Crossing into Rwanda is one of the easiest borders we have found. The customs people are polite, smartly dressed in uniform and formalities are kept to a minimum. Even the currency dealers didn’t put up a fight and they were so good humored that we split our Ugandan shillings and gave them each some business.

Yet another border and thankfully the last

The run down into Kigali is an easy one which takes an hour. A lot has changed here since our last visit but we find our way to the Presbyterian Church guest house without trouble.

Kigali

Since Dunfermline we have driven 8,500 miles, have met new friends and lost some weight. The past weeks blend together into what seem like now distant memories. Would we do it again? We aren’t sure, but this has been an experience neither of us would have missed. Perhaps one day.

Our hotel last night was only a few miles from Kampala. Before long we are entering the city and find modern office blocks, banks and other trappings of city architecture that could be anywhere in Europe. What isn’t European is the traffic which is definitely African. There is no order or sense of discipline. At junctions the strategy is to force a way across the other vehicles using the horn and little else. Motorbikes are everywhere, and usually right where you are heading.

We find our way out of the city and follow the long road sout-east to the Rwandan border. This is tarmac but the quality leaves a lot to be desired. Pot-holes are everywhere and big enough that even the trucks and buses slow down. This is frustrating. We want to press on but find that the brake is being put to as much use as the accelerator.

This is farming country. We pass fields of maize, sugar beat and, increasingly, banana palms. Occasionally there are herds of long-horned cattle.

Long horned cattle

We stop at a small village and are besieged by dozens of boys each wanting to sell their produce. Half a dozen arms press goat kebabs and baked bananas against the window. We buy some of each and wish we hadn’t. The bananas were edible, the kebabs weren’t.

We aren’t going to make it all the way to Rwanda today, particularly on these roads, so we stop at Ntangamo for the night. This is one of the few times during the trip that we have pulled up before sunset and it gives us time to wander around. This is not a big place and it is clear that they haven’t seen many white faces. The children wave at us. The adults just stare. Across from our guest house, storks settle on a roof. These are large birds by any measure and serve to remind us that we have come to foreign territory indeed.

Storks

We are not unhappy at leaving Eldoret and its noise. A local club kept us awake with its music until the early hours only to be replaced by the shops around us starting their day at 3am. We hazard a guess that this must be the Muslim part of Kenya.

By now we have Kigali in our sights and with only two more borders to cross we are eager to press on. Eating is whatever we can find on the road so a local market provides an opportunity to buy some lunch for later in the day. In Kenya the currency is shillings and we are charged “ten bob” for two avocados. The Kenyan 10/- is a coin and not a note, so “queer as” sprung to mind.

A Kenyan settlement

Crossing borders is a skill that we are beginning to get the hang of. The knack is to be able to identify the fixers that attempt to guide you through the customs process. Throughout Africa we have been plagued by these people who work on the basis that in return for accompanying us through the various offices, we will reward them with money. In the north this was a service worth paying for as the process is chaotic, few people speak English and even the immigration people don’t seem to know what is going on. In Egypt it confused us that the policeman who took charge of us was the fixer and wanted paid for his trouble. Having crossed several borders and finding that getting passports and vehicle processed isn’t difficult, the attentions of these fixers starts to become a little irritating. At the Uganda border we had a dozen of them arguing with us, and each other, about who saw us first.

We leave the fixers to fight among themselves and had our passports stamped. Next job is to change our Kenyan shillings into Ugandan shillings. The strategy here is to wait until a tout comes and offers money. We ask his rate and tell him his friend over there has offered better. This really upsets them and before long we have a gaggle of dealers around us arguing about who saw us first and therefore has the right to sell us his currency. In Ethiopia we had managed to get a couple of dealers bidding against each other and improved the rate by half a point but here in Kenya the idea of competition has still to catch on. We end up choosing one using the “one potato, two potato” basis, do the deal and move on.

A little way down the road into Uganda we pull up into a lay-by where a troupe of baboons are crossing the road. Infants ride on their mother’s back or else hang on underneath. One adventurous female comes up to the vehicle and peers into the open window at us. It is a moment of magic but the spell is broken by me reaching for the camera. She moves off. It is tempting to offer them some of our bananas but I suspect that if we did we might encourage more attention than is comfortable. It would be easier getting rid of the border fixers than hungry baboons.

Into the afternoon we pass around the north shore of Lake Victoria and meet an old friend. We first met the river Nile way back in Cairo. Our route has brought us down the banks of this great river through Egypt and Sudan. We parted company at the source of the Blue Nile, the Blue Nile Falls, in Ethiopia. Had I remembered my history and geography better I would have recollected that the White Nile starts its course further south at Lake Victoria. As we cross the river a railway runs beside the road. Two giant cranes above the track were built by William Errol and Sons of Glasgow. There is a lot that is strangely familiar in these parts.

We stop for the night a few miles short of Kampala. The guest house is cheap and clean. On the menu is stewed goat which is tough to chew and has a strong venison-like taste. If ever I get goat to cook, I think I will marinade it in something first. Having seen many goats through Europe and Africa it strikes me that there are two types of people in the world. There are those that don’t know where their meal has come from and there are those that know what their meal ate for breakfast before they killed it. I have an uneasy feeling that sooner or later we will be joining the second group.

When we arrived in Isiolo yesterday, the vehicle looked as if it had been doing some serious messing about in a desert somewhere. The original green had been turned into battle camouflage with sand covering everything, including the engine. This morning we emerge to find that the hotel porter has given her a wash and we set off looking like real tourists again. I think we were making the hotel car park look untidy.

First stop this morning is Mount Kenya. At over 15,000 feet there are glaciers at the top and this is the second highest peak in Africa. Unfortunately the mountain is covered in cloud today and there is little to be seen.

As we drive around the base of the mountain we cross the equator for the first time. Our road heads due west taking us alternately between the northern and southern hemispheres.

We made it this far - we might as well photograph it

Eldoret has been chosen as a resting place for the night because it puts us within striking distance of the Ugandan border tomorrow. We arrive after dark and can sense something of the lawlessness we have seen elsewhere. Along the busy main street shops are protected by heavy steel grills as is the stairway into the guest house we find. The town is busy and the air is filled with music turned up to full volume from every little shop. This isn’t a peaceful place, and is made less peaceful by the sound of heavy trucks rattling their way to and from the border.

We are starting to feel fatigued by the journey and are glad of a nights rest, even if it looks like a prison. Tomorrow we should cross into Uganda and, roads permitting, Rwanda the day after.

This is day two of our cross-country ride into southern Kenya. In truth we aren’t looking forward to another day like yesterday but there are no options.

We refuel at the small filling station in Marsabit and the attendant tells us there has not been rain in over twelve months. Elephants are dying in the reserve. The people here are nervous.

The strategy for driving over this road is to go as fast as possible (anything over 10mph is good) whilst trying to find any soft ground that hasn’t been compacted into solid corrugations and at the same time avoiding rocks that might destroy a tyre. The arithmetic is simple, 150miles, 10mph, 15 hours. We can only hope there are faster stretches further down. Like yesterday, it is like driving over cobbles that have been ripped up and set in concrete.

A camel train makes its way across the desert rocks

Every now and again we cross a concrete bridge over a river. Each tells the same story. The dry beds, one easily 100m across, have not seen water for a long time.

There is more traffic on this section of the road than yesterday. Mostly trucks carrying workers or tankers taking water north.

Dry desert, northern Kenya

Eventually, with 50 miles to go, the going improves a little but this is still another ten hour day. Isiolo is a relief with its new tarmac road. This is a small town which serves to connect the Kenyan road network with the Ethiopian border to the north. There are more churches here than anything else and there is even a branch of Barclays bank along the high street. There is a strange familiarity here. The cars drive on the left and the road signs are the same style as used at home. At the hotel, fish and chips are on the menu.

Talking to the hotel manager we are at last within striking distance of Kigali. Hopefully, two days should see us into Uganda and another two to the finish line. We are looking forward to that.

This has been one of the most challenging legs of the journey yet. In the next two days we must cover some 300 miles across the Kenyan bush and desert before we can turn westward through Uganda and into Rwanda.

The red and white line on our map is grandly named as the Trans East African Highway. Unfortunately the reality doesn’t live up to the billing. Over its good bits this is a sand track. The rest is rock and corrugations. We have driven 7,000 miles from Dunfermline, all of it on tarmac (except of a few miles in northern Sudan which was under construction) and it has taken until now to run out of road. It had to happen sometime but I was naively thinking that we might just make it to Kigali without leaving the black stuff.

The first stretch south from Moyale is rough but sandy. We manage an average 20mph. The slow progress is compensated for by having a wild life park to ourselves. Crossing the track in front of us we see antelope, monkeys, warthogs and gazelle. The birds are stunning as they swoop across the windscreen.

A dik-dik

There are few settlements but what people there are keep the usual oxen, goats and camels. At one point we pass a train of these ships of the desert saddled with grand roofed cages, their tops curving stylishly forward to protect the contents.

A long and not very winding road, northern Kenya

Our steady progress deteriorates with the quality of the track. Much of the day and at least a hundred miles is spent crawling over rocks and corrugated sand. The combination is bone jarring. On several occasions we are thankful for the sump protector mounted under the engine as rocks thud into the steel plate.

It takes ten hours to cover 150 miles to the Marsabit wildlife reserve. We find a lodge run by a Swiss development worker who has settled here. He tells us that last year’s rains failed completely. They have no water in their taps but are able to buy what is shipped in by tanker. He is grateful that we have brought a small supply with us. With our jerry can filled by the garage in Addis Ababa, we should be able to stay the night without depleting local supplies.

The Swiss Cottage at Marsabit, Kenya

This is being typed in a small shelter beside our sleeping hut. The walls are decorated with pictures of local wildlife and optimistically in one scene, some gazelle stand under a cloud dropping rain. This may be a story of wetter times past but it is also a hope for the future. The land here is parched and we can only wonder how many years without rain these people can take before another international crisis hits the western news screens.

We are up early and eager to get away from the night’s lodgings. Breakfast is an orange, a banana, a cup of mango juice and a malaria pill.

I had thought we must be through with the hill-climbing but there is still more to do. Out of Agere we rise again onto a plateau of deep red sandy soil. Thorny shrubs and trees litter the landscape along with termite mounds, some of which stand 3m tall. This is camel country. Further north, small children are left in charge of the family goats. Here we saw herds of camels being coaxed through the undergrowth by youngsters small enough to walk between the animals’ legs.

Children herding their camels

A few days ago my mind had wandered back to Band Aid and the Ethiopian famine of the 1980’s. It struck me that the Ethiopia we had seen until then didn’t match the television images of desert and drought. Now we have reached that Ethiopia. This land is parched. It is easy to see that if the annual rains failed here, what little livelihood the local people have would be lost.

A termite mound

The women are noticeably brighter with oranges, yellows and purples making up this season’s colours. This is more like picture book Africa. In front of us a female baboon and her family cross the road. Further on we see a group of warthogs. There is also a small animal we have spotted looking like a cross between a stoat and a red squirrel.

As we drop down to the Kenyan border we cross another plateau where wheat and maize are growing. The crops look thin and withered. There has been no rain recently and none is expected until October.

Rather than sleep on the Ethiopian side of Moyale we decide to get the customs formalities out of the way ready for an early start tomorrow. On the Kenyan side, Moyale is a dusty town without a great deal of purpose. Tonight, the hotel has no water at all, nor electricity. There is a faint smell of white spirit in the room. We had thought that the cell we slept in at Wadi Halfa in Sudan was bad. This one at least has a wooden door as opposed to a steel one.

Two hard days lie ahead. Three hundred miles of sand track to get us to the south of Kenya so that we can strike westwards around Lake Victoria.

Until now we have been sending these postings by text to Nicky in Dunfermline who has done a superb job of keeping up with us. South of Addis Ababa we have run out of signal and so Nicky gets the day off and this is being posted from an internet cafe and a keyboard thick with sand in Moyale.

After our enforced lay-up, we set off on the road south for the second time and not without some trepidation. Even though Ultimate Motors have done a superb job on our engine, I am keeping a constant eye on the temperature guage in case we spring any more leaks. At least we are past the extreme heat of the desert further north.

We retrace our steps, remembering the various landmarks down the road. By early afternoon we have recovered the lost miles down to Dila and start climbing steeply into the southern Ethiopian highlands. The road looks as if it has been cut clean through the jungle with banana palms and the occasional cacti lining the route. At the top the views are spectacular with nothing but forest covering the surrounding mountain tops.

Forest in southern Ethiopia

As we pass through village settlements there are signs indicating projects run by the various aid agencies. In Addis it wasn’t hard to spot a UN vehicle and we have seen Christian Aid, World Vision, USAid, and the Red Cross all doing work here. Judging from the dilapidated state of the settlements we have seen, there is evidently still work to be done.

Each day we have tried to find a stopping place before nightfall. Tonight’s choice is Agere Maryam and is the last town where we are likely to find a bed before the Kenyan border. The biggest hotel in the place is full. As we drive along the main street looking for something else, there is a sense of lawlessness which we first felt further north. Local youths are fighting with whips in the middle of the road while the police stand by watching. Neither seem eager let us pass but not for the first time this trip, a close-up of the bull bar and a loud horn does the trick.

We manage to find a room which is clean, has electricity, but only manages a trickle from the tap. The shower doesn’t look very inviting, which is perhaps just as well. We are learning that daily niceties such as washing sometimes have to be missed.

Agere puts us in a good position to reach the Kenyan border at Moyale tomorrow.

We have spent the last four days here in Addis while the vehicle has been repaired and at last are ready to move on once again.

It has to be said that Addis is not a particularly attractive city. This is the Manchester of Ethiopia. At 8,000 feet it catches every bit of rain passing, usually starting about four o’clock each afternoon and lasting into the night. The result is that the roads, many of which are unsurfaced, turn into muddy rivers. The traffic crawls gingerly around or through the pot holes, avoiding pedestrians doing the same thing.

The hotel we were brought to is named after the Meskel flower. This is a plant unique to Ethiopia and associated with the cross. It flowers only during September when the Church celebrates the crucifixion. Our stay here, although enforced has given us a much needed rest. We have had the chance to reflect, gather our wits and consider the seemingly gargantuan task we have set ourselves. We have come to rely on the Lord for our strength and whatever we have that day. I think that without our faith and His comfort we might well have given up at this point.

The Meskel Hotel has been something of a culture shock for us. We baulked a little at the price – £30 per night but decided that the alternative was more than we could cope with. For that princely sum we enjoyed five star luxury. Porters at the door saluted us as we went in and out. When we sat down in the bar someone brought another seat for Bronwen’s handbag. It was impossible to go anywhere in the hotel without someone insisting on carrying whatever bag we had with us. This was all quite embarassing considering the only clothes we had were what we stood in and we were still leaving a trail of sand behind us when we moved.

Yet outside this surreal haven is another world. The corner twenty yards from the hotel door is where a figure sleeps on the muddy pavement with his dogs. The dogs look in better condition than he does. Directly across from the hotel, in the mud and what can only be described as squalor, a family keep their goats which are moved in and out of tarpaulins to shelter them from the daily rain. Addis is not pretty.

The view from our hotel window in Addis

Today the vehicle is in one piece again with a rebuilt engine. For that we have to thank Ultimate Motors, the Land Rover garage who looked after us superbly well. They even washed the Sudanese desert off when they had finished. The vehicle looks unrecognisably clean.

We have our visas which have been extended for another two weeks. Tomorrow we head south for the second time towards the Kenyan border.

When planning this journey we were never under any illusion that progress would always be smooth and steady. Only today though did we realise that we might spend some of the trip going backwards. We rolled a seven and “Go back to Old Kent Road” turned up.

There is a mechanic around the corner from our guest house and the Land Rover is taken to have the water leak investigated. He quickly identifies the water pump, and this is replaced by the spare we are carrying. After a couple of hours we move on again.

On we head, hoping to cross into Kenya at Moyale around lunch time. After a while we reach a place called Dilla and stop for provisions with no indication of impending trouble ahead. After leaving Dilla we round a corner and the engine stalls. For the first time in the journey I had taken my eye off the gauges and the temperature is way up into the red.

The engine is hissing and spouting steam. We have water in a jerry can but that isn’t going to fix the problem. The only thing to do just now is let the engine cool. Without any real plan of action beyond this the people of Africa yet again prove their amazing willingness to help.

The usual crowd gathers within minutes around the open bonnet. Before long a car pulls up and Dagmauic, a civil engineer with good English asks us what the problem is. He pulls out his mobile and makes a call.
“I have called a mechanic from our company” he says.

Ashenafi the mechanic arrives shortly after and suspects that the water pump fitted earlier that morning has failed. He spends a long while pouring gallons of water into the hissing engine trying to expel the air that clearly shouldn’t be in there. We quickly use our 20 litre jerry can and stream of assorted containers filled from the local stream. All this takes place amid a throng of locals eager to see what is going on.

Eventually, Ashenafi gives up saving that water isn’t circulating around the engine. Bad news. The situation doesn’t look good and for the first time we are forced to contemplate that this might be the end of the road. Out comes Dagmauic’s mobile again. There is a driver in Dilla who can take us to Addis Ababa. This is the only place in Ethiopia where we can find a Land Rover mechanic. Amazingly the garage that Dagmauic has found is the only Land Rover mechanic in Ethiopia, never mind Addis.

A truck arrives. This is one of the small Isuzu workhorses we have seen on the roads. There must have been twenty villagers around the vehicle pushing it up onto the grass bank and down again onto the truck. The Land Rover barely fits. With mirrors folded there are only inches to spare either side. We are filled with a mix of despair and amazement as we watch. The whole affair becomes surreal when a red Land Rover Defender rolls up going north. Dan and Joanne are traveling from Cape Town to England and have been on the road for three months. They watch with us as three tons of vehicle and kit are unceremoniously manhandled onto the back of the truck. We exchange intelligence about the roads each of us have ahead and how long it is since any of us had a shower. They wish us well as they travel on.

The AA wouldn't come out as far as Ethiopia

With the Land Rover firmly strapped down onto the truck we head back to Addis with heavy hearts. It is mid afternoon. The two of us sit up front with the driver Gigavin, while his mate, Marcus sits in the Land Rover.

It is clear that this journey is going to test us. After a few miles we are stopped by a police check point. It seems that transporting goods between districts requires a bit of paper which we don’t have. Back we go to Dilla “Do not pass Go, do not collect £200.”

Realising that Addis is several hours away I go to find food and water. With little time available I select a likely lad from the ever present throng and have him lead me to the local market. It is huge. We pick up bananas and return, my assistant clearing the way through the crowd. Back on the main street Gigvain roars up on a motorbike and signals for me to get on the back. The day is turning into something from an Out of Africa film. I hang on with white knuckles as we race around the rocky side lanes to the local police office.

The police want to see our vehicle documents and eventually, with our permission to travel we are back on the road at last. It will be the early hours before we are back in the capital. After dark we hit a queue of standing traffic. There has been an accident ahead and the two of us decide to see if we can help. In the middle of the blackness we locate the victim. There is a curious deferment to white faces here and we are ushered through the crowd. A boy introduced himself as a medical student and says he has seen that the man is dead. There is clearly nothing we can do.

Back in the truck, the police fuss and we wait for the queue to clear. Nothing happens. It seems the vehicle that hit the man didn’t stop and the locals are protesting by blocking the road. We have some sympathy for them. The roads here are as much a utility for human traffic as vehicles. There is an uneasy competition between the two and the scope for accident is obvious.

It is 3am before we arrive in Addis. We are extremely tired. Gigavin finds a hotel and we park the truck. Before we can get out, the local police armed with machine guns turn up. After a long discussion they insist that we park outside the police station for safety. Bronwen goes into the hotel and we drive to the station with four policemen in the truck and Land Rover. We park up. Gigavin and Marcus are told to sleep in the truck and I am escorted back to the hotel with the truck keys in my pocket. The Ethiopian authorities seem very keen to protect visitors from their own people. This is galling given the help we have received but there isn’t much point in arguing.