Visa: free
Car: free

The Rwandan border was the easiest one yet.  We were able to sift through the schemers and cons with relative ease as we were now trained in the art of spotting them.  All you have to do is smile and ignore them.  Sometimes you have to mutter a polite no thank you to the really insistent ones.  The usual task of passport and carnet stamp and then we were on our way.  The roads are splendidly smooth, which we dealt with later.  It was late so we headed for a roadside hotel, where the manager on duty was ever obliging.  We were able to park our car in the courtyard.  We had electricity and a clean room for only $10.  There wasn’t any hot water, but that was soon remedied when the manager herself brought us two 20 litre tanks of scolding hot water.  An hour later we were bathed and ready for supper.  The restaurant did a quaint meal of meat and bread, but they didn’t serve alcohol.  Fine by us, we needed to detox anyway.  A little work on the laptop and then to sleep.  We slept so well.

In the morning we packed our goodies and went for breakfast.  Did I mention that the staff at the hotel hardly spoke a word of English?  It was so funny watching Neil explaining that he wanted scrambled eggs and not an omelette.  Now Rwandans understand French, so I simply mentioned omelette and they lady understood me.  One thing is for sure and that’s, I don’t know how to describe scrambled eggs in French.  So the more Neil tried to explain that he didn’t want an omelette the more the lady just nodded and laughed.  He never got anything.  Yup, my breakfast came and went, so eventually Neil went to the chef and asked for the omelette, which he understood and 10 mins later Neil had his omelette. I eventually had to break it to Neil that he would have to simplify his requests for the sake of his sanity.  This was Rwanda and not Switzerland where they understand about a half dozen languages.  Where were the Staub’s when you needed them?  It dawned on us that we were really on our own now and so we headed for another adventure down the nearest dirt road.  We drove the whole day across Rwanda along the dirt road.  Through villages and farmland only to see nothing but villages and farmland.  Now I was really excited to get to Rwanda, but what I had seen so far really depressed me.  There were no forests whatsoever to speak of.  All the natural forest had been farmed out.  We decided that we would head for Ruhengeru.   This is near the reserve for the Volcanoes NP where the Gorilla trekking takes place.  We tried to find some cheap camping, but ended up camping outside a hotel for top dollar.  They served a buffet that evening to which Neil and I just could not say no.  It’s a good thing we were inside as the rain came down in buckets during dinner.

The next day turned out to be one of the greatest disappointments of the trip.  We didn’t have enough for the Gorilla trekking, but we wanted to see the birds of the forest.  After waiting for 2 hours a poor excuse for a bird guide takes us to a botanical garden some way off.  I might add that we paid $45 each for this pleasure.  Neil was livid and the more I tried to calm him the more he took it out on the guide.  Eventually I just went and sat in the car and Neil had it out with the guide.  Needless to say the guide didn’t want to get back in the car, so we left him there.  Apparently there were other people due to arrive who had also paid $45 each to take an hour long walk in a botanical garden.  I didn’t think so, but then again, like us, they most probably didn’t know it was just a botanical garden and note the forest itself.  If anyone wants to see Gorilla’s I would recommend you go to Uganda, absolutely no doubt about it.  The roads aren’t great, but it’s the African experience.  Uganda has more Gorillas and more impenetrable forest. We are definitely fans of Uganda.  Anyway after that disappointment we headed south the Lake District where Nyungwe NP was located.  It mentioned in the guide book and on the GPS that the Nyungwe forest was extremely depleted and believe us it was.  Just like the rest of Rwanda there were farms as far as the eye could see.  We managed to find a walking trail on the GPS that seemed to go down into a 1km square patch of dense forest.  We managed to find 3 lifer birds for our list.  Imagine how great Rwanda could be if it just took better care of its fauna and flora.  I suppose priorities are with the people though.  The story of the genocide in 1994 was bone chilling and with that bit of knowledge and understanding one can understand the culture.  People just want to live and at least they are making good use of the previously forested areas.  Did you know that Rwanda is only 150km2, that’s just less than 100 square miles with a population of about 10 million people of which I’d say 90% are rural.  Once again disappointed by the forest we headed even further South in search of a place to camp.  This road we were on was really bad so the going was slow.  We ended up at Lake Kivu, but boy was it expensive, especially only for camping.  We went in search of another campsite which turned out was non existent.  We were able to drive right down to the water where some locals were swimming.  Neil was in the water before you could say the word ‘hat’.  On the other hand I was not about to undress and parade in front of about 10 other men.  So I stayed in the car.  By now I had had enough, so like I do I threw a right strop like the spoilt child that I’ve become.  Well Neil was having it and drove straight for the border that very evening.  So toys out the cot and feeling terribly tired we drove into Kigali at about 10pm.  Once again prices were over the top, but we did manage to get a basic BnB for $40.  It was so good to be clean and have a proper bed.  I slept like a baby.

We had breakfast and headed out early the next morning.  We were pleasantly surprised when we found our car all clean and ready for the days drive.  We tipped the grounds keeper and headed for the Tanzanian Border.  The drive to the border was much of the same.  The border is defined by a bridge over the Kagera River.  It was kind of wild water so Neil got out to take pics.  I did notice that there seemed to be quite a few people standing on the end of the bridge, but this being Africa you get accustomed to people just standing around in random places.  Well it turns out that there was a body in the water and nobody had removed it yet.  The reason being that not one of the countries wanted to take responsibility and it didn’t help that the body was at the bottom of a torrential waterfall so even if they wanted to they couldn’t get to the body.  Sounds crazy doesn’t it, only in Africa I say.   

So finally we had made it to Uganda.  Albeit that it coincided with the general elections, it was such a treat to be with our new found South African friends. It did cost us $50per person and a further $40 odd for the car. Our first night in Uganda was spent at this lovely locally run guesthouse. It was clean and the best part was that it cost us only $5 a double room. What a bonus! The next morning saw us head out on the dirt road towards Sipi falls. The views are beautiful but the road quality leaves much to be desired, as you might expect. For those of you that plan on drawing cash as you go, a word of advice, have lots of space for notes. It was a strange feeling going to the local Stanbic bank and drawing 700000Ush. As for Sipi falls, they are something special. We camped at a site that had a great view of the falls and they served cold beers and locally prepared chicken.

Our third day in Uganda was spent driving. We drove very near to five hundred kilometres and much of the tar we drove on was in bad repair, not to mention the final 80km of dirt road from Masindi to our campsite in Murchison falls National Park. I’ll take this opportunity to mention the extortionate prices that the National parks in East Africa charge. Take for instance Murchison falls. It costs $30 per person and a further $50 for the vehicle. Compare this to South Africa then you realise just how crazy their prices are. What makes it worse is that the further east you go the more expensive it gets. Anyway back to the travels. We camped at the Red Chilli Campsite. They have warm showers and prepare decent food. They are a tad on the expensive side, but not too bad though. We even managed to go for a night drive in the park. Michnus and I sat on top of the car while the girls drove us around. The only things we managed to see were two civet cats and a black backed jackal. It was fun though. We had a full day of game viewing scheduled for the next day.  This was particularly exciting for our South African friends. They were on bikes, so driving in a national park is something they have not really done before. Reason being that it is not allowed in S.A. To avoid sounding too much like a moaner, I would just like to say that in terms of game viewing it was a disappointment. Especially considering the price we had to pay for admission. We did get pretty close to some elephants though.  That evening we camped right next to the roaring White Nile. It was in a Gorge about a kilometre fro the falls. I would definitely recommend it to those of you who are self sustained. There is nothing there except for a ‘long drop’. On that note, you are meant to pay 15000Ush for camping there. We refused because the guy only tod us this the next day and he never showed us any of the facilities. The falls themselves are spectacular! The sheer volume that passes through that narrow gorge is truly astounding. In some respects it is as great as Victoria Falls. After leaving the falls we headed out of the park, stopping at the Eco-resort for a wonderful breakfast. It was too late in the day to do any real birding.

We spent the next two days camped at the Masindi Hotel. They have brand new facilities and their restaurant serves good food. It costs 20000Ush per person to camp there. On the morning of the second day in Masindi we parted company with Michnus and Elsebie. The reason for the temporary split was that they had to meet up with friends they had met earlier on their trip and we wanted to go birding in the Bidongo Forest. So we headed towards the Bidongo Eco-camp. We arrived there discovering that it was virtually deserted. This was a pity because it is right on the edge of a pristine little forest, where we spent three days birding. Someone did eventually turn up and he said that camping there is 5000Ush per person. We were happy to pay, seeing that we had the place to ourselves and no one bothered us. It was wonderful falling asleep to all the forest sounds. The campsite has the potential to be great if they can sort out some showers and running water.  We spent our time walking through the forest for which we were supposed to have a guide, but since no one turned up we just sorted ourselves out.  We did come across locals cutting down some indigenous trees, but they dropped everything and ran as soon as they saw the two Mzungos.  Well I’d be scared as well if I’d never seen a white person before.  We did mention the happenings to the forest ranger, but he seemed to think that nothing could be done about it, even though it was illegal.  We visited the Royal Mile, which is a particularly good birding site in Uganda, but we didn’t find anything there that could be found in the road just outside the camp.

Having spent three nights in the Bidongo Forest it was time to head south to reunite with our S.A friends. We were scheduled to meet in Fort Portal. The road down was mostly a narrow little dirt track. Surprisingly a lot of it was well graded so it did not take us too long to reach our destination. However there was one aspect of the journey that was particularly disturbing. The rate of deforestation is sickening. If we had to do this trip again in five years, I doubt any natural forests would still exist outside the national reserves.

The Town of Fort Portal is nothing spectacular, but it does have a wonderful view of the Ruwenzori mountain range and the campsite we stayed at, The Whispering Palm, is well maintained. They have a great little garden walk and it is walking distance from the town centre. We spent three nights there along with the S.A couple and another Dutch couple, Martijn and Wibien. We drank a lot of beer and ate some great food. Martijn is quite the chef. There is only so much lazing about one can do so it was once again time to head south  We bid our new Dutch friends goodbye and started for our next birding destination. We were meant to go to the Begodi swamps, however we never got there. We instead spent a night camped at a communal eco camp. It is set on the rim of a crater lake and they have a piece of natural forest that one can walk through. We did this; unfortunately we got caught in the rain. It was fun, however, cuddling up under a tree waiting for the thunderstorm to subside.  We spent the evening making supper and listening to the rain falling on our tent. Luckily the next morning was sunshine and we could continue our journey. Most of that day’s driving consisted of driving down a single track that looked like it hadn’t been driven on for at least ten years. You should have seen the look on the local’s faces when we drove past their huts on top of the hills. Unfortunately most of what we say was banana trees. We were due to meet Michnus and Elsebie near to Queen Elisabeth National Park, however, our route meant that way took far longer than what we had first anticipated. This didn’t turn out to badly though. We spent that night camped in the park. The best part was the fact that all we had to pay for was the 30000Ush for the camping.  I simply told the guy at the gate that I had burnt the entry tickets by mistake. We drove off before he could come up with an answer.

The drive from Queen Elisabeth National Park to the Buhoma camp in Bwindi National Park was harrowing to say the least. Our trusty GPS routed us through some of the most rural Ugandan roads out there. There was some incredibly beautiful scenery. It still took us the better part of eight hours to cover the 200kms to our destination. What made the journey just that little bit more interesting was that our fuel had become contaminated so we drove the last few kilometres at a snail’s pace (literally 5km’s/hour). A fact that had Silvie in quite a state. We did arrive safely though to find the amazing forests that are Bwindi National Park.  We were greeted by Elsebie running out into the road in front of us.  What a sight for sore eyes.  We decided to stay at the community campsite along with Michnus and Elsebie. The people at the campsite aloud us to open our tent in there car park for $20. Not the greatest deal, but what can you do. At least the showers were hot and the facilities clean.

It was here at Bwindi that we met Alex. This man is a local bird guide which is trying to make a real difference.  He, along with a local touring company started a bird guiding course for local youth. We were really impressed by the way he ran the course along with his enthusiasm. It stuck us that this would be the ideal project to which we could give the binoculars and telescopes that we kindly donated to us by Opticron. Everyone involved was super excited, especially the ones that did not have any binoculars of their own. As you might expect the birding was awesome.

We spent two full days walking around in the beautiful forests. Unfortunately our funding did not allow us the luxury of doing the gorilla trekking. Well we can’t do it all and we have decided that Uganda will definitely see us again. The landscape is breathtaking and the people have to be some of the friendliest we have met up to this point. This however did not mean we could not explore the other extraordinary sites in Uganda. Our next stop was Lake Bunyoni. Here we resided at the Bunyoni overland resort. It is set on a picturesque lake with great facilities and an affordable price tag. We enjoyed food from their exotic menu and I even had a swim in the crystal clear water. The only downside to our visit to the camp was that the rains had finally caught us and we thought at one point that we might be washed into Uganda’s deepest lake. Subsequently we weren’t so we were able to continue south to the border.

Unlike our usual routine at the border. You know, get your passport and carnet stamped then continue on your merry way. This day we decided to not proceed with that and instead turned 180 degrees and headed back north. The reason for this turn in event is that contrary to our previous understanding, Uganda does not issue multi entry visas at the border. To us this would not have been a problem, however, our travelling companions needed to head back to Nairobi at some point so having to pay the $50 per person entry stamp was not really fair on them.  This worked out for the best as we had not yet been to see Kampala and were going to visit the Ssese Islands as part of our northbound excursion.

If you have been to South Africa, or any other Southern African country for that matter, you would know that finding a campsite near a national park is a pretty straightforward affair. Not so in Uganda. We came across this very phenomenon at the gates of Lake Mburo National Park. There was not one campsite outside the park’s borders. This meant we had to either cough up the $110 for entry or make another plan. No points for guessing which option we took. Luckily for us Michnus had well honed negotiating skills and was able to convince the guard at the gate that we were poor travellers stranded in the big out doors with nowhere to go. The man had a soft heart and a “rubber arm” so he let us camp right there next to the gate.  There was a lot of game about so it made for a lovely evening out in the African bush.

The next morning we bid the guard a friendly good bye and headed on to Lake Victoria. We did give the guard a little gift simply because he was so kind to us. The drive to the lake was pretty uneventful. It was only bout 100km and most of it was flat. The only part of the journey that does get one’s heart rate up a little bit is the road works. The fact that there are road works is not the issue, it’s the fact that no one knows what’s going on. You have cars driving in six different directions at once, trucks dumping sand in the middle of the road, add about a hundred cyclists and it all gets pretty hair raising. So due to this we decided to spend the night on the mainland before debarking on our island adventure. We alighted at the Lake Nabugabu campground. It was nice enough apart from the wind trying to blow us off the side of the earth. We ate supper at their restaurant and consumed more of the local beer. By now this had become norm. Rock up to camp, order the local cuisine and stock up on beer. Not a bad way to have a holiday, but not a great way to stay healthy either. What the hell, you only live once.

We packed up camp in the morning and headed for the Ssese Island Ferry in Masaka.  This was a free ferry to the island, but we experienced a two hour delay.  We made the most of it though by sampling the local cafe’s food which included a prehistoric donut and hard boiled eggs.  Silvie managed to start an argument with one of the officials, which was later resolved with a bribe of about 200 Ugandan Shillings, that’s about 10c US.  Hehehehe, not bad price for a little entertainment.  The lake flies gave us more than our share of entertainment for the rest of the journey to the island.  The island had a good mix of forest and farmland.  The predominent crop seemed to be Palm nut.  The first evening we camped at a venue with DSTV so Neil could watch the rugby.  It wasn’t too bad here as there was direct access to the Lake which we took advantage of.  We had a good evening watching the rugby and having dinner.  The only distraction was that someone was having a party at the bar, so the doof-doof went on for quite a while into the night.  It would have been that bad really except for the fact that the dj couldn’t get the track off the birthday celebration song, and then the builders were at it the next morning at 8am.  I’d like to add that it was a Sunday, so we didn’t expect the builders to be there.  We decided that it would be best to move to another camp.  Thus we spent the rest of our time at a wonderful camp where we were waited on hand and foot by a chef who supposedly worked for the Ugandan President… very yum and oh so posh.  We explored a little of the jungle forest, but ended up in the mangrove so we had to return, but not before passing one of the local bars to have a beer.  Ultimately we had the laziest time possibly imagined on this island.  After about 4 days we caught the Entebbe ferry back to the mainland.  This ferry wasn’t free, but the money paid was well worth it for a seat inside the boat.

In Entebbe we headed for the botanical gardens, we sat chatting for a while and decided that we would find the campsite.  Even though we paid to get in, we organised it so we could return later that day.   We found accommodation in the zoo, where they had 4 person chalets available.  The chalets were terribly infested with mosquitoes and the nets had holes in them.  Neil and I decided to sleep in our tent, which has excellent mosquito protection.  The next day we explored Entebbe on motorbike compliments of Michnus and Elsebie.  Ooh I want a motorbike now!!! I think the age 30 calls for a midlife crisis if it should be called that.  Well we had a lovely lunch of chinese food and beer and headed back to camp where we explored the zoo.  Entebbe Zoo has quite a comprehensive list of animals including 3 lions, 2 rhinos and giraffe.  The monkeys were a fun bunch to watch and the Shoebill was a pleasure as well.

The following day we headed to Kampala.  We found a Shoprite and sorted out our laptop charger saga by purchasing a multi purpose charger pack.  We bought books and various other techy bits.  Boy were we excited to see a sign for Spur Steakhouse at one of the shopping centres, but it turned out that it had been closed for some time already.  We did manage to find a good alternative, Rancher, where I had the best ladies steak possibly in Africa.  All shopped out and nowhere to go, we headed for camp. The place to stay is the Red Chilli in Kampala. They have a tiny splash pool, a massive pig, pizza nights and best of all they have DSTV so that we could catch up on the Super 15. We spent two nights there enjoying the company of Michnus and Elsebie. But alas all good things must come to an end and we had to say farewell to our new friends. They had to return to Nairobi while we had to continue our journey south. We had had an inspiring time with them and it was quite sad that we now had to go our separate ways. Not to worry we had swapped details and are bound to meet up in the future.

So we were on our own again. It is always a mixture of uneasiness and excitement.  It is so easy to become accustomed to a certain way of doing things.  It was now strange to only have to think about what we wanted to do and to know that it would only be us at camp that evening. So as our first point of action we decided to fulfil one of the goals of the trip. As you might have gathered we are quite avid birdwatchers. So it is only natural that we would want to see the famous and much endangered Shoebill. This bird is to the birding world what the Simien Wolf is to the animal watcher.  Luckily this is such a tourist attraction that our faithful Garmin actually had a site where we could possibly have the chance to see this incredible bird in the wild. It routed down the main road past Entebbe and then on to a gravel road. We thought that the coordinates must have been wrong, but low and behold we were met by two excited guys on a motorbike. Our innate scepticism immediately kicked in and we were on guard from the start. It turned out that our fears were unwarranted. One of the gentlemen on the motorcycle happened to be the local Shoebill guide. This man, Winston, had been a guide for the past ten years. He had sponsored by UNESCO and had his training done in South Africa. He was a wealth of information and was able to share with us some of the most extraordinary facts about this incredible bird. For instance Shoebills only mate once every five years. What makes matters worse is that they won’t mate if there is another bird in the area with a chick. This means that certain birds could go for as long as ten years without mating. Seeing as they only live to the age of twenty, some birds never mate successfully.  Besides the facts, this was one of the cooler things we’ve done so far.  With the trepidation of leaving our car in the village, we took a ride in a dugout canoe on the waterways amongst the overgrown reed beds.  This is what I wanted out of our Africa trip.  Felt like being on a filming session of the National Geographic Earth Series.  I could hear David Attenborough’s voice soothing away the problems of the world in my head.  A good one and a half hours and some awesome views of the Shoebill later, I was on top of the world.  I hadn’t felt this feeling of awe since the volcano in Ethiopia.  We drove off with such a feeling of accomplishment and we agreed once more that Uganda would definitely see us again.  We camped that evening in a forest camp where we were able to walk by ourselves amongst the gnarly old giants these Africans call trees.

We rode the next for what was to be our final destination in Uganda.  As fate would have it, our radiator burst halfway there and so we limped into Mbarara Rotary Clubhouse.  We met up with a lovely lady who happened to have a brother who was a big shot at Toyota Kampala.  Before you could say “where’s your hat” we had someone over and an appointment for repair the next morning.  The rest of the evening we whiled away at the Rotary club where we were able to camp.

What do you know; the next day we had our radiator fixed and exhaust rewelded for the equivalent of £35.  All done by 2pm, we headed for the border, which was pretty uneventful compared to the entrance border.  Goodbye Uganda, it was a pleasure and we will see you next time.

Visa: No visa required for South Africa staying 30 days. Car Road Tax: Free unless staying more than 7 days otherwise $20

Upon entering Kenya, we were shocked by the automatic increase in camp prices. Kenya Wildlife Services charge $15ppp/n for camping. Camping! I just turned around and we drove straight out for the Marsabit Road. I might as well add that it was 3pm when we started driving the road. The Marsabit road was a pleasure after Ethiopia. We didn’t see people for at least a half day. Even though we bust all 4 shocks and both rear springs we loved the Marsabit Road. We spotted new birds for our lifer list and got to see gazelle and elephant for the first time on our trip. We made camp in Marsabit where the dog greeted us, so we let ourselves in. The showers were hot and we didn’t mind being joined by a 10cm spider. We were happy to fall asleep clean that evening.

We rose early the next day to inspect the damage to our poor vehicle. Apart from all four our shocks now leaking our exhaust was now also loose. I spent a couple of minutes trying to tie it up, but was not that successful. With inspection and patch jobs completed we headed out of Marsabit. It was already 10am by that time. Marsabit happens to be in a national park so we were fortunate enough to see a herd of elephants grazing not to far from the road. We also encountered another couple that were cycling to South Africa. As for the road conditions, they were still awful. It took us five hours to get from Marsabit to the brand new tar at Isiolo. You can only imagine our delight at driving onto that wonderfully smooth surface after so any ours of having our teeth rattle loose in our sculls. Unfortunately our day driving was far from over. We still had almost 400k to go and for those of you that might know, driving in Nairobi at any time of day is never easy. Trying to negotiate there four lane highways that have no light or road markings was an ordeal all on its own. Never the less, we arrived at Jungle Junction in one piece. I can happily report that it is as nice as people say it is. The place is filled with the most interesting vehicles and the most colourful assortment of people you could ever hope to meet on a trip like this.

The following day was operation ‘fix Big Red’. Surprisingly this turned out to be far easier than what we had anticipated. Nairobi is pretty organised. Out first port of call was the Toyota dealership, where we were directed to a reliable exhaust specialist. With that completed we headed over to Rob’s Magic to have our suspension sorted. Unfortunately they did not have our TJM’s in stock, but we were quite happy to have them replaced with the Rob’s Magic oil filled shocks and rear springs. Once that was completed, we headed to the shopping centre to have a bite to eat. Neil was pleasantly surprised by the fact that one of the restaurants served ‘Boerewors’ pizza. We headed back to camp where we met up with 4 South Africans driving North on motorbikes. We spent that evening with them ordering in pizza and drinking beer from the well stocked fridge at Jungle Junction. Michnus, Elsebie, Harold and Linda, all from the Eastern Cape, were good entertainment that evening with their stories of driving fun in the Southern Hemisphere.

We spent the Sunday doing laundry and trying to reattach the snorkel, but gave up and just tightened it as best we could. It was on this evening that our laptop chargers and phone died without us realising it. There was of course the mother of all storms and no electricity, so we thought nothing of it.

We left the next day for Uganda. After a good day of driving we camped at the Flamingo Camp where we were the only people. We had a lovely evening cooking and relaxing to views of the Lane Elementaita. The next day we crossed the equator for the second time and made sure we stopped to take the all important pictures. We even bought trinket chess board. We entered Mount Elgon National Park that evening where we paid $80 for entry and camping for 24hours. We were the only people there once again. The stack of braai wood was higher than the car and there was water and shade. Not to mention the waterbuck, impalas and baboons parading around the campsite. We went for a stroll that evening into the forest. We saw bushbucks which bark like dogs when alarmed. At first I thought it was the baboons barking. We saw impala which could easily make it into the Roland Ward record books. The next day we rose early, packed a picnic bag and headed for the caves. The day was nice and cool and we didn’t see another person. There was plentiful evidence of elephants, but we didn’t see any. We spent a lovely time at the cave where the water was seeping off the cliff to cool us down. We walked back to camp and were packed up by 3pm. We reached the border by 4pm on a very dilapidated road. As we drove in we could see the road off into Uganda going up the hill. What we saw was a little disturbing. There were hundreds on people walking down the road heading toward the Uganda border side. Neil mentioned the crowd with brief concern, but we thought nothing more about it until we walked out of the immigrations office. By that time the crowd had reached the border line and were toy-toying around. Apparently it was only the local governor on his campaign run. Well happy or not, there was no way we were going over until then crowd either disappeared or settled down. We were officially in no mans land having just been stamped out of Kenya and not wanting to enter Uganda. After about a half hour the crowd miraculously disappeared. We did all the bits and bobs necessary to enter and we were surprised when we walked out the customs office to find Michnus and Elsebie at the pillbox immigration office. It was the start of a beautiful friendship.

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We would like to take this opportunity to apologise for the delay in updates.  Our electrical goodies were zapped during an electrical storm while we were in Nairobi. 

Entry visa:  $20 for single entry, $30 for multi-entry

Well now we’re in Africa.  We were being followed by a local to seemed to think he was our guide.  We stopped outside the vehicle authority building and headed for the officials. This little nimrod protested that we first had to go to the building across the road which was the passport control.  Okay, so we gave him a chance.  We learnt in Sudan that it’s notalways the best idea to argue with these locals from the start.  We went into the building only to be told that we had to go back to the vehicle authority building.  So now this guy had burnt his bridges with us.  Neil now had a target for his Lariam fuelled outburst.  Shame, poor guy didn’t know what was for what after he got the brunt of it.  He soon left us to deal with the vehicle officials.  They were a bunch of fun by themselves.  We approached them armed with our ‘Embassy  letter’ for our vehicle.  After about 10 seconds they were quick to let us know that in fact the letter was not the right thing for the job.  The story is as follows they said:  “You need to phone your embassy to phone the Ethiopian foreign office and ask for permission on your behalf to enter the country with your car.  Then the Ethiopian foreign office needs to phone us and let us know that you have permission.” 

This was reasonable and even though it would take a while to get through to the wench at the South African Embassy in Ethiopia.  I was looking forward to making her work for her living.  Uh-uh, as I was about to walk of the official added:  “Our telephone and fax lines are down at the moment so they will only be able to call in the morning.”  Oh crap, this is Africa for sure!  Well a long story short… Some junior official tried to bribe us, but thankfully they are still to stupid to know how.  They eventually accepted our ‘Embassy Letter’ and upon enquiring with the senior official about the $50 we were asked to pay.  His exact words were:  “Don’t believe a word they say.”  Well we take it that by this he meant the try-it-on, good for nothing junior officials.  Reminds me of the program ‘Americas dumbest criminals’.  Oh well we were out of there in about 3 hours.

We camped that evening alongside the road just after a village.  This was a stupid mistake on our part as there were a group of kids who kept asking for stuff until I eventually told them to go home and return again in the morning.  These kids were still polite in regards to the rest of Ethiopia.  Story to be told.  They disappeared along with 2 adults who we presume were relatives.  We spent the rest of the evening showering and making supper.  We were in Ethiopia and looking forward to Africa.  Nothing could go wrong at this point.

Neil and I woke early the next morning to find the kids sitting huddled a little distance off from us.  We didn’t bother ourselves with that, we were on a mission to get our first birds for Ethiopia.  We headed up to a hill across the road and indeed had a wonderful birding experience.  We were joined by Adrian and Corinne for a little while, before they hiked further up the hill.  We arrived back in the camp to find the kids from the previous evening running from car to car collecting their rubbish or whatever was available.  We didn’t give them anything coz I believe in giving things responsibly.  We decided to give our pens and such to a school and not to kids on the street.  I think it makes it harder for the next traveller if you give things to children that beg at your car.  We split up from Gary, Francis, Adrian and Corinne and carried on travelling with Roger and Marina.  We drove on to Lalibella to spend Christmas there.  We carried on driving for the rest of the day, but had to camp halfway there at Mulu Hotel.  Man alive was this a dump.  I’m convinced that this was more a brothel than a hotel.  I can’t believe this place was even mentioned on T4A.  Really horendous!  This was the start of the downfall of my view of Ethiopia.  We ate that evening at the local restaurant, which was more like a shebeen.  We crawled into our tents that evening without having showered as there was none available.  Luckily I made Neil put the rain cover on the tent as it rained cats and dogs that night.  I didn’t help that Neil started feeling quite ill.  He didn’t help himself or us by insisting that it was nothing.
 
We woke to the sound of someone blaring their music and the hotel waking up in general.  The courtyard we were parked in just about fit in our two vehicles.  While making breakfast there we about 5 people simply watching us.  I adhore being stared at and decided to ask them what they were looking at.  Apparently they were just standing in the sun and warming up.  So does that mean you can’t mind your own business.  It’s not like they come up to you with some geniune interest, instead they just stare at you like dumbanimals.  Of course these were only men.  It seems like it’s only females that work in this place.  After breakfast I was so relieved to be out of that place. Can anyone please tell T4A to take that hell-hole off their maps?  We drove that day on to Lalibella.  Now at this point Neil was feeling really rotten and feverish.  After quite a devastating incident we were relieved by the lovely service of the hospital in Lalibella. 

We spent 3 days at the Mountain View Hotel.  We ate there as well as at the Seven Olives Restaurant, which we would highly recommend.  We ran into Mike and Sabina while on our way to view the Rock Churches.  That was a nice surprise since we hadn’t seen them since Turkey.  On the drive out from Lalibella, we took what seemed to be the worst road in Ethiopia as far as pestering children go and that’s saying something!  We wild camped on some forgotten track.  Well actually this turned out to be the track all the villagers used between the main road and home.  Oh well after this drama of a night we decided that was the last of the wild camping for us in Ethiopia. 

Mekele was quite an amazing little town.  It definitely had that young student feel of a typical university town.  We spent almost 10 days there at the Hilltop Hotel.  This included the 4 days we spent at Danakil and Dalol.  We can’t stress enough how highly we recommend this tour.  We used Abel from Hawk Tours.  What a swell guy and Takaz was such an endearing guide.  Besides Danakil we didn’t do a lot in Ethiopia.  We’re not that interested in the cultural goodies and as far as we’re concerned if you’ve seen one rock church, you’ve seen them all.  

We had more important things on our mind reguarding our charity visit.  Now that is something worth mentioning.  We planned to spend quite a while in Addis with Alex of Street Kids International and Tessima of Emanuel Development agency.  The problem with our car and Silvie not feeling well changed our stay to just 3 days, but what we saw was fantastic.  We got a generous amount of awesome photos, got to check out the funded community projects as well.  We were really impressed by Retrak’s involvement with StreetKids International and EDA’s ‘Drawn to Develop’ concept.  Check out the pics and if you like what you see then please donate something to Street Kids International.  You will see their link above.  We felt proud that RamblingRat Africa could do this trip for the benefit of  Street Kids International.  They had shown us so much and in only 3 days.  Neil even got his vellies (trekking boots) shined for the equivalent of 15 pence by one of the entrepeneurs from the Street Kids International ‘Business Toolkit’ classes.  Now imagine how these guys could thrive on let’s say £15 for their business investment. 

Ethiopia is really tough on your car and nerves.  This was definitely not one of our top destinations.  Most of the cultural festivities are carried out for the purpose of tourism.  Such as the running of the bulls where woman get whipped.  Also the  tribes where the woman wear the coin in their lower lip… etc…  We’re not fans of sadochism and masochism, especially when it’s fuelled by tourists.  So we gave all that a miss.  We tried to have an open mind about Ethiopians and ‘their way’.  Unfortunately we just couldn’t see past how ruined this county is by US Aid and the UN and such…  Who knows who’s fault it is.  We had had enough.

We spent our last evening at the very refreshing Boran Lodge.  We would highly recommend this lodge to anyone on their way out of Ethiopia about 200km before Moyale.  It’s about 2km off the main road and listed on T4A.  This place at least gave us hope of good things to come as we headed for Kenya.

21st Dec Entry into Sudan took about 2 days, simply because we fought the law at every corner. The ferry came into port at about 1pm on 21st December. The boys went off to find out what needed to be done as far as paperwork. We eventually went in search of them as this took a while and we wanted to get off the ferry. The were filling out some kind of Alien Registration form detailing where we were going and contact details. We alighted the ferry and Mazir found us on the way to the baggage check. I was so rude to him, and in hindsight I can see he was completely harmless. That’s what you get from me when I’ve only had 4 hours sleep. Wadi Halfa is a tiny dusty town that is there for no other reason that the ferry needs a place to port. We headed to the customs and immigration to register ourselves. After a lot of back and forth and 103SDG each later we were registered in Sudan. You need 1 photo as well. We asked the police captain if we could camp in the station building, but after much laughter and some broken English, he very politely turned us down. At this stage we were 3 Swiss couples and us. Strength in numbers seemed to be the order of the day, so we all headed off for the only hotel in town, Hotel Cleopatra… More like an old jail building or storage house, we decided to camp out in the common room for 5SDG per night. The rooms had dusty beds and metal, noisy doors. So after clearing the common room of dust and what looked like a massive desert spider of sorts, we set out our mattresses and bags. Heading into town, we had a tasty full meal for 19SDG for both of us. 22nd Dec We woke to the delightful sounds of metal doors clanging as various people used the toilet in the morning. We went for breakfast and it was a feast at 4 SDG each. Off we went in search of the tourist police to get our photo permits. This set us back a cool 26SDG, but not before we argued the point that our friend had just paid 23SDG for the same thing. After quite an argument we got an escort of tourist police to find this person that received his permit for 23SDG. Long story short, we were wrong and now we listen more carefully to the information people give us. The boys went off to get the cars through customs and that took all of the day. Neil apparently was quite notorious after the whole affair. We eventually drove out at about 5pm and went in search of a wild camp in the desert. We found quite a good spot amongst the dunes all in time to have a shower and prepare a delicious meal. 23rd Dec We drove in search of food and that took us into Abri market. Sudan is very expensive! It’s cheaper to eat out for two people that it is for 2kg of oranges. I’ve decided that I don’t like markets, at least not in Sudan. These people don’t realise that if they give the tourists the local price then they will get more tourists. Anyway, I find the markets a bit of a hassle. I don’t like going to them unless I really need something. I think it’s a good idea just to eat out. Well it’s only the first country of proper Africa, apparently it gets cheaper. We headed for the Nile and found a lovely spot for swimming and birding. The flies were never ending though, so we left after about 1 hour. We headed into the desert to camp. 24th Dec We drove south toward Kerma and found a lovely spot in the desert to spend Christmas. We went down to the Nile for a bit of a swim and some birding and got back to camp. While the boys were making an oven out of the flat rock. The girls were preparing something for dinner. We were joined by two overlanding families and they brought with them the two cyclists, Stephano and Adrian. We had a lovely dinner of baked bread, roast chicken and salad. We even had a Christmas tree made by Lawrence and Brigitte’s children. We stayed up until midnight with the Swiss couples and swopped gifts then. Roger and Marina bought us a lovely MacDonald’s towel. The very same one that Neil wanted Aswan, or rather tried to steal in Aswan. We gave Roger the fossilised whale bone from The Valley of the Whales and to Marina we gave a pair of used binoculars. What a cool gift, we love the towel and we have good memories of MacDonald’s on our trip. 25th Dec We rose early to make pancakes for almost everyone. Unfortunately we could only just manage to get ourselves fed on the pancakes. Neil tried to fill the car with diesel from the jerry cans and I tried to help, but not before I spilled in excess of 2 litres all over my trousers. Word of warning to all travellers….GET AN AUXILLARY FUEL TANK… Jerry cans are ridiculous and hard work. With my foul mood set for the day, we headed back to our previous campsite in search of Neil’s rugby ball. We realised that we left it there the previous evening, but worse was that the campsite was 150km back. Well we made a day of it. We found the ball, headed to the Nile for a swim and filled our water tanks. Then we went to the market and stocked up on some greens. We drove back into the camp at nightfall to find the families and cyclists had left. It was so quite compared to the festive feel of the previous evening. At least the kids had left us a pathway system and an extra oven built of rocks that they had built the previous evening. We were wondering what they could build if they had a week. Maybe some houses and a skyscraper. 26th Dec We woke this morning and got set to drive for Nuri Merowe. We found the small pyramids there. We were joined by the Belgian and French families who promptly decided to climb the pyramids. That isn’t something Neil and I like to do, but each to their own. We believe in the preservation of these archaeological sites for future generations. The police arrived shortly afterward and politely told us to leave. We drove around the site to camp, but were once again chased away or rather told to go and camp further into the desert. We later found out that the families were stuck in the sand and took an hour to free their trucks. We met a South African couple enroute. What a pleasure to hear the South African accent. Allard and Shelley were on their way up to the UK via Saudi Arabia. We spent the evening exchanging stories and route information. 27th Dec We had a good breakfast of eggs and bread. Packed up camp and said a final goodbye to the South Africans. After exchanging contact details we headed for Jebel Barkal. While the Swiss couples climbed the mountain. Neil and I reopened the tent as my glasses were still inside. I’m completely useless without my glasses. That didn’t take too long, so we went birding around the mountain. We took excellent pictures of Egyptian vulture and House Bunting. We headed for Meroe Royal City that afternoon, had lunch on the road and camped that evening in the dunes. We were visited by random sheepherders who seemed quite content to sit in the middle of our camp and watch us. Eventually I walked up to the guy and comically tried to explain to him that he should leave as the girls want to wash. He quickly understood and went on his way much to everyones amazement. Apparently the guy wouldn’t listen to anyone else. We spent the rest of the evening in relatively alone. The sheepherder resumed to watch us from a distance, but we carried on with dinner and setting up camp for the evening. 28th Dec Neil and I rose early to do some bird watching and watch the sunrise over the dunes. We drove towards the Meroe Pyramids. Upon arrival we decided it was too expensive. Instead we drove around the site to go and look for the campsite pointed out on the GPS. Turns out it was someone’s wild camp with a very awesome view of the pyramids. We took advantage of this with some photos and very politely ignored the tourist policeman that approached us as we were driving off. We met the Swiss couples for lunch around the other side of the pyramids. Once again we were joined by the travelling families. We spent a good hour exchanging stories and having lunch before heading for Khartoum. We arrived that evening at the Blue Nile Sailing Club. It was quite nice as far as the view went, but $15 is too expensive for a place with no hot water. We headed to the National Camping Residence where we didn’t mind paying 15SDG (5 for the car and 5 pp). We met a father/son pair who had to get their Ethiopian visas the next day. We were relieve that we wouldn’t be the only ones needing to slog it at the embassy the next day. 29th Dec We rose really early and packed up the tent. We drove to the Ethiopian embassy only to find out that the GPS point was incorrect. Something told me that we didn’t need to go far to the new site as the physical address mentioned something in the way of the embassy being near the graveyard. We drove around the block or rather the graveyard. Neil decided it was best to ask the traffic policeman we had just passed. Wow, what a brilliant idea! He grabbed the pen and paper, jumped out the car. With a slightly bemused look on his face, the policeman gently led Neil with a hand on his back exactly 10m to an entrance of the building he was standing in front of. Wow we were the first people there for visas and the Belgian father and son were right behind us. This didn’t help as Africans don’t believe in lines and simply stood in front of the door the whole time. The actual application process was pretty painless and $20 each later we were finished with instructions to return the next morning to collect. We only opted for the 2 month single entry and the multi entry is $30. Americans pay more though, well at this office anyway. The rest of the day we spent at the Steers in Khartoum and at the Afra Mall. We ate takeaway the whole day, but felt we deserved not to cook and toil any further. You learn to appreciate shopping centres and their coffee shops while travelling. 30th Dec We were off to get our visas in a jiffy. After which we filled our tanks and headed to the Afra Shopping Mall to meet up with Roger and Marina. We tried to contact the South African Embassy in Ethiopia. Can I just say that I spoke to the most unprofessional person over the phone. I’ve only ever had one good experience with a South African Embassy and that was in Syria. So honest and professional. The same can’t be said for the Embassy in Khartoum or Ethiopia or Egypt for that matter. It’s like only one person can ever do the official letters and everyone else is just too lazy or has an ‘it’s not my job’ attitude. How pathetic was the Khartoum Embassy you ask? Well they didn’t even have the contact details for the SA Embassy in Ethiopia for us. These officials always seem to be on lunch or at breakfast. My rant doesn’t end here… Appalling service from embassies, you should be ashamed of yourselves. Represent your country for crying out loud!!! I’ve experience less frustration at the Egyptian, Sudanese and Ethiopian Embassy together. We won’t admit to what we had to resort to get this letter. Otherwise we stocked up on water and headed for Dinder National Park. Adrian and Corine had driven ahead of us, so we met up with them at a really cool little spot in the bush. Neil and I spent the rest of the evening doing some much needed birding. 31st Dec We arrived in Dinder. After getting a little lost we stopped and asked some official looking people where we could find the National Parks Office. They were so surprised to see us that they were hugging the boys in welcome and offering some awesomely cold water around. I drank it with much gusto and so did Neil. We ended up following one of the locals to the office. What an amazing office these guys had. Ceiling fans and lush furniture, we felt we could sleep right there with no problem. Well after lots of what looked like serious administration we eventually got around to asking the price. Can you believe our complete disbelief when the captain rolled off a cool $100 each per day. Choked, gasp, splatter…!!! Thank you we’ll skip Dinder. It doesn’t even have lions and the Buffalo are kept in an encampment. After much negotiation, our guide said that the price could be brought down once we arrived at the park. Well six hours one badly scratched car and no working headlights later we were at the camp. Don’t get us wrong, the birdlife in the place is amazing, but nothing you couldn’t get anywhere else for any cost at all. The officials couldn’t get the price down enough for our liking so we gave them a number to ponder upon and had dinner in the meantime. After dinner they returned with $50 for all, but we could just stay the night. They couldn’t understand that we didn’t want the use of the rooms, just the showers and we would sleep in our tents. We were quite happy with the price thinking we would just take our time driving out the next day. Unfortunately for the officials and workers there Neil was quite revved up by the day’s events. Marina and Francis went to shower, but returned with the story of some worker asking for baksheesh before they could enter the showers. Oh boy, that was it for Neil. He lost the plot completely. We drove out of there in a massive convoy leaving our guide, John, behind. Apparently he was crying and begging for us to stay. I don’t think he understood what happened. Shame poor guy. Six hours away from home right on New Years Eve. It was really mean of us, but we’d had enough. Roger and Marina felt really upset that we left John behind, but he wouldn’t get in the car and we couldn’t be persuaded to stay for anything. Bunda bashing our way out of the park we stopped just outside to wish each other Happy New Year. Before long someone came running down the path with torchlight. Serves us right to stop just outside the park. Oh well, we raced further with flickering spotlights, seems they were on the way out as well. We stopped to camp a ways outside the park grounds.

The Wadi we had discovered the previous evening turned out to be a real gem. It was wide and shady with towering cliffs to either side of our camp spot. We had decided that car maintenance would be the order of the day. This entailed n oil and filter change for e and an oil change for Roger. For some tie I had been feeling a strange vibration from the front right wheel, the one I had changed in Syria. Si I checked the wheel bearing. It was fortunate that I checked as one of the wheel nuts had come off as well. Luckily I had all the parts and tools to tighten and wheel bearing and replace the wheel nut. With our mechanics completed we decided to do a bit of exploring. This wasn’t as much fun as we had first thought so we soon turned back. If only we knew then that in ten days tie we would be going up that exact same Wadi on our way to St Katherine. Anyway we turned the vehicles around and headed for Dahab. It was a three hour drive which saw us get there near dusk. Luckily it was not hard for us to find another great little camping spot. This happened to be right on the beach with the full moon reflecting off the calm Red Sea. We even had a camel walk right past tents while we were preparing one of our favourite meals of aubergine and tomatoes… Yumm!!! Having sampled the delights that the underwater world has to offer when we went snorkeling in Aquaba, Jordan. We decided to take the plunge and do our PADI Open Water Dive Course. Of course we were up and about long before the local inhabitants of the little village, now a diving resort had come to life. So we did a quick biscuit and snack stock up and went looking for a campsite that offered both electricity and water. After driving around for a while we came across Dahab Divers Club. It was just in there grounds, but there was enough space for both us and the Swiss and plenty of space to spare, what made it better was the fact that they supplied us with electricity and cleaned out one of the bathroom/shower facilities for our personal use. All this for only thirty Egyptian pounds per car per night. Result!! With accommodation sorted. We headed towards one of the biggest diving outfits in Dahab, Planet Divers. We confirmed the price (211 Euros per person including a 10% discount four all four of us). We were well set on the path to becoming open water divers. Great Excite!! By this time it was getting on in the day and as there was no MacDonald in Dahab we decided to sample they local cuisine. This took the form of a fresh fish restaurant. The prices were very reasonable and the quantity and quality was great. For the duration of our stay in Dahab I always had to use the loo at about 1am in the morning. We put this down to the water which was slightly salty in taste. The water in Dahab is easily avoided as almost every shop sells the stuff for pretty reasonable price. Our instructor was Agmed Mimi, who we called Mimi because we could. He was really well spoken and professional. I did however manage to give him all his days. The naughty school boy in me came out and I could not help teasing and taunting him at every opening. He was a good sport and I at least had a great tie being a pupil again. With the prep talk completed it was time to get our diving gear. For those of you that have not yet tried it. Getting into a wetsuit is no easy matter. Especially not if you attempt to put your leg down the arm pipe. I had actually managed to get both my legs into the suit and about to put my arms through only to find that I had the suit on the wrong way round. Yup, I’m an idiot! Not to worry a half hour later with much jumping around and tugging at the gear. I was finally kitted out and ready to go. Now at least we looked the part. All we had to do was prepare our equipment and go to the water for our maiden dive. It was at this stage that Helena, a lady from Finland, joined our group. Boy, was she a strange one. From the off she was arguing with Mimi or simply refusing to follow instructions. Normally this would be nothing more than a nuisance, but if you are in an alien environment, this kind of environment could be life threatening. Being underwater truly is as surreal as they say. We went through a host of basic exercises including standing on our knees and removing water from your goggles underwater. It is simply that fact that you are breathing underwater that blows ones mind. We spent the better part of 3 hours in the water thanks to our strange friend. It was all good though and we were having fun. With our diving completed we were pretty bushed and all we had strength for was to head to the ‘local MacDonald’ and head for our tents to sleep. We were pleasantly surprised that the little corner restaurant served great food at a reasonable price. We all enjoyed our meals and retired early to our beds. Up at 7am and at Planet Divers at 8:15 to start our second day of diving. We hadn’t finished all our exercises from the previous day as well as some theory. We had been slightly naughty and not finished the allocated reading for the day. No worries, as we were bound to have everything done by lunchtime, or so we had hoped. It was fundamentally important to me that we finished early that day as it was Saturday and the Bokke game was showing at the local English pub. As far as the diving went I was not having a great time. My sinuses were blocked as a result of a cold. Each time I tried the dive descent it was accompanied by excruciating pain. Not fun at all. Taking your mask off underwater isn’t a great sensation either. Nevertheless, we did manage to complete our allocated exercises and we were sitting in the bar with a cold beer each, just in time for kick off. I’m pleased to report that the Bokke did manage to trounce England at Twickenham. It was the third day of our four day course. Silvie and I had stayed up past 12 to catch up on our reading. Ensuring that we had plenty of questions for Mimi. It was actually good fun burning the midnight oil with cram sessions. It reminded me of my university days. Waking up at 7:30am wasn’t as easy this time around. We were on our own that day as our friendly Finnish friend did not join us. The prospect of a productive day was quite exciting. We were set and in the water by 9:30am. Silvie and I had the buddy check down to a T. BARWF is the acronym all the way. On the way down to 12m, I was stuck at 3m once again due to my ear pain. It was getting a bit frustrating at this point. Luckily Mimi sorted me out with some awesome eardrops and I was on my way a little easier this time. When we got back, we completed a few quizzes and a welcome early end to the day. This gave us the opportunity to go fishing in the Red Sea. We hired a boat to take us out passed the corals. Our fishing guide was in fact a local dentist with a passion for fishing. As far as the fishing went we lost more sinkers then catching fish. In the end I caught a nice sized spotted cod, while Roger managed 2 little gropers. Back at camp we cooked our catch over an open fire. Bringing to an end an altogether lovely day. We completed our diving course on the fourth day and the next day we were given the opportunity to test our new found underwater freedom. The obvious choice when diving in Dahab is The Blue Hole. We were there at the same time as a lady from Poland who was attempting the female record of 164m. This is apparently the place for diving record attempts, but not what it is infamous for. Once you have your diving gear on you walk past the memorial rock covered in eulogies for Blue Hole victims. The latest victim was in May 2009. Our experience of the place was not dramatic at all. You are closely observed at all times. Technically we couldn’t dive down through the blue hoe as it’s located about 62m deep. You dive down what looks like an open sided mine shaft to about 18 then follow the length of the reef wall for about half an hour then ascend up over the reef wall into the Blue Hole exit. If you have the necessary qualification you can dive to 62m and follow the passage which flows directly to the exit and not up over the reef wall. We spent the rest of the afternoon snorkeling the reef, which was an excellent experience just by itself. We feel that snorkeling is just as rewarding an experience and takes less effort than diving. Both have their risks though. You are ore likely to get attacked by a shark while snorkeling than diving, but diving allows for a lot more complications regarding air and buoyancy. The next day we said goodbye to Dahab and drove down to Sharm El Sheik. We stopped at the MacDonald and decided that this was not the place for us. I think we were spoilt by Dahab. Sharm El Sheik was a much more mainstream tourist destination whereas Dahab was perfect for travellers. We really felt the difference in the definition of these two groups. Travelers blend in ore with the local way of life and tourist go in search of the creature comforts of home away from home. We finished our MacDonald and returned the way we had come in search of the wadi we had to drive through to get to St Katherine monastery. We ended up driving back past Dahab and realised that it was the very same Ras Abu Wadi we had camped in on our first night in Egypt. That had to be the longest detour anyone has taken for MacDonald in history. It was a 120km round trip, but it was good to be back in that Wadi. So quiet and peaceful. The stars were bright and the moon new. This made for excellent stargazing and we fell asleep to the sounds of the ‘Heidi’ thee tune which I played for Roger and marina. They live on a mountain called the Bell Berg in Switzerland and found the song quite fitting. We drove to St Katherine’s monastery the very next day. Yes we drove through the wadi which is actually a very good dirt track past numerous cliffs and oasis. We were stopped by some opportunistic locals who we thought were trying to tell us that something was wrong with the car. At first there were two on a motorbike, one of which was eager to shake our hands. Next he asked for our passports. Now this guy had the mankiest hands ever and at least four rotten teeth. There was no way he was an official. A second motorbike pulled up in front of us. Unfortunately for these guys we weren’t in the mood for their fun and games and very politely nudged our car into his motorbike and past the while they were protesting. A very weak attempt at playing official. Well we were thankful that this was our only incident as far as fake officials go. Driving on a little further we came across a spring and helped ourselves to 5 litres of really good water. We wild camped that evening again in the wadi just before reaching St Katherine. The next day we drove into St Katherine. We stocked up on supplies and went to the monastery. This had to be the touristiest thing we had done in a while. We squashed into the monastery along with bus loads of tourist. I felt like tuna in a can, but it was worth it. This was still a functioning monastery so they had to get the crowds in and out within 3 hours. Now there are no cameras allowed, but I managed to get a video of us standing in the chapel. How sneaky am I? After this we headed up Mount Sinai by ourselves, but decided that it would be safer to take the compulsory guide in case we ran into any officials. We had lunch and arranged for the guide. Our walk was really good until the guide tried to bribe us that it would be more money as we had walked up the steps and not the camel path. We argued with the guy threatening him with police and such. Cheeky bugger will think twice before he tries to bribe someone again. We made it up the 3700+ steps just in time for sunset. It felt really good on top of the world for the next half hour before we started descending in the dark. We had the compulsory torches with us and we walked down the camel track. Marina rode a camel as her knee wasn’t holding up to well after the steps. The descent was quite uneventful as far as bribery went and or guide actually started being a little more informative and friendly. We knew he was working for the tip which we felt obliged to give him after a serious talking too. That evening we drove back into the wadi where we camped for a second night. The next day we made a beeline for Cairo. We drove almost the whole day and managed a late lunch just on the other side of the Suez Canal. We thought to go and look at the canal, but couldn’t see how we could get close without running into the military. We arrived late that night at Salaam camping. Wow, welcome to Africa. The driving skills degraded by about 200%, but we were soon hooting and swerving along with the best of them. Fun! We spent a fruitless 3 days in Cairo trying to get our Sudanese visa. Roger and marina got theirs in 2 days. We couldn’t even get the letter of introduction from our less than useless embassy in 2 days. After a 3 day mission with our embassy we decided to get our visa in Aswan, which issued same day visas. We instead enjoyed the souls of Cairo, visited the pyramids of Giza and the Cairo museum. We even ventured out onto the subway system which was cheaper than taxis and not really scary at all. We only had two weeks left in Egypt and thought that the Western Desert and Luxor were better places to spend our time. We set off for the Western Desert and wild camped on the shores of Lake Qarun. We woke up to fishermen passing us on the way to their daily trawl. One of them tried to scare us with stories of bandits and such, but we weren’t phased. He was most probably trying to get a stint as our guide. Sorry brother, no stupid tourist here. We drove on to wadi Al-Hitan. Better known as Valley of Whales. Wow, what a pleasant surprise. We visited the protectorate and were delighted by the hundreds of whale skeletons untouched and on display in the original archeological graves. I would recommend this place for anyone who has an interest in the evolutionary world to pay this site a visit. The whole area is covered in ‘coins of the desert’. These were formed by microscopic crustaceans which have accumulated over millions of years to form these tiny round discs. We wild camped that evening just outside the protectorate. We found a whale bone and a shark type tooth while digging a hole to burn rubbish. We also found a travelers message box nestled in a crack in a cliff rock from 2004. Now that was amazing. We left a message and an item from our pocket for the next traveler to find. Inside the box was a postcard, a toy soldier and a sweet wrapper. The last message was from Italians earlier in 2010 and we were only the 12th group of people to find the box. We felt quite privileged to have found the time capsule. Please leave us a message if you found the box as well. The next few days we meandered through the black desert and the white desert. We took in the sights of Cristal Mountain and the mushroom-like rock formations. The Western Desert circuit was one of the highlights of Egypt. We were only followed once by officials. I think this may have been a miscommunication on our part as we stopped at one of the checkpoints to ask for directions to one of the attractions. I believe they thought we were asking for an armed escort. Oh well, they turned out to be good company and one of them was even a Christian guy. We drove out of the Western Desert region with fond memories of dune driving, fossils and amazing natural beauty. Now Luxor was a real diamond in the rough. Lovely tree lined avenues next to the Nile River. We camped in the grounds of a hotel and went in search of food that evening. Note to everyone, eat at the hotel. It doesn’t get better in town. Luxor is synonymous with Egyptian ruins and ancient history. No place more so than the Valley of the Kings. It was our objective to go and view this astounding valley of tombs followed by a foray into some of the other temples and relics. Foremost was the two huge monuments called The Colossus. In the Valley the tombs were truly breathtaking. One of the tombs we went into was 160m long. The 120EP entry fee allows you access to 3 tombs. We were fortunate to meet a guide at the entrance who advised us on the best ones open at the time. We chose tombs 34, 8 and 16. Number 34 was by far the most spectacular. It had 4000 year old murals with 3 near perfect sarcophagi. It almost baffles the mind to think how the Egyptians went about making these tombs. With the tour of the tombs completed. It was back to Luxor where our next bit of adventure awaited. What had happened was that Roger and marina had met the postmaster earlier that day. He had invited all of us to have dinner at his house. It was under the pretence that he had a letter from Germany that he would like Roger and marina to translate. He also wanted us to experience local Egyptian life. The dinner at his house on Television Street, started out pleasantly enough. We had traditional food and fanta to wash it down. However, this was all an elaborate ploy by the guy for us to view his private collection of ancient Egyptian artifacts. He had everything from Roman coins to Horuses and Scarabs carved from Turquoise. It took a while for him to accommodate our meager overlander’s budget. In the end we picked up some great bargains, but we still left with a funny taste in the mouth. Once our black market dealings were completed and we were safely back in camp. We decided that discretion is the better part of valour. Time was marching far too quickly for us. It was time for us to move onto Aswan to arrange our Sudanese visas. We departed early the next morning and were in Aswan by 11am. Now for those of you contemplating getting you Sudanese visa in Aswan. I can certainly advise it. The entire process took 1:15 minutes with afternoon prayers included. The only bad part of it was the $100 each for the visa. With visa in hand it was time to find a camp for the night. Luckily the desert surrounds Aswan so locating a suitably isolated spot was no trouble at all. It was only the next morning that we had a spot of bother. The thing is that I’m still not proficient in sand driving resulting in us getting stuck not 20 metres from the new highway. Much to the amusement of the truck drivers passing by. With 2 hours of digging a cursing we were still no closer to getting out of the sand. Thoroughly fed up at this point, Silvie proposed that we build our own road. We did this with the flat rocks lying nearby. It was not the m1, but it sure as hell got us out of the blasted sand. Just another day in the Rautenbach camp. For the remainder of our stay in Aswan. We resided at Adams Home. We befriended the owner and even indulged in a bit of fishing. The local MacDonald (the real macdonald this time) was frequented by us on several occasions. Buying the ferry tickets and making our arrangement to depart from Egypt was a fairly simple affair. Mr. Salah has the whole process down to a T. Everything that is apart from a disgruntled South African (moi) having a right go at him at the port. The reason I was slightly unhappy was that I had overheard that some scoundrel had been demanding baksheesh from Virginia (Chamaco) to open the doors of the upper deck. This got my blood boiling and I wanted it sorted out sharpish. The first person I came across was the friendly Mr. Salah. He unfortunately got the sharp end of my Lariam fuelled temper. Poor guy! Luckily he never followed through on his threat to abandon our cars at the Aswan port. We both realised that the solution would not be found so made a truce. After 8 hours of border bureaucracy we were finally aboard the infamous Aswan-Wadi Halfa ferry. Waving farewell to Egypt where we had spent a magical month filled with wonder and adventure. We did everything from diving to collecting fossils along with getting stuck in the sand and buying ancient relics. It was a truly amazing experience and we will always think back on Egypt with fond memories.

It is funny how perception can influence ones perception of a place. With out a doubt Syria left a sour taste in our mouths. It just left us with a feeling of disappointment. Jordan on the other hand started on precisely the right foot. You cannot believe what a difference a smile from a friendly official makes. The border crossing was dream. We had to pay a bit. For instance the car insurance for a month is 36JD and to stamp the Carnet costs 20JD, but that’s not so bad. The best part of the border crossing was the fact that as South Africans we do not need visas to enter The Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan. Great success!

Once through the border it was our mission to find camping. This turned out to be a mini adventure by itself. As luck would have it our visit to the Kingdom coincided with their local elections. It probably has not been an issue at all if not for the fact that our GPS kept taking us through the heart of public gatherings. Silvie was driving and she does not seem to slow for people. It got me worried but probably not as much as the people who had to dive out of the way. Luckily we managed to avoid most of the happy voters. Having dealt with them our GPS decided to keep making our lives interesting. It sent us down one of the craziest little mountain roads we have come across thus far. The worst moment was when we turned the umpteenth switchback only to almost connect with an overloaded taxi coming in the opposite direction. To demonstrate just how close things were. The taxi that had been hearing up the hill had to swerve completely off the road. I suppose the prospect of connecting with our massive bull bar was not something he was prepared to do. We drove considerably slower after that. The reason we were even on that road was that we were looking for a camping spot in the Dibben Forest Reserve. We never did find the spot that the GPS indicated, but we did manage to find the forest reserve’s headquarters. This was an excellent find as the guy who was working there allowed us to camp behind the main building for free.   It worked out really well. The next morning we had a brief walk in the reserve, we didn’t see much so decided to head out for a day of exploring.

Our first point of call was the Baptism Site of Jesus. At first we were annoyed that they only way that you can view the site is by paying 7JD each for a shuttle bus ride to the place. However, things turned out well as guide had studied Biblical history and was shared a wealth of information to us. He even went as far as to dray maps in the sand to illustrate the difference between modern day maps and that of the Bible period. He also explained at length the various reasons why this site specifically is accepted to be the Baptism Site of Jesus. Another one of the facts he explained to us was the origin of the river Jordan’s name. Apparently the word Jordan is derived from an Aramaic meaning steep slope. The reason this word was given to the Jordan is because of the river’s geographical characteristics. The river drops from its origin at 3000 meters above sea level to 400 meters below sea level in under 300km. Quite amazing! Interesting facts aside, as a Christian, one cannot help but feel awed by the whole experience. To think that our Lord Jesus Christ, had walked in virtually the same place as you. I now have a better understanding of just why the people in this region are so protective of this part of the world.

Once we had visited the baptism site and taken a picture of the muddy and dwindling Jordan River, we headed for Mt. Nebo. This was the where Moses was shown the Promised Land, but was told he would not enter it. When we told our guide where were heading he made the comment: “Not even he could get in without a visa”. This made me feel a little better about the Syrian visa episode at least. When we got to the mountain we had to fork out some more cash. What made it worse is that when we eventually reached the exact spot that looks out over the Jordan Valley our camera battery decided to die. Oh well, at least we got to see it. There is a massive movement in this area to build new churches in both places. We were told that they want to make the Christian Pilgrimage path far more accessible. Lets hope they are not just doing it for financial gain, but on behalf of Christians everywhere. It waits to be seen.

With our religious sightseeing done, it was off to do the compulsory swim in the Dead Sea. Our first attempt at it was next to the Holliday in. It looked like a massive building site, so we assumed that they wouldn’t mind if we just drove up to the water and had a quick splash. We were mistaken. It wasn’t two minutes before a security guy came sauntering down to tell us that this place is “out of bounds”. Unfortunately for him it was a long dusty road back to his post. So we made sure he ate a lot of dust before we left. I mean a 3 tonne Land Cruiser can through up a bit of it when pressure is applied to the right pedal. I feel a little bad about it now though. Anyway the Dead Sea is a pretty big place so before long we came upon the perfect spot. Once again our superior clearance allowed us to venture very close to the water. We jumped out and went straight to the water. Wow! As many photos as you see and as often as people describe it. Floating in the Dead Sea is completely unreal. It is as easy to submerge yourself as it is to float on it. At first Silvie was just standing and looking at me, but it wasn’t long before she just couldn’t resist the temptation of the water any longer. Not knowing if the water is caustic or if it’s bad for you we soon got out. We were also just a bit nervous about being caught. The priority for us then was to get ourselves free of the salt, as you could imagine, so we put our solar shower on the roof and had a great shower. Silvie recons we didn’t even need soup as the salt would have killed all the bacteria on our skins. I tend to agree with her.

Earlier that day we had phoned our Swiss friends to tell them we would meet them somewhere near the Dead Sea. Unfortunately our Phone decided to give up the ghost, well at least our Syrian sim card did, and you couldn’t expect anything less really! Anyway we were stranded without a means to make or receive calls. So we decided to drive on South with the hope of meeting up with Roger and Marina at a later stage. We had driven approximately 100km and had just pulled up to make supper when a text with their coordinates arrived. It didn’t take much deliberating before we decided to pack our stuff and go and find our friends. This ended up being quite an adventure. Not only was it more than an hours drive, but when we got to near the coordinates we discovered that the point that they had given us was halfway up a mountain and there was no direct route from the bottom. We reasoned that they must have come towards the Dead Sea from the other direction so we decided to drive around to the other side of the mountain. Well to put it short. After four hours of driving some of the hairiest 4×4 roads and obstacles we never got within 1km of the said coordinates. It later transpired that these were not the right coordinates. It didn’t really matter. We had a bit of fun and we ended up setting up camp in a gorgeous spot on top of a mountain overlooking the Dead Sea.

The next morning saw us doing a bit of compulsory bird watching on our way back to the main road leading south past the Dead Sea.  So we were back on the road heading back feeling quite despondent after not finding our friends. You could imagine our delight when we recognised the distinct shape of their Land Rover, with its spotlights in front and the tent on the top, coming in the opposite direction. With flashing headlights and screaming tyres we pulled of to the side of the road. It was such a good feeling at finally finding them. It turns out they had been up most of the night worrying about what had happened to us. With greetings completed we headed for the Dead Sea’s very own hot springs. Man alive! They are not kidding when they say “hot springs” the temperature of the water ranges between 45˚C and 60˚C. I mean my bathwater isn’t even that hot. What makes it even stranger is that these hot springs come in the form of a massive waterfall. It is an odd sensation. Your mind is expecting the water that is cascading over the rocks to be cool and refreshing. Instead you are pelted by searing drops of water that almost turn to steam on impact with your flesh. However, you soon get use to it and it becomes quite relaxing. For a time at least, for you can only stay in nearly boiling water for so long. If only they had a cold swimming pool that could offer you the opportunity to recover from the heat. Anyway we had to make the most of it seeing as we had to pay 15 JD per person to get in. For the novelty, I suppose it is worth the money. Besides we had found our friends and we had got the opportunity to fill all our water tanks and do dishes.

Did I mention that these hot springs are located at the bottom of a valley? In fact they say that the bottom of this particular valley is 100m below sea level. Our GPS said differently, but that did not change the fact that getting to and fro from this place was hell on poor Big Red. To put it this way, on the way down our brakes smelt if they we about to catch fire and to get back to the to, all we could do was floor it in second. Very scary!

Once we had reached the top Roger and Marina lead us to the place they had camped the previous evening. It truly was a magnificent spot overlooking the Dead Sea. We soon had the tents up and busied ourselves with making supper. More importantly we were able to make a bon fire with wood we had collected at the Ma In hot spring. What a treat, not only did our Swiss friends make the best supper, but they even spoilt us with their famous “chocolate bananas”. Molten Swiss chocolate inside a roasted banana was always gong to be spectacular. While camping another overlanding family joined us. They are Peter, Helena and their son Andre. They are also heading for South Africa on roughly the same route as us.

The next day we decided to show Roger and Marina the spot we had swam in the Dead Sea. This time we were far more relaxed and really took our time to enjoy the experience. It was so strange to try and stand upright in the water. No matter what you feet keep bobbing upward. Altogether it was a very enjoyable experience. We then had a solar bag shower and headed for the Majib Nature reserve. Unfortunately, as with all the other sites in Jordan they ask extortionate entry fees. So we decided not to enter the canyon. However it was here at the reserve that we met a French couple who directed us to an incredible canyon that is only 15 minutes drive down the road, more importantly it is absolutely free to get inside it. This same couple also informed us of the ridiculous prices the Jordanians are asking to enter Petra. It is 50 JD per person for one day, 55JD for two and 60JD. What they had done to get around this obstacle was to by a three day ticket go in for two days and then sell the ticket on the third. If you want to save money, you sometimes have to be ‘creative’.

We did find the canyon the people had told us about. It was just past the Potash factories. The entrance is opposite the big white memorial site. It had to be one of the most magnificent things we had witnessed thus far on our journey. It is a narrow canyon, with walls that go up about 100m to either side. The sensation is completely breathtaking. What made it even better is the fact that we were able to drive about 2km into the canyon, in order to camp right in the heart of this incredible place. We were able to make diner and then eat it beside our roaring camp fire. Waking up the next morning with the soaring Wadi walls to either side was something that words simply cannot describe. A definite highlight in the trip!

Off to Petra to face those crazy prices. Well in the end it turned out that we are also capable of doing some ‘creative thinking’ of our selves. It came about as follows. While we were at the entrance to Petra we ran into Peter and Helena. We stood around discussing the diabolical prices, when we struck upon an idea. We were three couples, so it would not be too difficult to by two three day tickets and then share the cost among the 6 of us. Each couple would go on one of the separate days. This worked out well as 20JD per person is considerably cheaper than 50JD per person. I was a little apprehensive about being asked for ID because the tickets have names on them. It turned out that they don’t ask at the gate and even if they did all you have to do is say you left your ID at the hotel. To be honest the place is so busy I doubt that would ever be a problem. While in Wadi Moussa, the town nearest to Petra, we stayed in the grounds of the Valentine Inn. It was cheap enough and they offer a buffet for only 5JD.  Just don’t try and make a fire in their grounds. The owner definitely takes an exception to this. The first day, while Peter and his family went into Petra we spent the day surfing the web and playing cards with Roger and Marina. The next day, while roger and Marina went to see Petra; we went in search of a new gas bottle as well as Dana Nature Reserve. We now have a massive 25kg gas bottle strapped down in the back of the truck, but we still have not seen the reserve. Go figure.

So at last our turn to see the set for Indiana Jones had arrived. They are amazing to behold and the place is seeped in history, but I am not sure if I would be willing to pay 50JD to see it. In Petra there are two major sites. The first is the same one everyone associates Petra with. The one with the massive red pillars carved out of the rock and the other is the Monastery, which is located at the top of one of the mountains there. We entered the site around 6:30. We knew the place would be inundated with tourists before long so we made a mission to get to the Monetary ASAP.  We managed to make it to the top before 8:00. We felt pretty proud of ourselves. The only problem is that we were so exhausted we didn’t feel like exploring much after that. Make no mistake it is a place we will never forget, but 6 hours of walking around was enough for us. So by 12:30 we were once again on the road, this time heading for Wadi Rumm.

Originally we had decided to meet up with our Swiss friends only the following day. We had thought that it would take us at least the entire day to explore Petra. It didn’t so we were ahead of schedule. When we arrived in Wadi Rumm there was a campsite charging 8JD per person. We would have paid it but there was no electricity, so we bid them a friendly goodbye. On exiting the campgrounds we ran into Sim and the girls. We exchanged hugs and stories and we told them that we were not terribly impressed by the campsite (Bate Ali) and that they should try somewhere else. We were in the process of doing this ourselves when came up to the gates leading into Wadi Rumm reserve. What do you know? Here too they are asking exorbitant prices to enter the desert. This to me was the final straw and I told the official as much. I was determined to head straight to Aqaba and get the next ferry to Egypt. Fortunately for the second time on the trip we encountered our Swiss friends coming in the opposite direction. We were so glad to see them. Again some ‘creative thinking’ was applied. We decided to simply find a different way into the desert. It wasn’t terribly difficult. I mean it is a massive expanse of red sand and mountains.  So instead of paying 30JD for us and the car we were in the desert for free!

Wadi Rumm was another one of those places you dream about when you are envisioning an overland journey. The sand is a brilliant red and the sandstone mountains have been so beautifully shaped over the millennia that it makes describing their wonder simply impossible. Driving in the desert was awesome. We even had to let the tyres down for the first time. At first I was struggling, but by the third day I felt far more confident. Silvie never had any trouble driving in the sand. Her foot is decidedly heavier than mine. This seems to be a distinct advantage when you are driving in thick sand.

Roger and Marina, being Swiss, love climbing. So on our first morning in Wadi Rum we decided to climb one of the beautiful rock outcrops that we camped next to. Now for those of you that do not know Silvie that well, she has a serious fear of heights! So I was pretty amazed to find that she was scaling this mountain with us. Well she did up to the point where she looked down for the first time. It was tickets after that. Never mind, she still did pretty well all things considered. As for myself and the Swiss managed to traverse the rest of the outcrop pretty much without hindrance. That is apart for the time when one of my footholds crumbled, causing an emergency shorts swap at the car. The view of Wadi Rumm was breathtaking!

We stopped again for lunch and did some more climbing as well as had a spot of something to eat. It was such a great experience sitting in the shadow of a massive red sandstone outcrop with the sand stretched out before us. The whole time we were keeping an eye on the GPS making sure we stay well clear of the check points and gates. It seemed to work really well and we spent the day riding around without anybody asking us for a permit.

With the evening fast approaching we drove up to the largest sand dune we could find. We had to take pictures of course. Red dunes and a blue sky do make an amazing backdrop for photos. As you could imagine, we were not the only people that thought that the dune makes an idyllic spot. This must be the busiest dune in the region. It happened to be fantastic! Desert T.V. watching the tourists come and go as well as the antics of the crazy desert guides. It all culminated in Roger having to winch one of those cowboys out of the sand. I thought his winch was going to tear the guy’s truck in half. But the funniest part of the day had to be when Silvie decided to go for a shower at the precise moment twenty odd tourists came to see the sun set over the dune. The sheer panic in Sivie’s voice made me almost we myself with laughter. They never saw anything, but that did not stop Silvie from feeling very exposed. Eventually she did get clean. Altogether it was a highly enjoyable evening drinking beer and cooking over an open fire.

The next morning, after breakfast we decided to make our way towards Aqaba. This turned out to be quite the adventure. The track out of Wadi Rum is fairly simple to follow. It is used often so is very clear. The issue arrived at the point where we had to decide to go the ‘scenic’ route or head straight for the highway. Guess which way we decided to go? At first it seemed to be just a rough track, following the power lines towards Aqaba. However, the track leads to a very nice little tar road. This should have got the alarm bells going. It didn’t, so off we went on our merry way. About 20km down the road we drove past a military. He was off to the side and the guy in the vehicle looked half asleep. So when he waved at us I decided to just drive on. Not such a bright move on my part. A short while later that same vehicle came screaming past us at a rate of knots. There was a soldier on the roof with a massive automatic weapon trained on us. I can only imagine what the poor Swiss were thinking. I mean I have experience with this kind of thing. You would have thought I would have learnt my lesson in Turkey about staying well away from military zones near borders. But that’s me. I’m not what you would call a fast learner. So after handing over our passports we were taken by military convoy to the headquarters. Definitely not good times! In the end we just had to explain who we are and where were going. I had to play the stupid tourist card again. Luckily it comes easily to me and in the end we were given sweets (seeing that it was a festive holiday) and sent on our way. We only lost a couple of hours and sweated a couple of bullets. A story to entertain the grandkids one day.

Finally we made it into Aqaba and into the campsite that we were recommended to go to. The place we stayed at was the Bedouin Moon. It’s an awesome little place with a swimming pool and comfy seats where you can put your feet up for a couple of days and catch up with the blog.  After settling in a bit and having a swim it was time to go into town and sample the real deal local McDonalds. What a treat! Aqaba is also perfect for stocking up on the essentials, i.e. Nutella, biscuits and beer. 

I have never been snorkelling before, so seeing the pristine coral reef right in front of our camp, was incredible to say the least. We had to go and do a bit of shopping about to get some good, cheap snorkelling gear. With the search we had stop for lunch, so of cause we had to frequent the local Pizza Hut. We are such cheats. So much for immersing ourselves in the local culture! Once we were back we went for a snorkel. I was dumbstruck by the abundance of life only mere feet beneath the surface of the sea. Snorkelling is something I definitely like. However, I doubt I will ever again have the opportunity to snorkel in a place where the water is as clear as it is in the Red Sea. That evening we smoked some hubbly bubbly and drank a couple of beers, very relaxing if I have to say so myself.

As much fun as we were having it was time for us to leave Jordan. So to do this we needed to buy ferry tickets to Nuweiba and get visas for Egypt. Finding the ticket office is a simple affair. It’s the first large building on the left hand side of the road past the first set of traffic lights coming into town.  At the time we paid 271 JD for two people and the car they print the ticket and tell you to be at the Ferry no later than 11 a.m.  The visa was just as easy an affair. We to the Egyptian embassy first thing in the morning and were then told to collect it the same day at 13:00, very civilised indeed.  To celebrate how easy everything went we naturally had to go and have some more local McDonalds. That evening we returned to Aqaba with the hope of watching the Springboks play. We did manage to find an English pub that showed the ruggas, unfortunately the only game we watched was New Zealand vs. France. It was an enjoyable game and a great little pub. We had decided that we would not be sleeping in the campground. What we did instead was to move to the front of the establishment, where there is a building sight and an easy enough place to set up camp for the evening. We had some wood and so decided to make some grub on the coals. It was amazing to fall asleep with the sound of the sea lapping against the shore.

Our last morning in Jordan was fairly straight forward. We woke early and went straight to the garage to fill up all our tanks. Little did we know that Egypt had the cheapest fuel in the world. Oh well, you win some you lose some. After this it was time to head for the ferry port and start the exit procedures.

Not sure if we did it correctly.  We bought car insurance, then had our Carnet stamped and then our visas checked and fill out the entry card. On a side note the official who handled our Carnet was the one to ask the all encompassing question which is a follows: “Your car, diesel or benzene?”  Of course ours is benzene… not! There isn’t a shred of evidence on either our V5/logbook (well actually it states ‘Heavy Oil’, but that could be anything) or Carnet to prove otherwise.  This little white lie would save us 150 Euros per week.  I suppose it helps that we entered through a relatively small border.  Of course this was all preceded by: “Welcome, welcome!”  Apparently Syria has only two border crossings with Jordan, so we plan to take the smaller one on our way out.  Once this was done an official came to pack out some goodies, which we were expected to pack back in.  Neil is ever so keen to oblige the officials, so I let him pack everything back into the car.  First impressions of Syria, the roads are really good, but once again not much can be expected of the drivers.  Luckily enough we managed to obey the first rule of overlanding, don’t drive at night.  Now Syria isn’t as full of camping places  as we’d hoped, so we took a chance and stopped at a large garage in the hope that we could camp there.  Well what do you know not only could we put up our tent there, but the owner even brought us some Dutch Import beers.  Neil was terribly impressed by this.  We had a lovely dinner of coffee and cookies as we were too scared to light the gas stove so near to the pumps.  After that we sat and drank our beers.  Can you imagine the disgust on Neil’s face when I finally told him that the beers were non-alcoholic beers.  Yup!  Exactly 0.0% alcohol.  Oh well at least we had another nights free and safe camping. 

Day 2 in Syria we headed into Aleppo.  Firstly we didn’t realise that the time zone had changed back to GMT+2.  So we were at the tourist office at about 6:45am.  Oh well, ever the optimist we set our watches and went for a walk in the city.  We had a lovely stroll and coffee in the botanical gardens watching early morning joggers of all shapes and sizes.  We sorted out an MTN phone card for which Neil had to sign a contract not only with ink, but they made him give his thumb print… Huh? Well at least we got to contact family and friends.  We eventually got the tourist office open at about 9am and made our way to the Aleppo Citadel.  Would you know it, as I walked in the official announced that the citadel was closed, yup it was Tuesday, who knew?  Whatever, we had our photos of the main stairway and the surrounds already.  Thank goodness we only paid for an hour parking.  Alas, we headed NW to do a round trip of the historical ruins.  These would include The Ein Darah Temple followed by St. Simeons Citadel.  We had lunch before walking up to the Temple as there were quite a few tourists there at that moment.  We chatted with the local guardian and fed his puppy ‘Rex’.  Syria, like Turkey, is full of dogs both wild and domestic.  We were charged a whole 150SP for both to see these ruins; luckily they were Syrian pounds, which are valued at about 65SP to the Euro.  St. Simeons was a delight for which we felt happy to pay 150SP each.  We spent over an hour there as the sun was setting giving the photos quite a dramatic effect.  After quite a successful site seeing day, we headed for our campsite in Dakkour.  Every person we passed in the little town waved and was shouting: “Welcome, welcome!”  They had obviously seen overlanders before and knew the proper greeting.  Upon arrival we were glad to see overlanders we met in Cappadocia.  A Canadian couple, Pat and Bill, are driving to Jordan to visit there grandchildren.  The camp owners wife, Christal, was a Belgian, so we could speak a little of the ‘Taal’ with her.  We set up camp and made a lovely lamb and tomato pot, followed by fruit sherbet tea, a lovely hot shower and we fell asleep to the sound of Terry Goodkind’s “Temple of the Wind”. 

The next morning we were woken up by the sound of the call to prayer.  We were convinced that the Mosque could not have been further than 50m from us.  Plus this prayer was being echoed by another Mosque not more than a half mile away.  That is something we have noticed.  There are about 3 mosques in every mile in populated areas.  Of course we had to head back to the mall we had spotted the previous day.  We wasted no time in indulging in our 2nd most favourite hobby that is shopping.  The equivalent of 70 Euros later not only had we stocked up on food, we also managed chocolate milk and a box of chocolates, but Neil had a new pair of jeans… Neil’s trousers are always splitting at the crotch for some reason.  I think it’s his big bum, but he begs to differ and insists that it’s not that part of his anatomy that is too big.  Hmmmm…  We spent a good hour afterward surfing the web at the coffee shop and enjoyed our first European style Late of our trip.  We even ran into Pat and Bill again.  The overlanding community is quite a small one, so it’s always nice to see a familiar face.  Eventually we vacated the shopping mall and headed towards the Euphrates River.  We’ve always known that the roads on our journey would be hazardous.  So we join in the throng of cars hooting and revving our way along the highway.  All until we were faced by a mad driver reversing diagonally across the highway.  I managed to check the inside of the car while Neil was hooting and swerving only to see that the car had no driver in it!  A quick look around and I saw the driver belting it from the other side of the highway in pursuit of his car.  We have never seen anything like it!  We felt like we were on a Hollywood action set.  All this made for interesting conversation when my Dad called from the UK.  Now that was a nice surprise!  Thanks Dad!  We headed for a halfway camp and not before getting a little lost in what seems like a desert.  We found a lovely camp outside a restaurant and across the road from one of the most amazing ruin sites we’ve seen yet.  It seems like a citadel.

The Rassafa Ruin was as stunning on the inside as we had imagined. I was amazing to see architecture that had lasted as long as this clearly had. We had decided to wake at the crack of dawn. We reasoned that the earlier we rose the more we would get out of the day. Well, the longer the day went on the more we realised that the getting up early and doing stuff, is just not for us. Our intention was to drive up to the Euphrates to the next birding site. The spot didn’t seem like much so we reverted to other hobby fishing. This was also a bit of a mixed bag. Neil at least managed to catch a fish. It was so small the lure he had used to catch it seemed to dwarf it. It’s incredible what they can fit into their mouths if they have the right motivation. All I managed to catch was the bottom of the river as well as every reed in it. So after an hour of fishing all I had managed to do was clear the river of most of debris and to lose two of our prized lures. This did not do wonders for my mood as you might imagine.  We were there for about a half hour before what seemed like the all the village children descended upon us.  So we moved on.  We lunched in Deir Essour on the land next to the train line and went in search of camping for the evening.  We landed up a few kilometres north of Deir Essour in the dunes.  What a great find this place was.  Camped out between the dunes, it was so quiet and we were even visited by a very friendly Wheatear. 

After a great nights rest we headed for Palmyra.  Not before we changed our front right tire.  The tyre was functioning fine except there was what seemed to be a bolt stuck in it.  The puncture safe was doing its job amazingly.  Had we not done a close inspection of the tyres for stones.  We would never have known the bolt was there.  To avoid any blowouts at high speed, we changed the tyre and kept it as a spare.  We were convinced that wild camping would definitely be quiet easy in Syria what with all the dunes and wide open spaces in the desert region.   Onto Palmyra we drove.  We stopped at the Tahila Reserve and were quickly guided to the Arabian Oryx and Giselle.  They also bragged about their Bald Ibis, but we weren’t interested as they were caged, therefore we could not count them as lifers.  This stint into the reserve was quite a funny one with the guide  or local vet assuring us that he would do as much as he could for us.  On our way to observe the Oryx, Neil was haring it down the track, much to the vet’s consternation.  All the vet could manage to say before taking a bite out of the seat was: “Slowly my dear!”  Huh? He was talking to Neil, nevertheless, we soon realised that everyone was “My dear” to the vet.  There quick show around the reserve was followed by: “My dear, when the sun goes, you go.”  Okay fine.  We needed to find camping anyway.  Since our base map was not up to the task, we ended up camping in the parking lot of a restaurant on the outskirts of Palmyra and not under the date palms.  It was just our luck that there were 4 bus loads of university students having a party at the restaurant.  Seriously, the speakers were so large and loud that the security lights dipped in time with the beat of the music.  We were quite surprised to see the students drinking, more than likely the  0.0% alcohol beer.  Then we were approached by some guy and his boyfriend. Huh? Apparently Syria boasts a 100% heterosexual nation.  We were pleasantly surprised by this though, as it shows that Syria is indeed moving forward with the times and more liberal than one expects.   Nice!  We had a comical chat with them and together with the 6 million other students left on the buses.  Before supper we sorted out the car and refill our water tank.  Neil was on his way to do this when the groundkeeper grabbed the bag from him and disappeared off somewhere.  Sometime later he reappeared with the 20 litre tank full and demanded a 10 dollar tip.  What!?! I don’t think so.  I was livid with Neil for not doing it himself.  The guy wouldn’t disappear without a tip, so I just gave him 50SP (50pence).  An important rule in Syria is to do everything yourself as every service is tip worthy to them. He seemed happy with this and left.  Grrrrr…. Eventually we got supper and showering done and climbed into bed.

The next morning we were caught by the restaurant manager on the way back to the car from the showers.  Arrrggg, I was so not in the mood.  He offered us coffee and seemed intent to chat.  This guy gave me the creeps and with good reason.  He insisted we see the Bedouin tent before leaving.  Okay so maybe I could fit that in before breakfast.  He sent Neil off to get the camera leaving me alone with him.  Arrrggg…. Once Neil left he enquired as to whether I was cold and put his arm around me… Geez! Warning bells.  I proceeded to shake his hand off me, but continued to follow him to the tent.  Great, now I was in this dark tent with this greasy old man.  Then he was insisting that I try on the Bedouin wear, which he felt obliged to help me with.  This was quite a scary experience without going into detail.  Let’s just say that Neil had his jacket off and ready to bust the guys face in.  Afterward we packed up really quickly and left the place.  At least we came away with a photo or two.  Girls beware of this type of thing in Syria, always stay in the company of a familiar male.  From then on we decided that we didn’t like Syria.  It’s a very dirty, dusty place and very sexist.  Honestly, we weren’t expecting much better. 

As bad a taste as Palmyra gave us, it did start getting better soon after we left the place. We hadn’t driven to far before we looked in our rearview mirror only to see a big blue Land rover filling it. It soon past and we were following it. In short order  the vehicle pulled over and out stepped two friendly Brits by the name of Jamie and Helen. After making our acquaintance with the couple we lead them to  a well known rest stop on the road between Palmyra and Damascus.  It is called “the Bagdad Cafe” it is a nice enough place and it gave us an opportunity to chat and swap stories. After a cup of coffee the boys showed off their respective cars. Jamie has a whole host of fancy gadgets on his car, it makes ours seem quite plain. We took the all important photo together and were once again on the road to Damascus.

In Damascus there is only one reliable camping spot. Unfortunately our GPS coordinates were off by a bit so we had a few moments of anguish before we found it. Once in we were pleasantly surprised. Not only was it a large clean campsite, but there was an overland prepared Land rover there already set up. It did not take Neil long to start making friends with the couple. It so happens that this couple, Marina and Roger, are from Switzerland and are driving virtually the same route as us to South Africa. That evening we shared our first meal with them. Unfortunately Roger was under the weather, but after supper and with Neil’s insistence we played board games until late in the evening.

The next morning saw us bundle, together with our new found friends, into a taxi and headed for Damascus’ old city. The taxi dropped us off outside the bazaar. It was still early so we meandered aimlessly for a couple of hours. We did manage to see some of the sites including mosques and churches. Lunch time was spent sipping various Syrian drinks and milkshake, quite nice. On with the sight seeing and snack buying. Despite all the old buildings and churches, the site that grasped our attention the most was to see three buckets completely filled with writhing snakes. Gross to the extreme. Animal welfare does not seem to be a big thing in Syria. What made matters worse is they had about 20 kestrels and two other raptors in a tiny cage. That was not cool at all. Anyway we moved on as Roger and Marina had to get some Syrian pounds. So as seems the custom in this part of the world we went off to find the local black market guy.  It all worked out well and we were soon back at the campsite.

We woke the next morning and got stuck into cleaning the car.  The Courty family arrived at about 10am followed by Roger and Marina leaving for Jordan.  We were already into our second week so we would most probably have to pay the extra diesel tax.  It turned out that the next day was Jills birthday.  We gave her fish fingers and oven chips as a birthday present as this was a family favourite for them.  Jill wasted no time and fried us all up some fish and chips for dinner.  What a treat!

The next day we said goodbye to Sim, Jill and the girls and headed for the Jordanian border.  What a pleasure this border was and they didn’t even ask for the diesel tax.  I suppose it helps that the border was the smaller of the two.  We paid 500SP each for exit tax.  We had exactly that amount as well.  All in all Syria was the more unusual of our experiences.  I’m not so sure we can come to appreciate the Bedouin Culture, but hey each to their own.