Crossing the border to Ethiopia

Ethiopia so far is utterly stunning. I get the feeling that Ethiopia suffers from a really bad image problem. The image that has been fixed in my mind is of starving babies clinging to the dried up breasts of emaciated women. I was one of those kids brought up on, “Think of the starving children in Ethiopia.” So I arrived here with pretty low expectations. I have, without being all gushy, probably never travelled through a more beautiful country. The landscape is just extraordinary. The people are friendly and there are many shiny, bright faces especially of kids who seem to find the motorbikes extremely exciting.

Ethiopia is also a huge country and the roads are… ummm… not that good really so it takes time to travel around. There is also little in the way of internet cafes – they do exist but the connection is so slow and dodgy that it’s been impossible to do things like blog sites. Well. This is a very under developed country and I couldn’t feel further away from my old Western style life in the “civilised” world, but I don’t miss it for a second.

26 October: Sudan – Khartoum to Quallabat border

My lasting memory of Khartoum is BUREAUCRACY. I’ve mentioned the mindless bureaucracy in Sudan before. No surprise when we experienced a real hassle getting ourselves registered in the Aliens office. We had to register in Khartoum and get a stamp in our passports before leaving the country even though we had already registered in Wadi Halfa and we didn’t dare not have this stamp. Nothing in Sudan is easy! For instance, we had to fill in a form that had to be stamped by the Blue Nile Yacht Club’s secretary who was always about to arrive for two days but was nowhere to be found. Why the campsite could not realise this fact and have stamped forms ready or leave the stamp with someone else – I don’t know?! We got all our photocopies of visas and passports ready and the stamped form... this was all possible (although required a lot of chasing and nagging) but then the Aliens office wasn’t open. Well it was open, but not for aliens to actually register. By day two, midday, we were still hanging about and were all pretty pissed off with the situation. Martin and Richard took it upon themselves to tell this very annoying Sudanese official how long they had waited and that it was, well, rude. It is the truth but I don’t think it went down too well. And when the guys pointed out that we should not be recharged as we had already paid in Wadi – all hell broke loose. I guess corrupt officials just don’t like being told that they are corrupt. So the boys came out of the building and Martin said, “Let’s go now. We have to drive because they are calling the police.” I could tell by their faces that it was no joke and so we legged it down the road.

We had the stamp and we were free to leave Sudan. It had been an interesting visit but we were now on a mission to get out of there!

There was another little highlight in Khartoum – the British Embassy. There is absolutely no alcohol allowed in Sudan. And come to think of it, there isn’t much in the way of entertainment in Sudan either. There is certainly no tourist trade and very limited options for non-Sudanese people and not that many non-Sudanese people to socialise with too. I think that all the nasty bureaucracy extends towards people who have contact with foreigners too. Locals seem to keep a distance. They were friendly but preferred to stare rather than interact with us. I didn’t miss the beer much but the boys did so we were most delighted to accept an invitation to the British Embassy’s pub. I’m pleased to say the bikes helped us yet again as it was a fellow biker who invited us. Bikers are so cool.

I think we were all relieved to finally get on the road to border and even more relieved when we felt sure that there were no police chasing us. The road was mostly asphalt and mostly in a good condition so we could really blast along. Two days later and we were off the asphalt and only 60km from the border.

The road turned to thick mud. I cannot begin to recount the kind of filth that tumbled out of my mouth. I just was not impressed at all. So close and yet so far; and all I wanted to do was cross that gadam border! I know the guys have some great pictures of me getting the bike stuck in muddy ruts up to my knees – and fortunately there were three of them laughing at me – safety in numbers. I was not a nice girl!

Finally with a lot of help from Paul I got through the bad mud patch and about 500 meters down the road I could smell rubber burning. I pulled over and started to pick the mud off my bike. It had stuck and I mean, STUCK all over. The mud under my front mud guard was so stuck it had hardened and was scraping the tread off my front tyre. I was mad. Fortunately the guys still found me amusing as I stomped about getting tools out, cursing and temper flaring said, “You know, I planned this trip for four years. And in those four years it never once occurred to me what a stupid fucking idea it was.”
Off came the front bumper. I was covered in mud and grease and picking the mud off the chain with a big black thunder cloud hovering over me. Paul came over to see how I was doing.
“Do you suppose it’s too late to ask for my old job back?” I asked, “I’ll keep my head down, stop dreaming and be normal…”
Paul laughed.
“I’m serious. I’ll fit in and take my lunch breaks with Pat and Lona.”

I guess I had to finally have a really hard day that got me down. I’d made it so far and taken it all in my stride – sand, heat, officials, rain, shitty toilets... I don’t know why the mud that day was more than I felt I could manage. And, you know what, it didn’t matter how I felt. There was still the hard reality that: I had to ride the bike. I had to ride through the mud no matter how bad it was. And that I did.

29 October: Ethiopia – Metema and Gondar

Finally! Oh my God the next morning we were finally at the border and crossing into Ethiopia. Getting out of Sudan was a breeze and for that I will always be thankful. Getting into Ethiopia was hassle free and we felt like we were actually being welcomed. What a wonderful feeling.

My first impression of Ethiopia was that it was going to be laid back and a lot easier. There were women walking about in the streets wearing western clothing, working in markets and even occupying official jobs. Even the guys noted that it was good to see woman about looking relaxed.

The big easy! The roads improved too. We were on hard mud, gravel and rocky roads most of the time and the roads were GREAT. (Did I just write that?) I guess my off road skills were finally improving because we did the whole 200 km stretch to Gondar in about five hours and it didn’t seem that bad.

Gondar is part of the “historic” route and has the very famous little church with the funky paintings on the walls as well as a castle complex. I remain blissfully ignorant of the pertinence of these places. We mostly relaxed. In particular I enjoyed the hot showers and soft beds while the guys got stuck into the beers. We managed to fit in a visit to the Dashen Beer Brewery in Gondar – and that was fun. They don’t usually have visitors so we were sent off to the marketing department and I realised that I do actually miss the day job! Hard to believe but it’s about four months on the road and doing some product research seemed like fun when all I do all day is ride a motorbike through strange and exotic places.

Ethiopia has its own time. Yes. Time in Ethiopia starts at sunrise and so 6am is 0 o’clock. The calendar is different from the European Gregorian one too - they use the Julian Calendar. We are in September 1999 here. The alphabet is pretty radical too. The letters include the vowels in them and look like wonky letters (that look particularly good on beer labels). It certainly is a different place!

We’re getting used to a lot of attention on the bikes in particular. Where ever we go in villages, towns or along the roads…. Everywhere! There are kids running out screaming “youyouyouyou” and sometimes getting quite worked up. No major stone throwing as yet but there have been a few hands going to the ground and both Paul and I have had stones chucked towards the wheels of the bike. I’m sure the kids would feel really bad if a stone did hit us and make us fall off the bikes. Kids! I’m sure it’s just naughty fun. But it’s irritating!