Beach fun at Pangani

4:45am is never a nice time to get up...especially if you didn't get to bed until after midnight!  That said, with the hope of a lovely ocean getaway we were all up and ready for the 8 hour drive to Pangani, on the north coast of Tanzania.  I had a spare seat next to me in the van (it sounds like I'm on an airplane!) so snuggled up and read about instructional and transformative leadership.  Yep, assignment writing time :(

I didn't go last year, and this year there were a lot less people - only 3 carloads of kids, tents, and cooking supplies.  Once we arrived I set up my tent and then went in search of the promised wifi (assignment due in 2 days - I had looked at reviews to make sure there was wifi).  Alas "wifi" was about as slow and ineffective as wifi can be...eek.  So, I went next door to a cafe/accommodation place and begged use of their internet.  They said I could come back tomorrow and use it for the day...hooray!

So, my first full day at the beach looked something like this:

2000 word essay in 9 hours straight from start to finish....Praise God that it happened because I usually need so much more time....I really didn't leave this position the whole day.

Did I mention that it was crazy hot? Mid 30's during the day but so humid and then only getting down to high 20's at night.  Thankfully the next day it was time for snorkeling and a trip out to the disappearing island (a sand bar that is submersed when the tide comes in).

looking back at our campsite

ready for some snorkeling!

Beautiful clear water!

Disappearing Island

The last night was even more ridiculously hot so I was up at 5am to go for a dip in the ocean (which is like swimming in warm whale pee), and take pics of the beautiful sunrise.

Perfect time for a swim :)

So that was our fun beach adventure.  Here are some more pics of this beautiful place.  Now to motivate myself to smash out another assignment and get ready for school going back in less than a week!

Love this gal :)