This is just a quick post to mention that we are about halfway around the world from our starting point of Portland Oregon. We're in Dubai, UAE for a few more hours before heading to Bangkok. For those of you who are curious, nobody ever even checked for the Israeli stamps in our passports.

We've been in Africa since January 12th with a brief hiatus in Israel and Jordan. We're finally leaving on Thursday.

Africa has been pretty amazing. We thought we would like Morocco a lot more and we had no idea we'd love Egypt as much as we did. We haven't been sick nearly as much as we thought we'd be, (Maybe dysentery contributed to not liking Morocco so much) though the jury is still out on whether or not we have contracted Malaria or Bilharzia. In March and April we were constantly singing Toto's lyrics "I've seen the rains down in Africa" and at one point we thought the mud would never wash out. We've been mere feet from Mountain Gorillas and actually touched lions and cheetahs. We saw TWO leopards when we were in the Serengeti. We came to understand the true depth of the swahili word pole-pole (slowly slowly), and we learned to enjoy warm Tusker beers like the Kenyans do. I jumped off a bridge and we both jumped out of a plane. We feel pretty lucky to have had such a remarkable 5 months or so.

The overland truck trip had its ups and downs. It's a very economical and easy way to see a lot of the continent's highlights. The downsides are obvious, the only advice we can offer is that you might want to pay a little more to guarantee a trip with fewer than 20 people on it. Ours had 29 people on it, and it did test people's patience. Overall, though, it was absolutely worth it. The truck took us to places we would never had known to go to on our own, or would never have had the confidence to go to, like Zimbabwe, which was one of the trip's highlights. We also made some very good friends that we'll be imposing upon for places to sleep in the future.

Some advice:

*Mosquito repellants are pretty hit or miss. Some days they just don't work. Make sure you have long pants and sleeves.

*Bring a wheelbarrow to carry around your Zimbabwean currency.

*Consider learning to use an SLR camera, I certainly wish I did, and that I had one with me.

*If tent camping, have a really good sleeping pad, especially if you sleep on your side.

*Beware of acid-beetles.

*Try scud, ask the locals in Zimbabwe where to find it. Its local cornmeal beer. Thick, low in alcohol, and slightly sour. Oh, and its disgusting.

*Get over your bathroom hangups. Squat toilets and shrubs aren't that bad. And that smell is just ammonia. Pretend you're cleaning the kitchen.

*If there is ever anything you're not sure you really feel like doing, do it anyway. Chances are you'll be glad you did.

*The weather is colder and wetter than you think it is.

*Its not as cheap as you think it is, except Egypt, which is cheaper.

*The internet access can be suprisingly good until the power goes out.

*Read _Dark Star Safari_ no matter how annoying it can be.

*If you're going on an overland truck trip, bring some recipies.

*Relax, it's Africa.

We're very excited to be moving on to new and different things. We are flying to Bangkok via a stopover in Dubai. Our next challenge is getting the UAE passport control people to not notice the Israeli stamps in our passports. Otherwise we'll have a very long wait in the international transit lounge.

PS: There are a LOT of new photo albums up. I normally post links to all the new albums, but there are just so many and they're all at the top of the page when you go to the Photo Gallery. I hope they keep everybody occupied for a while.

Hi all,

We've been off the truck and in Cape Town for a few days now. We still don't have any flights booked out of South Africa, so we're stuck here for a bit, but its given me plenty of time to get pictures uploaded. In addition to the new albums, I've added links to two videos we shot to the "Mzungus in the Mist" Post. Be sure to check those out. All the links with new stuff are below:

Gorilla Videos in Blog Post
Kenya
Uganda Part I
Uganda Part II
Uganda Part III

Those should keep you all busy for a while. More to come in a few more days. Thanks for reading!