A relaxing day

Finally a day without any must do things like flying to a new destination or working! I woke up, showered and went down to try out the breakfast. It was good - fruit, bread (the electricity was out so no toast), an omelette and 2 sausages all washed down with a mug of coffee. I have decided to definitely stay on here for the rest on my time in Mombasa so I paid for the remaining nights and then went for a long walk.

I wanted to see how long it would take to walk to KMFRI (where I will be working) so wandered down that way. It is not far maybe only about 10 minutes at an amble. Once at KMFRI I just carried on walking on the same road looking at all the new seafront apartments and hotels that are being built and I eventually came out at the beach. Standing there looking at Mombasa old town brought back wonderful memories of my late grandmother. When I would tell her I was going to Mombasa her face would light up. She had been to Mombasa during the second World War to visit my grandfather who was stationed somewhere up here. I'm not sure whether her obvious pleasure at hearing that I was going to be in Mombasa was because it was the one place in my travels that she could identify with but I like to think it was because she had such a wonderful time here - an idyllic holiday that brought back treasured memories.

This beach is not yet in front of a tourist hotel so it is in its natural state i.e. with seaweed on the beach. At the resort hotels the staff clean the beach every morning of the seaweed to create the "perfect" beaches shown in the postcards. This beach though is more to my liking but the seaweed does hide deeper pools in the intertidal areas. I now know how Ash (one of the hounds at home) feels when she goes into a pool thinking it won't be deep and she ends up wet with an embarrassed look on her face :-). I spent ages poking around in the pools and watching the birds and crabs doing their thing.

Eventually though it got too hot and I headed back to the hotel but still ambling along and enjoying the views.

Back at the hotel I chilled out with a book and listened to some music. In the afternoon there was a knock at the door and the hotel owner said there was someone who wanted to speak to me. I rushed downstairs and there was my friend Kizzie. He suggested we go for a drive and of course I agreed. We drove to the old part of Mombasa, picked up a couple of Tuskers and headed out to a spot overlooking the ocean and had a great catch up session. Although Kizzie and I keep in touch via email it is a year since we have last seen each other so there was lots to chat about! I was very slack about taking photos during this time :-) but here is one from the lookout point:

There are vendors selling ice-cream and coconut milk as well as traditional jewellery and the guy in the right foreground is frying fresh crisps. Mostly everyone just leans against the barrier looking out at the ocean and socialising.

I was dropped off at the hotel and really wanted to go for a swim because it was very hot but the pool was too crowded. Maybe I will go later. One of the great things about this hotel compared to the resort hotels is that there are no closed times for the pool, I can swim whenever I want to swim.

Now my weekend is drawing to a close and it will be back to work tomorrow. We are only starting at 09:30 so it really is not going to be a hardship getting up in the morning :-).

Take care all!