Welcome to the Gwynne Conlyn WeBlog

I’m doing what I enjoy most – travelling. Although, as most know, Africa ain’t for sissies, it holds breathtaking beauty and often, surprises.

We arrived here in Tanzania about four days ago, on Ethiopian Airlines from Lagos in Nigeria via Addis Ababa. After the filth and aggression of Lagos anything would seem better, frankly, but flying over Ethiopia really was incredible. It is a mountainous country (the part we traversed, anyway), green, lush and very beautiful. The people, too, are physically exquisite.



An aircraft was bought by an Arab man from one of the people who used to work for my husband Graeme, and now lives in Dubai and sells airplanes to rich people in the Middle East. The purchaser of the plane is here in Tanzania at the moment because he owns a number of hotels, and is also busy building one in the Serengeti. It turns out he is a really, really nice guy - a Bedouin, actually born in a tent in the desert and a completely self-made man. As is my wont, I asked him when he was born (i.e. his birth sign), and he said, “my mother says there was a big wind that year...”



So we're staying at one of his hotels in Dar es Salaam and basically hanging out with him and his entourage. The day before yesterday he phoned us (we were having an afternoon nap) to say, let's go to Arusha! (Arusha is the town right next to Mount Kilimanjaro). So we jumped out of bed, dressed, packed and rushed to the airport. Arusha is about an hour's flight from Dar, and we landed there literally three minutes before the airport closed for the night. Our new-found friend has just bought a beautiful property there, with magnificent gardens, and is about to build another hotel there (with gardens on top of the roofs of the buildings in the hotel complex).



The hotel at which we're staying here in Dar is right on the ocean and if we could see far enough, we'd be able to see Zanzibar. We watch the ferries go to and from the island every day. Ali leaves for Dubai today, so we might just take a ferry to Zanzibar.



Tanzania has never been at war (did you know that? I didn't) so the people have no issues. There is peace, absolutely no aggression, and the place is relatively crime-free. And it is so beautiful it brings tears to my eyes.



What has been interesting about spending time in other countries in Africa is how many fascinating people (apart from the locals) live here. For instance, our friend is also buying into a lodge on the beach about 200 kms as the crow flies from Dar. It is owned by a young Greek guy - who was born and grew up in Burundi. And although Costas witnessed many things that millions around the world don’t even know could happen, he has only good things to say about the country of his birth. He, too is a fascinating man and deeply spiritual.



Tomorrow we take our friend’s fabulous new business jet  to Dubai. He's a bit of a nervous flyer, thus his flying there on a big aircraft. I'm sure we'll see lots of him there, since we're all in love with one another now!



Next Friday my husband Graeme's other client, a wealthy Nigerian man, arrives in his private jet. Graeme is then taking him to Beirut in Lebanon (and I'm tagging along). I'm very excited since Beirut is known as 'the Paris of the Middle East' and of course the cuisine, I’m told, is fabulous.