Wednesday 30 March
We are in Sudan and have problems loading pictures or anything at this internet cafe. Very hot here hope to get to the ferry at Wadi Hafi next week Wednesday ,but tomorrow will travel to Khartoum.
Sunday 27 March 2011
We eventually left Addis Ababa on Saturday morning after a breakfast with Harry, Linda and Angela as we are not sure if we will see them on our travels again as we have decided to push to Europe as fast as possible. Getting out of the city was a breeze, lots of new roads and traffic not too bad for an African city. It was a long days riding, started off cold on top of the mountains and got very hot in the valleys. Nice to be on the move again after having spent so much time in Addis getting all our visas! We stopped in a number of the small villages on the way and found that there is a major shortage of petrol around here and so we had to resort to buying some on the black market. The two white faces always attract a large crowd with people asking for money all the time, they constantly touch me and push and pull the bike.
We left the best hotel in Kembolcha (alright the only hotel in town) early this morning heading for Lalibela to see the churches in the town. We drove through a spectacular mountain pass and once we had been travelling for about half an hour Larry suddenly remember our document wallet and portable safe which he had very carefully hidden in the hotel room, so a quick about turn and back to find these rather important items, luckily they were just were we had left them so we were lucky enough to get to do the mountain passes three times!!
There is still lots of subsistence farming in the area, so we were dodging the live stock most of the day. The villages are smaller and the children all coming running out to see the bikes pass through, some of them appear aggressive but most are just happy to see us passing. We did have to slow down for a herd of cattle and a taxi alongside me and a small herd boy of about 14 threw a large stone which hit the bike and bounced off me.
We travelled on another large pass even more impressive than the previous one and up at the top we had our normal picnic lunch of rolls, salami and cheese, it is very difficult to carry enough food and water for a days riding. We then turned off the nice tar road onto a really bad gravel track / road. I said about three times we should look at the maps as I could not believe that this was the road to such a well known historical site, but Larry could not really believe that we were on the wrong road. The road got progressively worse and then suddenly it opened up and lots of work had been done on the road and for the next 500m to 1km we managed to travel at a top speed of 60km. For the next 20km the road was often very bad and then a nice stretch, with Larry telling me very patiently that the road was going to get better – it never did just got worse and worse! It took us about 4 hours to travel these 65km of bone shaking roads! About 12km from Lalibela there was a junction to our left and the tar road which we should have been on was right there! The entire trip on the gravel was spoilt by the locals running up to the bikes as we slowed to go through the villages shouting gemme or money money! Some of them would run alongside the bike and try and push at the bikes and when we don’t stop start getting aggressive. It is not only the children but lots of the adults also expect something, they also need to be educated on the roads, Ethiopia traditionally has not had many tar roads but with the Chinese coming in and building roads they need to understand that if a car, bus or bike hits you it can really hurt. We saw someone trapped under a large bus in one of the small villages, the people all live along the roads and small children, some as young as 3 or 4, are often seen herding goats or cattle along the road and children only just learning to walk playing along the road!
Anyway we are here staying at the second best hotel in town, it is reasonable and has a bathroom with hot water and a big double bed so not too bad.
S
On Saturday we rode nearly 400 km , which took us about 8 hours, with all the villages, stops to look for fuel etc. We also stopped to chat a group of 7 guys, on Ktm’s. All international, with one local guide / tour operator. They are riding for a week. Then there was a German guy, Chris, on a Yamaha, travelling from Europe Southwards. Might see him in SA as well! We were supposed to stop for the day in Dessie, but found a nice hotel – for Sharon 25 km short, in Kembolcha. We also got the bad news that Bagu, our dog, had died. A sad day, after nearly 12 years, and many stories.
Today we really had spectacular riding, 243 km in total. The new tar roads are great – mostly, and we basically rode through continuous mountain passes, the road never straight, with curves and bends, ups and downs all the time! A bikers heaven, although slow, with lots of people, goats, cattle, camels etc a lot of the time. Then we added the 60 km of bad gravel, just to round the day off. Ok, the gps took us the short way – and the map doesn’t show another roads – although it does appear to exist. There are lots of tourists in Lalibela, and we hope to see some of the sights tomorrow.
We have now done nearly 14 000 km , still on the same set of tyres, and hopefully these will see us through, until we can find replacements in Europe .
Probably the most frustrating thing at the moment, is all the kids and youngsters, demanding all the time. Money, pens, waving us down all the time, rubbing thumb and forefinger together – the international sign for money, jumping into the road, throwing the occasional stone, often threatening to throw sticks at us etc. Sharon
We are 2 days riding from the Sudan border, and hope to leave here again on Tuesday, so should be in Sudan on Wed, and Khartoum
Monday 28 March 2011
We spent the morning at the churches of Lalibela, these churches are mainly solid rock churches carved into the mountain, really worth seeing. There are three different sites and eleven churches in all. There has been a fair amount of restoration done on the sites and some of the churches have been covered with a huge roof to try and stop the weathering of these churches. The churches were built during the 12th centenary and took between 23- 30 years to complete by an estimated 30 000 people. The insides of the churches are very basic often with really old artwork hanging next to a gaudy bunch of plastic flowers or furniture. Most of the valuable artifacts have been moved to a very simple museum unfortunately all the descriptions and dates are given in amharic. The churches are still used today as the place of worship for the towns people and tourists are only welcome there at certain times, when we arrived here on Sunday there was a large crowd of local people in the church grounds and apparently the service can last the whole day. The local people of Lalibela are used to tourists and are clearly very proud of the town and always ask how you enjoyed the experience of visiting the churches. Very different to other small villages. Along the roads, people call and shout, occasionally for the normal money money, but here mostly Welcome welcome! Inside the office, a list of do’s and don’ts includes a request not to give money and sweets to children on the streets. Most churches allow photos inside and out, only one requested no flash in the church. One also prohibited women entering.
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