When we met Susi, Marc and Tam in Wadi Halfa in the middle of November last year, they have just arrived by ferry and were waiting for their bikes to arrive from Aswan, Egypt. We were getting ready to leave Sudan the next day going in the opposite direction. I immediately liked Susi, as she was the first girl biker I have met on our trip and she was riding a very cool KTM. She was even the same height as me and only one year older. It was great getting to know them better.
Susi, March and Tam left Austria at the end of August 2011 and was travelling down all the way to Walvis Bay in Namibia. We tried to convince them to come all the way down to South Africa, but it seems the negative publicity about crime in South Africa have influenced their travel plans. It is such a pity, as the road down from Namibia through the Northern Cape and onto Cape Town is such a splendid road for riding. Hopefully one day we can convince them to come and visit us in South Africa and then they will see the amazing places we have for riding.
They are currently in Uganda and have also gained one more team member since the beginning of the year. Marianne is riding a STX 200cc trail bike. They are visiting Zigoti now, the school where Susi was a volunteer more than a year ago. She said that the kids were really impressed to see her on the bike and the one boy said: “The volunteers have so little money that they couldn’t afford to fly, so they had to come by motorbike…”.
We wish them all the best for the rest of their journey as they head down towards Namibia. Hopefully one day we will do some riding together in South Africa. Follow their journey on www.321offroad.com
The container ship carrying our battered MotoMias arrived Sunday a week ago and we had an appointment with the customs clearing agent for Wednesday. Johan Badenhorst and Stefan Sonnekus of www.voetspore.co.za was also there to pick up the three Amaroks. Tania unfotunately had to work on Wednesday and I luckily had a Nissan Livina with a towbar as test vehicle last week.
We met at the SACD container yard at 10h00 and entered the compound once Evert from Premier Freight and the custom official arrived. It was a tense moment as we waited for the seals to be broken. Would my MotoMia (hanging from the side) still be upright. Will they even be in there. Remember, we didn't get the exit stamps in our Carnets in Alexandria, so we need the bike in SA in order for the Carnet deposit to be discharged.
As the doors swung open we were met by this forgotten scene:
We were in such a rush that day in Alex that we roughly tied the one back upright and semi-dismantled the other one. But they were here and customs were happy, so the Carnets were stamped in.
Stefan and I had to untie the Amaroks, which is quite a mission as there's less than 10 cm space at places. I had to crawl underneath the back of the one bakkie to untie the ratchet straps attached to the rear wheels. They fired up and Stefan drove them out one by one. The mouse they gave a lift since Kenya did some serious damage, nibling through a water tank, some of the interior panels as well as gifts they bought in Egypt.
I first tried to start Tania's bike (since it still had fuel in it - oops!), but her key had broken off in the ignition during shipping. I managed to hot-wire the bike, but the kickstart didn't work. I then transferred some fuel to my bike which I managed to get going and rode out to the car. Some guys busy with forklift training in the parking lot kindly helped me load the bike on the trailer. I then had to pursuade the guards to let me in the container yard to fetch Tania's bike which I managed to load using a broken pallet lying around the yard.
We are looking forward to replace the worn chains and sprockets and give them a good service. They deserve it and we'd like to get riding again. Having them back on the porch brings back memories of preparing for the trip and wandering what it might be like travelling through far off African countries on these cheap, small bikes!
During our three-month trip from Cape to Cairo last year on two Chinese roadbikes, we met some interesting people along the way. All of them with a fascinating story to tell. Since I have returned from our Africa trip, it has been my dream to share some stories about them. I will write regular updates about the people we have met along the way and keep you updated on their progress. Now, let me introduce Darrin...
We met Darrin in Nairobi at Jungle Junction last year on our Crossing Africa trip. He is a remarkable man - he's been on the road for roughly two and a half years, managed to travel down the whole of the West Coast of Africa and then back up the East Coast up to Sudan where he is at the moment. This Kiwi has done more than 200 000 kilometers through Africa with his landy and is still going strong.
But, his trip has not been without any surprises. He managed to get shocked in one of those very dodgy showers where the warm water works only when plugged into the wall. He had a really bad accident at a lodge in Dar Es Salaam, but pulled through and recovered. This didn't put him off and even though he is still struggling with some sore back muscles and a slight loss of hearing, he didn't give up on his travels.
Here is a photo of Darrin with his Landy:
Darrin called Francois and myself the "KFC-couple" while we were in Nairobi, due to the fact that the first question I asked him shortly after we met was: "...now where can I find the KFC??" We also had a laugh as he explained to us his opinion of South Africans. He doesn't seem to understand our love for a "braai" and asked why South Africans just want to make a HUGE fire all the time?!! I also think he stayed with South Africans who had an excessive love for lamb chops!
In his latest update he explained that he had to spend almost 20 hours this week in the Addis Ababa embassy trying to actually get a stamp in his passport to extend the normal 2 week visa all vistors get. He added: "They love their paperwork and the right bloke was never there to sign it off". But eventually he managed and he is in for a lekker time in Sudan. We loved our time in Sudan, especially the time spent camping in the desert. We also found the people there extremely hospitable and kind.
So Darrin, all the best and enjoy Sudan! We'll update you on his progress as he goes along.
Driving on gravel for more than 1000 km through the Western side of Tanzania still remains one of the highlights of our entire trip. We enjoyed the people of Tanzania and the place was overflowing with small bikes exactly like ours so we felt right at home!
Francois’s highlights: The people in on that Western route was amazing and riding gravel roads for around 1 130 km in the dust and rain and road works, it really felt like an adventure biking trip. Especially since we’ve done mostly tar road up until then. Having my MotoMia sorted out by a local in Kasulu was another highlight. We struggled at times due to the bad conditions on the road, getting wet for days on end and falling over in the mud, but looking back it was one of the top five experiences of the whole trip!
Francois’s lowlights: I think this must have been buying 3rd party insurance at the border upon entering Tanzania. The guy charged three times the amount we’ve paid at other crossings and we couldn’t make out whether he was robbing us or not. In the end he offered for us to pay via recharging credit on his phone (as we didn’t have enough cash), but we couldn’t manage even though we tried for more than a week.
Francois's favourite photo was this one, both falling in the slippery mud...
Tania's highlights: It was an amazing experience travelling through Western Tanzania. Despite all the rain and challenging roads I would still do it all over again. I have to say that seeing the 200 + hippos next to the road in Katavi remains a definite highlight. I also discovered Mandazis here - sweetish bread almost like "vetkoek" which quickly became my favourite snack in the day, plus did you know that you can get potato chips ("slap tjips") everywhere in Tanzania?
Tania's lowlights: On our second day in Tanzania, we had to do what everybody warns you against when travelling through Africa - drive during nighttime. We totally misjudged the time and kilometers to get to Sambuwanga and it was quite a hairraising experience at that time. I was also very tired at the end of it all, not being used to heavy off-road on a "road-bike". But, still through it all I still managed to laugh at seeing a huge pink pig in the road in the middle of the night. I mean where else would you ever experience this?
Tania's favourite photo was this one of Francois. He had this "Not cool!" look on his face.
Tanzania Trip Stats:
Distance: 1 502 km Time: 9 days, 0 hours, 37 minutes, 16 seconds Highest point: 2 290 m (87 km into Tanzania, close to Mbeya) Lowest point: 486.6 m (Border with Malawi) Maximum speed & Fuel consumption (Francois & Tania): You will unfortunately have to wait for the Crossing Africa book to come out for this (Along with other detailed information e.g. the accommodation and food budgets)
Our video of Tanzania
And finally... here is a short video of our most interesting experiences in Tanzania.
We loved travelling through Malawi on our Crossing Africa trip. There were many highlights so it was difficult to choose them. Here is a pic of our route we took through Malawi:
Tania’s highlight – When we arrived at Mayoka village in Nkhata Bay, they upgraded us to a bungalow for the same price as a campsite! The bungalow overlooks the beautiful Lake Malawi and this remains one of the coolest places we stayed at during our trip. The snorkelling was awesome and it was too difficult to resist the pizzas at the beach bar/restaurant. Trekking crocodiles with Juma in the Nkhotakota Nature Reserve was also a real treat.
Tania’s lowlight – I read a lot about the little town Livingstonia (named after David Livingstone) and the Mushroom farm in Malawi (just past Mzuzu). It is situated way up a mountain and the only road leading there is a terrible gravel road. We wanted to go and check it out, but we could only manage about two kilometres before we decided to turn back. I am positive that our bikes would have made it, but with us still having about 10 000 km to go on this trip we didn’t want to risk hurting the bikes.
Favourite Pic – This pic was taken with our GoPro while snorkelling in Lake Malawi
Francois’s highlight - Being offered a bungalow for the price of a campsite at Mayoka Village in Nkhata Bay (see video). Also, baking roosterkoeke on a fire at Senga Bay. And meeting Solomo next to the road while having lunch.
Francois’s lowlight - This is a difficult one as Malawi is such an amazing place with such amazing people. The worst experience was probably when the owner of Mzoozoozoo yelled at the guy working in the kitchen. What a rude old man.
Favourite pic - view at Senga Bay
YouTube video:
We have put together a short video clip of us snorkelling in Lake Malawi at Mayoka Village in Nkhata Bay - enjoy!
Click here to read all our blog posts from our time in Zambia.
Francois’s highlight: Meeting Jeremie and Claire from France on their bicycles just outside Lusaka. We had a lovely lunch next to the road with them and listened to their stories of cycling down West Africa. Then, after lunch, they played some music for us on their accordions. It was a great lesson, seeing them so relaxed, in taking it easy and not rushing the trip. Seeing elephants just outside Livingstone was another highlight.
Favourite pic: Frenchies playing their accordions.
Francois’s lowlight: This has to be when we stayed in Chipata for two night during the national elections and we saw an entourage of about 20 4x4’s coming into Mamarula’s where we stayed. We didn’t go and ask what was going on until after they’ve left when we learnt it was then-president Banda coming over for breakfast. Ge’s good friends of the owners and they said he would have met with us if we came over to say hi. The lowlight was learning this too late, as it would have been great to meet him!
Tania’s highlight: I loved meeting Jeremie and Claire, the French couple on bicycles. They were such an inspiration and I was utterly impressed with their crate of vegetables strapped to the back of Claire's bike and the basil they kept trying to grow in a small tin attached to the frame of the bike. The other highlight of Zambia was definitely seeing Vic Falls for the first time. And yes, the elephants roaming next to the road in Livingstone was absolutely awesome too.
Favourite pic: I like this photo of Francois and Boyd very much. He is the Steers delivery guy and we enjoyed chatting to him about the bikes.
Tania’s lowlight: The day we left for the border between Zambia and Malawi we stopped to refuel at a small petrol station in Chipata. As I was sitting on the bike waiting for a pump to become available my right foot slipped on some oil and slam bam I fell over my bike, ass over head. It was quite a show. The petrol station was very crowded and all witnessed this fall with great interest. At that time it wasn't funny at all and my ego was bruised, but if I had to do it over I would have jumped up, made a small bow and said "Tadaaa!" as I smiled. Funny how your perspective change after completing a trip like this. I definitely try and take myself a bit less serious now...
Zambia Trip Stats:
Distance: 1 375 km Time: 6 days, 21 hours, 6 minutes, 48 seconds Highest point: 1 350.3 m Lowest point: 363.1 m Maximum speed: 97 km/h Fuel consumption (Francois & Tania): You will unfortunately have to wait for the Crossing Africa book to come out for this (Along with other detailed information e.g. the accommodation and food budgets)
Video of Claire and Jeremie in action playing their accordians:
Namibia is one of the most exciting and beautiful countries to travel through by motorcycle. The roads are good, the scenery stunning and with the exception of the Caprivi very quiet in terms of traffic and people. Here we also camped at some of the most beautiful campsites during our journey from Cape to Cairo.
Here is our route through Namibia:
To see our blogposts during this time please click here.
Here are our highlights and lowlights in Namibia.
Frannie’s highlight: The highlight for me was when we met Charley Boorman in Divundu. We struggled the whole morning to find 3G reception and ended up in Divundu, exhausted after battling the deep sand tracks to Ngepi Lodge. When we rode into the garage to fill our tanks I saw this lone bikes on a BMW1200GS. When he turned around I recognised Charley and we had a great chat and took some photos with him. Later his group of bikers he was leading from Vic Falls to Cape Town arrived. What a nice bunch of chaps.
I also enjoyed sleeping under the stars at Bagatelle Lodge near Mariental and I loved the bushveld surroundings of Roy’s Restcamp near Grootfontein.
Frannie’s lowlight: Our stay in Otjiwarongo was spoilt by a run in with diamond smugglers. I started chatting to three friendly chaps and they asked whether I’d like to do business with them and offered me some diamonds to take on the trip. They said I can send the money to them and asked for my number. Then they asked me to go out with them to look for ladies. I politely declined and we left as early as we could the following morning.
Another disappointment was when we didn’t make it to Kwando River Camp before sunset and had to stay at Bum Hill. It was already dark when we got there and the camp was pretty deserted.
Francois's favourite photo was this one taken with Charley Boorman in Divindu:
Tania's highlight: I absolutely fell in love with the campsite at Bagatelle close to Marienthal in Namibia. We slept under the stars and woke up between red sand dunes and bushveld. The spoor all over our campsite that morning showed that we had a few four-legged friends visiting us during the night.
Another highlight was spotting an elephant roaming freely around next to the road in the Caprivi. The sun was setting and the sighting incredible.
Tania's lowlight: Namibia's sandy roads really got to me and a number of times I ended up face down in the sand. Die Burger even published our article with the heading "Tania val vas in die kalaharisand". Somehow the sand proved to be the most difficult off-road terrain for me, but later I got the hang of it. And yes, I agree with Francois, the experience at Otjiwarongo was very very interesting!
It is difficult to choose my favourite photo in Namibia as there were so many, but I really liked this photo of the bikes in Namibia.
Namibia Trip Stats:
Distance: 2 331 km
Time: 7 day, 2 hours, 12 minutes, 55 seconds
Highest point: 1 927.1 m
Lowest point: +-135 m
Maximum speed: 98 km/h
Fuel consumption (Francois): 29.3 km/l
Fuel consumption (Tania): 35.3 km/l
During our time in Namibia we took some video footage with our GoPro camera. I have selected some interesting frames from some of the videos and it is presented below in a slideshow format - enjoy!
Our Crossing Africa trip started on Monday 5 September 2011. We left our home at 18h00 and only had a short 45 kilometers to complete to spend our first night camping next to the pit straight at the Killarney Race Track. The next day we pushed through all the way to sleep at the Springbok Caravan Park and then entered Namibia the next day. Here is an overview of the route through SA:
To see the blog posts during this time, please click here.
Here are our highlights and lowlights based on the two days spent in South Africa.
Tania's highlight: Sitting on the dark empty track that Monday evening with Francois eating our McDonald's was definitely the highlight for me. We had the whole track to ourselves and after a hectic few days it was good to relax and reflect a bit on the journey that lay ahead, plus what a cool place to camp! I was super impressed with Francois for having organised this as it was such an awesome way to start out our adventure.
Tania's lowlight: We were standing ready next to the track at Killarney waiting to tackle our first lap while journalist Dave Abrahams were taking a photo of us. Francois accidently pressed his backpack against my screen when he climbed off his bike and "crrrrrkkkk" a piece of my brand new screen broke off. Looking back it wasn't really a big deal, but I was very proud of my new shiny Motomia. If I knew what the screen would have looked like anyways in a month's time I would not have been so shocked back then.
The flowers were beautiful on the way to Springbok:
Francois's highlight: This has to be sleeping on the grid straight at Killarney Raceway and doing a couple of laps around the track the following morning. When I asked Joy Hoskins a week or two before our departure date whether this would be possible, she and all the other officials and the board all agreed without any worries. Paul Lehman (in charge of safety and security) and Gail met us at the clubhouse on our first evening and welcomed us with coffee.
I’ve always wanted to ride a bike around the track, but never thought my first time would be on a 200cc Motomia with three months’ luggage on the back.
Francois's lowlight: Between Citrusdal and Clanwilliam we were held up by strings of cars, driving centimetres apart behind slow trucks
We both loved this shot on the track with Table Mountain in the background:
South Africa Trip Stats:
Distance: 692 km Time: 1 day, 16 hours, 35 minutes, 58 seconds Highest point: 1 000.4 m (after 660 km) Lowest point: 1.7m (after 42 km) Maximum speed: 107 km/h Fuel consumption (Francois): 30.2 km/l Fuel consumption (Tania): 35.9 km/l
A quick flashback at our diary cam recordings in Springbok:
Tania and I are not the best at planning and admin, and as a result we left most of the important stuff to the last minute. The highlight of this part of the trip must be preparing the bikes for the trip. After we picked up the bikes from Motomia we spent one all-nighter at Eon and Mari’s fitting the GPS and a Hella plug to my bike and a 12V cigarette lighter plug on Tania’s. I lost the latter fitting’s bracket and we subsequently fashioned one from one of Mari’s baking trays.
We also spent the second to last night at our place fitting the drain pipe tubes (that housed the spare tubes and our rain coats) and other spares to the bikes. My favourite photo was of the first test ride with Eon on the back. It was too cold outside so we staged the ride in the living room:
Francois’s lowlight:
There weren’t many, but I think for me it has to be when the AA phoned me informing me that the minimum value on the Carnet de Passage is higher than the value of the bikes. This put some serious strain on the budget, but was sorted when the bank gave us an indemnity letter. Now we just hope the bikes arrive in SA! When I got the news from the AA I said to Tania maybe we should just turn around in Ethiopia and come back. Luckily she talked some serious sense into my head!
Tania's highlight:
Riding my brand new 200cc Motomia for the first time, starting out with only 2km on the clock and realising I will be doing what I love for the next three months.
Tania's lowlight:
Sorting out the final admin for the trip, whilst still working full-time in the last month before leaving for Cairo. Thank goodness women can multi-task!
This shot (excuse the pun!) was my favourite in the pre-trip planning phase. The doctor had a hard time focusing on giving me these shots trying not to laugh while the two of us had fun taking this pic.
And for a final trip down memory lane, we have put together the following video for you... enjoy!
If you have trouble opening the video above you can also click here to watch it on YouTube.
Since we bought the GPS just before the trip and was still figuring out how it operates as we rode out of the yard, it is going to take some time to mine all the data, but for those of you who cannot wait, here are some teaser-info: The total distance of the Crossing Africa trip was: 15 526 km (of which roughly 280 km was by ferry across the Aswan Lake). This means the Motomias still covered around 15 246 km. Not bad!
We started on the 5th of September from Killarney Raceway (see the new image bar at the top of this blog) and reached Alexandria on the 3rd of December. The trip took us 89 days 2 hours 16 minutes and 51 seconds. This means be made it within the planned 90 days timeframe.
The little Motomias did well at sea-level, reaching a maximum speed of 109 km/h on the GPS somewhere in Namibia. At Windhoek we were already at around 2 000 m above sea-level and from there onwards we rose and fell quite a lot. The highest point was close to 3 541 m (I haven't managed to find out exactly, but remember reading this in the GPS in Ethiopia). Here is the total trip profile:
I've started analysing the actual spending per category per day, as well as the average fuel consumption. All that I know is that the claimed figure on Motomia's website (www.motomia.com) is not accurate (are they ever!?), but in this case the actual figure was better than the claimed!! How about that!? I think we averaged around 35-38 km/l...
Please keep checking in as we plan to give each of our highs and lows (with pics) of each country shortly.
