NGORONGORO

Today I was a tourist for the first time in this trip.On our bikes, we never feel like that. When you use your own energy to go forward, you are part of what you are traversing, but when you sit at the back of a Landrover, you are a tourist... So I dressed like a tourist, I wore a khaki shirt and trousers.


One exception though, I did not have a tourist breakfast... I had a hungry cyclist breakfast... One of the biggest breakfast ever... The lodge buffet breakfast was not the greatest, but it had freshly made pancakes and something I have been missing... Bacon!

There was a huge pile of just made pancakes... I took the entire pile on a plate and brought it to my table accompanied by a full plate of jam. Yes, I took the huge pile of pancakes that the kitchen had made for the entire lodge, feeling like a hyena that had just stolen a kill from another predator. These pancakes were mine and I must have looked dangerous as nobody dared saying anything... The look some gave me clearly indicated what they thought of me... but none of these fat looking tourists made a comment loud enough to be heard... he he... As I was on a mood to eat half of the buffet, I also took over the bacon platter and politely asked the kitchen to start preparing more to accompany the fried eggs I was ordering as well. The pork sausages looked a bit dry, so I only took three to sample them. As I noticed that the yogurt supply was starting to run low on the buffet, I built a pile on my table. This was the last drop, now everybody could see it, I was an ass hole... I didn't care, today I was gonna eat and was not gonna be polite. I need it plenty more than the people surrounding me and I have no time to go to each table and explain them why, so I will live with the fact that they probably hate me by now... But who cares, the pancakes were on MY table... As the fried eggs and extra bacon arrived, I was only half way through my pancake pile, so I asked the staff to bring me some foil, I would eat the rest later in the day during the game drive.
I could hardly move after that, so luckily all I had to do was what tourists do.... Nothing.... Just sit at the back of a Landrover and be driven around by a game ranger.
So, off we went, Jos and I had this private ranger and a vehicle just for the two of us. What a pleasure when we saw how many tourists they manage to stuff in one of these vehicle. Luckily, we were not part of a group with one of these special packages and we had the full luxury of a car all for ourselves.
There are just as many animals inside that crater as there are kids in Ethiopia.... Plenty and everywhere! Unbelievable.... About 90 % of all big game is made of 3 species: Zebra, Wildebeest and Buffalo. Huge herds of them, they fill the landscape. It is crazy! How can they all survive in there? It looks like Time Square on New Years eve... There are also plenty of predators. It did not take long before we came across our first lion group with cubs. Hyenas are also everywhere and hunt in big packs.
At times, it wasn't even game viewing, it was game avoiding as the roads were completely obstructed by game... Guys, if you have never been in a safari, don't start with Ngorongoro, you will get the wrong picture; you will be spoiled and nothing can come close to it. It is like going fishing for the first time and catching a trophy Marlin on your first cast...
Anyway the picture talk more than words so, have a look.
Talking of pictures, I was struggling today with my compact camera which is definitely not ideal for this kind of shots. My Canon reflex with tele lenses was out of question for this trip, too big, too bulky. I am actually using a compact LEICA. What a wonderful little camera. It is a real Leica with a Leica lens and as you have come to appreciate on this blog, it really shoots great quality pictures. It is just not the right camera for shooting wildlife. But I have to compliment the manufacturer on the quality and robustness of that camera. It has been travelling with me on the bike going through the extreme heat and fine sands of Sudan, the stoning of Ethiopian kids and the heavy rains and humidity of the equator without any sign of fatigue... well done Leica! The model by the way is called "Leica D Luxe".

                                                     Elephant at the local coke stop....

                                        Pack of hyenas eating a freshly killed baby wildebeest

                                                         Wildebeests on the move

                                               One of the lakes at the bottom of the crater.

                                                                      The Great gazelle

                                   The very rare black Rhino, still on the endangered species list.
                                   There are only 23 of them here at Ngorongoro. The white rhino
                                   is no longer on that list thanks to the great job of South Africans.

                                                                  The Thomson gazelle

                                                                   Warthogs bathing

                                  This gives an idea of the size of the herds here at Ngorongoro

                                                    Wildebeest and Flamingos in the lake

                                                                 Lion herd with cubs

                                                             Female lions on the move

                                                                       Spotted hyena

                                                 Zebra rolling in the dust to get rid of parasites

                                                    A close up of the white wildebeest

                                         Acacia Umbrella trees are covering the side of the crater

TOURIST WELCOME TO TANZANIA...

Day one of 3 rest days.... It is a day I have been looking forward to. Today, Jos and myself are heading for the world famous Ngorongoro crater. It is situated at about 4 hours drive from Arusha and we have a private transport organised by his ex employer in Tanzania the NBC bank. The drive to Ngorongoro was just as scenic as what we have gone through over the last few days. Just plain Africa, absolutely magic! Cannot say the same about the road though, and we were feeling like scrambles eggs after the 4 hours drive. Ngorongoro crater is unique. It contains the highest density of wildlife per square kilometer in the world. Game viewing here is just spectacular and will spoil the novices as it simply does not get any better anywhere. Some will argue that Serengeti is just as good. Well, perhaps but it around the corner anyway...


We have been booked into a lodge called Sopa lodge, not the most exclusive one, but still of excellent value and unbeatable position at the edge of the crater facing the sundown... I am very impressed with Tanzania. I was here 12 years ago to climb Kilimanjaro and I can clearly see an enormous difference. The country is playing the tourism card big time and has really progressed a lot in 12 years. I would really recommend it as an excellent option for safaris with good value as prices here are definitely lower than in South Africa. Staff here at the lodge has been friendly and professional.

So this is the place where I will be recovering and relaxing before jumping back on my saddle in 3 days and riding the 6500 km south to Cape Town.
 

                                                   Me with the sundown over the crater

                        Spectacular sundown over the Ngorongoro crater viewed from the Sopa lodge.

                                     The hills surrounding the crater are steep and covered by
                                     a lush thirsk indigenous forest.

                                                   View from inside the lodge main building

                                                             wao... Luxury at its best....

                                    The roads inside the park leading to the several lodges are
                                    running along the edge of the volcano

                      As we reached the top of the climb at 2300 meters, we finally got to "view point"
                     where you could see the complete crater... What a view, it made the shaky 4 hours
                     drive from Arusha worth every minute

                    On the way to Ngorongoro crater we stopped for drinks. Coca Cola sponsors
                    each little shop here with their logo attached off course... Rasta is the name of
                    the owner of the souvenir shop by the way. He used to be a rasta he told me,
                    but his wife told him to cut his hairs off or...

                           I sneaked into someones backyard to take this picture. When passing in
                           the street these colourful clothes hanging there caught the attention of my lens....

                              On the way to the crater, we passed this guy pushing his bike loaded
                              with bananas. I asked our driver to slow down for taking this shot
                              from our car while passing by.

TANZANIA HERE WE COME

Tanzania is a beautiful country. It doesn't take long to understand the magic of African bush complimented by two giant volcanoes facing each other. I am referring to Kilimanjaro and Mt Meru. These two mountains give Northern Tanzania an extra dimension to the beauty of its nature. The roads we took today to reach Arusha took us through perfect African scenery's, the ones you have seen in the famous "Out of Africa" movie. It was intense, the trees were perfectly shaped, the bush looked healthy and green, hundreds of colourful butterflies kept on crossing the road in front of us and plenty of birds were calling exotic songs as we scrolled down heading south. I was so enchanted by this that I decided to slow down and ride alone for a while, just listening at the sounds of Africa and enjoying the scents of the bush.


At kilometer 40, I rejoined with Jos and Peter from South Africa and it was a lucky move. I had my first big problem on the bike. My back tyre got a flat, so I stopped to fix it. As Jobs offered to pump extra air in my front tyre while I was replacing the back one, the front tyre tube valve broke. The tube inside my back tyre was also completely out of order and I realised that it had the same problem, the valve was busy braking. The 5500 km had beaten the tubes so badly that they both needed to be replaced.. I always carry two spare tubes with me, unfortunately one of them proved to be also destroyed by the vibrations inside the saddle bag. It had holes all over it. So now I was standing with 1 tube and 2 wheels to be fixed. Jos is using different size valves, which meant that his spare tube could not help. So Peter was the one who made my day since he is riding the same size wheel and valve as me. We were not out of the woods yet as my pump suddenly decided that it would not cooperate and Peter"s pump only puffed sand... At that point, Jen one of our female riders passed by and lent me her pump so we could get going...

The incident had taken almost an hour to sort out and now we were suddenly right at the back of the race. Chriss, our bike mechanic was doing the sweep today and appeared just as I was putting back the second wheel on the bike. We pushed hard all the way to lunch catching the last few riders that had passed us while we were fixing the tyres. There was a nice climb after lunch as we had to scroll along Mount Meru foothills to get to Arusha. This took us back to an altitude of 1800 meters before we plunged back into the savanna surrounding Arusha.

It was a long straight downhill where we almost lost Jos again.... At one point the dirt road split into two and Jos made the wrong call, he choose the right hand road which had an enormous hole filled with fine clay dust. As he hit this he flew over his handle bar and went straight into this giant hole, head first. I was right behind Jos when that happened and had managed somehow to anticipate the situation, so all I saw was Jos going over his handle bar and disappearing into a big cloud of dust, before he reappeared standing up, completely black. It was a miracle as he stood up unhurt and covered with this fine clay dust. A group of local girls passed by walking along the road and exploded in laughter when they saw Jos face, so did Peter and I.

Arusha is a relatively well developed town and you can immediately see the benefit of income from tourism here. It is a major hub for safaris and for climbing Kilimanjaro.The town has a modern feeling to it especially when you arrive from the dirt road like we did. Traffic lights, some nice looking vitrines and hotels do contrast with the African style shops made of corrugated sheets. At night, it is not very safe apparently and we were advised to use taxis to move around. Our camp is the Masai camp, a well known spot here in Arusha, but I joined Jos to the New Arusha hotel since a bit of luxury will do us good. We have the longest brake of the tour, 3 days, so I am going to visit the world famous Ngorongoro crater situated 160 km from here.
The first thing we did in our dirty cycling shorts on arrival at the very stylish New Arusha hotel was to order a huge hamburger with extra chips. At least we have our priorities right here, first the stomach, then the shower...

                                                    Jos after his fall head first into the dust

                                                             Home made wheelbarrow

                                      Coke stop during the climb of the foothills of Mt Meru

                                   Here too, road constructions going on to pave this section.
                                   For us it means dust and heavy vehicles.
                           
                          This section was supposed to be dirt but it has been paved since last year.

                                                                   Meeting the locals

                                  This guy on his single speed bicycle was hard to follow uphill....

                                   Beautiful Tanzania.What a privilege to ride in such countryside

                                        TDA crossing the border between Kenya and Tanzania.

                                Ruben enjoying the Italian salami, Swiss cheese and Chilean wine

                              The luxury Swiss Italian dinner organised by Maria Pia and Gabriele

BYE BYE KENYA...

Another green dash on the board, and that is next to "Kenya" this time. The 160 km long stage today took us right to the Tanzanian border. Departing Nairobi on Sunday morning early was good idea. It spared us the danger of riding in the mad Nairobi traffic and within an hour we were out of the city boundaries on a small "tarred" road heading south towards the Tanzanian border. Tarred, is a bit of a over statement as the surface of the pot holes was definitely beating the surface of what was left of tar... Anyway after km 50, we turned into another road and things got better for while until we hit the section they were rebuilding. That is where the day's unexpected challenge hit us. There was a choice to go right onto a dirt road that browsed along the road work or to keep on straight and make our way between the heavy machines. Being Sunday, the roadworks looked almost stopped, so most riders went straight through and did not use the side road. Mistake... Many paid a heavy price for this... They had just poured fresh liquid tar on that section and within seconds the riders who had chosen this way got splashed with warm liquid tar, all over their bikes and themselves. Some even fell in it.... At camp later, it took them hours to wipe that tar of their bikes.

Kenya gets the full marks as far as I am concerned. I enjoyed this country and was impressed by the level of education everywhere. I was also impressed by the way they have embraced Internet and cell phones. Both are available everywhere with different operator competing and at very reasonable prices. A healthy sign for the future. I have never seen as many schools as here in Kenya. They seem to have bet on the future generation through education and I can tell you that the difference between here and Ethiopia or Sudan is obvious. Kenyans I have met were mostly friendly and educated, they were all interested about our journey and I felt a lot closer to them than any of the other nations we have met so far.

I am now looking forward to discover Tanzania where we are going to spend 15 days crossing it diagonally. Tomorrow we will reach Arusha where the TDA takes its official mid way break, a full 3 days off the bikes! Yeah!!!

                                                         Dan cleaning his bike full of tar

                                                                          Termite nest

                                          Amazing indigenous trees fashion the landscape

                                                                The bark of that tree

                              The landscape we crossed today were magnificent. Untamed Africa....

                                                       Church in the middle of the bush

                                           Dana was also one of the riders who got "tarred"

                         Josh, Gabriel, Jim and myself on a dirt portion of today's 160 km long stage.

                                      Eric did not only liter his bike with tar, he also fell in it...