I’m paraphrasing the title of a great book (well, I thinker’s great, anyway) West with the Night, a memoir by Beryl Markham of her life in East Africa. Yes, at last our big adventure begins! We leave for Paris today, where we will layover for two days before making the last push to Nairobi. We live Paris on Jan 9. Which is also the date of a threatened Air France strike. Did I mention we’re flying Air France? C’est la vie, I guess. If all goes according to plan, our safari starts on Jan 10.

We have an all-in baggage weight in Africa of 33 lbs and I am right there. Chuck is 5 lbs over so I am envisioning him on an airstrip in Kenya throwing socks and underwear out of his bag as he runs for the plane.

I hope to post photos to Flickr and Instagram and maybe even get some blogging done!