The Blue Elephant

A girl from the tribe near Turmi.


On the Kenyan side of the border, we haggled for a minibus to take us to Nairobi. With fish hanging from the windscreen wiper and the door firmly tied on we sped through the sunset, past brown fields and cattle towards the capital. On the outskirts we hit the traffic, four lanes of confusion, hooting and belching black smoke. We inched along painfully through the carbon monoxide cloud that hangs permanently over the city like a European winter. Eventually at a circle we jumped out and ducked and jived for our lives to the relative safety of the stained black pavement.

By late evening we found ourselves at Upper Hill campsite. It was crowded with Peace Corps workers having an off weekend, and getting fuller. We hastened to secure a patch of land for the tents then grabbed an ice-cold Kilimanjaro beer each and chatted to the volunteers around the outdoor TV. Mostly Americans, some had been living in Kenya for over a year helping out on various farms and schools.

I awoke the next morning to the sounds of a building site in frantic activity. I was horrified to see, upon crawling from my canvas cavity and stretching, a massive building looming above the campsite. Workers swarmed all over rickety wooden scaffolding nailed haphazardly to the twentieth floor while eagles circled, screaming at them. The march of the skyscrapers was spreading rapidly and in only a matter of time this hill, the last outpost in Nairobi, will fall to the bricks.

Upper Hill campsite is like an oasis in a rubbish dump. An eclectic mix of tents line the one wall, broken up by shady trees, tables and benches. The tents are permanent structures and have been collected over the years from bummed-out travelers looking for money to go home. My two-man tent was giving me endless problems with broken poles, so I swapped it for a really good hand-made one man mountaineering tent. Pebbly paths lead off to various small huts; there's a bar, an outside TV area with couches and tables, and a small restaurant. At the far corner of the property broken cars and parts abound and it was in this mechanic's paradise that we met Urs. In ripped jeans and elbow deep in grease, he tinkered around a big blue truck. After talking for a while we discovered he was heading in the same direction as us and so asked for a lift. "Just as soon as I get these wheels on," he said. Then we noticed the front wheels lying on the ground. He said it would take a few days to pick up parts and fix, so we waited.

Numerous chores had to be done in the city and these filled our days (any chore in Africa will fill your day). Ethiopian visas were purchased and our legs were stretched and blackened by the passing buses as we trudged up and down the hill. World Cup soccer was on, so nights we spent in front of the box, beer in hand. I also met a nice willing and able Swedish girl called Karin.

After some days Urs was ready to leave. We packed up, said many good-byes and see-you-laters and hit the road. While navigating the busy city we crushed a taxi into the pavement. All we did was rip off their mirror and rake the side of an already abused and dented car, but soon a lynch mob surrounded us. Thankful to be in a steel beast of a machine, we argued through the windows for a while before finally settling on some small compensation for the mirror.

Three hours out, when the road had deteriorated into a potholed mountain track, we realized we were on the wrong road and had to turn back. We eventually found the right road and got as far as the town called Nyeri, when there was a horrible noise from the gearbox. After some heavy cursing, we were left with only first gear, so we limped to the nearest campsite. We were the only people in Green Hills and had the whole lawn to ourselves. We made a fire and discussed the situation.

Urs had been travelling for the last three years through Africa. He left his home town in Switzerland with his wife and dog and travelled to Morocco and then on down the west coast to South Africa. His dog died in Capetown and then his wife left him in Mozambique. His vehicle, a modified Swiss Army six-wheel truck, painted blue, was falling apart bit by bit. Urs was not a happy man. We decided to keep him company for a while and wait in Nyeri for a new gearbox to be flown out to Nairobi.

While looking at his photos on the laptop one night, I saw a familiar-looking car. It was a multi-colored Citroen with the name "Heribert" painted above the windscreen. The same car had been parked outside the workshop where I worked and I'd passed it every day for three years. It belonged to the surfboard shaper on the farm, Pierre. It turned out that Urs had driven Heribert to Capetown from Switzerland and then sold it to some woman there. Urs also used to attach a big fan to his back and go paragliding. He had some really cool aerial shots of Africa.

The Marabou stork is the world's ugliest bird, and we were fortunate to have a tree full of them next door. A big stork-like thing, they walk around with inverted knees clacking serrated beaks and looking for carrion. A few grey hairs pepper their motley bald heads and we could tell by their rheumy, bloodshot eyes that they were waiting for us to die. We kept a wary eye and made sure to placate these gods of the underworld with scraps from the fire.

During the course of the next week we played lots of soccer, smoked many spliffs, had a few barbecues, drank some whiskey, watched a few movies on the laptop, and saw the World Cup final in the pub down the way.

Urs left for Nairobi by bus early one morning and came back the next day with a gearbox in a crate. Into the belly of the beast. We cursed and sweated, through spanners around and got covered in grease, but finally it was in. A victory lap around the field and we were ready to go.

We grumbled out of Nyeri in the Blue Elephant early the next morning and sometime around noon we crossed the equator into the northern hemisphere. At the last outpost town of Isiolo we asked the military about the road ahead (the next five hundred kilometers of trek is notorious for bandit activity and the Blue Elle is an RPG magnet). We got the thumbs-up and headed into the desert on a stony road getting a puncture almost immediately. We chased a herd of camels for about ten kilometers, much to the dismay of the herders, who would have to run back and fetch them. Dik-dik (small buck) lined the road in the setting sun, but scattered at our thunderous approach. In the evening we bushwacked off the road into the thorny scrub to find a sleep spot. We sat with our feet pulled up onto the chairs around the fire that night as scorpions as big as my hand scuttled around beneath us.

The next day in Marsabi, the only town on that barren stretch of gravel, we got into trouble for accidentally photographing some soldiers. We ate our goat and rice then hurriedly left, getting another puncture deep in bandit country. By nightfall we had made it to the dusty one-horse town of Moyale on the Ethiopian border. After setting up in some overpriced ruin of a campsite we stumbled the streets looking for food; finding nothing but spicy goat meat swimming in oil, we grumbled, little knowing that it was to get worse.

The border crossing went smoothly, only taking two hours and some minor office to office walking. For lunch we had a taste of our staple diet for the next three months: Njira and tips. Njira is made from the seeds of a reed-like plant by pounding them in a pestle, adding water and salt, allowing it to ferment for three days and then pouring the mixture into a big wok. The result is a very big pancake resembling a dirty carwash shammy. Your bowl of tips, goat meat swimming with chilies in oil, is dumped unceremoniously in the middle of your Njira. Chilies are the only source of vitamins for most Ethiopians--they also help your stomach digest old meat--we spent the beginning of every meal fishing them out. Goats are butchered into pieces with crude axes, the resulting splinters of bone, as you chew lustily into your tough meat, have displaced many a good tooth; one of mine cracked in half. Eating is communal so you all sit around one big plate, tearing off pieces of Njira and fighting over the meat in the center.

After some black marketeering we trundled onto the town called Mega. We were mobbed by children as we stepped out to stretch out legs in the dying sun. They all shouted "Ferengi, ferengi!" and "You! You! You! Give me money!" I left Urs and Dust with the hustlers and ran around the dusty, wind blown streets looking for supper, dodging donkey carts, goats and raggedy children, I finally came back half an hour later with a bag of what looked like pigeon eggs-- all I could find. Later, as it was getting dark, we drove into the bush and eventually, after much tree dodging and reversing, had a campsite.

We made it to Konso by lunch time the next day and while sitting around in the shade of a thorn tree sipping on Coca-Colas we met Dino, an Ethiopian guide. His English was excellent due to the fact that he was adopted by Americans at birth and raised and educated in America. But his parents had died and now he was back to his roots, sitting in the dust waiting for tourists. He told us of wild tribes to the west who had strange customs and we could go visit them for a small fee, of course. He jumped in the back of the Elephant and we were off towards Turmi. The road was long, hot and dusty, and we had to cross a few rivers and climb a couple of mountains but eventually we were at a small village. The natives left their grass, beehive huts and came to investigate. The women wore nothing much but some tattered goat skins and shells with braided, dyed-red hair. The men wore some cast off European clothes, beads, elaborate hair styles with sometimes a feather and carried rusty AK47s and bows and arrows. They were extremely friendly and couldn't speak a word of English. I was soon involved in a game of catch with a box of matches, to discover that these hard, desert warriors were unable to pluck a moving object from the air--they thought my skills legendary. We set up truck and tents outside the main kraal and awaited the dark and the promised mating dance. Soon rocks were thumping out of rhythm to call all the neighboring clans and many people emerged from the dark desert. It became a wild party with lots of singing and stomping feet, but unfortunately it was too dark to see anything. After much negotiation with our guide and the chief it was agreed for a repeat performance early the next morning.

I awoke to the sounds of stamping feet and singing and emerged from my tent just as the sun rose above the distant mountains. A semicircle of men stood facing a semicircle of women in the dusty courtyard and we gathered at the circumference with cups of tea and cameras. Two men jumped stiff legged in the middle, clothes flapping, obviously in competition with each other. The women clapped a rhythm. Then they went back to their ranks and women and men, like the surf hitting the beach, came together with a steadily increasing chant before going back to their opposite sides. This went on for some time and although it was unclear to us what was happening we were informed that the women were choosing a mate. In their culture, when a woman gets married, she better have lots of sexual experience, otherwise she is beaten and kicked out of the house; she gets beaten anyway in the wedding ceremony. After the dance we were invited to a smoky hut for a coffee ceremony. Coffee beans are cooked and ground then boiled before being passed around the dim interior in a calabash skin. Hideous tasting stuff, guaranteed to put the hairs back on any bald head.

Later on we hit the road back to Konso, dropped Dino off, and ended up at Arba Minch overlooking Lake Abaya and Lake Chamo, one silver, one red. We stayed for two nights as there was no petrol in town unless you had a special slip of paper from the police.

The next day, after several punctures, we made it to Bulbula and camped under shady trees on the shore of Lake Abiyata. A tranquil place, it was a holiday spot of many Ethiopians, clustered down the shore fishing. I ran to the bar and purchased a bleeding cows heart, the apparent bait for fishing.

Early next morning I threw a hand line into the lake, sat under my umbrella in the light drizzle and waited. My patience was rewarded with two small tulapia and a catfish. While taking my early morning after-coffee shit in the ablution block a dog stole the tulapia. Dustin gave chase but alas I was left with only a catfish trying to escape back to the lake. I was just in time to haul it back to the frying pan where it belonged.

After breakfast we headed on to Addis Ababa, the capital city. We got there in the late evening to discover it was another typical African city: many lanes of hooting cars, no road rules, and plenty of one-way streets. We eventually found a bank machine, the only one in Ethiopia, at the Sheraton Hotel, then played bumper cars, remembering to drive on the right-hand side of the road to a small camp spot/whorehouse/carpark called Bell Air Pensions. Dustin and I set up our tents on the four by four meter patch of lawn, then we all drank beer with some elderly German tourists in the small bar.

Early the next morning Urs left for Sudan and beyond. We said our heartfelt thanks and goodbyes and waved as the Blue Elephant eased gently into the Addis traffic heading towards the rising sun.

THE SWAHILI SIDETRACK

It was soon getting dark and so we made our way hurriedly off the station and entered into Dar es Salaam chaos. Thick traffic, noise, pollution and here people really do drive on the pavement. Our first mission was to phone our good buddy Mike as apparently he was living somewhere in Dar. After hitching and almost getting run down a couple of times in the thick of traffic, we eventually caught a matatu (minibus taxi) for 200 shillings each and ended up in the city centre at a place called Posta. We bought a phone card and us and ten Tanzanians tried unsuccessfully to get hold of Mike. Sweating and cursing heavily we gave up and tried to get hold of Jay who was staying somewhere down the coast. Eventually we gave up on the public phones, attacked 2 passing German mzungo’s, bought airtime for their cell phone and finally got hold of Jay. He was drinking beer and watching soccer and was glad that we had finally arrived.

"Oh, Mike left 2 months ago, his visa expired for the third time and now he is working in Saudi Arabia." Well that was that, then told Jay we would see him soon and hung up. Had to escape the press of humanity before it got dark so we booked into the YWCA which was apparently the cheapest place around- it was also next to the biggest, noisiest taxi rank. Took much needed showers and then headed downstairs and out into the dark street to look for somewhere to eat.

On the corner we met a man who said he knew of a good cheap place and so we followed him up the street. In the dim, smoky restaurant he made a phone call on his cell and soon 5 of his big Swahili friends arrived, being all friendly but hemming us in and asking all the usual question. After the meal they tried to get us into their car with offers of a free lift back to our hotel. An ugly scene was unfolding. We declined the offer and said we would rather walk, at least 5 times, before eventually just turning and walking away. They tried one last time by pulling up next to us and claiming to be the police . "You think I am some stupid fresh faced European, fuck off!" They eventually drove away, too afraid to rob us on a busy street. Well, welcome to Dares Salaam.


The next day we tried to find the girls we had met in Malawi. Ellie had given me the address of the school she was teaching at and it was in a suburb called ‘Changombe’. We walked and sweated all day through multitudes of people, filth, noise, human drawn donkey carts, pavement drivers, soldiers, hawkers, cyclists, sick people, demented people, roadside food and beer shacks – their cooking fire all joining the black car fumes and hanging in a dirty cloud over everything. Eventually we found Yemeni Primary School but everyone had gone home, so we got hold of the last remaining teacher and after phoning someone he led us to her house. There was no one at home so we sat outside and waited, sweating in the evening heat. Eventually Consolate, their maid, came and thinking we were more gap students, let us in. We put our bags down and I headed to the outside toilet only to discover it didn’t flush and the water didn’t work. Great, haven’t even asked if we can stay and I’ve left a smelly present in the toilet.

Soon Craig, Brendan, Ellie and Mel arrived back from the beach and we all shook hands and got invited for supper. Later more students from different parts of Dar arrived and joints and bottles of Conyagi (really foul, cheap local rum, the picture of flames on the label) were soon doing the rounds. In the midst of this social gathering we asked if we could stay for a while and the answer was yes, have another drink. I sneaked out the back and set up my broken tent but soon gave up the idea of sleep and joined in the madness, which didn’t stop until 3 or 4 in the morning. It was usually crowded, chaotic and loud most nights but I got used to it and soon the place became home. We stayed for a long time. Down the road was the local pub, the TTC, where we watched many a football match on a big screen but with no sound. We were living on the edge of a slum area so the school had provided a night watchman, not that he was really needed. This old man, who constantly wore socks on his hands, sat at the gate all night in full uniform smiling and nodding at any attempt at conversation. No one even knew his name. There were plenty of roadside eating shacks up and down the road and we became addicted to chicken and chips and kilimanjaro beer, which was all really cheap, but the toilet worked overtime. Water was taken from a big storage tank underground in the back yard by bucket and poured over your head to shower, and into the toilet to flush. To escape the oppressive humidity, we would sometimes all climb into the water tower in the next-door yard, smoke spliffs and listen to the drums beating around us while gazing up at the stars. This was my favourite spot, especially during a power failure when everything blacked out for miles. Hoochie-Coochie was the drinking game and Dustin and I always lost, not being able to slap our knees, clap our hands and count simultaneously like the British. Frequently there would be people lying everywhere in the morning and I was glad that I had my tent, even though I stuck to the outside of my sleeping bag for lack of ceiling fans. We all went down to the dirty beach on the other side of town once in a while to swim and get stung by blue bottles in the piss warm sea. Sometimes we all missioned down to Q-Bar to dance and drink. It was an ex-pat place and you had to fight through the pretty hookers to get to the bar, black hands feeling you all over.

Somehow through all the madness Dusty and I managed to get stuff done. We managed to apply for our Sudanese visas after fighting through the bureaucratic bullshit that is the Sudanese embassy. "It will take 3 months, if you get it, we’ll post it to Addis Ababa."

Finally we left, heading south towards Jay, 300 km down the coast to a place called Kilwa Ruins. Late afternoon found us still hitching on the outskirts of the city. The ordinary thumb sign doesn’t work here, people return the gesture, thinking your wishing them well. I hunted around in the numerous piles of rubbish that line every road and eventually, finding a suitable piece of cardboard, wrote KILWA in big black letters with the marker pen we had for just that purpose. I held the sign and Dustin waved his arm up and down. Occasionally a car would stop and ask us where we were going. "Kilwa," we said.

"Cuba?" Was often the dumb question and after explaining for ages discovered they were turning off 2 km down the road. Eventually a friendly 4x4 stopped and we met Mike whose father was a Polish gunrunner and mother a Tanzanian. He was down for the weekend from boarding school and his English was good. He said we should go to his house, drink beer and then pay for a lift on a truck early in the morning. This sounded cool so we agreed and hopped aboard. Drove down numerous, dirty, narrow ally ways and eventually came to a huge metal gate set in a massive stonewall with glass and spikes on the top. A Masai warrior, complete with red blanket, sandals, spears and big knife swung open the large gate and we entered into a huge courtyard that looked something from a mafia movie. Careful to take off our shoes, we met mom and gran, got fed and then drank beer from a cooler box outside in the courtyard, 5 big dogs eyeing us suspiciously. Mike wanted to go and see his girlfriend on the other side of the city and insisted that we came along with him, the promise of pork ribs afterwards. For 2 hours we inched along in Dar traffic, which is like nowhere else in the world and got to his girlfriends house in the dark. He decided to take a shortcut down gravel roads on the way back. Now it had been raining for quite a few days and soon we came to a big puddle lined with expectant people. It was about 40m to the other side and Mike decided to go for it. Almost at the other side we hit a hole and the jeep sunk up to its windows. Stuck. 50 people attacked the car all with different opinions and shouting in Swahili about how to get it out. 4x4 proved useless and just got us deeper in the hole. Dustin and I got out and pulled and strained with everyone else in the waist deep river – a huge snake slithered past the car causing a moment of panic. It became a war – we strained, we swore, the car bubbled and smoked and the boot filled up with muddy brown water. A pickup appeared on the other side and Mike took off his jeans, climbed out the window and in his underpants wades across to make a deal. Dustin and I guarded the car against the increasing riotous mob. A towrope was attached and after snapping a few times finally pulled us out with every ones combined effort. A great cheer went up, someone got paid, heads were broken and a riot began. Hastily we all jumped into the car and sped around the corner and back towards the tar road; sopping wet to a take away pizza joint then back to Mikes and bed in the spare room.
The next day we surveyed the damage, cleaned the car and then Mike took us to a truck stop only to find there was but one left. We made an offer, they refused, we left and Mike took us far out of town and dropped us off.

Well we met a Mike in Dar, not the right one, but we did the same things: drank beer and went 4x4ing.

We hitched all day and after boiling in the sun and 2 really short lifts, found ourselves in a town with no name in the rain. Booked into a cheap guesthouse and then went to find supper. In the morning we found ourselves at the edge of a gravel road and waited with every one else for hours in the rain for any sort of vehicle to come by. We were all entertained by a man who liked fighting with goats and all roared with laughter as he was butted down the street.

Eventually a big open truck loaded with crates of ice rumbled up and was instantly mobbed, a price was set and we bumped along the worst road ever all day getting rained on occasionally and then drying out in the hot sun. Finally late at night in a torrential downpour we jumped off at our stop, said goodbye to our many companions of misery and ran for cover. We phoned Jay from a hotel and he gave us directions to his place. Jay’s tall, monstrous form loomed out of the shadows when we were half way there. It was good to see him again after so many months and we went back to where he was staying, laughed a lot, smoked a few joints, drank a few beers and ate some food; then slept like dead men. Jay was staying at Kilwa Beach Lodge, the big game fishing spot on the Tanzanian coast. He had helped build most of the place but now had overstayed his welcome, run a huge bar tab and caused loads of shit, as Jay tends to do. He had to leave soon; the manager was on his case. Jay shared a house with Brett; nephew of the biggest big game hunter in Southern Africa and Jay was doing his professional hunters apprenticeship through him. Brett was an ex rally car driver and bionic man – he had more metal plates and broken bones in his body than robo cop.

Over the next few days we did what we always used to do: went sea kayaking, riding some nice waves and capsizing many times, got lost in the bush for a day and took a Dhow across the channel to visit the Kilwa ruins – an old Arab fort. Had loads of fun and then had to leave, sneaking out early one morning before the sun rose on the back of a hunting vehicle. The 3 of us sat on the hunting seat at the back while Brett drove like a rally car driver. Got back to Dar in record time and Dustin and I jumped out at Shoprite with a promise to meet Jay later at Q-Bar for the final between Chelsea and Liverpool. Back home to Changombe. Me and Ellies relationship took off and I moved into the house, bed, mosquito net and ceiling fan. Match night came and we met Jay and Brett down at Q-bar. The large open-air pub was packed with anticipation – even the hookers were silent and knew it was no use plying their trade at a time like this. Kick off on the big screen: Jay and I backed Chelsea and Dustin and Brett backed Liverpool, beers backed everyone. After a long hard game Chelsea lost and we switched to tequilas, doing them suicidally – lemon in the eye, salt up the nose and tequila down the gullet. Caught a taxi home later at some ungodly hour of the morning.

A few days later Dusty and I booked a ferry ride on the cheapest pile of junk we could find to Zanzibar. When voyage day came we made our way bleary eyed to the harbour in the morning mist, climbed on board and fell asleep, our bags tied firmly to our ankles. The previous nights send off party had only just ended. Woke in Zanzibar at night, had our passports stamped at immigration and made our way to the first food place we could find. After chicken and chips we followed a raggedy seaman type through the narrow alleys of Stone Town to Jumbo Guest house where we showered and then sat down in front of the T.V. In walked a Swedish girl called Hedwig. She was doing small business research in Zanzibar and staying at Jumbo. We all chattered for a while and then I went to bed shattered.

Woke at 5 the next morning to the machines at the bakery going mental and a mosque calling everyone to pray. Left in the rain to find quieter accommodation and ended up at Annex of Abdul where we found Steff upstairs in a tiny room stitching her jeans: "Hey Steff, long time no see". We were staying in Stone Town, the oldest suburb of Zanzibar. A labyrinth of tiny, twisting alleyways, crumbling buildings, strange doors, mosques and scooters whizzing around blind corners. An awesome place – especially at night when the scabby cats come out to hunt, an old peg leg taps away somewhere on the cobblestones, shadows twist and turn and you can hear the ghosts of pirates whispering in the alleys. You feel you definitely need an eye patch, 3-point hat and a sword – especially when you get lost, which happened every night.

Annex was where I began my Kili training and every morning I would run up and down the 3 flights of stairs until I felt sick. We hooked up with Hedwig – who we called H – and went missioning around with her a lot. We went to the seaside food market, which happens every night and where you can buy shark, tuna, octopus, lobster and all manner of things. We took a matatu up north to go and see the slave caves. When the slave trade was abolished the Arabs began hiding their cargoes of slaves in caves along the coast to await the ships. We stayed all day, swimming in the sea and losing track of time – we missed the last matatu and had to walk 15km back to the tar road, it was getting late. Passed grass rooted villages, grinning idiots and coconut groves. We walked until a man came passed on a bicycle, towing another one. We stopped him and H jumped on the back carrier on the back and Dustin and I took the other one. It became a race and Dusty rang the bell as we swerved passed goats and chickens, peddling furiously through mud and sand as I clung on desperately, my arse feeling every bump. We stopped eventually and I got off thankfully, feeling like I’d just served ten years in Pollsmoor prison. The man waved goodbye and turned down a jungly track to his hut – on we walked. Presently a man on a scooter stopped and one by one – gave us a lift through the dark jungle to the tar road. From there a matatu back to Stone Town.

H had to go away on business for a while so Dustin and I headed up to the north coast of the island for a few days. Really beautiful but expensive. White beaches, crystal see, palm trees and hundreds of bloody resorts. We tried free camping but once again it was impossible, this is Africa, people are everywhere. Mzungu, give me money!! Walked most of the 80kms back to Stone Town, then got a lift. When H got back we went down to the south coast, hired a boat and crew for really cheap and went snorkelling with the dolphins. For hours we played with them in the warm water, swimming amongst them and listening to their song – it was an unforgettable experience.

Back in Stone Town we ran into Paul the Austrian whom we had last seen in Mozambique, he now had big. fat, crusty dreadlocks. Dustin went off to Pemba (the island next door) with H for a honeymoon, I moved into Paul’s hotel down by the harbour. After a few days of guitar, philosophy and joints I took a night ferry back to Dar, was sea sick all night, landed in the dawn, took a taxi back to Changombe, woke Ellie through the window and climbed into bed, finished. For the weekend Ellie and I crossed the channel by ferry and went to a beach resort called Kipepaeo where we lived in luxury, swam in the sea and looked for shells. Back at the house Paul phoned in a state of panic. He had been negotiating for ages for a freight ship to Madagascar from Zanzibar in broken English and had succeeded in getting a small boat, which had now got as far as Dar to stock up on cargo. He was stuck on the boat in the harbour and after fighting the pirates for his own bed now had to contend with the rats. We all met at the TTC for the final between Arsenal and Barcelona – the Changombe house, Dustin and H who were now back in town at the YWCA and Paul, the mad Austrian. I managed to secure him a place on the couch for the night and he was most grateful. ‘Rats the size of cats, man’. He left for his boat the next day, head hanging and questioning his sanity. (I have since heard that he actually made it to Madagascar, the place of slow monkeys with human hands and then just in time for his flight home from Joberg).

After another lengthy stay in Changombe, Dustin and I finally left for Arusha and Jay, who was busy building a bush camp somewhere up there. After catching a strange bus we ended up miles off the tar road in a little village for the night. Hoping that the bus was leaving in the morning to resume the journey north we camped right next to it and cooked supper on the petrol stove in front of the whole village. Sick of the constant stares and laughter, which we were obviously the butt ends of, we lit a candle and bored them with a long game of chess. At 4 in the morning the engine started and we hastily broke camp, helped load up many beams of timbre and then hit the long windy gravel road at the end of which, the bus turned south. Off we jumped and went to find breakfast. Walked for a long time and then stopped to hitch. 5 minutes later we were in a fast car going north . Outside one village, we hit a goat at about 120 and, sitting on the back of the pickup we, watched it cart wheeling after us for a bit. Out here if you kill some ones livestock, you don’t stop and so on we sped, white knuckles on the rails. Got to Moshi and thankfully got off. 10 minutes later we were in a land rover, drinking beer with 2 American NGO’s and then we saw it, Kilimanjaro, a massive, snowy, hump-backed beast rising impossibly high off the plains. We were lucky they said, today’s a clear day – You have to be lucky when you are a hitchhiker.

They dropped us off at Masai Camp in Arushu and we set up our tents on the shady lawn where we met Neil, another crazy cyclist crossing the continent. Two days later we moved around the corner into a shed at the back of a locals home – much cheaper. Up the nearby mountain every day with Gina the one Masai Camp dog to get fit for Kili. Soon Jay rocked up – Mr Utility we called him, as he now had to wear a massive belt full of gadgets – part of being a professional hunter. He came with us up the mountain, we played soccer and we had a massive braai with Brett, who was also down. Then Jay had to head South past Dar, to start another bush camp. I made an offer: we work for you, you feed us. ‘OK sounds good, I’m sure it will be cool with the boss’ he said. Early the next morning the three of us were on a bus heading to Dar. Brett had dropped us off at the terminal but had left before we could say goodbye with the soccer ball and my umbrella. He had been mobbed by Africans all shouting ‘Mr Norris, Mr Norris!’ as he looks a bit like Chuck Norris and being a bit racist he had torn out of the car park scattering everyone.

By evening, after a torturous bus journey, we were back in Dar and after hopping in a taxi, got dropped off at a Catholic Hotel called, wait for it, Passionate Fathers. Jays boss had organised it for him and we sat under an umbrella outside drinking beer and making jokes about how he might survive the night. We left Jay and headed for the Changombe house. We met Jay at the spur 2 nights later for some good food followed by many drinks at the pub next door. Next day we got the phone call on Ellies phone:’Sorry guys, the deals off, no one else allowed on the game farm.’ Well that was that then.

Back north we went and after spending the night camped behind a restaurant ‘somewhere on the road’, we ended up in Moshi; a small town at the base of Kilimanjaro. We booked in at Hotel da Costa – the budget accommodation for people wishing to climb Kili. While at the bar drinking a beer and checking out our adversary looming above the clouds in the distance, we met Steve. Hey guys, do you think I have malaria? I feel a bit funny. Hey, are you from South Africa?’ I was wearing my Poffadder T- shirt. Steve was a bit of a worrier and from the Transvaal (no wonder); he was also a young game ranger, out on his own to broaden his horizons. The next day we walked out to the orphanage to give them some of Stevies clothes and other excess. Then we climbed a steep hill all day, never reaching the top and finding out later it was the base of Kili and we should have permits. We spent the next few days trying to find the cheapest company with whom to climb the mountain. Unfortunately the only way to climb the mountain is with guides and porters at a ridiculous cost. It’s the law and the only way in which new Africa makes money. After meeting the operators sparkling with jewellery and gold teeth we eventually met Angus from Crown eagle. It would cost us 770 dollars each, including tips, carrying our own gear and going the popular route – the best price by far. Now we had to get the money: no banks in Moshi, so it was off to Arusha 80 kms away to hit the banks for three days until we had enough cash – damn bank withdrawal limit. Stayed in the usual Masai camp, climbed the mountain everyday with Gina our trusty dog, the messed it all up in the pub every night. The Changombe crew arrived on our last night . Hitched back to Moshi on Sunday afternoon after the last bank robbery, just in time to sort out our gear before an early departure on Monday morning. Borrowed jackets, boots, balaclava and gloves from the crown eagle, had a last debriefing, met our guide Peter and then headed back to Da Costa for an early night. H had arrived and tried unsuccessfully to set me up with her friend.

Dustin stood red eyed and yawning in the morning – a victim of circumstance and his organs – while we loaded up the minibus with food and bags; the bulk of our stuff being stored at Da Costa. In the morning gloom we headed out to the base of the beast where we encountered the Kilimanjaro Circus hanging about at the entrance gate. Filled out forms, hummed and ahhed and all (guides, porters, cooks, Americans, Russians, Germans, little people and big people) milled about at the start – it was like some damb fun run or something. And they’re off – ten minutes down the path we let everyone pass and sat down with Peter, our guide, to smoke a joint. Trekked up hill (obviously – any down would have sparked immediate concern) all day along a well-trodden path through thick, dark, jungle, passed pretty waterfalls and numerous raving colubus and blue monkeys. By the evening we had passed everyone and were at the first base camp, 2700 metres above sea level. As usual I damaged myself on the first day, pulling my Achilles tendon – Kili would have to be climbed mainly with my left leg. It was cold and we all ate in a big A-frame bungalow, while the wind whistled through the cracks and different languages congregated under the ceiling. Before supper we had taken an extra walk further up the mountain to the rim of a small crater and so retired early to bed in our little 3 man A-frame. As I lay snug and warm in my sleeping bag I could feel the altitude, my heart beating a little faster and breathing through my mouth as the orifices in my nose proved inadequate for adequate oxygen intake.

Next morning we cracked on our boots and headed to the mess hall for breakfast before hitting the super highway onwards. Soon the scenery changed, turning to skeletal, moss covered trees as we passed through the clouds and then settling to stunted bush, not unlike fynbos on Cape Town Mountains. This day we took it ‘pole –pole’ (poorly –poorly) which means ‘slowly-slowly’, it is best this way to acclimatise – not as if we could have actually gone any faster, it was getting harder to breathe. By evening we were puffing like run away steam trains as we stumbled into Horombo Camp at 3720 m. It was wreathed in hissing mist and felt like some World War One, bomb blasted, trench warfare site – it didn’t look much different either. People had quietened down quite a bit by this stage and were now firmly set into the grim business of climbing a mountain. Being South African, we were soon bored and so headed higher up for a view of the snow capped peak and a spliff. Things burn for twice as long at high altitude and joints really make you feel quite mad. Late evening we floated down through the howling mist to find our poor exasperated guide desperately searching for us to give us our food. We liked Peter, he was really a good guide, but we were sick of being mothered up a mountain and so we all had a good chat and he relaxed a bit and left us to our own devices – we became the ‘cheezy mzungos’ which means ‘crazy white men.' A huge full moon rose that night above the cloud layer that covered the surface dwellers down below like a blanket. It was truly beautiful and we 3 sat on a rock overlooking this spectacle of silent awe and knowing that this was exactly where we were all meant to be. Sleeping was a little harder that night.

The next day we slogged through the high altitude desert, the only living thing being crows at the lunch spot where we crouched behind boulders sheltering from the howling, cold wind. At 4500m altitude struck and pounding headaches set in. We stumbled into Kibo camp, exhausted and immediately lay down on our bunk beds, dead men. We managed to stumble to a frugal supper of soup and bread and then back to bed. Kibo is where all the different paths converge and everyone sleeps in one big hut with many rooms. It is like a funeral parlour, no one talks, no one leaves except to the toilet: it is freezing cold, the wind whistles through the bleak compound and people groan miserably like pitiful dying animals. There were 9 in our room; would have been 10 but he or she was carried past us on a stretcher on our approach, wrapped completely in a body bag. Dead or alive? Climbing this mountain had become a grim business. A Jap on the bed beneath me groaned all night; he was not going to make it; the Americans ate their oxygen pills, checked their heart rate monitors and worried; the Russian slept in his neon mummy bag. We were to wake at 12.30pm and leave at 1 – the last to leave; guides had been monitoring their people over the last days, checking speed and endurance and matching starting times for the summit accordingly. I slept with my boots on and all my clothes next to me, stuffed in my sleeping bag. Sleep was hard and fitful and by 11 impossible – everyone was kitting up and heading out, checking pulses and swallowing little pink pills. Sleep impossible, I went outside for a cigarette and a shit and watched the twinkling torches climb the mountain. At 1 we were off after biscuits and tea, one slow step at a time, following the feet in front like some dumb animal, breathing like a maniac and heart pumping like a machine gun. As usual we passed many groups, some people coming back down, beaten things, heads hung, focusing on the steep, slippery slope. For hours we carried on this numb mindless stepping, worming our way slowly up, Peter in front, setting the pace, an automated machine. Finally at 5700m we reached Gilmans Point, still in the dark but the sky lighting in the East gradually. We flung ourselves down and had a cigarette then left for the summit on a narrow, twisty path that bordered on a huge drop into a crater. Soon the headaches and nausea started; strange altitudinous thoughts crept into our brains on fluttering legs. The sun rose, a thin red line on the cloud horizon; it was beautiful, but beauty has no place in a numb mind with only one thought: top. We were in the snow field now, sharp jagged ice crystals underfoot, death drop to the side. I balanced carefully on my dizzy stick and fought my ragged mind. The dazzling way forward, lit by the sun, grinned its flashing white teeth at our torture. The ugly pimple of a summit appeared around a bend and we grinned right back. With the summit in sight it was easy and we reached the signboard with out realising how we had got there. I flung down my bag and stick, fell among the rocks and puked my guts out. Dustin, as usual, found it most amusing and took some pictures of me and breakfast. Then we posed and prostituted ourselves in front of the cameras for a short while, admired the spectacular view through glazed and bloodshot eyes, then headed down – you can’t stay long at 5896m at –16 degrees C for long. I vomited some more on the way down and really had to fight hard to get back to Kibo hut. We had to get out of the altitude as soon as possible, so after a forced bite to eat headed back to Horombo at 3700m. Got there like the dead gets to a funeral and then slept. Woke later feeling a little better, then headed to the eating hall for the war stories. We found out we were the only ones from our room to summit; one guy being picked up wondering the mountain and not knowing his own name.

The next day we walked back down through the jungle, laughing at those going up. By this stage my ankle was appropriately buggered and I was wearing Peters mouldy leather sandals. Got back to the gate, picked up our certificates, said our heartfelt thanks to Peter and the boys for excellent service, gave back the sandals and barefoot headed back to the hotel for Kilimanjaro beers all round. We made it up the mountain, but found it difficult returning downstairs to our rooms; knees locked in rigamortis.

We recovered in Da Costa for many days. H had arrived again so I moved into a room with cheesy Steve, where we had much fun smoking pot with two French tandem cyclists who kept on getting bust by the funny manageress for smoking in their downstairs room. Eventually the 4 of us took over the hotel and had the staff in stitches with our crazy Swahili and even crazier antics. The 2 Frenchies had cycled down South America, crossed to Cape Town and were now ending prematurely at Nairobi due to the inevitable ending of money. They had a massive sun bleached set of horns mounted on the front of their bicycle as well as horns of the hooting variety mounted all over the place, and a trailer. They were clowns and crazy people and stopped to entertain schools and orphanages all along the way for free. It was the soccer world cup so we all watched many matches upstairs in the pub. Soon the Frenchies left, taking their crazy 2-man circus with them, the mobile freak show with horns. Then Steve left after trying unsuccessfully for ages. Soon Dusty and I left too, heading west, back to Arusha and Masai camp. After another bank robbery we headed north, the green giving way to brown as we hit the Kenyan border. A black market money deal, lunch with our lift and then over the border into a new country and new adventures. We had spent 3 months in Tanzania, staying to the very limit of our visa and having an unforgettable time learning a lot of Swahili and making some lasting friends.

The show must go on.

Timo

Victoria Falls to Dar es Salaam

We awoke in the still dawn silence that is the great African bush. While sitting about in our crop circles of long grass and eating a breakfast of oats, a troop of baboons wandered past, plucking at grassy shoots and berries. The boss, a huge hairy beast, decided to come on over and investigate. He strolled right up to me, sat down and scratched his balls. Not knowing what to do, I carried on eating out the pot, clanking away a little more loudly with my spoon. Curiously he looked into my eyes. Only a minute change of circumstance between man and beast, we traded thoughts. Then he got up, grabbed Steff’s sleeping bag and tried to get away. She was up in a flash, shouting abusive German and tugging on the other end. In wide-eyed terror the baboon beat a hasty retreat up a tree. After much laughter, breakfast resumed without further incident but under cautious, watchful eyes.

Today was the day to leave Zim and cross into Zambia. We paid our 20 dollars each at the well-guarded gate and entered into a world of roaring mist. Victoria Falls is hugely impressive, the entire Zambezi river plunges 95 meters into oblivion along a kilometre long gash across the earth, whereupon it gathers itself and continues sedately round the bend. The falls can be viewed from various intervals along a dripping path winding through a rainforest. Umbrellas were deployed but here the rain falls in all directions and so eventually proved quite useless. After David Livingstone’s statue and eating a soggy lunch we headed across a bridge and to the Zambian border.
After having my bag searched and our passports stamped, we were in Zambia. A couple of hours and one lift later we were in Livingstone, the first town on the map. We booked into Fawlty Towers, a really nice place with a pool, DSTV and a bar. Unfortunately we had arrived in Zambia 3 weeks too late. Their debt had just been wiped clean – part of the first world debt reduction plan – one dollar got you 300 Kwacha, before, you got more. Ate a nice pizza around the corner for supper while kittens back at Fawlty Towers rampaged all over our tents, playing catch and perforating our fly sheets.

After unsuccessfully trying to book a train to Lusaka we bought bus tickets instead. Travelled in the super tinted, air-conditioned mega hauler all day, eating cheese sandwiches and watching confusing Nigerian movies on a little screen right in the front of the bus. One called ‘The Tome and Jerry’ featured two naughty boys who constantly played tricks on their poor blind grandpa. The bus was in stitches every time the old man’s seat was pulled from underneath him, his cane went missing or he sat on a drawing pin.

Eventually as the big red ball in the sky began its gradual descent through the layers of dust and smog, we hit Lusaka bus terminal. Miriam, an engineer and pilot who had been on the bus, offered us a free lift in a private taxi. We jumped, eager to leave the overcrowded, festering bus depot. After being dropped off almost on the edge of town we walked into the night and eventually came to Mumama Guest Lodge where we asked if we could sleep somewhere in the back for free. After much politeness and many attempts at leaving, they finally agreed and gave us a nice little patch of grass next to a duck pond, which was covered in shit. Beer, soccer match in the pub and bed, buggered.

Walked and walked all morning and then after 3 lifts ended up at some big river and camped in the bush. Got stopped by soldiers the next morning while trying to cross a massive bridge.
“Where from? Where going? Passports? Money?”

I gave the one guy a book, signed the cover, smiled patiently, sweat dripping from every pore and waited.

Across the bridge we walked, stopping halfway to throw sticks into the swirling chocolate mayhem. On the other side we waited for hours, entertained by dancing children who were meant to be walking to school, and taking turns to sit in the shade. Eventually a car came past going in the other direction – an overland truck, as usual filled with really bored looking European tourists. After listening to our stomachs singing something in B flat minor for a while, Steff volunteered to go back across the bridge to find some food. Ten minutes later she came back sitting in the front of a bakkie; on we jumped.

It was a convoy of 3 bakkies; we had a choice. The great hand of destiny had also ensured that these were Zambian beer reps, and so we sped stopping frequently to drink beer. This just reinforces my belief that if you wait or suffer long enough, something good always happens; always, without fail. It’s all about balance. The beer reps were off to a crop planting festival in Chipata, which is almost at the border to Malawi. Dropped outside Chipata in the dusk, many handshakes and thanks and then up a hill to a really terrible, bumpy camp spot in the dark.
Onward the scales tip. Walked all morning and eventually got to the border. We had crossed Zambia in 3 days. Well, no one needs a visa for Malawi – unless maybe you’re Russian – so stamps and then across the border we walked. Got hassled by all the usual suspects, mainly taxi drivers. One in particular wouldn’t let us go but kept pace next to us as we walked, begging and pleading.“Look, buddy, the only way I’m getting in your taxi, is for free”.

“OK”, he said eventually, so in we jumped (of course, now he had to pick up more people to make up for his loss).

We arrived in Mchinji a tangled mass of limbs, chicken and maize and after I’d removed someone’s foot from my ear someone else tried to grab Steff’s bag. She gave him such an earful of foul German at the top of her lungs that he dropped the bag and hurriedly hung his head. He was no thief, just another enthusiastic taxi driver trying to secure a passenger. On we walked until eventually we stopped on the side of the road to make lunch. Kids surrounded us as we ate and watched mouthful practically to stomach. A note on people: You are never alone in Africa. You sit down to eat, have a smoke and 30 people will be standing a meter from you, watching every move. After an unsuccessful attempt at a finding a camp spot near the road (ants everywhere) we climbed a hill, passing a few beehives suspended in trees, made fire, cooked, slept.Awoke to a storm, ran down the mountain to look for water, came back successful an hour later, soaked, and made breakfast under umbrellas. Dodged a herd of cattle and got back to the road where the sun came out and cooked us. Walked to the Kaysea Inn for lunch and then Dustin and I conducted a very dodgy, drug deal feeling, black-market money change in some dark little back room. More rain and it got late so we pitched our tents in the back for 500 Kwacha for the three of us. Fanny, as Steff is affectionately known, had developed a bad foot (we found out weeks later after that she actually had a broken bone). Well, the good people at the Inn liked us so much that they offered us a month’s free accommodation if we could organize seeds for their vegetable garden. We couldn’t of course so we left the next day and after hitching for ages we finally took a cramped mini-bus to the capital, Lilongwe.

We camped at a nice spot at the edge of town called Kiboko, getting invaded by ants on a daily basis. We visited the orphanage down the road and after playing some soccer with the kids got invited for breakfast the next morning. Patricia, the really nice Malawian woman and owner of the orphanage, cooked us a nice breakfast of eggs and beans and we ate while watching old cartoons on the telly. After buying supplies and haggling for tobacco we got a lift with John and Karen, two American lawyers who were attacked and robbed while in SA, us three squashed on the back seat of their golf with our bags on our laps all the way to Kande Beach. We had to walk the last two km of sand track, as the car was too heavy.

At last, Lake Malawi. The lake looks just like the ocean – white sandy beaches, small waves and you can’t see the other side. At the campsite we met Derek the overland truck driver again, with a new group of European tourists coming up from South Africa. Just as in Mozambique we bummed supper. Ah, South African meat and veggies. We all took a walk down the beach to check out the local dugout canoes. A Malawian dugout is not like a Mozambiquan dugout. There is no v-shaped hull; it’s just a massive hollow log that you have to sit on rather than in. I had a go on one and stability was definitely lacking. The whole of the next day was spent walking the beach, haggling for a canoe. At each small fishing village everybody gathered to watch the 3 mzungo’s (ma-zung-oes: ‘white man’ or ‘he who travels aimlessly’). Eventually at the end of the day we were the proud owners of a leaky log after capsizing in front of many laughing villagers, haggling for hours in smoky huts over cigarettes and salty fish and walking up and down the beach for ages. Something had to be done about the stability, so we worked late into the night attaching a windsurfer board as an outrigger.

The next morning, Dusty and I took our strange craft to the distant island for a test run and breakfast. Steff wouldn’t set foot in it. Many leaks but otherwise no problem. After fixing the leaks the local way – pushing bits of cloth and plastic bag into the cracks with a knife – we loaded the bags, convinced Steff she wouldn’t die and left to an audience on the shore. Having a large weight on one side of the boat made steering extremely difficult but we got it in the end and travelled reasonably straight. Steff sat in the middle with the bags; her job was to make lunch and bail out the steady inflow of water; Dustin and I alternated between front and back. It was heavy going so we sang songs and acted like pirates. When it was getting dark we beached the boat, set up tents, made a fire, cooked supper and then slept like babies.

We woke to the sound of many curious villagers poking around outside, packed up quickly and escaped to the lake where we ate breakfast. We had bags of this horrible porridge stuff where you just add water. We docked for lunch at some fancy beach lodge, ate, lay in the sun and swam. Suddenly this irate, twitching little man appeared and began screaming at us:“Your girlfriend’s in my shower!”

Reluctantly I went and fetched Steff. Two screamings in one day is not good. Then the weather changed; the rain came down, the wind picked up and the swells got big – really big. We were far offshore trying to round a huge rocky headland when the waves started coming in. Fearing death, we headed to the nearest beach where we hid miserably under umbrellas waiting for the storm to pass.

In the late afternoon, we rounded the headland and came to a small village where we were warmly greeted, pulled ashore and helped offload. A long line of scruffy fisherman and children trotted up the long winding path through the dim jungle all proudly carrying an item from the boat. The paddles branched off to that house, the ropes went to that one and so on. Too tired to protest and failing to be understood anyway, we followed the procession; we’d sort it out in the morning. It ended at Chief Goodwing’s hut. A fire was made and the whole village watched while we set up tents, cooked and ate.

The next morning it was raining and Dusty and I took a long, escorted (you’re never alone) walk to the distant village for some supplies. In Malawi, there are no real shops and so you eat whatever you can get. The rain slacked off in the afternoon, so Dust and I, sick of the constant stares and attention, decided to escape to the lake for a bit of fishing. Steff wanted to stay, being in her element (she is German after all). We took GO (Gretchen Odyssey) back up the shore for a bit and beached at a small lodge to look for earthworms. There we met Jim, a skinny drummer from the sixties with a crutch. He was the owner and bought us lots of beers as we sat on the deck and chatted. We got back to Steff in the dark, no fish but slightly piddled. After supper, chief Goodwing took out his rusty tin guitar and sang wedding songs to Steff at the fire – we definitely had to leave in the morning!

Early the next day, we fetched all our things from various huts through the drizzle and hit the lake again, much to the chief’s disappointment. Of course the whole village saw us off and waved until we were far in the distance. We actually found an empty beach that night. The next day the beaches became less and gave way to rocky, jungle-like mountains towering from the lake; little huts perched at intervals like vultures. Children would spot us from far away, gather together and shout: “Mzungo, give me money!”

This never stopped. After crossing some large bays, sometimes putting us three or so kilometres from shore, we came to a little muddy, grassy beach thing next to a small brown river. While recovering on our bags under the stares of all the usual people who spring up from nowhere, a man came up to us and began waving his arms about wildly. Rabies?
Eventually, he pointed up river and said, ”Crocodile?!”

Well that was the magic word, so we packed up and with burning arms and blistered hands we paddled further up the coast.

A bit longer than presently, we arrived at another beach with a big stone house on it. There we met mzungo Mike from Canada and his beautiful Malawian girlfriend. Mike had no more ganja and so we gave him some in exchange for letting us sleep on his beach. Next morning Dusty and I smoked a pipe on his roof and said our goodbyes and we were off. Camped in the rain that night in some wet bushes, cooking on the petrol stove. Next morning it was still raining and having no food I decided to walk up the coast to Nkhata Bay, the first town on our journey. We knew it had to be close. Steff was not happy, she wanted to pack up in the rain and paddle on an empty stomach. After an argument I left in the rain towards Nkhata.

Walked and walked, the sun came out and on I walked down the beach. Eventually I came to a large river and after looking right, then left, then right again for crocodiles, I waded across. Soon the beach stopped and gave way to steep rocks and cliffs pounded by the lake. It looked doable but I decided to rather go inland through the jungle. Along ancient paths up and down mountains I walked passing the odd village from time to time. Eventually by late evening I arrived at Nkhata Bay. Before I could do anything I had to change dollars for kwacha. After meeting a man who knew a man who knew a man, I ended up at the small harbour, shouting exchange rates to a fat Muslim sitting in a boat. Soon in front of fifty people we had a deal and then I was off, running for the shop before it closed. Filled the daypack with food, picked up a litre of petrol and then sat down for the first time that day, demolishing a packet of biscuits and having a smoke. Soon I was up running again – it was getting dark.

I decided to take the coast all the way back as I thought it would be quicker. I picked my way carefully up and down the rocks along the shoreline until soon I came to a big cliff; I would have to climb. Half way up it got dark and I began to get desperate. My umbrella sticking from my bag had hooked on a vine; I was stuck. Balancing really carefully I managed to gently pull the umbrella out and drop it down the cliff to the lake far below. Eventually, I reached the top and could breath easy again. Much later I reached the top of the mountain, breathing like a madman. My shirt ripped from thorn bushes. I sat down in the dense dark jungle and lit a smoke.

“What more could possibly go wrong?” I thought.

Then the rain came lashing down.

For hours I stumbled about blindly, sopping wet, until eventually I came across a hut. After scaring everyone to death and much discussion in very broken English, the old man gave me his three sons to guide me home. Up and down slippery mountain paths we trudged until we got down to the big river, waded across and then onto the beach. I reached our camp at one in the morning, paid my guides in cigarettes, said many thanks and then sat down for the third time since the previous morning. Buggered.

I found out from Dustin that Steff had left for Nkhata Bay just after me, having had enough of the stinking, leaking boat and that bastard Tim. The next day was Dusty’s birthday and we made it to Nkhata in the sunshine. Eventually we found a lodge with lake access and pitched the tents. The lodge was called Butterfly and we met Charlie, the owner, Julius and Mel. We stayed there for three days, stocking up on supplies and having much fun and insanity. Like the time we attempted and actually ate a ganja cake made on the petrol cooker.

Soon we began making our own bread on the coals, as there is none on the lake. At one village lunch stop we made a sail and the boat became the ‘Black Pearl’, after the colour of the sail – now we were pirates. We flew along before the SE wind, which blew most days, travelling further from shore and fighting big swells. After a few days we reached the town of Usisya for lunch but decided to head on to Charlie’s (lake access only) lodge somewhere around the corner called Ruarwe. After a crash landing and flooded boat in the dark, we stumbled into the bar and found the place deserted. Too tired to pitch tents we ate from cans and slept on the floor suffering much pain from over exertion. Deadbeat.

For a few days we recovered there, playing chess and reading. Eventually I caught my first fish with an earthworm. Then on, ever north we paddled, sleeping in tiny villages miles from any roads, now boiling and drinking lake water as there were no more boreholes. Oh ya, in Ruarwe, we also blew up a TV. The village chief from yonder hill came to hear of the two mzungos in town and so he sent his sons to come fetch us by canoe to tune in his TV. After paddling for a while and then climbing a large hill we arrived sweating at his hut. First the generator had to be fixed. The starter was broken and after watching ten men tinkering over the thing for two hours, I couldn’t take any more. I wrapped a rope straight around the motor shaft, pulled, hey presto, we had power. They looked at me with religious awe so I connected up the TV and began fiddling with the buttons and things. Soon Dustin said he smelled something burning, smoke was pouring from the back of the TV! We apologized but they didn’t seem too fussed. Thank God. There would be no lynching that night.

We left Ruarwe the next day. After some days and more crocodile warnings we reached Chiweta and found some cokes but no cigarettes. We had been smoking this foul local tobacco which you buy in wet leaves and then dry over a flame before crushing it up and putting in the pipe. The wind that had helped us so far decided to turn against us and so on we struggled with the sail down. We knew Chitimba lay somewhere close by and so decided to keep going until we got there as we had no food. Eventually after dark, we saw a bright light far in the distance.
“That’s got to be it”, we thought, our bodies groaning audibly.

Then the wind swung and increased in strength. Soon we were flying along; howling demented banshees, moths to the flame. Then we could hear the waves roaring on the beach.“Quick, the torch!”

Pssst. The bulb blew.

“Other torch...shit, no batteries. Change batteries, change batteries!”

Roaring getting louder; numb, aching hands fumbling over useless contraption.

Click. Light beam illuminates big waves pounding beach.

“Turn the boat, turn the boat! Shit. Too late. Out, out!”

Trashed, boat filling up.

“Offload!”

Fumble with knots, cut knots, big relay up beach to safety. Boat, bending and groaning, filling up quick.

“I’ll get help”.

I run towards the light, a dripping demented moth. Inside, mzungos sipping beer, eating the evening meal, not to be disturbed.

Wild eyed flapper-spraying water: “I need help!”

“You sure do, buddy”.

Roy the lazy barman gives me two kitchen staff. I run, they walk. Dustin half drowned trying to hold the boat straight.

“We have to cut the outrigger off”, they say.

Knives out. Start sawing away at the stubborn rope. I stab my hand. Blood, spray, rope. Outrigger off, we all roll the heavy log up the beach. Rest, breathe. Only one paddle lost, never to be seen again.

Haul gear up to the bar. Dripping, shivering all over the floor. Don’t care for curious stares, warm clothes on. Sit, relax, made it. Luckily there were two plates of food left over, meat and chips; they were gone in a second. Then a beer while we twitched all over. There was some kind of party thing going on so we drank some more beer and then much later slept where we fell.
Woke up in Chitimba Beach Lodge with a big hangover. Our boat was finished so it was the end of the mission. We had paddled from Chinteche to Chitimba, some 200 kilometres. Recovered all next day and met a crazy girl called Natasha and 3 gap year student teachers: Ellie, Mel and Jo, who were down from Dar es Salaam on holiday. In the evening, Natasha, Dusty and I walked to the village and haggled for a chicken. I carried the gibbering thing back home by its feet, butchered it into pieces and put it over the coals. It was bloody tough; they sold us an old hen.
The next day the girls and us went on a day mission up the mountain to a small town called Livingstonia. I had an infected foot from various wounds that had been in the lake for too long. It swelled up like a balloon and the last two hours down were the longest of my life. Well, I couldn’t walk so we got jobs behind the bar; no money but free food, accommodation and drinks.
The next day 70 cyclists arrived with their support crews from Egypt on their way to Cape Town. The ‘Tour de Afrique Cycle Circus’ was in town with cyclists competing from all over the world. They filled the campsite with tents as well as the usual daily overland trucks. For the next two days we were extremely busy, serving drinks and drinking. Some of the cyclists were pretty rude complaining about the lack of glasses and stuff.

I would point to a T-shirt hanging behind the bar, which said, “I’m not paid enough to be nice to you, this is Africa so fit in or fuck off!”

Eventually they left and things quietened down a bit. We met Mick and his girlfriend from the mushroom farm up the hill. Adele, Kevin from USA, Mike from Denmark and Ollie from the UK. Over the next 7 days we played volleyball during the day and served drinks at night. We had crazy conversations about fat people, Olympics and slaves and every night watched fantastic lightning storms over Tanzania. We did so well, John the owner offered us permanent jobs but we declined fearing alcoholism.

Eventually we managed to escape, signed the bar, said goodbye to all our friends and Steff, who had reappeared, and hit the road again. We had managed to sell the boat to an old fisherman for half the price we paid and two fish. We walked up the road to a quiet campsite with a bed in a tree, pitched the tents and hit the sack.

By the next night, after hitching all day and taking one taxi we had crossed the border and were in Mbeya in Tanzania. Electricity, lights and food! For 3 days we stayed at Silent Lodge (which was noisy as hell) while trying to organize train tickets to Dar es Salaam. Eventually we succeeded at 45000TSH (Tanzanian Shillings, 1 Dollar = 1000 TSH) each. Clackety-clack into the night, we shared a cabin with Godfrey and Fred, two Tanzanians. Dustin and I drank whiskey (it was my birthday the next day).

Woke up and saw giraffes, buffalo, zebras and other animals out the window – we were travelling through a game reserve. Well, we had no local currency and we were about to hit a major city in the dusk so Josh (mzungo) gave us 8000TSH.

“Don’t worry, my parents are rich”, he said.

“Shot bru”. A birthday present.

The train came to a stop and we fought our way off the platform into Dar es Salaam; the first leg of the journey complete.

Whiteriver to Victoria Falls

Well, we finally left Whiteriver on 13 Jan after sorting out malaria stuff and many other things. It was the first day without rain for about 2 weeks. We needed a holiday after hitching up and down between Whiteriver and Nelspruit on a daily basis in heavy traffic and having 4 days of stress just trying to send photos back to Cape Town, so we said our goodbyes to Maureen and Eckhard on the farm and hitched to Pilgrim's Rest, spending a night at Sabie on the way.
Pilgrim's Rest was a gold rush town. Gold was found in the late 1800’s (2 kg per ton) and the town slowly grew up around the mines as dropout types from around the world came to stake claims and strike it big. All the old buildings still remain as museums and every day at around lunchtime it becomes a tourist rush town as busloads of grinning idiots arrive, taking pictures of everything.

The 2nd night there found us camped miles down an old abandoned train track next to a river. A huge storm pulled in and we just had enough time to set up the tents before the rain came lashing down. Supper was impossible so we chatted thru the tents and eventually drifted off to sleep. I awoke sometime later to a wet leg, rolling over I discovered that my tent was in pretty deep water. I shouted Dustin awake and we quickly relocated to higher ground, half asleep in the pitch dark with the rain pouring down. What an ordeal!!! Slept wet that night.

The next morning we went down to take a look at where we had been sleeping and discovered a knee deep fast flowing river! After spending another day in lazy Pilgrim’s, we hitched back to Sabie where I made a dental appointment at the tired, rundown government clinic. Later we bumped into another crazy highway oddity while out looking for a sleeping spot on the edge of a forest. Armand had been a good Afrikaans boy growing up, studying to be a priest until around the age of 32 when he suddenly became a Moslem. Ostracized by his family and community, he fled to the road where he has been for 5 years, working here and there. For 3 days we talked religion, politics and life, camped under a bridge on the Sabie River next to a huge waterfall. Dustin and I spent much time diving off the bridge into the raging river 10 meters below.
Then came the day of reckoning: I walked alone to the clinic and had some fillings and a back wisdom tooth ripped from my face – finally we could leave South Africa. Said our goodbyes to Armand (funnily his ex wife was the one who made headlines some years ago when she stole a baby and kept it for 2 years before being discovered).

Headed back to Nelspruit, where we purchased a map of Africa (only goes as far as the top of Kenya but after weeks of searching it’s the best we could find). Exchanged R1000 for 3.6 million Meticas and became millionaires overnight. Night found us camped next to some sugar cane fields just outside Malelane. Jan, who dropped us off there, is a tour operator operating over Southern Africa and does some very interesting things like donkey treks up the Skeleton Coast. Check out www.getawaytours.co.za for more info.

Braaied some boerewors over hot coals to celebrate our last night in SA for a long time. Next day, we got a lift to the last petrol station in SA, outside Komatipoort. Drank a coke and then walked about 5 km to the border post. Stood with our packs on, sweating all over the counter and the forms we had to fill in before finally stumbling outside for a smoke.

In Mozambique, saw a lady with a Labrador in a big 4x4 and asked her for a lift. After much consideration she finally agreed and gave us a lift into Maputo. For many years, Mozambique was under Portuguese rule but by 1962 the Mozambique Liberation Front, Frelimo, was established with an aim to liberate the country. War broke out and the final blow to Portugal came in 1974 with the overthrow of the Salazar regime. On 25 June 1975, the Independent Peoples' Republic of Mozambique was proclaimed with wartime commander Samora Machel as president. The Portuguese pulled out virtually overnight leaving Mozambique in chaos. By 1983 the country was almost bankrupt and suffering from drought. Onto the scene came Renamo, the Mozambique National Resistance backed by the South African Military and certain sectors in the west. Roads, bridges, railways and schools were destroyed and atrocities were committed on a huge scale. Much war and politics followed until eventually in October 1994, Mozambique held its first democratic election.

The country is now peaceful but many landmines still remain – grizzly reminders of the turbulent past. The country is still dirt poor but progress is slowly being made and many South Africans are obtaining land, starting farms and opening up the beautiful coastline to tourism. You can see Maputo was once a thriving city, it still thrives (or should I say crawls) with life but the buildings are long gone - beaten up remnants of a prosperous past. Paint peels, the rust groans and the bush has started taking over. People are everywhere and always trying to sell you something. “No” doesn’t work and often a good shouting is in order. A variety of food is scarce but cokes and beer are cheap and everywhere. Food is bought from markets where lots of dirty haggling must take place – a white man is a bank and must be ripped off as much as possible. That being said, the people are extremely friendly and always want to talk - definitely a much safer country than SA.

We spent the 1st night in Maputo at a backpacker’s and haggled a fish for supper down at the dirty, fly-infested fish market. We spent the 2nd night deep in the heart of town at another backpacker’s where we met Radek, who was also camping el-cheapo in the back yard. Radek was from the Czech Republic and a madman. A bearded, 32 year old geography teacher, he is cycling alone from Cape Town to Cairo. We drank beer and played cards together in rudimentary English until late that night. We also met the odd bunch: Gary (“Howzit, bru… I’m from, like, Durban”), Sarah, the sexy American woman with ‘Africa’ on her ankle, a skinny Hindu and a fairly normal black guy; all in one car, travelling somewhere, pot being the common factor.

Nursing lumpy heads, Dustin and I slogged (swam) all through town in the humidity the next morning to some sort of bus pickup spot and caught a bus (the bus actually caught us as it didn’t stop moving but shot out strong black arms and hauled us onboard to be placed between chickens and smiling, sweaty people all the way bumping along, picking up even more people right to the edge of town). We fell out, fought off many people insisting on giving us lifts for good prices and began walking. Luckily we were plucked from this press of humanity by a white guy in a bakkie, to be dropped off in the middle of nowhere. By the end of the day we were buggered after having caught a few lifts and walking thru many small villages fighting off people trying to sell us things all the way.

Here in Moz, the heat is extreme and you sweat constantly, even at night. You have to go easy on the water too as everything has to be boiled when you do find some. So as we sat on the side of the road, the sun almost set, debating where to camp between all the mud huts that constantly line the roads under tall coconut tress, a bakkie stopped. “Where you going?” asked Mervin, the happy-go-lucky Dutchman. We sat in the back and had a really cool ride thru the jungle, passing smoky villages in the twilight, jazz playing somewhere in the background (Mozambiquans love their jazz) and over a few rivers (one the Limpopo) until finally at 9, we had reached his spot at Barra Reef. Beer, chicken, bed.

I awoke in the morning in a palm leaf shack; perfect blue sea broke on a perfect white beach. I ran outside and took a swim in the warm ocean, burning the shit out of my feet on the hot sand. After being stung by numerous blue bottles and strong jelly fish tentacles, I made my way back to the shack under the palms for breakfast. For 2 days we stayed with Merv, and learned how to secure a patch of paradise by paying bribes and buying whiskey for the officials.

Then we walked 8 km south along the beach to a small town called Tofo. On the way, we passed many local fishermen all carrying big fish. We stopped for a few hours to watch one fishing operation. It consisted of 6 men, 2 anchors, 3 body boards, 2 floats, 3 bags full of rope and a lot of big hooks, snorkels and goggles. We watched as they loaded the hooks with octopus, sorted out the lines and rope and then paddled all this plus anchors and floats far out to sea; specks even in the binoculars. A leathery old man stayed behind, obviously in charge and I asked him what fish they were after. He spread his hands wide, grinned thru missing and crooked teeth and said: “Makulu Shark”, before keeling over and almost pissing himself with laughter.

At Tofo we drank a coke and then swam with tropical fish before setting up tents in some holiday maker’s rusty back yard right on the beach. Next day, we microwaved on high and swam and after some unsuccessful fishing we camped in some dunes. As we were cooking supper, Dustin got cold and put on his jacket. I looked at him as if he was mad – something was definitely wrong, it was still hot. The next day, he felt worse and after a swim he was freezing again. We booked into Bamboozi Lodge, set up tents in some shade and then discussed taking a malaria test with the kits we had. Pretty soon a small crowd had gathered and like doctors over a kill we all gave our diagnoses; the verdict: MALARIA.

Tim, the big, bald overland truck driver gave us some pills (so we didn’t have to use ours). Dustin took 2 and then lay in his tent unable to move as his muscles failed. Every 12 hours he had to take one and so at 1:10 in the morning I woke him up and made sure he took another pill. For 2 days he lay in his tent, unable to move. Eating what little he could and taking pills. He emerged the next day, weak but feeling better and soon made a complete recovery. We stayed there for a week and made some unforgettable friends. Parties around big fires on the beach at night, massive prawn braais, all of us sitting at a long table under the stars sharing stories, laughs and smiles, drinking beer and listening to coconuts fall with a reverberating thud (never pitch your tent under a coconut tree, never). Maya & Kristin, the Americans; Kerry & Alex Bailey (who have a brother back home called Tim); the funny Brits; Catherine, the crazy world-travelled, rock climbing chick; Doug, the coal mining Zimbabwean prawn guzzler; Lindsey, the nice Pommie; Paul, the Austrian (who must never be mistaken for a German) and many more, all of whom won’t be forgotten.

On our last night, we had a big party in the palm leafed pub on the beach and I ate a barracuda steak. We had organised a lift with Doug in a truck going part way to Vilanculos at 7 the next morning and we were up on time with Lindsey (who was going to hitch with us) when I discovered my camera had been stolen. No use crying over spilled milk, I gave all my leads and batteries and things to Alex. So, unfortunately there will be no more pictures.
Well, Doug arrived in his bakkie full of workers and was giving us a lift down the sand track thru the coconut groves when we had a puncture. We all walked the rest of the way with Doug explaining that his business partner’s wife was not cool about the lift idea and so we must walk to the edge of town and wait there for him and the truck. Well, the truck never came, so we hitched a ride into Inhambane and then took a dodgy little boat across the bay to Maxixe (pronounced Mashish), and as we got back to the road, Doug’s truck picked us up (by road you have to drive around the bay - an extra 70 km - so we had caught the truck nicely). Smiles, handshakes, excuses and we were off, down the worst road I have ever seen.

In Africa you drive on the best side of the road - also if you see some animal ears protruding from a pothole, it’s not a dog, it’s a giraffe! For hours we bumped along at between 20 and 40 km/h, zigzagging past donkey carts, cows and people. We stopped for lunch at some rundown restaurant in some rundown little village and ate chicken and chips washed down with Mac-Mahon Beer. We parted ways at some small market place in the middle of nowhere. Lindsey, Dustin and I sat on our bags and waited, not a car in sight. Eventually, after enduring a dust storm and then some rain we got a lift in the back of a security van full of AK-47’s and sweaty, dodgy looking men who looked longingly at Lindsey and her wonderful cleavage. We sat on either side of her, our umbrellas on our knees. The driver loved the bad road and it soon became an endurance marathon eventually ending at the turnoff to Vilanculos.

Another lift and we were at Baobab Backpackers. The wind had picked up and Snowy, a local named for his white hair, warned me in the pub of a cyclone expected to hit in 2 days time. Snowy is an old hippie and his friend, Connor, whom he hadn’t seen for 7 years had just arrived from Oz. Conner was an Australian pot farmer and rum distiller. He had a bottle of his finest with him and we all helped him finish it. Many beers, a few spliffs and crazy tales: like the time Snowy got blown up by a huge box of fireworks, then stung by a really nasty scorpion and then got malaria all in a week, after which he got lost and was considered dead after his quad bike broke down and he had to walk 100 km back along the coast.

Woke the next morning felling terrible – and it wasn’t just a hangover. My leg was swollen and red, my ears and head hurt and a sore on my heel was infected, causing a lump in my groin. In this humidity, wounds become infected very easily. I thought I had a chigger in my heel (a large flea - it burrows into your flesh, lays its eggs and dies). Dustin scratched around in my heel with a scalpel but found nothing. I lay in my tent all day while the wind picked up and coconuts flew. The rain came down that night. I felt a little better and Lindsey gave us each a haircut in the dim light of the kitchen (Paul had arrived from Tofo with his head shaver). Then Stephanie and Miriam, 2 German girls, arrived from Tofo late the next day and after chatting for a long time Stephie expressed wishes to join us. Dustin and I had a discussion and in the end decided it was good - we needed a cook (ha, ha).

Then there were 3. Said our goodbyes to more good people and then left after the minor cyclone had blown itself out. Caught a slow truck heading towards Tete after much negotiation (out here you have to pay for most lifts - always haggle about a price before you get into the vehicle). We all stopped for the night at a truck stop in Nova Golega to be up for an early start at 4am. Camping with us in the yard was a Jap with a motorbike. He was riding down to Cape Town from Japan and he joined us at our fire. A jazz band was playing somewhere so we went to sleep with earplugs. Awoke at 3am to the alarm and packed up in the dark. More trucks had arrived in the night and you could make out their monstrous forms around us in the faint glow from the east. The drivers lay snoring underneath them. The jazz band was still going full throttle and then suddenly stopped at 4am. Silence. We sat on our bags and waited with the light slowly strengthening. Goats up on the trucks bleated and regarded us sceptically.

By 4:30am, we had organised another lift with a bakkie going into Zimbabwe - perfect, we were headed for Victoria Falls. Silently, we grabbed our bags and hid under the canopy in the back. Dustin shot into the shop when it opened to get some biscuits for breakfast (we hadn’t paid the truck driver). We hurtled down a gravel road for hours, only getting one puncture before doing some dodgy money changing on the black market just before the border.

At the border: Disaster. Discovered you couldn’t pay for visas in Zim dollars and that’s all we had. Dustin and Stephie needed R600 between them (for me it is free, being on a South African passport). Well, we were stuck between two borders in no man's land, unable to enter either country. Luckily the driver came back and lent us R600. Money is a tricky thing in Africa, and the banks give you terrible exchange rates. We decided to go back to Messina in SA and change a lot of our money into American dollars, which can be changed for any currency on the black market. That way we could pay the nice driver back (he was going to Louis Trichardt).
By late afternoon, we were back in SA and boy was it demoralising. After 3 countries in one day we were dead tired, so we had hamburgers for supper. It took us 3 days to change the money – spent most of the time in banks (or me at the doctor as I had an ear infection and needed antibiotics). One morning Dustin even took a taxi to Louis Trichardt to look for more dollars as we had cleaned out the banks in Messina. He got back in the afternoon after the taxi was stopped for hours on the road while the police checked everyone’s papers. We eventually left SA in a massive thunderstorm and spent the night just outside Beitbridge, camped under a baobab.
After a whole day hitching, we eventually got a really bad lift – all of us squashed into the back of a car, our bags on our laps – for $20 US, about 3 hours to a petrol station just before Masvingo. Slept right on the side of the road and got eaten alive by mozzies. Next day, we got a lift down the road to a Spa in an old beat up car with some friendly Zimbabwean ladies. Stephie sat in front, careful not to put her feet on the 2 half dead chickens on the floor.

After buying supplies, we got a lift with Roger to the Great Zimbabwe Ruins. These massive stone buildings were built between the 13th and 17th centuries and were the capital of a major prehistoric state in south central Africa. The walls and watchtowers were built from layer upon layer of stones, all fitting perfectly together, no mortar being used upon the joints – it is a hugely impressive feat. Around 2500 adults occupied the enclosure, one up on a hill, where the king lived, and one down in the valley for his wives (clever man). This tradition can be traced back to the Shona, some of whom were still living within the stone walls in the 1800’s. In 1980, the country’s name changed from Rhodesia to Zimbabwe, after the ruins and the big stone carved Zimbabwean birds found there (6 in all). These birds can be seen on the money – which is now as valuable as toilet paper – and were probably fish eagles as the shamans used to communicate with these birds about all tribal affairs.

We walked around this vast, imposing place all day, taking pictures and trying to imagine the hustle and bustle of everyday Shona life. Then we walked 8 km up the road to Inn on Great Zimbabwe, which Roger owned (he said we could camp there for really cheap rates). We stayed for 3 days, eating really cheaply in the restaurant (as dogs kept stealing our food). For $90000 Zim (the equivalent of R 4,50) you could buy a really big bacon and egg sandwich.
Dustin & I took a 25 km hike thru the bush, over mountains and rivers, up waterfalls and around a huge lake. We met Peter, a local of the Shona, and he took us to his village on the way – we met everyone and were asked many questions. Zimbabweans are extremely friendly and generous people, and in the heart of their village I felt safer than anywhere in Cape Town.
Never be fooled by what you see on TV. The truth of the matter is the white South African farmers exploited and raped the country. They backed the MDC and tried to get rid of Mugabe after he had helped them in the first place. Well, Bob wasn’t going to go easily, so he kicked these rich farmers (who all have money in overseas bank accounts) out of his country. I met no farmers but gleaned this information from white people living in the country. ‘Arrogant’ is the word they use for the farmers, and I know, I worked for some rich ones who fled to Newlands. But Bob has got to go; the country is suffering under his hell bent vengeance streak. Food is scanty, but not as bad as in Mozambique. Zimbabwe is a beautiful country filled with beautiful people – go there, but take lots of spare fuel cans.

We left for Bulawayo early in the morning and by lunchtime no cars had passed. Eventually, by late afternoon, we got a lift 30 km back into Masvingo where we attempted to stock up on food at the Spa. While standing in the queue the power for the shop died. Everything works off generators here and obviously it ran out of fuel. Everyone had to return the food and we all went to the shop up the road. Camped for the night outside town.

Got a lift 281 km with the police in an open backed bakkie all the way to Bulawayo for free. They dropped us off at the massive crumbling station in the centre of the city. Steph and I went to go and buy supplies for an overnight train journey to Vic Falls. Some bread, a bottle of wine and bottles of Eagle Beer were enough. $470000 Zim per person for the tickets ensured us a second class 3 bed cabin. At 8 o’clock we hissed out of the station, driven by a huge diesel engine. We bumped and rattled along all night, stopping every now and then to pick up silent people appearing like ghosts from the bush, parcels and suitcases on their heads. We woke up in the morning at Vic Falls station - we had travelled 480 km during the night through a game reserve.
Vic falls is a tourist town – luckily it was off season. You can do anything here from riding on the back of an elephant all the way thru to bungee jumping. Of course, all prices are really high (in American dollars) and there are many companies all doing the same thing, all competing for your attention. We chased them all away and headed to a restaurant under the trees where we all ate huge breakfasts and drank many cups of coffee. We stayed at a cheap caravan park for the night while buffalo and warthog roamed the streets outside. It’s now our second night here and we are camped out of town in the bush. A herd of impala have just run around us and vanished into the long grass. Unfortunately, I cannot tell you about the Vic Falls. It costs $20 US to get in (it can’t be seen from anywhere else as it’s all fenced off) so we can only go once. It’s also the way into Zambia for us, as you have to cross the Zambezi (which is the border). I can hear it thundering constantly though, a large cloud of mist hanging in the valley. Unfortunately, I have to send this now, so will tell you about it next time. I’ll leave you all with this poem from the museum at Great Zimbabwe:

I want to worship stone because it is Silence
I want to worship rock so hallowed be its silence
For in the beginning there was silence and we all were
And in the end there will be silence
And in the end we all will be
Silence speaks to fools and wise men, to slave and king
To deaf and dumb, to blind men and to thunder even.
The mind that dreamt this dream massively reaching unto time and space
The voice that commanded the talent that wove the architecture
Friezes of dantelle herring bone, check patterns, chevron
And all the many hands that put all this silence together
The forgotten festivals at the end of the effort:
All speak Silence now – Silence.
And behold these stones the visible end of silence
And when I lie in my grave, when the epitaph is forgotten
Stone and bone will speak reach out to you in no sound
So many mysteries will weave in your mind when I am gone
Because silence cradles all – the space and the universe –And touches all.

Musaemura Zimunya

St. Francis Bay to Whiteriver

At 05h30 on the 29 November we left Dustin’s grans place in St Francis Bay. Our clothes washed, our bellies full we reached the N10, said our goodbyes to gran and waved as she headed back towards PE.



Enter the Karoo. We made it through the stinking heat to Cradock that day and headed straight to the Fish River for a swim. While filling up our water bottles the kind owner of the house asked many questions and then gave us 100 bucks. In town we met the bearded wanderers – two brothers who had been on the road for 16 years. They had a small dog on a rope, bags and buckets, a radio and apparently even a TV – luggage with legs. The next day while hitching in the middle of nowhere a massive thunderstorm struck in the middle of lunch. We were drenched thru and standing ankle deep in water in the space of five minutes. Later a truck dropped us off at a Police roadblock on the edge of the Eastern Cape, our roads splitting. We made our way thru the drizzle to the police caravan to ask for water and some petrol for the cooker. The police insisted that we sleep the night in the caravan and dry our clothes under the tarpaulin as it was getting dark and we looked like drowned rats. We agreed. We strung up a wash line; hung up the contents of the bags – even our books – and sat there under cover drinking tea and watching the cars roll by. There had been an outbreak of swine fever in the Eastern Cape and the cops had set up roadblocks on all the exits to try and stop the leaving pork. Dustin and I chuckled quietly to ourselves – the irony of the pigs trying to prevent pigs from escaping was just too much. Consequently we never saw them searching any vehicles. They were a good bunch and asked many questions, not believing that we were doing such a mission without a firearm. I awoke the next morning to the sounds of the boss going mental. “Wie se bladdy goed is dit?” I hastily showed my face, made friends and was given coffee. We escaped to our road, hung out our damp clothes on a barbed wire fence and made mieliepap. As the sun broke free of the clouds the road erupted. Ants attacked us mercilessly and breakfast was eaten while dancing around wildly to some hidden beat.



By nightfall we were in Kimberley at the Big Hole Caravan Park. We walked into town to Steers for the WackyWednesday Special (pay for 1 burger, get 1 free) only to be laughed at and informed that it was, in fact, Thursday. During the night the caravan down the way was robbed of their cell phones. I gave chase but couldn’t catch the bastards. Woke at 4.30 the next morning to avoid paying for the night – alerted a German couple next door: Conney and Aggie: who were driving around SA in a rent a car and were also trying to save a buck. Met them later at the Big Hole (Groot Gat) where we chatted over breakfast made in the car park. The Big Hole is now almost completely filled with water – soon to be the Deep Lake. After walking most of the morning we eventually got to the mine dump town of polluted people, Orkney.



Ryan, a friend from Cape Town who is working out his apprenticeship3 km’s underground on a gold mine, was overjoyed to see some normal people. Over the next 2 weeks we all had much fun climbing mine dumps, swimming in the Vaal, drinking in the madhouse pub, Musketeers (must-get-beers) and discussing the utter stupidity of gold. To get one ounce of gold five tonnes of rock must be blasted out from sometimes five kilometres underground by thousands of sweating Africans who need to drink 8 litres of water a shift just to stay alive, and hauled to the surface where it is treated with sulphuric acid and other hazardous chemicals to extract the gold. If you work underground for more than 3 years you are cursed to die a horrible death of some lung disease. The waste product of the mines are huge mine dumps of rocks and massive dams of sulphuric acid and rock sludge that, when the wind blows, covers the surrounding towns with a fine white poisonous dust causing everyone to look like members of the Adams family. Billions of Rands are needed to start a gold mine; millions of Rands are paid out every month as wages, yet somehow a profit is made – imagine the rape of the earth. Underground it looks like Swiss cheese and this causes tremors and earthquakes. These are actually quite fun (tremors) and happen on a daily basis – luckily not while I was in the dentist chair. And all this for some shiny little piece of metal that has absolutely no practical value. But that is the world’s economy; what can you do? The idiocy of man.



The highlight of our time in Orkney was our visit to Le Tsatsi Big Cat Farm. We paid R35 each and got to follow the man with a death wish, Corné, around the compound as he fed all the wild beasts. We saw leopards, cheetahs and the scariest Bengal tiger, ever-scary when only a flimsy fence separated us from them. “Do they ever escape?” I asked. “Oh, ja”, Corné replied, making it sound like a regular occurrence, “but we usually get them back.” Then the lion cage. Twenty or so lions paced around hungrily as the red bakkie drove through the open gate full of sheep carcasus and one very scared looking black man on the back, clutching desperately to a length of black PVC pipe, his only protection. Corné strolled in also carrying a black pipe and began shouting and smacking the beasts on the head as they surrounded the bakkie and the now white African. While this happened the gate was open and one male lion, seeing the open fields beyond, made his mad dash for freedom straight for us, the open mouthed meat in clothes. Well to run meant death, so the three of us just stood there in shock, my heart forgetting to pump and my hands rattling all over my camera as I tried to change the battery. What do you do, besides foul your breeches? Let me tell you this: a human is absolutely no match for a lion no matter what you might think. Corné came to the rescue with his little black straw, shouting at the man eater like it was some under-achieving pupil. Corné looked worried – he had forgotten to make us sign the indemnity forms at the gate. The lion faltered, unsure of himself and then slunk back into the cage. Whew!! My heart slowly settled back to its normal rhythm. We had all felt man's primal fear, and lived.



We went with Ryan to his dad’s house in Welkom for a full on Christmas dinner on the 16th, prepared by Ray’s girlfriend Liz and her pretty daughter. Crackers, party hats and bloody good food, lekker. After supper the whiskey flowed and out came the WW2 303 rifle and the pump action shotgun. Swam in the pool the next day and chatted with Katie’s ridiculously hot friends Monica and Jo. Got kidnapped for another night and then left the next day headed for Nelspruit.
Ryan dropped us off outside Kroonstad in his dads BMW in the middle of a lightening storm (luckily we had bought ponchos in Klerksdorp). Shot bru.


Over the next few days we passed thru Harrismith, Ladysmith, Volksrus and then into Swaziland at the Oshoek border post. Many lifts, including 3 single women (must be doing something right) and a South African kung fu champ George Coetzee in a truck. Bumped into a friend while at a police roadblock.



Well, got to Swaziland in the early evening in thick mist – couldn’t see more than 20 metres – we walked into a strange country and couldn’t see anything; we had to find a camp spot. After many misses we finally found a patch of grass in the rain not knowing where we were, reggae music playing somewhere nearby. Woke up next to a small explosives factory and made breakfast under a bridge in the rain. Got a lift to Piggs Peak along the most beautiful road I’ve ever travelled – small kraals stood sentry over lush, green hills dotted with cattle while thick jungles and rivers steamed in the valley below. Young girls dressed in banana leaves danced on the side of the road while people on bicycles, donkey carts or foot ambled by. We spent a few days in Swaziland – the most beautiful place I’ve ever been. We visited many waterfalls, had many run ins with cattle at the camp spots and sat out one hectic lightening storm on our sleeping bags, careful not to touch the ground, our knees tucked under our chins. A lightening storm in a house is lekker, in an open field next to a river in a small tent is pretty scary especially when you cannot hear yourself think. Some years ago Dustin, Mike and I were nearly hit by a lightening bolt (4 metres away) while hitching at night near Plett. A lightening bolt is one solid beam of raw power with a snap that is the loudest thing you will ever hear.



Down a heavy gravel mountain pass where they still shoot lion and elephant from time to time and into Barberton on Christmas Eve where we bought a bottle of whiskey and a chicken. Parked off all day Christmas day playing cards while drinking and listening to the African music playing from all the taxis at the next-door braai area. Later I fell out of a tree, giving Dustin something to laugh about. Then to Nelspruit where we stayed at Safubi caravan park for free after making friends with George, the owner, and hearing evil tales of malaria. An extremely dangerous form of malaria called Cerebral Malaria now exists that attacks the brain. If you survive you usually lose your memory. His wife was in a coma in ICU for a good few days and now cannot function properly. Scary stuff. We met some cool people, Jeff and Nicolene and are house sitting at their parents farm just outside Whiteriver while they are house sitting a film producer's mansion up the road. We have been staying here and at Safubi for the last couple of days, waiting for my dentist appointment at the government hospital and for the Mozambiquen embassy to open.



Big New Year's bash at the stables with the sun coming up too soon. Dustin spent the whole of New Year's day in the men’s toilet at Safubi alternating between lying on the bench and sticking his head in the toilet. The humidity here is bad and if you have a hangover here you have a HANGOVER. Sleep is impossible in a tent as it turns into an oven; outside the flies and ants never leave you alone. A long shitty day. To go to the shop I jumped in the pool fully clothed before attempting the 2km walk up hill and bringing back a coke which settled Dustin’s stomached. As usual met many crazies on the road on this leg of the journey: Charmine Phillips’s (of Bonnie and Clyde) brother Mark and Willy the mad boxer who did 12 years in prison after tying someone to the train track, drinking a bottle of brandy and waiting for the train, as well as many others too mad to mention. I write this from the stoep of the farm while thunder and lightening flash across the sky, the dog pukes on the floor and the hippo in the river at the bottom of the garden does whatever hippos do.



Leave for Mozambique soon: Landmines, malaria, floods, potential hostile natives, AK47’s, wild beasts and foot rot. Keep you posted.



Positive Tim



PS. Feel free to suggest any interesting places you would like us to go and we will try to get there if we can, bearing in mind we only look at the site once a month and unless you send us some guns and a tank, war zones are a no go. Also I have lost all my phone numbers so if you want please put them in an email. To my sister, Niks, hope you and the little ones are all right; send something please. And lastly I’ll leave you all with this: He who makes no decision, decides in favour of the outcome.