We transited through to Tanzania and back to towards lake Victoria to the town of mwanza. Our guide Nash gave little away about where we were staying but we were pleasantly surprised when we arrived.

Nash has a brilliant nack for managing 28 people's expectation on places we stay, he has wonderful sayings such as 'wifi ish' , 'hot shower ish' and my favourite 'running water ish'. He has used all of these so far in the places we have stayed.

The lodge on mwanza was on lake Victoria and like Mosquitos to the light we all chased into the water after erecting our tents. Olly was on cooking duty that evening so after a swim around he was set to cooking on the beach for the rest of us. Probably the nicest location for cooking for the whole trip so far. The location and the heat resulted in a long evening of drinking and surprisingly a small fight between two of the gents on the trip. The next morning we had breakfast and then a group reconciliation.

On towards the Serengeti we stopped at a beautiful campsite at the foot of a hill. A few of the gents set about climbing up, but shortly came running down when the heavens opened and everything came to a standstill. I tried to hit the hay early after feeling the beginning of a cold coming on, but like quite a few of the group, I spent most of the night awake listening to what you might describe as crazy preaching that was coming from a local church. This was an overnight lock in which started at 12 am finishing around 5 am. None stop screatching screaming and all coming from one person. Fascinating and slightly unsettling to listen to.

Tired and still pretty cold full we headed off into the Serengeti for an afternoon game drive. This was to become an highlight for most of us on the trip. To date we had seen many lionesses but today we are saw our first male lion. And this was him in full action mating with a female. We stayed watching for 30 minutes as they mated then napped and then repeated. Amazing to hear the lions roar close up. We drove off completely ecstatic at seeing this when our truck came to an abrupt hault and there in the tree was leopard lying in the tree. We'd been holding out for this since the beginning of trip and it didn't disappoint.

This evening was a night of wild camping in the Serengeti, meaning no boundaries to stop animals coming into the camp! We were treated to some waterbuffalo walking through the camp as we sat around the campfire and some of those who woke in the night saw hyenas walking around too. Olly and I had a great night sleep oblivious to it all.

We woke before dawn to watch the sun rise and head out for an early game drive. We didn't think yesterday could be beaten but immediately it was. We came across 20 young lions crossing the road around our truck heading for a play and water from a stream. We were so close watching them as they crept around the car.

From there we moved on to see literally hundreds of wilderbeast walking in single file across the plains. We then spotted lionesses in the long grass looking to make a kill. We chased closer but to no avail, but a thrilling few moments in the park.

As we exited to the sergeniti we had amazing views of flat plains where there must have been 700,000 wilderbeast grazing amongst zebras. When the park ends weirdly so do the wilderbeast as if there is an invisible boundary. Between the park and the Ngororo crater only the Masai Mara are allowed to live. We were given the option of visiting a Masai village, a bit of a tourist attraction and probably not a full time village, but I was keen to see this unique culture up close. However this wasn't a great experience and I had a horrible feeling some kids were being kept in a mock classroom for tourists, so I left quickly not really knowing what to do or say.

The road from here to the crater is ROUGH and wild. Barely road and constantly dodging giraffes and a few of the Mara tribe hearding their cows across the plains. As we head up the caldera side the temperature dropped and we all started dreaming of a hot shower. We had been told this was a 'hot water ish' camp and pretty wild. As soon as the big truck arrived at the camp an Irish man brandishing a tent hammer started waving and wagging his finger at the truck. Clearly not a fan. We came to a stop and he ran to our guide telling us that we were spoiling his view and told us to move. The gents were calm and told him to get a park ranger. Those rangers were Tanzanian locals that our driver Steve, a Tanzanian himself, knew well from the decades of coming to the camps. The guards turned up with guns in long black coats and greeted Steve as they hadn't seen him in many months. Much to the annoyance of the Irish man. We had a great evening around the camp fire before hitting the hay for another early morning to game drive.

The morning started at 5 am with a hearty breakfast we then jumped into jeeps to drive into the crater. This is technically a caldera and contains all the big 5 plus hundreds of other animals and birds. We had some amazing hours seeing lions hunt warthogs ( failed attempt, this warthogs run so fast), and an amazing encounter with a massive elephant that walked through the picnic spot and around our jeeps.

From the crater we took a long driver into Arusha and camped at a fabulous lodge, time for Olly to get his pool skills out and shock a lot of the gents on the trip. I lost count of the number of times they came up to me in dismay about how good he was. Everyone wanted him on their team.

With some sore heads and a crazy man running through the camp during the night we heading to Dar es Salaam. This was a two day journey with a stop at a truely terrible camp site, with frogs in the grass, 0 water and cracked concrete everywhere. But onwards to Dar and the much awaited beach break in Zanzibar. The next day brought our first sight of the Indian Ocean and beach.

Crossing into Zanzibar was a hot and inefficient process with people trying to porter your bags and send you in every direction, but the boat was a beautifully calm affair. Arriving to our hotel in stone town, olly and I found our first proper hotel room still used from the last guests so promptly asked for another key, after several attempts in different rooms with no locks we managed to bag a huge upgrade room with a panoramic view. Score!! After a month in camps and run down lodges this was 5*! Happy to be settled in we headed for a local restaurant with our guide and the English couple. The food was cracking and hearty. Given the history of the island the cuisines is mixmatch of Asian, Arab and African.

With food and lemon and ginger smoothies in us we got some time to roam together without the group. 1 month on this was the first time we had a good few hours with just the two of us. Stone town was beautiful and every turn presented something new. With our new found freedom as a couple we opted to hit a bar before we all descended onto the food markets for dinner. As we approached the bar 20 of the group turned up, and we were back to the group antics! No rest for us just now! We don't mind as the group has changed again and we've got a new group with us to meet and get to know.

The next morning we headed across to the beach resort of the north. We spent lazy days snorkelling , chilling on the beach and hanging out with the group. The place was beautiful and we had space to do our own thing and eat locally. A holiday from a holiday it seemed!

After 3 days of beach life we headed back to Dar and to mentally prepare for two days driving +14 hours a day to across into Malawi. Over the two days we cooked breakfast in a petrol station, camped in the bush, ate brownies by torch light, took dangerous loo breaks on the side of mountains, encountered heavy down pours and blistering heat, were constantly ejected from our seats and thrown around on the worst roads to date on this trip, and of course a two hour wait at the chaotic border where our passports are handed over and we hoped to see them at some point later and hoped our visa has a name that vaguely represents ours or someone on this trip!

I think the above skims across our time in Tanzania which feels like it has been an epic journey literally across and back through the country. I can't believe it's now a month of being on the road. Everything comes naturally to us being on the bus and camping almost all the time now. I relish a cold shower and I think we have now ditched the rain cover and sleeping bag as we head south into Malawi and things heat up.

As ever we keep an eye on Zimbabwe but fingers crossed we will head there. Our guide is confident that the atmosphere should be something special.