A Lady in London

After an unexpected 48 hour flight delay in Bamako, my boyfriend and I finally made it to Lamu, Kenya on Monday afternoon. When our prop plane touched down at the tiny airstrip on Manda island, I was overwhelmed with relief to have at last arrived at the final destination of our Africa trip.

(more…)

After the taxi breakdown on the way to the Dakar airport, I hoped the rest of our trip would go smoothly. Unfortunately, the incident proved to be a mere taste of the bad luck we would encounter over the next three days.

(more…)

As of two days ago my Africa adventure in Senegal was going smoothly. Despite flight connections on several different airlines, a number of multi-hour taxi rides, and a myriad of hotel reservations, my boyfriend and I had not encountered a single snag.

(more…)

After our final day in Dakar, my boyfriend and I got back in our taxi for the long drive down the hot dusty coast of Senegal. Passing small villages with cinder block buildings and thatched roofed huts, donkey carts moving slowly down the roadside, and towns full of colorful tourist shops, we eventually came to the end of the paved road. Not stopping there, we pushed further south along a potholed red dirt track flanked on either side by dry brush punctuated by centuries old baobab trees.

(more…)

After six days of non-stop traveling, my boyfriend and I woke up on Monday and decided that we needed to give ourselves a little bit of time to relax.

We sat by the pool at Le Meridien in Dakar from 10am until almost 2pm, reading books and sipping café au lait. I have to admit that I had a hard time with it. Being type A++, I wanted to be on the move, exploring more of Dakar.

However, I was also exhausted and running low on energy, and knew that I needed to take some time to rest if I wanted to keep up the pace of the first half of the trip.

(more…)

The first thing that struck me about Dakar was how much more developed it was than Bamako. Tall buildings—or really any buildings at all—were a stark contrast to the low-slung structures that lined the streets of the Malian capital. All of the roads were paved instead of just the few main streets, and some of the buildings reminded me of ones I would see back home in London.

(more…)

When I started telling people that I booked a trip to Mali, most of them wondered how such a seemingly obscure country had worked its way into my list of places to visit. The answer lies in a class I took at Brown: West African Dance. The professor was married to a Malian man, and most of the dances we learned were from there. In addition to learning the dances, we also learned about the culture, food, history, people, and traditions of Mali. I was fascinated. Mali was added to the list.

(more…)

Last time I was in Nairobi was exactly four years ago. I came with two girlfriends and stayed with the parents of one of their classmates from Georgetown. It was a lovely trip, complete with a safari in the Masai Mara and a four day mini break in Zanzibar. I had no idea when I would return, but when I moved to London I figured it was only a matter of time.

(more…)

As if my Africa trip preparations weren’t keeping me busy enough, my boyfriend signed me up for photography classes in London this weekend. He gave them to me as a Christmas gift, and sixteen hours of photography lessons at Take Better Pictures in London Bridge definitely gave me a better eye for composition, a deeper understanding of how my camera works, and a greater appreciation for the powers of Photoshop.

(more…)

One of the nice things about living in London is that seemingly every country in the world has an embassy, high commission, or other visa-dispensing diplomatic mission in the city. Sometimes this makes it really easy to get visas. It also sometimes works to my advantage when the UK visa fees are lower than the US ones, as sometimes I’m only required to pay the UK fee despite my blue-and-gold passport.

Sometimes.

(more…)

A friend of mine that works for Lonely Planet recently posted a link on Google Chat for Lonely Planet’s Travellers’ Pulse Panel, a discussion forum where LP listens to what travelers have to say about their adventures throughout the world.

(more…)

Having lived in Hampstead for over two years now, I thought I knew the area well. I’ve been to all of the museums, explored the Hampstead Heath extensively, and eaten at almost every restaurant in the neighborhood. I’ve walked down almost every street in the area and I’ve gone into most of the shops, but the other day I found a place that I had yet to discover.

(more…)