At first sight nothing has changed.

Even the old habit - sundowner on the veranda - hasn't changed. Kilimanjaro and Mt.Meru are greeting from the distance like always and every evening we enjoy a different sunset - one as nice as the other.

Something important is new: An additional house is under construction. This keeps us all more or less busy.

The party season starts with the birthday of Dolores as usual, followed by the xmas holidays, Rainer's birthday and New Year's Eve.

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For the Christmas dinner the compulsary turkey has to loose its life. Lois has brought an outdoor turkey fryer last year already and we have to use it eventually with a 9 kg bird!

Something very special is a visit to Arusha's most famous restaurant "Chicken on the Bonnet". In the evening the spare part shop changes to an excellent barbeque restaurant.

Because the new house gets its thatching all the other units will get a new thatching as well. Many rides with the pick-up are necessary to bring all the thatching material up the mountain. Of all the days on New Year's Eve is a lot of thatching material available. But our two fundis work hard to bring it all up - they don't care about New Year's Eve!

And when the party starts they are neat and clean again!

New Year's Day is the day of Alfred, the pig.

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The next door neighbour of Ngurdoto is David Read. He grew up with Massai people. He published several books about his life. From outside his house is almost invisble, inside it is quite comfortable.

He invites us on a safari around Mt. Meru. The offroad trip takes about six hours and is quite interesting, especially with David as guide. His adventures will fill some more books!

When a bigmouth got on his nerves about how much bigger and nicer everything in the States is, David's only answer was "and that's how we grow asparagus"!

"Down the road” lives the Erb family. Marta and Walter are from Switzerland and choose this place for their retirement. They have the most beautiful garden you can think of. Fifteen years ago there was nothing, they planted everything.

Walter cultivates orchids. Marta runs a small swiss farmyard with a few cows and chickens. And all kinds of fruits! Marta's mangos are the best!

Since years Dick supports a small orphanage. Under his supervision the house was built. Here live appr. 45 children between five and sixteen years.

. They own a couple of cows and some geese. When somebody brought a few eggs to breed chicken what hatched out looked a bit strange. Since then the orphange has crone cranes instead of chickens!

Here are the safaris of this year:

 

All good things come to an end. All of us get a special farewell cake!