I became aware of the buses and their uncivilised honking around 530am. Accompanied by a pesky mosquito whistling in my ear their trumpeting dawn chorus made for a slightly earlier start than we had originally planned. It also became apparent that my airborne friend had had a midnight feast on my flank so inbetween sporadic bouts of scratching we finished our packing and headed up for breakfast.

At 845 the Killidove guy appeared and apologised, Josh was still battling traffic so we loaded our bags into a battered old disco and headed to the supermarket. Shopping was quite entertaining and challenging, trying to dream up a menu from the wide and eclectic selection of produce on offer. With a very heavily laden trolley we checked out and after much confusion, and with Charlie's cards not playing ball, we paid for our trolley of goodies and ventured outside to where our trusty vehicle had just arrived.

She was a 110 crewcab pickup in burgundy with 2 roof tents and a hardtop loadbay painted in violently clashing tangerine... Our bags and shopping only just fitted into the boot with lots of shoving, and after Charlie signed the papers we were off, headed straight to the fuel station.

After filling the duel fuel tanks, and emptying our wallets of cash, we headed west with Josh at the wheel and the speakers providing us with music for the Lion King as a soundtrack. The countryside was vast and soon stretched away from us for miles in all directions whilst the road just kept on rolling. We decided to name our vehicle Princess Rainbow III, after her unusual paint job, and after being pulled in by several police roadblocks we were soon cruising into Tarangire National Park.

Despite a hearty breakfast we were starving and scoffed the spaghetti and vegetables on sale at the gate, avoiding the prehistoric looking deep fried perch which topped Charlie's plate. When we'd finished our beers we haemorrhaged another small fortune for our park fees for 24 hours and then set off down the sandy track into the park.

Within 5km we had seen graceful Impala, noble giraffes, teams of baboons, huge groups of elephants and elusive waterbuck. Amusing groups of pumbas charged through the long grass as a family of mongooses poked their noses out of a disused termite mound. The bird life was incredible with vultures, fish Eagles, kingfishers and countless other bright specimens flitting past us as we traversed the roads which cross crossed the park. Sadly lions remained elusive as did Leopards which reportedly lounged in the numerous sausage trees. I have not done any other animals here justice by listing them but the whole experience was incredible and cameras clicked madly as we cruised around the park from the tall cliffs to the wide river valley.

We drove back through the sunset, passing a huge solitary elephant enjoying a mud bath and a jackal on the scrounge before arriving at our accommodation which also proved to be home to a very sweet little dikdik.

Whilst Charlie and I tried to make some sense of the shopping over a cold beer the girls created a chicken stirfry and strangely exhausted we all retired early to our mosquito netted cocoons and had no difficulties getting to sleep.