13th February 2008 - Baher Dahr, Ethiopia

Researching the Tour d’Afrique, one of the most striking features and challenges seems to be the physical exertion under extreme temperatures in Sudan. We had been warned of a rapid temperature increase from our port of entry in Wadi Halfa onwards and were mentally preparing ourselves. My bike was modified to carry 4 bottles (2.8 litres) on top of a 3 litre hydration backpack. Instead, we found strong winds, cold nights/mornings and somewhat warm afternoons. My windbreaker jacket became an essential piece of clothing and I placed my hydration pack and some bottles into my permanent bag (this is loaded on top of the support trucks and can be accessed only on rest days) for their lack of need. So really, conditions were modest and the daily grind on the bike remained just that…cranking away in our acquired routine. That is until Khartoum. Seemingly overnight temperatures jumped up by almost 20oC. At noon, readings went up into the 40s and my required water intake leapt up similarly. Hydration before, while and after stages became an absolutely crucial part of recovering and ensuring a steady performance. John, who used to serve in the Royal Air Force, recalls some key figures from his survival training: given our environment and exercising levels, the body looses 3l of water an hour, while being able to take up no more than 2l orally…whether the exact figures are correct or not, the moral is that dehydration is a serious threat and extreme care must be taken. However, my bottles and hydration pack were in my permanent bag, leaving me with no more than 3 bottles on my bike. During the last days in Sudan, water indeed became a precious resource and I had to stop in most villages we passed through, scrambling for the liquid gold. The heat had some other effects as well. Apart from the road kill starting to smell pretty bad, countless bush fires were scattered across the landscape. On our first night on Ethiopian soil, these were clearly visible in the far away mountains…going to sleep in my tent and seeing through my mosquito net the orange glow under the sparkle of the stars was a bizarre experience.


DO NOT USE GLUELESS PATCHES or HOW ETHIOPIA HATES ED
Africa is unpredictable. The stages on the Tour can be classified according to their profile: length, elevation, wind and surface. These may grant statements along the line of “tomorrow is a tough and challenging day”, “many people will struggle on this stage” or inversely “that stage is simple and straightforward”. However, most of us have long stopped paying attention to this descriptive commentary. Sure, the daily grind is considerable and I am suffering from a severe lack of recovery time. But the real challenge is so much more personal. It is illness, injury or mechanical failure that is most likely to bring a rider to his knees and prevent him from completing a stage. Or in my case the ridiculous bureaucratic workings of Ethiopian immigration officials.

Entering Ethiopia should have been straightforward. Entry was the crossing of a little bridge and indeed the immigration authority placed in a hut on the side of the road could have easily been missed if not pointed out by the tour organisation. I dropped of my passport, trying to kill the waiting time by sampling the first beer after three weeks Sudan and taking advantage of the local brothel’s showering facilities. Meanwhile, the smiling faces at immigration were slowly but surely working their way through the pile of passports and randomly flicking through a huge book containing thousands of hand written names (the IT wave has not yet advanced to Ethiopian border control). I am still completely puzzled about what exactly they were doing or trying to do. Anyway, after continuously checking on the status of my passport and repeatedly being assured of everything being in order, I make a final visit in the evening after sunset. Seeing my passport as the last remaining one on the desk was certainly not a good sign. I was informed, that my entry into Ethiopia was impossible until further notice from Addis Ababa (the capital) and that I would have to return to Sudan until the next day. Talking, negotiating and pleading were all fruitless, yet I was permitted to sleep in our camp for the night. It took up to noon the next day for my passport to get that all-important entry stamp, by which time the other riders already had up to 5h head start. Making this very difficult stage before nightfall was with certainty going to be a tough task.

(Note: out of almost 80 people, my entry was the only one to be delayed. The reason, it turns out, was my name: Edward Din. On Ethiopia’s list of wanted individuals was a person whose first name was also Edward…nothing more but my sharing a common Anglo-Saxon first name with a wanted individual had delayed my entry by almost an entire day. Even more ridiculous was what I witnessed in the morning while waiting. A man with a clearly Sudanese appearance and distinct Sudanese accent attempted entry with an Ethiopian passport. The passport’s date of issue was 4 months in the future and it was lacking an Ethiopian exit stamp. Him they permitted entry, me with my FIRST NAME they did not…ridiculous).

I could have dealt with this portion of bad luck and still mastered the 100km of heavy off-road, steep climbs and boiling heat…if it wasn’t for glueless patches’ intolerance of high temperatures. While waiting for my entry permit, my already patched tube started leaking air. I replaced the faulty patch, only for it to leak again. A slow leak, requiring me to pump up the tyre every 10-15 min. I can deal with that. After 30 km a puncture in the rear tube followed, which I promptly patched up. The patch started leaking and was replaced. Another flat followed and I had no more patches or tubes left. In my desperation I turned to some construction workers, who are attempting to pave stretches of the road in the coming couple of years. These wonderful guys offered to drive me to their next camp, repair my tube with Tip Top used for their 4WD vehicles and drop me off again. At their camp a new puncture was identified, repaired and I was driven back to the initial place. After a couple of hundred metres, the patches leaked air again. In a last attempt I located a barber in a remote Ethiopian mountain village, who also happened to repair bike tubes with glue and patches of cut rubber. Half the village assembled around me and my bike and together we fixed all leaks in the tyres. However, luck was not to be mine that day. 40km before the finish line and 90 min before sunset my beaten-up tube finally gave up and the Tour’s van, searching the route for me, picked me up. I could have dealt with the bureaucratic tinkering. I could have borrowed a tube/patch of another rider behind me if I would have started in the morning. But both together on the same day proved too much and left me 40 km short of completing my EFI (i.e. finishing every single stage).

The first day in Ethiopia surely contained enough bad luck for the time being. That was my string of thought anyway.

Our everyday items are packed in a 70l box called the RED BOX, which is loaded onto the support trucks before departure every morning, to be offloaded again at next camp. To quote Tour d’Afrique instructions: “Your life must fit in this box. All of your daily necessities including … must fit in this box”. You get the message. Until today I am unsure of the exact events that happened on my 2nd day in Ethiopia. It appears that during transit on the bad roads my red box fell out of its slot, the door opened and half my belongings were scattered across a stretch of Ethiopian gravel. All my camping gear, all my toiletries and a large part of my clothing was lost (fortunately, a kid picked up my Petzl headlamp and tried to sell it to Mike, a Canadian rider…one item retrieved, many lost).

This is Africa, full of the unexpected. All there is we can do is to take things with a healthy portion of humour and deal with the situation.

My fellow riders were incredibly helpful in assisting me with gear and words of support in those days. Words cannot express my gratitude for these many gestures. THANKS GUYS!!!!!!

02 February 2008- Khartoum, Sudan

Heading into the heart of Sudan, we are increasingly facing a very flat desert facilitating some strong and persistent winds. At night and in the mornings, temperatures drop to as low as 3-4 degrees Celsius. Add the strong winds and you get conditions way beyond the comfort zone of most of us (save the odd hardcore Canadian). Even more, the wind carries the sand everywhere…our clothing, ears and nose, sleeping bag, food and drink. Waking up in the morning, my face is covered with sand and grinding my teeth I get that gritty feeling. Eventually, one becomes accustomed to that. Electronic equipment does not. Digital cameras are dying like flies, but mine was holding up pretty well. During our latest sandstorm I am therefore fully aware of the hostile conditions and keep my gadget nicely tucked away in its bag. That is until that one beautiful shot comes along. I quickly take aim, use the palm of my hand to shield the lens against the sand-filled wind and place the camera back into its case within seconds. Too late…sand has entered the lens and I have learned my lesson.

KHARTOUM, THE “ELEPHANT TRUNK”
Yesterday we entered Khartoum in a police convoy with people cheering and greeting left and right. Since leaving Cairo 3 weeks ago, our life has consisted mostly of desert camps and small settlements. Purchases rarely exceeded the choice of fuul (a basic but tasty Arabic dish of fava beans) or egg omelette and chai (tea) or Turkish coffee. New acquaintances were mainly humble but poor locals. Our last real showering facilities were 12 days back in Aswan, Egypt. So waking up in the desert, we found ourselves only a few hours later groomed and shaven in a large western style mall. Entering the mall, I literally had to stop for a second, trying to absorb the wealth of choice and abundance of splendour and luxury. It is also the first time since Cairo that we see any serious amount of non-African faces. These fall into one of two categories. There are Chinese engineers building roads, drilling oil wells etc. …you name it, they do it. And there are UN employees, many of them (shops even start running discount schemes for them).

HEADSCARFS, HOW TO PLAY BY THE RULES AND THE ETERNAL QUESTION: HOW MUCH IS TOO MUCH?
As a whole, Khartoum, the home of an Islamic dictatorship, seems surprisingly Western and fairly wealthy. Certainly, our girls have been told off (sometimes rudely) when showing skin up to the elbow or not covering their head. However, there are some interesting observations. In a funny incident, we turn towards some locals on our quest for food and drink. These direct us towards what later turns to be the student refectory of the Sudanese University in Khartoum. Imagine a group of tourists walking into YOUR university canteen. So far we have always attracted a fair amount of attention, but I have never had so many faces laughing out loud or heads being shaken at me in disbelief. Anyway, it seems that as long as your dress adheres to a few stringent criteria, there is a fair amount of liberty regarding appearance and behaviour. The parallels between this crowd and my own student experiences are stunning. MP3 players, western designer clothing, latest fashion fads and cliques everywhere. It should be noted that these all looked like a fairly wealthy bunch. Therefore, the point I am trying to make is that conservatism and strictness with rules may be very heterogeneous across Sudan’s various income classes.

GETTING PHYSICAL
The daily workloads on the bike slowly but surely grind away our energy reserves and most people are struggling with knee problems, sore bums, that persistent bug going around camp etc. Miraculously, I have been spared so far. Riding out of Dongola, many were relieved to find smooth tarmac (once again part of Sudanese-Chinese relations) after the strenuous off-road. Nonetheless, over half the participants have at some point so far not managed to fully complete a stage, either due to fatigue or not reaching camp before nightfall. Fatigue is a big issue for me as well and pacing myself is paramount, but I have managed to retain my EFI (i.e. riding every single stage) and am still going strong. Khartoum marks the finish of the 1900km section “Pharao’s Delight” and race results have been published. Unfortunately, there has been a mock-up with the time taking and I have received a couple of 12h penalties. Very annoying and I will definitely look into that.

14th January 2008 - Desert Camp, Egypt

Yesterday marked the first riding day. After some desperate and forceful squeezing and pushing, I manage to pack my red box and complete and prepare my bike and gear for the start. We move in a slow convoy out of Gizah. Some superficial picture-taking followed at the pyramids, which were idyllically concealed behing Cairo smog. The Egyptian ministry of tourism shined through its absence, and so did the promised tea-and-snack-session on their behalf. Riding out of Cairo was fast and easy. My intentions were starting with a low intensity and building up during the week, similar to my training sessions. As so many good plans, this one went straight out of the window in the heat of action. The stage was set to be 129km under the anticipation of some moderate climbing and no wind/tailwind. After 40km we started facing a most ferocious headwind, which gulped virtually all of my pedalling power and left me moving forward at a measly 12-17km/h. At times I felt like screaming into the wind, at other times like giving up. My muscles were filled with lactic acid and I knew my body would have to pay the price in terms of fatigue in the days to come. 2 ½ h before sunset the remaining distance was still over 50km. I quickly did the maths and realized that my current pace would not allow me to reach camp before dark. The thought of loosing my EFI on the first day...the horror! Somehow I managed. Many others didn’t.

The evenings rider meeting, which was to brief us on tomorrow’s stage, announced a distance of 170km. Everyone paled…with similar conditions that would be an extremely taxing day.