Sudan cont

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For the first time since leaving home over three months and seven thousand miles ago, we had ourselves a convoy. Yeehaw! As we left Wadi Halfa, Alex led in his Toyota, followed by Donkey, as Andrew and Angela had affectionately christened their Rover, with us, the tail end charlies bringing up the rear on Harri. It felt good to be travelling with like-minded people, but there was the nagging worry that we would not be quick enough, or able enough off road, and would end up being a burden on the others. Worries put to one side, we buzzed off into the Sudanese desert. Goodbye, maa salaama, good riddance, Wadi Halfa. The pleasure was all yours.

The first thing that strikes you as you leave Halfa is just how different the country is to Egypt, the scenery changes instantly, into Flintstones style rocky outcrops and powder fine red dust. I had to pull my shemagh up over my mouth to avoid choking on the long plumes sent up by the cars. The one thing that doesn't change is the sun, which even in late afternoon was still fierce.

It was almost five by this time, so we had less than four hours light left to reach Abri. Not a problem if you are in a Land Rover with darkness blasting halogens on every corner, but a little more worrying if you are on a commuter bike with a flat battery and a bag strapped in front of the light. Never mind, despite the fact that every blog that I have read describes the road from Halfa through to Dongola as awful, the locals had assured us that it was 'very good.' Who was going to be more accurate, locals, or travellers wanting to big up their own exploits?

Well, it was a 180k trek, and around 140 of that was asphalted, and indeed very good, the other 40 was on tracks running parallel to the road, which hadn't been finished in parts. So the locals were correct, so were the travellers, everyone was telling the truth.

The 40k off road probably took as long as the other 140. It was a mixture of deep sand, gravel, moon rock and skittery rubble. For a proper dual sport or off road bike, it would have been a breeze. Two up on a learner bike, it was slightly more interesting. The lack of power, combined with bicycle thin treadless tires and a relaxed seating position don't combine to make a very capable dirt tracker. I am firmly of the belief that any bike is good for anything though. With enough patience and rider skill, the deficiencies of the bike can be overcome. The little Honda hasn't let us down yet, and our first stretch of Sudanese desert proved her yet again. Loose rutted slopes that forced the four by fours into four wheel drive, and looked as if they would stump us, were negotiated. Rocky outcrops that promised to pringle our wheels could not cash their cheques, drifts of sinking sand attempted to swallow the bike whole and failed. Admittedly, the slopes would have beaten us if we hadn't had a run up, and then had me jumping up and down crazily paddling either side to force our way up, and the sand drifts would indeed have swallowed us without silly amounts of over-revving, and more flip flop, side-to-side paddling from me. The point is she made it! The other lady in my life also deserves a mention for being the worlds best pillion. Even when I was throwing the bike head first over dunes, slipping and sliding over at silly angles, and fishtailing like crazy, she stayed put, not even flinching a foot from the peg.

The setting sun illuminated the desert with an ethereal glow, and cast shadows from the mighty outcrops which danced in the rising heat. There wasn't a cloud in our sky, literally, but metaphorically, the big black cloud was hanging on the horizon. The sunset may have created an oasis of shimmering beauty across the empty desert, but it also signalled the onset of darkness. We took our front bag off, and Angela and Andrew kindly took it in Donkey, to give us some semblence of vision. The lights flickered on and off over bumps, as unknown and unseen electrical connections did whatever it is they do, or not, but in the half light of the African dusk, it really wasn't too bad. Even though the sun had disappeared, there was still sufficient light, especially when travelling in Donkey's wake.

After several hours of desert, we began to encounter small villages, packed with waving women and children. The smiles every single one of them gave us, and the warm handshakes they insisted on stopping us to share were radiant enough to light a lifetime of dark roads. I have never seen such honest and friendly smiles from anyone, anywhere, and it was all they wanted to share. After the hassles of Egypt and Halfa, seeing such happy and genuine people in the middle of nowhere elated all of us. Except the Russians. I lost count of the amount of times Donkey stopped to share handshakes and smiles, and everytime they stopped, kids ran over to our bike to say hello, or just to touch us, as if to check we were real, while their fathers sat and smoked, and waved at us from their blankets, but the Russians just sat in their people carrier with the windows and doors holding their precious air conditioning in. Most strange.

Women were coming in from the fields with their herds, wearing clothes almost as bright as their smiles, leading gaggles of dozy cows. Men shared shishas by the road side, boys played football on makeshift dust pitches, and little girls sat in huddles giggling and squealing as we passed. These people live a spartan life, but I don't think I've ever, or will ever, see such content and happy people. Progress is over rated.

We eventually made it to Abri, in complete darkness, relying on Donkey for all our light. We were sweaty and filthy after two unwashed days and the off road sections, looking forward to a good shower in an air conditioned hotel. But of course, Abri doesn't have a hotel. There is a lokanda, which is basically not much more than a courtyard with a tap. Never mind, I've been a lot longer than a couple of days like this before. Before we collapsed into unconsciousness, the Russians produced another bottle of vodka, which we sat and shared on our beds, and ate some tuna and bread that Angela and Andrew kindly provided. Han and I felt guilty for not being able to bring anything to the party, but as so many times over our trip, the incredible generosity of other people provided for us. We fell asleep fully dressed in dirty clothes, on dirty beds, under the cleanest clear sky imaginable, it seemed as if every star there ever was and ever will be was trapped in the superheated sky above us.

We were woken by the phloegmy hacking and spitting of the Arabs sharing the locanda with us. If there is a more disgusting sound to wake up to, please put your answers on a postcard. After boiled eggs and processed cheese, we got on the road to do the second stretch towards Dongola. This second stretch would be slightly longer, but we had been reliably informed it was better.

Of course, it was worse. More of the same, but worse. The road continued to disappear, and the dirt service track wound over and around the closed sections all the way. It wasn't impossibly difficult, just difficult enough to slow us down, and ensure that I managed to sweat the optimum amount in the scorching sun. The worst was the fast and loose gravel sections, where the vehicles could maintain a good speed, with the luxury of having four wheels in contact with the ground at all time, they could afford to loose grip on one or two from time to time. For us it was lethal. The sand was easier, in a predictably unpredictable way, the gravel on the other hand could be firm one second, and then just give up into a scree of marble slippery pebbles without any visible change. So many times, both wheels started to slide, and we were only righted by kicking out at the way we were falling and attempting to power out of the slide.

For most of the time, I was concentrating so hard on not throwing the bike down the road, that I barely even saw our surroundings. It is almost a pity that this road will be completed in the next few years, and take away excitement of the off road struggle. Well, it may be completed, we saw approximately half a dozen people working on it, and half of those were simply sleeping in the cabs of their JCBs.

We met several people on the road, despite the apparent remoteness of the road. We met a pair of men about our age on a bike, who laughed at our bike, and warned us of the corrugations to come, before trying to demonstrate on the map where we should go to avoid the worst of them. He was convincingly sure of where we should drive, until Andrew pointed out the map was upside down, and him and his friend creased into fits of laughter as they realised the mistake. We left with happy waves and cries of good luck and goodbye. The other memorable encounter came as we crested a slope, and saw a man running from nearly half a k away on a smaller desert road. Andrew and Angela were further ahead, and thought that he was just waving, but he was trying so hard to get to us, that we rode over to save him the run. I have never seen someone so happy to see me. It turned out him and his cousin were stranded there without petrol for their bike, so we gave them our emergency water bottle full of leaded, and left him smiling and thanking us graciously. I hope he made it to Abri, though at the time most of my hopes were that I wouldn't regret giving him our emergency supply!

By the time we reached Dongola, our aim for the day, six hours after starting, I was thouroughly dehydrated, despite Angela's frequent hand outs of water along the road, and Hannah passing forward bottles whenever possible. While we waited for the ferry I bought bottle after bottle of Pepsi from the market on the riverbank, and downed them without even feeling slightly quenched. Coming from Egypt, the idea of having to wait in a market holds little appeal, but in the half hour we waited, not one person wanted to sell us anything, the only thing they wanted was to say 'good morning,' or simply smile at us. Andrew bought us tickets for the ferry, at a bargain price of 1SD, or 25 pence for a bike (11 for a car.) The ferry pulled up, and disgorged its load of pick ups, people and donkeys, and we drove on. The cars parked at the back, and our little pony was parked up with the donkeys and carts at the front. Within ten minutes, we were riding off the other end of the ferry, and on to the other side of the bank. Get me in a hotel and fill me with water.

Of course, there are no hotels in Dongola either. Well, there are, but they are either complete flea pits, or silly expensive. The Russians were gagging to get off to Khartoum, so they said farewell, and sped off. I liked Alex, I appreciated his enthusiam and generosity, and respected what he was doing with his family, but I don't quite get it. He simply wanted to get from A to B as quickly as possible. He didn't judge travel by experiences, but by miles. He would talk of how far he had gone, and how many passport stamps he had, rather than what he had done or seen. Each time the four of us Brits got out to speak to people, or just to rest, him and his family would stay in the car, or even drive off slowly, waiting for us to get a move on. I would have been going crazy if I was one of his family stuck in the car all day. Horses for courses I suppose. Maybe when I have done as many miles as him, and been to as many places, I'll want to rush through too.

Guided by Donkey's GPS, we headed out of town, after stocking up on food and water. We pulled up in a paradise of a grove beside the Nile, and Andrew walked off to find the owner for permission. It was granted, and we set up camp in the palm trees. We had a little explore around, pumps ran up from the Nile and fed irrigation culverts that criss-crossed the fields. We stopped to wash our faces in one, which was blessed relief, and Han managed to throw herself down the slope on the other side, landing in a laughing pile in the mud at the bottom. When she got up she saw the calf who had just watched her acrobatics passively. It can't have been more than a few months old, and was laid down tethered to a tree. Han and Angela fussed over it, stroking and petting its willing head, and giving i feminine ahhhs and oooohs.

After the long and dusty track here, all we wanted to do was cool down, so we wandered down to the river. A local fisherman was just rowing his boat to the shore, so I gave him a hand up the sheer banks of the Nile and we chatted for a while. We needed assurance that we weren't going to be eaten alive by crocodiles if we jumped in. We could be pretty certain that there was all manner of nasty little beasties in there, but none of them hold quite the same horror as a dinosaur that can swallow you whole. He seemed certain that there were none around so we jumped in.

Well. I say we jumped in. Angela kindly let Andrew jump in first, to make sure it was safe, then the rest of us dived in after him. Considering that the Nile is not much more than a fast flowing cess pit, it was bliss. The water was brown, and bath warm, but it felt like being born again. At least we now had new dirt, rather than the stinking build up of the last 72 hours. We splashed and floundered in the strong current for ten minutes, then tackled the climb back up the bank. The three of us normal sized people managed it easily, but Hannah struggled rather more, and required a combination of being pulled and pushed to get her up.

That evening Han and I sat around Donkey being useless, while Andrew and Angela busied themselves in producing an incredible range of cooking equipment from their car. Angela produced the most amazing pasta meal I've ever had. It may have only been pasta with some vegetables but it was real, fresh, Western food, it was mana from heaven. I even got to chop some garlic, on a chopping board, with a real knife, rather than having to do it into my hand with my utility knife. I had forgotten how much I missed being able to cook properly, but that little task was so enjoyable I ended up going rather over the top, giving the most minutely sliced garlic ever seen.

While we were finishing eating, the head of the farm came and sat down with us. We drank chai, and chatted, while a gaggle of children gathered in the bushes around us. He introduced himself as Bagir, and made us feel more welcome than we have in any hotel, anywhere on our travels. We spoke for a while, before he excused himself, and left with warnings of how sharp the thorns were, and to watch out of scorpions. We were squatters, on his land, and all he was worried about was that we would be uncomfortable, or hurt ourselves. Ten minutes later, he came back with a gallon of milk, fresh from one of his cows, and a bed! He was adamant we must not be uncomfortable on the floor, so we put the bed at the back of Donkey, and strung Angela and Andrew's mosquito net over us. The stars were out in force again, our bellies were full, and there was a light breeze under the car. Despite sleeping outside with no protection, I've never felt safer, laid there in the dark, listening to the birds kackawing in the palms, and the pacing and lowing of the cows around us.

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