HAPPY NEW YEAR – Welcome to 2012

Greetings my little party animals

I was up early this morning, on patrol, looking for our camouflage security folk…….I must admit they’re good – couldn’t find them anywhere!

I’ve become the lone German….I reserve all our chairs by 6.00am as whilst I have paid the man to sort it out, other people are trying to muscle in on our territory and have attempted to remove our well placed shells. Not any more….there is a selection of porn magazines now strategically placed on our chairs…..move them at your peril!!!

Indy has now resigned himself to not catching the Marlin this year – gives him something to look forward to next year – although not sure when or where.

Today we went on a snorkelling adventure – we were taken out to the reef and then went to discover life under the sea. All that kept going around in my head was the song from Nemo……just keep swimming just keep swimming…….followed by songs from Little Mermaid. Fortunately the Jaws theme was nowhere to be heard!! Jamie didn’t come with us which was no surprise as it would have meant her getting into the sea and that’s a complete No No – For years we have been trying to get Jamie into the sea but she insists she cant go in as there are fish……wasn’t worth trying to deny it today!!

I’m not a great fish lover myself but as it happens it was all very calm and serene with all the fish swimming past until some lunatic from another boat threw bread rolls into the water…….there was a wild fish frenzy going on…..millions of them appeared from nowhere attacking the bread…swimmer beware!! Cant say I enjoyed that too much, at which point it was time for me to get back on the boat. Adventure over!.

Then it was time to start getting ready for the evenings festivities…..

I found one of them!!! – Security is here! Not overly camouflaged……a native gentleman in khaki’s and his alsatian dog patrolling outside our room….good to know we are safe and not a Somalian insight. I’ll rest easy tonight!

New Year celebrations started at 8.00pm – a black tie gala event. There were over 400 people (hotel guests and outside people). There was a huge buffet with ice sculputres, sushi, various seafoods, roasts, curries, salads and an amazing assortment of desserts. The band were playing up until about 1.00am and then a disco kicked in.

There has been much excitement here preparing for New Years Eve – all the tables had glow sticks, glow spectacles, poppers, streamers, hats and amazing masks. It was a bit like being 10 again…we swapped around the masks until we were satisfied that we had the ones we liked!!

When we came down for dinner….more like along, the bar area was absolutely buzzing. Everyone makes a big deal of New Years Eve. DInner suits for the men and cocktail/long dresses for the women. The evening is kind of split into two……at 12.00 Kenya time New Year is brought in and again at 3.00am when it happens in the UK. if you can manage to stay awake followed by breakfast.

We saw in the Kenyan one in and by about 1.30 we were starting to wilt but got a second wind and ended up seeing in the UK one – complete with Big Ben. FInally at 4.00 we crawled back to our rooms and no sooner had our heads hit the pillow, the Zzzzzzzzzzzzz’s were being thrown up. It was a good night.

I was up this morning at 7.30 – checked the chair situation outside…..all is good. Porn magazines firmly in place!

It’s a bit like a ghost town here today….just me and the clearing up team are awake….No, I’m not offering to help! The security men are back to being well camouflaged again and all seems well in the world.

Sadly we are leaving here tomorrow so we have to get packed and organised.

Tomorrow we will be reunited with Geoffrey (hopefully) He is waiting for us in the International arrivals hall having been courierd up to Nairobi. The next problem will be locating him although I suspect he will be a bit difficult to miss bearing in mind his height!! Followed by trying to get him on the Virgin flight home.

Indy thinks he will fit in the car coming to collect us, with 5 big suit cases, 4 people, a driver and two big hold-alls. hahahahahahahaha….it’s never going to happen – he’s about 8ft tall!

On that sweet note – I wish you all a Happy 2012 and look forward to seeing you in the New Year.

Toodle Pip.

Love

Anna x