed to liberate the seat next to her whose occupant was very happy to swap with me, probably because he had been sitting on a large air filter. Fortunately we managed to stow this under the seat and settled in for the crowds to take their places. It took us another 30 minutes to actually leave the bus 'station' but finally with our legs spilling into the aisle and the smell of body odour thick on the air we were on our way.

I woke after about half an hour with my internal compass's alarm bells ringing. This was backed up by a familiar sky line and a smell of fish, we were back in Mwanza, and we could see our hotel. We could have stayed in beds for another 3 hours, and this induced a maniacal laughter in the other 3 as they came round, realising where we were.

We loaded onto another roll on-roll off ferry and headed across the channel, watching the sun rise over our stern as we finally left Mwanza behind. After disembarking, the coach set off at a frightening pace which did not match the quality of the road, but despite the spine jangling bumps, and the constant thunder of tyres on unmetalled road, we all drifted off to various uncomfortable versions of sleep.

With cricked necks and sore legs sleep was brief and the terrible road, combined with having Mad Max at the wheel, continued to make conversation impossible. Occasional periods of weightlessness would follow bumpy lift offs and neighbours regularly collided with each other in mid air as we ploughed on through the dusty countryside alongside a perfectly good tarmac road which had been blockaded with regular arboreal road blocks for no good reason other than to allow Mad Max the pleasure of crashing through the undergrowth alongside.

We blundered on for hours, with our route included some sections of tarmac though we often had to slow to walking pace to navigate rough sections and twice stopped to stretch our legs but avoided the foul smelling loos. We were soon off the 'better' roads and onto the slipped disc inducing narrow tracks which were no better than the game drives we had negotiated in the Serengetti. We stopped frequently at villages where dust filled the bus and I could practice my new non-explosive sneezing technique. It also allowed for people to purchase their shopping through the windows and, just before the sun set, a crazy lady threw herself on the bus and started screaming, dancing and hexing us. All rather scary, but not as scary as the roads when night fell.

After 16 hours of jiggling, jolting and bumping along the hideous excuse for a road network we finally pulled into the dim lights of Kigoma's surprisingly functional bus station. I readiness I barged to the front and managed to squeeze off the bus just as our bags were unceremoniously dumped out of the hold. They were unrecognisable, covered in a thick layer of red dust which got everywhere, and also coated Hattie's face making her look like a nightmarish umpalooma. Suddenly surrounded by faces offering taxis in the night we formed a defensive square around our bags and bartered our way into the cheapest car who carried us off into the darkness.

Wearily we took in the night scene of Kigoma and found it to be a clean and quiet place, though we did come across a prostrate motorcyclist who had tried to nip behind a car pulling out of a junction. Unfortunately he had not realised that the car was towing a second vehicle and the unfortunate rider successfully clothes-lined himself, though amazingly nobody appeared badly hurt.

We weaved our way up to the guesthouse which had received good reviews online but had refused to answer our numerous pho calls in an attempt to make a booking. The receptionist was as unhelpful in the flesh as he had been before we arrived, managing to possibly find one room for us but it took half an hour of faffing before we could finally unload our bags with their coating of orange dust, into the immaculate white reception. Fortunately for us the manager arrived and managed to find a second room for us in the seemingly deserted complex...

We dumped our bags and had a swift shower to try and remove at least the top layer of travel grime. After 3 shampooings I was concerned I may remain forever ginger as the suds from my hair were still coming away orange but at least our shower turned off, unlike Charlie and Hattie's.

Over a beer, Charlie and I discussed our travel plans with the helpful and we eventually tucked into some comfort food in the dark garden. Mercifully the mosquitos didn't make an appearance and sleep was inevitable though I feared the sheets would not remain brilliant white in colour, despite our attempts to shower.