Donkeys, Dust and Goat Chops with Spiced Tea in Sudan

We were up and loaded into local minivans for the drive up to the mountains from Gondar, for our morning of trekking, after an hours drive on dusty roads we arrived and were quickly surrounded by local villagers. We hiked through some spectacular scenery, clinging to the sides of mountains with little foliage to stop us should we slip. We were lucky to see some Columbus monkeys, which reminded us of the black and white ruffled lemurs in Madagascar. These monkeys were jumping down from trees to the ground, about 20 meters! Then running to the next tree! The 10 of us were soon walking with about 50 local people, many of these young kids with the sole aim of earning a tip from helping the ‘white people’ over the terrain that they were just not designed to! Honestly I was getting a bit huffy at being dragged up slopes that I could easily managed by myself, I was thinking “I am white, but I know how to walk!” We sat and watched baboons running in the distance and strolled through young kid’s herding goats and cows. The scenery was spectacular; I am still amazed at the landscape of Ethiopia, mountainous, green and rocky in some areas with incredibly abrupt cliffs and escarpments. We returned back to the vans and were surrounded by our initial ‘friends’ and then some more! On the drive back our driver seemed intent on sitting right behind the other van making us breath dust for an hour, we had thought that he didn’t speak English, but after a couple of comments between ourselves about the dust he dropped off slightly.

Spencer and I headed back to our favourite cafe for lunch, today it was fruit punch; layers of mango, avocado, papaya and strawberry juice, so thick that the straw was useless and the spoon was the instrument of choice! Followed by a soft drink (it was hot walking) followed by chips and tomato salad, this seemed incredibly light on tomato and incredibly heavy on onion and chilli. After I had put all of this into my stomach I forced a tiramisu in for good measure and waddled out, not before watching a 1990’s episode of friends which has some weird ass stuff happening to the voices!

From there he hired tuk-tuks to the Dashen brewery for our free brewery tour, we were very excited, but this didn’t last long, brewery tours don’t run on Sundays! After talking kindly to the lady we were able to meet the manager, who organised for a staff member to come out from town to conduct the tour. As the staff member had to be summoned there was a delay and time to be filled, in the bar, in the form of two 3lt beer towers between the 8 of us. When the tour started we were told that our cameras would need to be ‘minded’ by the security. As I have a huge mistrust of security guards of any description in any country I offered to stay at the bar with all the cameras, (there was some serious camera gear, too serious to be left with any security guard, especially at a brewery!) I had two beers and had acquired three Ethiopian ‘friends’ by the time everyone else returned from the tour, I was also quite on my way to being drunk.  We were intent on drinking our remaining Ethiopian Birr before crossing the border into Sudan the next day, this occurred easily! We had a great night with good conversation and company in a fantastic beer garden, which you just wouldn’t expect to find anywhere outside of a capital city of a developed country!

The following morning was a world of hurt and pain for me and a few others, bendy and bumpy roads in the heat and about three hours at the border are not fun on a hang-over!

About thirty kilometres short of the Ethiopia – Sudan border we were pushed forward by the truck slowing down, then felt two bumps as the back wheels went over something. A few of the blokes stuck their heads out to see a fully grown goat and a younger goat go under the wheels of the truck, two days later they were still talking about how the mother goat’s stomach split from the impact and a baby goat popped out. I was never so glad that I didn’t look out the side of the truck, I quite like goats, but they are not so smart...as these two proved, they just didn’t move off the road even though that had a 18t truck bearing down on them with the air horn screaming!

We didn’t think that would be the end of the goat issue, we stopped for lunch just before the border as Spencer and I came back to the truck we saw Mark sitting in the cab arguing with some police officers with the crowd of locals swelling by the minute. The farmer had gone straight to the cops and they had followed us down the road. Initially they wanted $300 USD as compensation for the goats; he eventually got this down to $50 USD per goat, we were not sure if the baby goat was counted as a third goat or not. As the police were not going to let us out of Ethiopia, the fine was paid.  The cops get about half of the money for their troubles and the farmer gets the rest. Mark was unable to make the police officers understand that had he smashed on the brakes that we would have been seriously hurt in the back as there are no seatbelts, he asked the police officers if the farmer would have paid him had one of us been hurt in avoiding the goats! The ‘food group’ (people cooking that nights dinner) felt that for $100 USD we should have been able to keep the carcasses, they were well tenderised!

We have no problems at all exiting Ethiopia, no forms to fill out, just a ½ hour wait in the emigration office, (which was air conditioned, much to everyone’s delight!) then we walk over the border to the Sudan side. Again a very loose border, I believe that you would have little issue in strolling through without the official documentation, however I am sure I would not want to be caught trying it! First stop over the border is the money changer, not the official one, just one in a mud and dung hut, but he was offering such a rate that there was no bartering required! We were under the impression that we had to pay for our registration in Sudan at the border; however we later found out that we now pay in the capital Khartoum (equivalent of $50 USD, so the officials can look after us whilst in the country).  Next stop was a ‘bunnings’ style garden shed to get out passports bio and visa page photocopied, after waiting for this we take on the immigration office, standing by the desk in some form of line, not knowing where we need to stand, if there is a line, or what the process is! There are about 30 odd locals waiting patiently in chairs, we were served ahead of them, not sure if it was just so the official could clear away the mass of foreigners from his desk! So after making some form of a line, out passports and photocopies are requested and looked at, then a form stapled to it, we fill out the form and line up again to hand it back, then they are shuffled left, shuffled right, then left again before being stamped three times, “bang, bang, bang” (must be the most enjoyable part of the day for a border official!) And we are told to go to customs. Finding customs was not as easy as we assumed it would be, it was a hundred meters up the road, in a wire mesh building with absolutely no signage, there were hotels and shops and I think a jail between the two buildings.  I tried to walk into every building between the two! Once there we wait and answer our names etc etc then we are free to go. Back in the truck we realise that we are going nowhere fast, the truck’s engine number could not be found, despite a large crowd of officials, passengers and onlookers surrounding the upturned cab! Four hours after arriving at the border and after phone calls to Tanzania, we were off, but not before I had wandered into the streets behind the border in search of bananas, a friendly local shopkeeper assigned a guide to show me where to buy them (no payment required, he wouldn’t even accept a banana!) I looked at a table and wondered what all the black lumpy stuff on it was, and then a kid waved his arm over the black mass which was moving to show that the whole table was covered in offal and meat cuts which were swarmed with flies! (I was super glad that I don’t eat land animals at this time, and there was not a fish in sight!)

It was amazing to see that after the border crossing the land changed dramatically again, we bid farewell to the hills and green scenery of Ethiopia and hello to dusty and sandy plains. We bush camped very close to the highway, I was surprised at the amount of traffic all night, many fuel tankers, busses and other trucks rolling along for most of the night and the occasional traditionally dressed man on a motorbike with robes flowing behind!. Just before dinner a local farmer herded his cattle through camp, and again the next morning after breakfast.

We all slept with the rain covers off the tents as it was very warm, I didn’t even take my sleeping bag off the truck (it’s infested with something still anyway, but more about that later) About five in the morning it started getting light, I was dozing and heard someone walk through camp, just assuming that it was one of our fellow travellers, they almost walked into our tent and I heard a ‘ohh’ sort of sound, then I noticed that there was no zipper sound of someone crawling back into a tent and realised that it must have been a local quite surprised to find a bunch of campers in his grazing area. I was telling someone else this on the truck the next day; she confirmed a strange being near out tent as she was camped next to us.

This was also the site of some of the worst ‘tentering’ (a word Spencer made up when tongue tied, whilst trying to make out that he was more experienced at putting up tents and therefore better, than I, and we all know that’s just not true!) So that night I go to crawl into bed and there is something under the tent, it’s sitting up at least 20 cm on my side of the tent (yes we have his and hers sides of the tent (now called ‘territories own”) So I ask what it is, to hear “must be grass”..hmm, there is f&*k sweet all grass around here, just thorns and those ‘bindi’ type prickles that go straight through the soles of most footwear! So I punch the object, it hurts my hand, but feels spiky and I announce that it was a hedgehog...not cool, apparently (yes, I was joking! There are about as many hedgehogs in Sudan as there are tigers in Africa!). So I get my clothes back on and get out to lift the tent to find a rock that was the size of a football under my side of the tent! This gave everyone a bit of a giggle the next morning!

The next day just got hotter and hotter, peaking, officially at 39 degrees, a thermometer on the truck broke after hitting 50 degrees, at 8pm in Khartoum it was still 31 degrees, I log onto facebook to see that Megan is in Darwin wearing a ‘slopy joe’ and is freezing her ass off! The UK people are struggling and I was feeling like I was back in Darwin, the expected low was for 28 degrees!

To take photographs in Sudan you need a photography permit, if you are caught with a camera and don’t have this permit you are arrested. The only issue is that you can only get this permit in Khartoum, two days drive! There is nothing like seeing your first fully grown man in white flowing robes riding at full pace across the desert on a DONKEY! And not being able to snap a picture!

Drinking as also prohibited in Sudan (a few of the blokes on the truck are a bit happy about this after two weeks worth of 25 cent beer indulgence in Ethiopia!), if you are caught with alcohol you are arrested, the truck can be stopped anywhere are searched. We were stopped at a number of checkpoints during the day, the first one the official was standing beside the truck shouting ‘passports’ at us, he didn’t even appear to wear a uniform, after checking these closely we were away, our passports now in the cab to speed the process up for the following checkpoints, I think we passed about 10 for the day, although they are a pain in the ass and slow you down, they are used to make sure that trucks etc get to where they are supposed to, on the west coast the police went looking for the truck after it failed to make it through the next checkpoint as they had made a bush camp for the night!

Before lunch my brand new hat (I’d literally worn it for a few hours ,seems the story of my life of late!) blew off my head and out the side of the truck, before I’d realised that it was out of the truck we were well down the road. The hat cost about 10 birr per hour of use that I had out of the thing! So disappointing though, I have been looking to buy a new hat since Cape Town, and finally found one that I liked, I’d only had it a day!

The people of Sudan are incredibly friendly, and seem truly pleased to see foreigners visiting their country. My arm is close to worn out after returning waves at adults, elderly and kids all eager to see us! Driving into Khartoum was interesting, we were hoping not for an accident to occur by one of the drivers straining to look up into the truck and not watching the road! When we stopped for falafel and spiced tea for lunch the spiced tea lady didn’t have change of a 10 pound note, the tea was one pound. A man nearby offered to pay for me (he was an old man, not a sleazy one!) saying “I pay for your tea as you are my guest in this country” As one pound is quite a bit of coin for the average Sudanese (and about 40 cents to us), I went and got some change and took it back, thanking him and shaking his hand, he laughed saying “you are very intent on paying!’. Spiced tea is delicious, so good that most of us were drinking it hot even in 40 degree heat!, I was planning a business venture for ‘iced spiced tea’ distribution, surely there is a market for it here!

Sudan has more of a Middle East feel to it than African, you see men in white flowing robes wandering through desert like surroundings, or riding on camels or on the back of a donkey that is pulling a crudely made water cart. Ladies covered from head to toe in dark coloured robes. Tuk-tuks are in abundance, and are also very abundantly decorated, I even saw one with the wheel caps like of grease (you know the ones that cut into the bodywork of the other car!) I think Sudan is going to take over from Ethiopia as my second favourite African country (Madagascar still sitting high at number one!)

We arrive in Khartoum to find that the “National Camping Residence” (who would have thought they would have such a thing?) was full and overflowing, so we move closer into the city to the Blue Nile Sailing Club, which feels like we have just pitched our tents in the Darwin Trailer Boat Club! (Instead of the ocean we have the convergence of the Blue and White Nile’s as out waterfront view!) The added bonus was a free, drinkable and COLD water fountain! Heaven! And free wifi internet, soon all laptops were out and discussion lulled as people stuck their heads into news from home, facebook, emails and other random tasks.

Khartoum is a very modern city by African standards, the outskirts of it put me in mind of how I imagine Dubai to be, lush golf courses and some flashy apartment blocks rise from desert like surroundings, having a city on the Nile means lots of irrigation water for crops. As oil was discovered about 10 years ago, there is a lot of ‘new’ money in Sudan; it will be interesting to see if the crime rate increases as the gap between the ‘haves’ and the ‘have nots’ increases. We have felt safer in Sudan than any other African country, it’s hard to believe that it is listed by smart traveller as a ‘do not travel’ destination, most of the problem is in the south of Sudan, which we are not going to and centres on the south of Sudan wanting to become independent of the rest of Sudan, but as the oil is in the south, it’s not really in Sudan’s best interest to let the south ‘take the oil and run’. There is a referendum planned for early 2011, and violence is expected in the lead up to that, we will be out of Sudan in nine days time, well before the referendum. You can easily walk in the city without being hassled for money, so far I have only had three people ask for money in three days in Sudan, you would have three a minute in some other countries! Everyone that we meet just seems so genuinely friendly!

We found out that our house is still empty...gurgle, gurgle, gurgle of money down the drain! Although we did hear that two different people have put in application forms, so here’s hoping someone moves in soon, we dropped the rent by $40 a week, just to get anyone in the place!

The next morning some people headed off to the ‘Alien registration office’, no s^&t, that’s it’s official name!, it’s the office where you have to register if you are a foreigner in the country, and pay $50USD! I went along with the food group to find the supermarket, a magical mystery tour in its own right. Khartoum is a city with quite obvious ‘new’ money, lots of electrical shops and mobile phone shops, but nothing that even resembled a supermarket. We asked lots and lots of people for directions, each one a contradiction of the other, until we found an American girl who was happy to walk us to a local market. Whilst the food people bartered for bread and vegetables myself and Jules sat down on mini stools with a man peeling onions, they put the vegetables on the sales stands pre-peeled, he told us that they sell better that way as they look better, it is also common practice to cut the bottoms off carrots, but not the tops. The man tells us that he has been to Australia to play football! Two white women sitting without our heads covered in the market in Khartoum attracted quite a bit of attention from the surrounding people! From there we went to source falafel, 144 pieces for 12 Sudanese pound, or around $5 AUD, after looking at the falafel through the barter process we decided to have lunch there, it was so delicious that we went back and ordered the same again! From there we took our bags of food and tried to find a taxi who knew where the Blue Nile sailing club was, we had read that the taxi drivers here didn’t know where anything was, it was spot on. With us directing him we push our way through intersections with 40 odd eggs loose on a tray balanced on Ish’s lap, with cars coming at us from all directions! Spencer and a couple of the blokes went for a swim in the ‘club’ next door to where we are staying, the man demanded to know how they knew there was a pool at the place, then charged 10 pounds and hour for swimming, so $4 each hour! Females are not allowed to swim, no even fully clothed! (Not happy Jan!) So I am sitting here in my long pants drinking copious amounts of water with all the other females.

And I’ll just finish with a Sudanese toilet story...(just for s&*ts and giggles) So I was squatting happily behind a nice small tree on the side of the road, feeling a million miles away from civilisation and about a hundred meters away from my travelling companions, just taking my time and enjoying the scenery, when I hear singing and hooves and before I can move anywhere a man rides past on his donkey, singing at the top of his lungs with his white robes flowing behind him! (Only in Sudan!)

Oops! Forgot about the bed bug infestation that has taken over the truck...the communal blankets that travel on the beach have been binned, the cushions etc were all taken out and sprayed, we have strict instructions from Mark to wash our sleeping gear and clothes whilst in Khartoum, people with down sleeping bags were just not keen for this and put them in a black plastic bag in the 40 degree sun to kill any unwanted visitors!, one casualty of the de-bugging was a sleeping bag was ‘accidentally’ thrown out by the staff here, quite ironic that is the US citizen who they were originally not going to let into Sudan! Searching high and low did not produce the sleeping bag!

North of Nairobi....frontier land...

We headed off to the Sudan Embassy with little hope of getting our Sudan visa easily. Other people on the truck had been told that they would not be issued with a Sudan visa until they had their Egypt visa, as a sort of insurance policy that they were not going to build a hut and live in Sudan forever! We filled out the form, twice and submitted it with two passport photos, two copies of our credit cards (no way we were handing over a bank statement!) two copies of our yellow fever certificate and two copies of our letter of introduction from the Australian Embassy. The lady behind the counter was one of the surliest creatures to roam the planet (with the exception of me aged 13) She said ‘so many tourists nowadays’ to us...(not really, looking at the forms at the gate of the embassy there had only been 20 visitors the day before, I don’t think that Sudan is quite the tourist destination yet!) I replied to her...trying to be nice ‘is that a good thing?’ Didn’t quite catch her answer, but it was less than positive. We left and headed back through security, which was non existent compared to that of the Australian Embassy and found our taxi again.

We had ordered the same taxi driver from the previous day and were surprised to find a different one waiting for us at the campsite, we pulled into a service station, it does not matter how far you have to go, or what type of taxi you are in but every time, andI mean EVERY time you get in a taxi, the driver pulls into a service station for like $3 of fuel! So in a week of visa hunting and embassy visits we have been into about 20 service stations, for a total of about $50 of fuel! Ha ha So when we pull into the service station I silently groan thinking that we would not be at the embassy at 9am as planned, instead of pulling into the bowsers we instead check the tyres for air! Then drive across the forecourt and are told that we change taxi’s here, well that’s new! So we change cars and are told that the driver from the previous day couldn’t make it so he hired his cousin, who couldn’t make the pick up hence the taxi relay... after 20mins of four fully grown adults (3 blokes) and me, squashed into the back of a Toyota corolla with four backpacks swerving through the streets of Nairobi we finally arrive, again thankfully to have survived as there are no seatbelts in any taxi over here!

We head to a shopping centre to search for a sleeping mat for Spencer, he was thinking that he could manage 12 weeks of no sleeping mat, he lasted one night...best we could find is an aerobics mat, seems Ok and he has refused offers of swapping the aerobics mat for the thermarest each night. We got lunch at the shopping centre, I ordered something on the menu that was called ‘lemonade’ hmmm I thought I knew exactly what to expect...no way! I was served up a contraption of potions and additives which needed mixing together, turns out it’s a fine art and I had to order another to work out that you don’t add all of the thick, sticky stuff that comes in the silver jug to your glass! That wasn’t the only surprise on the menu; the vegetarian samosas were laced with meat! I bit into the first one and hit animal whilst the waiter was standing next to me, with my mouth full of some type of beast I asked him ‘are these vegetarian?’ already tasting the answer...he looked and said ‘no’ at the same time that I was making a big scene in spitting out the offending moo cow or baa baa blacksheep and then wiping out my mouth with a serviette, whilst he apologised profusely. Turns out that saying vegetarian and actually pointing to the ‘vegetarian samosas’ on the menu was just not comprehensive enough!

The following day we head to the Elephant Orphanage and Giraffe sanctuary. But honestly the taxi ride was possibly more entertaining than the elephants of giraffes. Although a giraffe did try to head butt Spencer which I found a whole lot more hilarious than he did! Four of us breathe in deeply and manage to somehow get in and close the doors! We take off down the bumpy, dusty road in one of the outer suburbs of Nairobi, a couple of times I realise that we are rolling with out the engine running (this has happened in quite a few countries, Madagascar mainly, to save fuel) So I didn’t think much of it, apart from the fact that the Toyota corolla was pretty hesitant to start each time. Then the driver starts swerving down the road and the car sounds sicker and sicker, the swerving turns into a jerking of the steering wheel right and left and right and left, this is so not cool when you are jammed in between two blokes in the backseat! Then the car stops and flatly refuses to start and I am thinking ‘far out, we have broken down in Nairobi aka ‘Nairobbery’,  we are carrying a decent amount of cameras between the four of us (four SLR’s and possibly about 10 lenses). The taxi driver gets out and starts pushing the car forward down the road, lucky he was aided with a slope as none of the ‘mzungus’ could get out without exploding forth out of the crammed vehicle! The car somehow starts again and splutters as we rock back and forwards for the last 100m to the service station....ah ha! There lay the problem; this was the first taxi driver to not take us directly to the service station as a first stop! $3 of petrol later and we are on our way, with a transformed Toyota corolla. The elephant orphanage was good fun, apart from the herd of tourists! The giraffe sanctuary was also enjoyable, we got to feed the giraffes ‘giraffe pellets’, their tongues are so rough! Whilst they were eating you were able to pat them and give their ears a scruff. Their heads are so big up close!

That afternoon we head back to the Sudan Embassy at 2pm, we got a head start as the traffic in Nairobi can make the difference between a 20 minute and a 3 hour journey. We arrive at 2.30pm, ready to pick up our visas at 3pm. The clock hits 3pm, we wait, the clock hits 3.05 we still wait, clock hits 3.09 the receptionist gets up and walks into the back office, clock hits 3.10, I get up and fill up our water bottle from the water fountain whilst the surly receptionist is absent, clock hits 3.15 we still wait, Clock hits 3.19 large African lady across the room answers her phone and speaks very loudly for 15 seconds, thirty seconds later this occurs again, and continues until we leave the embassy! Sometime after 3.30pm she stands up again and takes all our passports into the back office, after keeping our passports there for over 24 hours they were deciding to process them now? After another cup of water and ten phone calls to the woman across the room passports start being handed out, mine was handed to one of the South African blokes on our truck, I was surprised at the fact that they were able to pick up the drivers passport with out an authorisation letter, with all the hassle we had with DHL refusing to pick up Spencers passport from the Australian Embassy even with embassy approval!

From there we took another interesting taxi ride back to the local shopping centre to post my ‘insurance policy’ (a back up of my favourite photos back home) ( just on the small off-chance that sit hits the fan badly and I loose both external hard drives...err, not me lose them, more likely someone steals them!) and head to the super market to buy the worst cream cheese in the world...let me tell you, there was definitely no eating of the cream cheese with a spoon, it was an effort in commitment to even eat any of the crap on crackers. So disappointing as it was the nicest looking label on the shelves, painted up like a devondale cow! Now that’s why they say, ‘never judge a cream cheese by its cow print!’ We also manage to find a jar of vegemite, although the smallest jar in the history of vegemite, and I think it may be old enough to earn a place in an Australian museum, it was worth as much as a museum display!  But totally worth every shilling the following morning on my toast!

Returned to camp to face my worst task of travel, the washing...dreaming of my fisher paykal 6kg, fully automatic, hot or cold wash, rinse and spin, wonderful machine, I find a plastic laundry tub, take the Omo and my new trial bar of Sunlight soap bar and head for the tap. Of course the tap is above a sink and the sink is too small to wash in and the tap is so close to the sink that one must balance the washing tub whilst filling it halfway then splash water down the front of ones self to lower the tub to the ground, where one must then scrub the African dust and dirt out of the clothes by hand. Turns out that the Sunlight soap bar is one of the best 15 shilling investment ever, we actually have white whites for a couple of days, not grey whites, or yellow whites or the favourite, red dust whites! So for any of you travelling to Africa, I will give you the washing information that has taken me 3 months and about 60 hours of scrubbing (and many layers of skin shed from my knuckles) to learn; the best way to wash is this; Step one. Fill washing tub with water. Step two. Use a bar of 15 shilling Sunlight soap and scrub all items thoroughly. Step 3. Rinse Sunlight soap out of clothes. Step 4. Refill tub and add liberal amounts of Omo washing powder (Anyone want to know why Omo is ridiculously expensive everywhere else in the world? Expensive prices are subsidising cheap African prices, no shit, it’s like $1.10AUD for 500g, if you get the 1Kg, it’s cheaper than $2!) So after adding the Omo, agitate the washing for a couple of minutes and let sit, and then agitate again (by this time the agitating becomes easier due to your agitation levels rising). Step 5. Balance the tub over the sink or dirt or bucket the water from the tap if needed (depending on your position) and refill enough to rinse the clothing out. Step 6. Piece by piece hand wring all items. Step 7. Erect a washing line to hang them on, if hanging on a tent, be wary of rusty tent poles or dusty canvas which will quickly undo your scrubbing efforts. Step 8. Position yourself in close range of the erected washing line to catch any items which look likely to fall onto the dirt or be eaten by stray goats and never, ever, leave washing on the line overnight, except in Johannesburg, it is apparently the only place safe to leave washing overnight! Ha ha ha (but true!)  Step 9. Enjoy the fruits of your scrubbing efforts for the five minutes that you have clean clothes, as no matter how hard you try, you will never stay clean for longer than five minutes. Step 9. Repeat steps 1-8 every two to three days in varying weather conditions and surroundings with varying degrees of brown water!

Washing History: we have been in Africa for 3 months and one day, we had ‘machine washed clothes’ (MWC) once in South Africa and once in Namibia. We had our bigger items washed in Nairobi. Currently there are clothes that we own that have never been washed in a washing machine...yes these are the clothes that will not be making their way back to Australia and will instead be gracing the ‘vinnies’ bin or similar in Istanbul!

We left Karen campsite at 9.30am the following morning, half hour later than planned, this was due to the few last minute items being moved from the old truck ‘Ruby’ to the new truck ‘Roxy’, one part of this was the fuel tank, which I believe is currently ‘temporarily’ strapped into place until there is time for it to be fitted properly. As there is a holiday in the middle east around the time of our ferry to Egypt and two ferry services have been cancelled (they only run once a week) we are heading swiftly towards the ferry, otherwise we may get stuck waiting in Egypt for Roxy to get on the ferry! We headed out of Nairobi, with time for a quick stop at the supermarket to gather three days of supplies as we are told there is ‘f^&k all for three days’ in Northern Kenya. Lonly planet says something like ‘to travel in northern Kenya be prepared to tread where few have tread before you’ and it’s pretty accurate, after finding out I was on cooking duty the first night and gathering supplies we weaved our way out of Nairobi, stopping several times as one of the storage bin doors kept popping open, three stops later (and us breathing sighs of relief that amazingly no cars had been beside us at any stage it opened or they would have been badly dented) we say farewell to the outskirts and look towards Mt Kenya which ws, unfortunately, covered by fog. The truck rattles along very smoothly, I am told it is to do with the air suspension, whatever, it is far from back jarring on the rough roads. This truck is set up very differently from the trucks we have been on for the past 60 odd days, there is a ‘beach’ section at the back, the size of a queen size bed, for anyone wanting to sleep through the day, there are 12 forward facing seats at the front and 18 inwards facing seats in the middle of the truck. It has canvas roll up windows about 200 books (I don’t know what to read next, I am currently into Dian Fosseys gorillas in the mist, reliving just how amazing the gorillas are!) Our storage lockers are in compartments under the seats, which is handy, but I am missing the lock-up aspect of the acacia truck. On route “roxy’ had it’s first test, rain, there are plenty of leaks in the canvas and the trapdoor over the beach. After 20 minutes the rain eased and we continued down the road, to make camp at about 6.30pm just off the side of the road. We had only just pitched our tents when two of the locals appeared wearing their traditional cloths with sticks and tried to move us along, then offered us security for the night...at a price...security declined we cook tea, eat and get to bed ready for a 5.30am start the following day. The next morning we get away on time, suprising as breakfast was late as we spent about 15 minutes looking for the matches so we could cook the eggs! We had about 250km to travel that day, last year it took the truck 11 hours! It took us 9 ½ hours, in which I think we may have seen 6 other vehicles!. We were temporarily halted along the way by a 20cm piece of sharpened metal piercing a tyre, with the longest type lever in the world (About 8ft) one of our 12 spare tyres was fitted. (yup, when I saw that we needed 11spares I did wonder just what I had let myself in for!) North of Nairobi is completely different to anything else we have yet encountered in Africa, it is true ‘frontier’ land’, very few overland trucks come through here each year and you can tell form the excitement on the kids faces as they run after the truck waving and yelling, a couple of kids ran for kilometres this morning smiling and waving in their school uniforms! We camped in the empty lot beside an accommodation place, We were happy to have showers available, as we were coated in dust from the days drive. The ‘showers’ turned out to be a tub of hot water set in a stand with a jug, not bad though, I managed to even wash my hair with my 10lts of water! The worst was seeing the colour of the water run off you and the fact that above the tub was an actual proper shower, obviously not in working order anymore!

The following day was a long one in the truck, Spencer and I were lucky enough to get ‘the beach’ (bed at the back of the truck) however on some of the worst roads that we have encountered we did wonder if anyone else wanted to be at the back of the truck! It was a great day of laying on the truck watching km after km roll past (slowly, like 10km/h!) and seeing nothing bar empty barron desert with the odd twister in the distance, the occasional local with goats, cows, donkeys or camels to make you wonder just how anyone survives in such unforgiving land! We stopped for lunch, many people sat ont he truck as there was no shade, one tiny tree, not wide enough for my ass to hide behind for a pee, so I had to stroll off into the desert to hide behing a peice of plastic tank, hmmm, of course a truck full of locals chose that exact time and place to blow a tyre! Well they got a view of mzungu ass from a distance! We were planning to camp in a police station near the Ethiopian border, but our slow progress and some problem with the air brakes meant that we pulled the truck off the track about 60km short and set up camp, not all that for from Somalia and in an area known for bandits and truck hijackings. We discussed the use of rain sheets on the tents over a dinner of pasta, an decided ‘no we don’t need them, the locals said it hasn’t rained here for two years’, my answer ‘well the locals will be happy if we make it rain by not putting the rain covers on’ ha ha, murpheys law struck about midnight and had people scrambling for the covers in the desert! The smell of the first rain for so long was unbelievable! Teamed with the heat from the ground, like a natural electric blanket was a night that I won’t forget anytime soon! The next morning we were up and away at 6.30am to make the border, however a familiar ‘hiss’ alerted us to another blown tyre, as we climb out of the truck we notice hundreds and hundreds of nokia phone boxes, empty...hmmm, stolen goods, crashed truck of hijacked truck...my mind seemed to be the only one being paranoid about the fate of the truck and exactly what had blown our tyre in the exact same place!  Another couple of locker door mishaps and we are finally at the border, it took almost 5 hours for 60 odd km’s. There was a problem with a couple of peoples Ethiopian visas at the border, the lady in the office mixed up the dates, after an hour and a half we were away and very grateful to the Ethiopian roads authority for sealing the roads! I was amazed at the change in the landscape as soon as we passed into Ethiopia, instead of being flat and baron, it is lush and hilly. We pulled off the road for another bush camp, before we were even off the truck we had a gathering of locals watching us with great interest, the kids were keen to play soccer and many had never seen a camera before, a coupe of the blokes got some great shots of the kids, much to everyone’s delight. I was having issues with my flash unit, worried for awhile that it had been a victim of hundreds of kilometres of jolting, changed the batteries even though the battery was showing full, sent a stream of sparks from the top of my camera, then worked fine....hmmm.....

We were up at 5am and away at 6am for the long haul to Addis Ababa, the capital of Ethiopia, a little over 500km from the camp. Ethiopia feels like you really have arrived ‘somewhere else’ overland trucks are very rare here and the locals seem truly happy to see you, they yell ‘yu, yu, yu, yu’ as you drive past my arm has been waving all day! Unlike other countries, it’s the adults and kids that wave and smile, most waving with two hands! We stopped for a toilet break, however the truck attacted so much attention that there was no privacy after approx 150 people gathered around, two little girls spied my camera and sidled up to me to get a photo, then I had about 30! Then most of them wanted to shake my hand, the kids here are very good with the camera, I didn’t have to wipe fingerprints off or spend time readjusting the settings! Some people are very shy or nervous with cameras aimed at them, we saw one girl scream and duck like she had a gun aimed at her when one of the blokes on the truck tried to take a photo whilst driving past, another bloke took great offense to the 4 DSLRs hanging out of the truck (mine was safely in my locker!) and threw mud at the truck, he wasn’t a great aim and it missed the cameras by meters and lodged on the wall above ‘the beach’. Today was a 12 ½ hour day on the truck, I slept quite a lot of it, unlike me, but I had space to lie down! We came across some crazy drivers, donkeys and goats today, Spencer was sitting up the front with Mike the driver, he recons that sitting in the front you can see exactly how good a driver Mike is as the other drivers, animals and people take a bit of dodging. Because the truck is a ‘split level’ you cannot see the road in front from most of the seats, which makes it interesting when you have no seat belts and you are sitting in quick dry pants on canvas seats and the anchors are applied to avoid a crazy bus driver that seems bent on overtaking when our truck is going the other way! The first I knew of the problem was the esky sliding towards my feet, then my ass sliding along the seats, then the stairwell of the truck getting closer and me thinking my ass was going to land down there! Then we finally all stop sliding (the people on the beach remained on the beach, somehow!!) My arm was linked with the lady sitting on the next seat, I thank her for catching me, no I had grabbed here without realising it! We arrive into Addis ,at over 2400meters above sea level, to find a crappy, dodgy campground with no water, hot or otherwise and poo sitting in the toilet, but the beer is 40 cents for a pint, now this is testing my self inflicted ‘dry season’ (yup mum, you will be pleased to hear that I have given up the beer until I get home, with the exception of my birthday, Christmas day and new years eve!) We have not had showers since Nairobi, five days ago, and too many km’s of dusty roads gone by! The lack of showers was not well received by some! I have just decided to ‘go feral’ for once and all! (And for any of you smart asses who say I have always been feral, I’ll let you know that I have found all new depths of feralness! (ha ha, dictionary tells me there is no actual word as Feralness!) he he he he

The cook group had trouble getting food for tea tonight, they arrived back at the truck with four whole chooks, it was a bit of entertainment watching four blokes pluck, skin and gut the chooks for tea, I was glad that I have a vegetarian option!

I am starting to worry about my behaviour when I get home, please tell me gently if you notice me peeing behind a tree when there is a toilet nearby, going days without a shower, or if I start ‘flapping’ my dishes dry instead of using a tea towel or if I start driving down the road madly waving at anyone who will look my way! Also note that it will take about a month of scrubbing for me to rid myself of the ingrained dirt in ears, nose and skin....cleaning your ears is a whole different experience up here, urghh!

So anyway, first impressions on ‘North of Nairobi’ absolutely fantastic! We have arrived in the ‘real Africa!’