Trans America and beyond, 2005

Recomended short cut

The unpaved short cut was, as promised, a great ride, however low and behold road works ahead! No one mentioned that and especially not having to follow a truck kicking up dust in our faces for 20 kilometres!

Road from Warmwatersberg

Slowly the road improved and our velocity increased to make the 150 kilometre stretch relatively easy.

Road to A-Ais - softer than it looks

A-Ais thats what the sign said, we turned left off the melting bitumen onto the black sandy gravel road, the D316, with the hope of making it to the Fish River Canyon that evening.

Road to Fish River Canyon

Warning - Warthogs ahead!

We left Windhoek for a 6 day safari to Etosha National Park in the the mighty Toyota Condor with Allan, who prepared it by filling it with wine. Good on you Wine Rider! We prepared it by filling it with food!

YOU CAN'T RIDE THAT BIKE HERE! - Dune 7, Walvis Bay

West Coast or East Coast? What route to take?Many overland travelers passed through Chameleon Backpackers.

Richard - Off to Angola

Filling Up

'There is a problem with petrol in Zimbabwe, do you think you have enough?' This from a Customs Officer as he perused our entry papers.

Markets in Livingstone

ZAMBIA

The BOI (Body Odour Index) had been raised considerably since crossing the border... surpisingly it was not us and was to plague our olfactory sences for our entire stay.

Our desination in Zambia (formery Northern Rhodesia) was Livingstone and the Victoria Falls.

Building in Livingstone

Crossing The Limpopo River from Zimbabwe to South Africa

Our return to South Africa was purely for business and to transit to the Mozambique coast.Having said that we did meet up with Christo and Eloise, fellow V-Strommers we met in Luderitz, Namibia, several months past.

Braii with Christo & Eloise

EN1 - Main Highway of Mozambique

We spent almost one month in Mozambique. In that time covering over 2,000 kilometres. We were robbed, bent the front wheel rim, had our first fuel injection problem and discovered the worst paved road we have been on. On top of all that, we counted approximately 3,200,270 individual pot holes on the main EN1 highway from South Africa, Komaliport/Ressano Garcia border, to Malawi, Zobue.

Black Market Petrol - Inchope

Grant Plays in the Sand near Cool Runnings

How do you pee on the side of the road in the most densely populated country in Africa?? Rather quickly actually, welcome to Malawi.
Not a Car Crash, Not Football Hooligans but Market Day, Malawi Style

Cool Runnings is a small guest house on the banks of Lake Malawi at Senga Bay.

Yes, the road is smooth

'You are very near now. Only thirte... kilometres and the road is smooth all the way.' (Easy for him to say sitting atop his steam roller.)

Miss Piggy & Grant

The first of June seems to come around quickly as does Easter, Christmas and Birthdays.

'So, where are the four lanes?'

According to our map the road, from Tarveta (border town with Tanzania) to Mombasa, was nothing short of a four lane super highway. Our map has been proven wrong in the past!After completing all border formalities we were not greeted with a 'Welcome to Kenya' sign, just 109 kilometres of bumpy dirt road.

Shocking!

Its official.... it's just like Equatorial Africa

Ethiopia at last

Finally arriving in Moyales we found the town to be as dusty, dirty and tired as we were, yet it was a blessing to find sanctuary at the Catholic Mission where we could erect our trusty tent and bed down for the night.

Featuring Grant Guerin and Julie Rose with special appearance by some other guy

Our flight from Addis took us to Sydney via Bangkok. For the first time in three and a half years we were eating seriously good Thai food. How we had missed it. The eight hour lay –over saw us having Thai massage and eating noodles non-stop!

Piggy Arrives in Sydney

All photos related to this blog entry can be found at Grant & Julie

Grant and Miss Crumpet, Piggy's replacement

Well after talking about it for what seems an eternity, the time for us to get back in the road has finally arrived.
There have been a few hiccups along the way, the biggest being the GFC ate all our savings, but we have managed to overcome those hurdles and are ready to get moving.

All photos related to this blog entry can be found at Grant & Julie

Cardwell

All photos related to this blog entry can be found at Grant & Julie

Early Morning Start - Hay

Time to leave Brisbane and we have decided to whip down to Adelaide rather than womble along.