19/7/05. Garissa.
Six days from Moyale and at long, dusty, stinking last I'm in a proper town with beer (Tusker!) and fags (Sportsman!) and a sit-down toilet and soap and towels and - heavens - a telly with BBC World and TARMAC! In theory it's possible to ride all the way from here to Cape Town on the black stuff.
Great fags
14/7/05, Buna, Kenya.
Near Buna
Tribal clashes with hundreds dead along the Marsabit road towards Nairobi, so I'm diverted by a worried-looking Kenyan along the back road. Chief Osman welcomes me to Buna and I'm put up in a comfortable thatched hut for the night.
24/6/05 Addis Ababa
Addis is still cold and wet, but it's a convenient place to sit and wait for spares to be couriered. It's also very cheap.
Great things on Ethiopian menus:
1. "National Food". Mmm! Slurp!
2. "Tibs". Is that not a brand of cat chow?
3. "John Worker". Two minutes thought leads me to deduce that they mean "Johnnie Walker". I order some. They do.
4. "Chicken Wot". Well exactly.
11/7/05, Awassa
Received wisdom states that the further you get from Addis, the more likely you are to encounter groups of kids chucking rocks at you as you pass. I'm pottering through a village a hundred miles south of Addis when a blanket-clad oaf runs out in front of me, picks up a lump of donkey crap and lobs it feebly at my shoulder. It bounces harmlessly off my armoured jacket. I slow down in order to laugh at him. He looks sheepish; the crowd begin to snigger. I offer him the middle digit of my right hand and scoot.
5/8/05. Eldoret, near Uganda border.
New Naiberi River Campsite has the most astounding bar so far. It won't be finished for a few months, but it's already a jaw-dropper.
1. It's huge.
2. There's a 200 metre cave-like tunnel that leads to it.
3. There's a river running through the middle.
4. It's really huge.
5. Did I let on about the size of the thing?
26/7/05. Masai Mara.
Contrary to my deliberately-set low expectations, it's stuffed to the rafters with all the greats - zebras, lions, elephants, wildebeest, weird antelope things etc, and that's just the 1-hour introductory spin round when we arrive. Worth every last penny.
9/8/05. Murchison Falls National Park.
120 miles of reasonable tarmac and 100 miles of baboon-strewn dirt track from Kampala to Murchison. I've been in Uganda three days and it's very endearing. Kampala is a proper city. Jinja has death-defying white water rafting, which I intend to do on the way back to Kenya.
8/9/05. Stone Town, Zanzibar.
On the potato boat to Zanzibar
5/9/05. Tanga, Tanzania.
The Kenya/Tanzania border crossing is a walk in the park, relatively. No bribes, no "road tax" (not even the $20 I legitimately owe the government of Kenya), very few moneychanging touts and several well-wishing officials. It's followed by 35 miles of horribly sharp rocks. I'm now on a non-Michelin Desert front tyre (Metzeler Sahara since you ask) and the primal fear of punctures has returned. Ah Deserts! 10,000 African miles and NO PUNCTURES as Magnus Magnussen would say, probably.
26/8/05. Nairobi.
13,000 miles from Islington. Time to strap a dead animal on.
There's an undercurrent of Satanic beastiality about climbing aboard now. I like that. There is a slight wet-arse problem when it's been raining, but after 10 months in Africa, a wet arse is nowhere near as urgent a warning sign as it would be in Europe.
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20/8/05. Nairobi, Kenya
The Uganda loop (Jinja - Kampala - Murchison Falls - Kampala - Jinja) is complete. Everyone does it, and they do it because it's great. Uganda is the best African country so far. The people are cool - no-one hassles you, the sights are designed for sore eyes (which I had), the facilities are (generally) working, and the driving is lamentable; although I only lose one piece of plastic from my bike due to an idiot ramming me in Kampala. If only it hadn't been the last complete section of bodywork left.
11/8/05. Kampala, Uganda.
Back to the capital for a few days of R&R, bike maintenance, big-city necessity purchasing and mental preparation for the frankly terrifying white-water rafting at Jinja. It's supposedly the second most hairy bit of rafting in the world (after the Zambezi) and the number of times I've done it before, rounded up to the nearest whole digit, currently stands at nearly one.
16/8/05 Jinja, Uganda.
2/10/05. Mbeya, Tanzania.
Nippers bunk off school to say hello
Being 6'3" is great. Y'know, calling anyone under 5'10" "Ronnie Corbett" and helping old women reach the medicated lavatory tissue from the top shelf; but there is a down side. The lumbar parts can be a touch flimsy, so Rule No. 1 for strapping lads and lasses everywhere is:
NEVER ATTEMPT TO MOVE A PASSENGER FERRY BY HAND.
20/10/05. Lilongwe, Malawi.
A strange mood descended on me just after the first anniversary of leaving the UK. Months 1-12 were (on the whole) just a barrel of larfs. Then Month 13 turned weird on me.
Suddenly I got bored of explaining for the millionth time where I was going, why, and where I'd been. I had to restrain myself from taking a deep breath and exhaling "Moroccomauritaniasenegalmaliburkinafasoghanatogobeninniger
nigeriacameroonchadethiopiakenyaugandatanzaniamalawi", in response to the inevitable.
25/9/05. Stone Town, Zanzibar.
Back to the port for a ferry tomorrow and the three day ride to the Malawi border. In Jambiani yesterday the 1000th person of the trip asked me if they could have a go on my bike. So that's 1000 times I've said "Not if I live to be a billion. I'd rather feed my lips into a paper shredder."
Seaweed farm, Jambiani
22/10/05. Lilongwe, Malawi.
If you spend a year travelling across Africa, at some point you really are going to have to go for an HIV test. That's just the way it i-i-is. Some things will never chaaange. Why are you looking at me like that?
On Friday I located the Seventh Day Adventist health centre and confirmed that
a) Yes, they do HIV tests, and
b) They're shut until Monday.
Fine. What are they gonna know anyway?
3/10/05. Karonga, Malawi.
I meet another overland truck at the last petrol stop in Tanzania. Expectations go guts-up - they're enthusiastic and friendly! Wow!
Kuche Kuche, at 3.7% ABV, is an all-day-long beer along the lines of Senegal's Gazelle, and similarly priced at 30p for half a litre. Slurp. Someone in Zanzibar told me that a packet of fags in the UK is now over 5 quid. Jayzuz.
18.12.05. Swellendam, South Africa.
After it survived over a year of being carted across the worst roads in the world, keeping me entertained in the ghastliest, most joy-sucking rat-pits on the planet, some piss-swilling, dog-faced, son-of-a-thruppenny-strumpet, thieving, pig-arsed, cat-wanking shit-sucker has stolen my bloody guitar. Sod and bastard. ("At last we are free!" - African music lovers).
5.11.05. Tete, Mozambique.
Not much money
Just before the bridge over the mighty Zambesi, there's a campsite called "Jesus e Bom"; "Jesus is Good" in Portuguese. Now then, Jesus may well be very good indeed - who am I to judge - but his campsite is a shithole, so I decide to check into the air-conditioned $20 magnificence of the "Hotel Zambesi" instead.
