Iringa, Tanzania.

Only three days since the last update, I've still so much to catch up on but the last two days have taken the biscuit for the most crazy 2 days for me. Seems I atract trouble at the moment, Ive been in the middle of most things that have happened on these two days, im going to talk through my part then list the other things that have gone on.
Shanny, who is the new tour Director took over from Nairobi, (this was a scheduled swap as the whole tour tends to take too much out of a director) kindly offered to take my sweep duty to give me a break as he is fresh and I find sitting at the back pretty tedious. So Im cruising up the road having left camp fairly late after helping clean up breakfast. I catch alex who is the Paramedic for the tour and we ride together no more than 2 kms when we come across one of the guys sitting at the side of the road after a crash, his arm is a mess and requires stiches but doesn't appear too bad at first so alex patches him up while i give his bike the once over and send him up the road. We stop for a coke after another couple of kms and Paul the guy who has fallen carries on. Alex suspects he is pretty sore and decides to ride with him after a very quick drink. I follow a few minutes later and find them another 2kms down the road, Alex holding his arm high in the air looking stressed. Turns out the elbow is broken and had come through the skin then as he got up it has gone back into place, after riding another few kms though it seems that the bone has cut through an artery and the blood is now spurting through the hole. Dinner truck arrives and everyone who has decided not to ride for whatever reason is put on the road, at this point im blocking his artery from the arm pit, Alex is applying pressure and pete the driver is holding his arm in the air, bleeding is hard to control but we finally seem to get it after about 15 minutes. We are trying to get the runabout back to get him to hospital but we have no cell phone reception, a rider is sent ahead to get reception or reach the lunch truck and get things rolling. We put him on the dinner truck when we learn that the dinner truck is in fact broken. The cradle that holds the suspension and wheel in place has cracked and is almost toast. We crawl up the road to where the runabout meets us and send off Alex and Paul the rider, then crawl the rest of the way to a small village to try and fix the truck.
I then proceed to spend the rest of the day till almost dark beneath the truck trying a thousand different ways to suspend 10 tonnes of truck remove the part and replace it withoutout the correct tools and using a series of jacks, the whole thing was a comical day but just before dark 4 of us finished the job to a point where we could drive the truck to camp (still out in the bush in the middle of nowwhere).

Tough day but got through it, so we arrive in camp last night on the edge of Irniga and the storm that we have been promised drops out of the sky. Almost everything is abandoned in favour of going for some food and a few beers. The few beers soon turned into a gong show with everyone who was there lighting it up till the evening was brought to an abrupt end when one of the most hammered guys fell down the stairs and split his head open through to the skull in a y shape across his forhead. Taxi to the hospital which fortunatly is much closer where we wake the staff Alex again sorting the wound initially but choosing not to stich it herself as she has sunk a few drinks too. I come along to help out and by about 1am he is stitched up and back at his hotel, we return to camp to find another rider standing there with a taxi his friend has been rushed to a dispensary with extreme kidney pain. Head out in the taxi again and find him in a little back street dispensary in a room with no door with a guy sitting next to him who claims to be a doctor, all seems a bit sketchy so we grab him out of this place and take him to the hospital where we wake the staff again. This time the doctor is out of his depth and calls in their specialist, in the mean time we put him on a geurney and he gets moved to a ward. A guy is kicked out of the bed he is given in the ward and is put in bed with another to make room. The ward has about 40 beds and another 40+ people on the floor trying to sleep. Leave there at 4.30am with nothing more we can do to help, he is being flown out today or tommorow and his situation is pretty serious. He will not be returning to the tour. The guy with the elbow was flown out yesterday by flying doctors where he is being assesed again in Nairobi and either operated on there or flown back to the States where he is from. The stair jumper is fine but will be in for some piss taking over the next few days.
This is not all that has happened on these two days, this is just the bits I have been in, the rest that I can remember are listed below.

Small fire on the truck where a bike wheel slipped onto one of the onboard battereies, it melted through 2 spokes and set alight.
2 further crashes one in exactly the same place as the elbow, one in need of stiches, the other very bruised.
1 guy walked into a door jamb and almost scalped himself, again stiches advised but the rider turned then down.
3 riders holding back as the truck that was broken had not passed and as such ended up lost riding i the dark in the middle of nowhere (after beer!).

There was more but those are the big ones I can remember at this point.

Anyways rest day now in Iringa, though not many are feeling rested right now, then we have a few more days in the bush before crossing into Malawi. we joined pavement here in Iringa and guys where climbing off and kissing it after the last few weeks. Apparantly it is paved now till Namibia but we shall see.

Rest days are not all you might think, its a race to try and get your shit clean make your bike work again, buy toilet roll and treats before hitting the road again, I rarely feel rested leaving these days but its nice to try and get clean at least.

Next day off is on a beach on lake Malawi, with nothing about so hopefully a swim and a few hours loafing when we get there. No internet expected for a good week, but we do pass through a few towns so will see.

Love getting the comments on facebook etc, keep leaving them, im curious as to if people are reading this or not. Hope all is well with everyone wherever you are right now.

Few more days passed since writting thae above, I didnt get chance to get online and update, the gong show continues.....

One more rider out for the count, the riding, though paved has been more treacherous through the trucks and busses passing, one of our number, a German called Werner got clipped by a truck and broke his elbow in almost the exact place as the other rider. It was the truck that broke it, he fell in the ditch but didint hurt anything else, in all honesty he is lucky to be alive.
I was run off the road twice yesterday and watched a car go off the road and almost hit a kid that can only have been 6 yrs old. We turn off this road tommorow and im looking forward to it, the locals actually get off the road when they hear a truck, probably wise but when your trying to get through 130kms it would take twice as long.

Tanzania is an incredibly beutiful place, its much greener than I expected, despite the traffic the roads are stunning, the people are extremely friendly and I haven't heard of a single rock being thrown! We dont have any local riders in this secton which is a real shame, I normally end up riding a few days with the local boys and it gives you a much better insight when you have someone to ask the dumb questions you have. Its incredible to see what these guys ride too. When embarking on this trip I brought some pretty extensive spares but still thought in all the major cities we visit that I would be able to stock up on whats needed. There has not been a single bike shop that carries what you would find in your average Canadian Tire or Halfords store, let alone the more specialist stuff that is so readily available in the western world. The variety of bikes that people have choosen to ride is pretty extreme too. These componants added together has made for some fairly interesting repairs, one frame cracked and peeled like an orange, broken spokes are a daily occurance, the record number of flats in a day is 8 in a half day, the rider in question was in tears at this point and rode the truck for the afternoon. Cables, freewheels and gear levers have failed through being gunked up withe the really fine dust we got in the desert. The dust is pretty incredible, it would go through the fly in your tent even when zipped up and be all over your sleeping kit, if the wind got up at night youd wake up covered in the stuff. You can imagine what that does to all the parts on your bike.

Not much more to add right now, the days really are becoming a bit of a slog, ite the routine that gets you more than the riding, but we are down to about 7 weeks more to go so there is a kind of light at the end of the tunnel, it just feels like its swiched off right now.

Few more days gone by again! On a beach in Malawi now, it could be Hawai there sre some pretty impressive green mountains coming straight out of the water, the lake is more like a sea. I have my laptop on the bar using the internet watching about 8 chicks play volleyball. unfortunatly not one of them should be wearing a bikini, but its good value listening to the boys comments! Malawi is another surprise, much like Ethiopia, its really densly populated and as such there are kids everywhere begging and hassling you. I counted 207 spectators watching us put up our tents up the first night. I have to say though the riders attitude has changed somewhat, we put up with alot in Ethipoia as it was expected, but the consesus has been that that was behind us, so now when a kid asks 'give me my money.' as most of them do here I have repeatedly heard even the most unlikely people respond with one of the greatest english phrases you find. - 'FUCK OFF'

Absolute Genius

BBB are adding carbon and alloy genius' to the guide fleet for summer 2009.
The frames have been sat in the office for a few weeks as inspiration and the attention to detail that the Scott design team have used is even better than the Ransom.

More photos to follow once the snow goes and I find time to get building!

It has been a while since the last decent update, and so much has happened, I think on any trip of this length you reach a time around the middle where you trudge through the days in a rythm that makes them go by so fast ech day blurs into another, these last few weeks have been this way.

Dont get me wrong, it has been incredible. It has been described as the hardest part of tour. This is not so much form a standpoint of the riding, that has been difficult but more from the mental aspect of hard riding days, extremely bad road conditions, extremely hot weather, illness's passing through camp, extremely unsanitary toilet facilities, and shortage of water, as such no washing alwed other than what you can do with wet ones you have. The ethiopians did at the end get the harsh end of some of this from most, the constant barrage for attention over a long day just simply wears you donw to breaking point, and it is almost impossible to smile and say hello when the words 'shut the fuck up' are all that are on you mind.

Luckily food has remained excellant, and as such if you are not ill you can get through most of it.

It is at best difficult to try and explain the terrain, the last week of Ethiopia which is when I think I last got online was rolling, lush vegetaion, and incredibly fertile soils, alot of the farming is still done by hand, but you cant help but think that if it was managed well how good it could be for the area. The biggest thing that stands out is the sheer volume of people, or more specifically kids. After remarking on the apparant lack of contraception I have thought back to if I have noticed any condoms on sale and have only noticed twice. Once was crossing the border into kenya where there was a box giving them out for free...it was empty, the other was just today as we passed through a town I saw some kids playing with a blown up one. I choose to ask no more questions or look no further at that point.

After 3 weeks or riding across Ethiopia it was good to cross into Kenya at the border town of Moyale, riding up into the first kilometre of Kenya was a great feeling, finally felt like we where progressing and there was a great feeling of achievement going around, we stayed in the Kenyan Wildlife agencies grounds and all got a sun warmed shower in a tin shed that goes down as one of the all time best showers of my life. The feeling of having some water running over you with a semblance of power and almost the perfect refreshing temperature was the highlight of the few days around it. Heading out into the Northern Kenyan scrub for the next six days we where warned that the roads where going to be harsh. I was of the mindset that its a road that has traffic, how bad can it be. I should add at this point that we are in the rift valley and as such all the rock around is volcanic. The terrain for the next 6 days (broken up with a rest day in Marsabit a Small town on a volcanic rim that we climbed up to where we stayed in rainforest for a night before riding down the side of the crater the day after into the desert again.) the roads where basically volcanic rock that was shredding tyre's with corrigations that shuddered through your bones jarring kidneys, teeth, bones, muscles and wrecking bikes. Ths rocks and coregation where broken up with stretches of loose sand that you could try and power through but would take every ounce of energy you had left to do so. Along the route we passed through maybe one hamlet per day where you could but a warm coke, other than that you out in the sun with no where to hide. Camps at this point where also just the trucks finding a spot where they could pull off the road into the srub and park, you would move whatever you had to to find a spot for your tent.

This brought one of the most interesteing evenings and some of the best photos I have caught yet, we got into camp at a reasonable time and sat waiting for the sun to cool a bit in any shade you could find. As the day went on a band of storm cloud formed to the one side but the camp still in sun, the cloud darkened to leave you without any doubt that we where going to get rain. The wind had been sparodic to this point and suddenly moved up to gale force, followed by the first drops. Within minutes its torrential, tents are falling under the pressure, people are running in all directions trying to rescue their shit, I had been too lazy to put up my tent so as such sat in the truck with the camera out the window laughing and taking the piss. Should have probably tried to help but it seemed pretty fruitless and besides which, it was way too much fun! When the rain reached its high point Eric and I jumped out with our soap and had a shower in it, still on water shortage so it was welcomed, then both of us tried to clean our bikes. Best part was figuring out where all the floods ended up then putting out tents up in the dryest spots in a break in the clouds. I have to say despite some people soaking absolutly everything they had everyone had pretty good spirits about the whole thing.

Vehicles have been another source of amusement recently, from the Land Cruiser the Ethipoian support guys had, an early 80s model they used to get food shopping and other things we needed. I spent a bit of time with these guys as they liked a beer at some point of every day and gave a totally different insight into the country. In this car all the windows are wind up but none have the original winder still on the door, as such thay have found another one that sits in the center consol and when you need to wind down your window you simply lean forward, borrow it, wind to selected height, take it back off and put back in the center console. Simple really, the fun really starts when it rains suddenly- good times.


Also came across a bus with a flat tire on one of the hills here in Tanzania the other day, bus is a loose term for what is left of this thing - it has stopped right in the middle of the road leaving no way for other traffic to pass, apparantly this is how you get help here. I was pretty impressed to see that they had a spare, till I realised it was one of the 4 wheels from the back of the bus! At this point the jack came out and they got the flat tire a little up but not totally off the ground fine for getting a flat wheel off but no chance of getting an inflated one on. The jack was at full stretch so the logical way of fixing this to me would be to lower it use chocks off wood and raise it higher....african thinking says different. The guys then produced a shoval and proceeded to dig a hole in the middle of the road beneath the wheel deep enough to allow the new wheel to fit.


I was enjoying this spectacle with Eddie, a Zambian that's helping us out for a few sections and who I was traveling with that day and as we go to pull away when its all finished two guys grab wood stoppers from beneath the bus and a truck wheel and jump back on their respective vehicles with the makeshift brake. According to eddie its cheaper to employ a guy to do this everytime the bus or truck stops than it is to fix the brakes.

Kenya seemed to pass to quick once out of the northern scrub we had a couple of cruisy road days heading toward Nairobi, in one of these camps about 20 of us went out to do some moonlit white water rafting. Rafting to me is great fun for the 5 minutes that you actually go down rapids, but the other hour is spent sitting on your ass in wet clothes freezing cold, but the moonlit thing put a new spin on it and we headed off to give it a go. Our guides philophosy seemed to be to take us down everything backwards as we couldnt see it anyways. Either that or he was a shit driver. The bats we came across in some of the areas of the river where incredible, its an experience I definatly reccomend.

I have written more but this fucking computer keeps crashing when I try and post it, im gonna finish here and keep trying to publish until I either succeed or start throwing monitors at the woman who who runs this place and thinks its funny when you loose your shit. Not sure how it would look in court - grevious bodily harm by computer mouse.

Canadian Affair seat sale

Canadian Affair's March news letter nudged me towards checking on the current pricing of flights.

they are currently offering a 10% discount on flights in June and September as well as a 5% discount for July and August

Probably a good time to make the most of the flight discounts in combination with our shoulder season holiday package rates for June and September.