From the hot, dry southern Sudan into the fresh green Uganda, although it is quite warm during the day because it's rainy season: during daytime heat builds up and culminates at the end of the day in a heavvy thunderstorm, though not every day.
sleeping in a Tukol, Nara South Sudan (the beer can prevents the bike from rolling backwards/
the river nile, Nimule south sudan/
Just before arriving at Gulu I saw heavy caterpillars with Chinese inscriptions: the last 150 km to south Sudan will finally be paved. A sandy track now, with loads of heavy traffic over it which made it extremely difficult to cycle. One day at noon I was really exhausted, I was in a sort of cafe drinking the warm beer and all I wanted really was putting my mat on the floor and go to sleep. I still do not know whether it comes through that stretch of road - that fatigue or the fact that because you are travelling so long makes your body just tired ... After each week of cycling I take a week of rest. This is the only way that enables me to keep on going what is the opposite of the beginning of my trip, when I could go, go, go...
Gulu, northern Uganda/
Gulu was also the city where it all began with the LRA rebel group. When I was 10 km outside Gulu I chatted with a guy of about thirty years old. On his 14th he was abducted to fight as a child soldier for the LRA. He managed to escape the first time because he wanted to see his parents. The LRA came a second time to his village, killed his parents and abducted him a second time. He could escape a second time and thanks to a belgian sponsorship he could go to school and be trained as a truck driver. When I asked whether he thinks about his parents he responded: `every day '...
baboons, Murchison falls park, Uganda/
Along the way, I camped always without any problem in primary schools, only 30 km for Kampala, I had the misfortune to meet mr. Formality who wanted absolutely inform the police that I wanted to camp in the church. About 2 hours later an almost complete police squad arrived and after a fierce interrogation they prohibited me to camp in the church (it is not a safe place, there are evil people around here, etc.etc.). The `father`, a semi-soft clown, who said all the time yes and amen to the authority didn`t come up with the idea to invite me in his house (I bet if when the Messiah comes one day he will first call the police). The director, the other formal clown, said it was impossible to camp in a classroom, so I left under an escort of half the school and the police-in-a-rebel jeep behind me.
this is no toilet hole but a genuine lord-of-the-ring`s style spider web/
Eventually I get rid of them (generally Africans are afraid of the dark) and I discovered the next day I camped in someone's garden (`hello, hello, hellooooooo` ... [I]: `who are you? `[the respondent]:` ahem ... I am the owner of this garden`). After having breakfast in peace and alone although it costed me some time to convince the not-too-clever looking-staring-at -me-proprietor that I wanted to be alone-I reached Kampala, after pedaling the last up and down cruel 30 kms.
camping in an insane garden/
Kampala, looks to me very like Yaounde (cameroon). Like the city of Yaounde Kampala is spread over mountainous terrain, and the roads go up and down (though less steeper than Yaounde).
Right now I find myself in a total- awesome-backpacker`s- tourist-paradise, quite a transition if you have passed the Central African Republic, southern Sudan where they have no idea what a touarist is (pronounced like Touareg). To have the possibility to take again a hot ( !!!) shower (!), sitting on a clean toilet and listening to american croaking around you, having a cold beer, pure madness!.
It's really funny, I have no super bike, but the locals can still fix `em anyway. The crankshaft was almost gone, I was pedaling on plastic and here they have replaced the device completely, it is now as new!. The axis of my rear wheel was completely worn out, and had to be completely replaced: I have now a new-old genuine Japanese-made wheel with spokes probably dating from the `60`s looking old but reliable. And all that beauty (the rear wheel) for only 20,000 Ush (6.50 euros). Sometimes I think as a Munzungo I am ripped off all the time, but if you calculate the price in euros you laugh (see above for the prize of the wheel). It gets really funny when that wheel gives up in the desert, well, then we will see. Maybe I will purchase in Nairobi a complete spare wheel.
SO ... I have no super bike, but I am still pedaling. Maybe a mountain bike is the best option for a road trip through Africa. You encounter mechanical problems more often than with a state-of-the-art bike as a Koga bike, but ... the local homies can always fix it. I wonder if anyone in Africa is familiar with an advanced bicycle such as a Koga bike, if a local mechanic can repair the gears, not to mention if spare parts are available. Here in africa no one has heard of a crank-puller: A tool that lets you loosen the pedals of the shaft. I had never heard of it either, yeah, actually I learned of the existence of it in the backpacker`s hostel. But here at the `garage` the good man takes a solid-looking bar and a hammer and hammers the pedals loose. A cruel, rough but quick and effective way to loosen the pedals. If I then use a difficult word like `crank puller` the mechanic gazes at me with this no-understanding-look: what is that Munzungo talking about, the way I do it works fine, isn`t it ?!.
I'm here already more then a week, and every day I am walking / biking through this crazy city. Sometimes -when I cycle- I have the idea of being in a some kind of computergame: traffic rules don`t seem to exist, they drive right on the road, everywhere these minibuses- taxis (Matatu), and taxi mopeds transporting people to everywhere in town and take over you at the left and right side. The first few minutes you are white-pale filled with fear expecting to be hit every moment, smacking over the asphalt and then run over by a truck...But then slowly I observed a strange kind of regularity, and you see that the participants in this mad show of traffic are actually careful, and sharp that nothing bad happens to there precioussss Jin-Cheng vehicle...
... a rocket launch platform, a hindu temple or just an antenna to contact E.T.?/
For some inexplicable reason in general all functions well, although accidents do happen. The center-center of the city literally and figuratively congestion's with traffic, mud, street vendors, pedestrians and other human shit. If it rains you have to wade through the mud, and find your way through the traffic congestion. A paradise for thieves one would think, unsuspecting Munzungo`s can easily be robbed, however, a street filled with crowds, buses, motorcycles, street vendors and other types makes it for you as a beginning villain difficult to get away, especially when such a white boy starts singing:` thief thief`. Have spoken so a villain ventured his luck when I walked down a street, a little calmer than the center. After having touched my pockets he ran away, , pursued by me and my 3 new Israeli / Quebecois hostel-friends. He had however nothing stolen, hamdoelilah `i ... !
I may sound sarcastic about the tourist paradise, but in fact the best are the encounters with other backpackers: listening as my new Israeli friends Itamar and Rei talk Hebrew, speak with them about Ethiopia, whence they traveled, the absurd fact that almost the whole of north Africa is inaccessible to Israelis `s ... with them trying an Ethiopian restaurant, eating a `beynath`, some kind of sponge-like pancake with on top all kinds of vegetables, potatoes, lentils, sauce... mmmmmm!.
Or listening to John from London, who has traveled from Rwanda, and talks about that country, the land of 1000 hills, tea plantations everywhere, a kind of Switzerland: 1 day of the week the people spend the whole day cleaning. Moreover, a densely populated country, with soldiers everywhere, all day and night observing, but apparently not interfering/ being part of everyday life. They are there to prevent the unthinkable of 1994 happening again (the genocide) and coming into action if a group of people is forming (everyone is then dispersed). The police however: regulates the traffic, and is doing what the police normally does.
the origin of the nile, lake Victoria, Jinja/
Stories like this makes you want to see/visit everything, but that's just not possible. John gave a telling remark: `actually at this moment it is the right time to travel through this part of Africa. Everything is relatively calm now, although there are rebels, bandits for example in the northern Congo`.
When I think about it I think he`s right; in the CAR were two active rebel groups `quiet` (didn`t perpetrate significant actions) when I got through (a Chadien in the north and the LRA in the south for the last 2 months calm), southern Sudan with a calm Western Equatoria and now in a fairly stable-touristy- western`like Uganda. Or would I have a powerful guardian angel on my shoulder watching over me?
I doubt now if I go directly biking to Nairobi or maybe do a de-tour around Lake Victoria. Ethiopia really attracts me even though it is not easy to enter that country. I was again in both embassies (the Sudanese and the Ethiopian embassy) and the Sudanese embassy was even more cooperative than the Ethiopian!. The Ethiopians refuse to give a visa if you come overland, one must be a resident of the country. The only way to get in is flying to Addis Abbeba.. Very annoying, but well, I'll try again in Nairobi, and if I fail again I have to fly for Allah`s sake to Addis Abbeba, catch a bus to the south and cycle my way up to the north. I will miss the piece which is in between Nairobi and Moyale (northern Kenya).
charcoal transport, Jinja
A pity while the north of Kenya is actually an extreme cool place to be: bandits, rebels and cattle-raging pastors that are responsable for the insecurity (as in southern Sudan!). A road you barely can call road (a sandy track in the rainy season becomes a quagmire), Ethiopian (human) parasites that will chase you in the border town of Moyale because they want a crumb of the Munzungu cake ... herrlitsj! It would be shame to just skip this part!. (to be continued)...
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