Articles by Gideon

Being a South African I am used to dealing with incompetence and unreliability. I thought I had an idea of what we’re in for traveling through Africa but I was so wrong. Nothing can really prepare you for the way things are done here in Egypt. It’s off the scale. They simply have different priorities, [...]

Finally, we’re really in Africa now. Although we’ve theoretically already set foot on African soil more than 2 weeks ago, we have only today arrived in the “real Africa”. Finally away from all the chaos in Egypt. Not a noise, no lights, no traffic, only silence and stars and desert.

The ferrie-trip through the nile to [...]

08.11.28 Dongola, Sudan. Five wipe-outs in 3 days. This is real adventure now. The roads has been wonderfully bad. My poor bike is suffering but still holding out good enough. No real damage yet, only small things: Indicator broke off, antenna for our bike-to-bike coms broke off, the bottom engine cover came off on one side, [...]

We’re 100km into Ethiopia. Contrary to what everyone we’ve spoken to said about Ethiopia, no-one has thrown any stones at us yet. Only big smiles and waving and friendly shouts.

I guess I can’t yet summarize Ethiopia accurately since we’ve only crossed the border 5 hours ago, but the first impression is exceeding our expectations. That [...]

It’s Christmas day and I’m in Nairobi in the heart of Africa, far away from the famaliar Christmas-feeling I’m used to having in my hometown, Bloemfontein in the Free State in South-Africa. We covered 500km really bad roads since we crossed the border into Kenia and the bikes were in need of some nurturing when [...]

Would a fortune-teller have told me a year ago that I’ll be spending new year in Kampala, Uganda, I would’ve probably made her out to be a fraud. That’s one of the things I love most about life, the unpredictability, the unexpected. We entered Uganda, coming from Kenia, on a “less traveled” road. The [...]

Kasulu, Tanzania 06.01.2009
 
The inside of an African state-hospital is not something that I particularly wanted to see on this journey, but I guess the state of affairs could’ve been worse, considering that the x-rays revealed only a fractured toe, and a small one for that matter.
Back in Uganda we’ve been staying at Olaf in Kampala. [...]

So it’s less than 2 weeks now before we’re off. Can hardly believe it. I’ve been working non-stop for what feels like forever and hardly had a minute to reflect on anything. My time in Germany has passed extremely fast this year although it was my longest stay here yet. So many friends I would’ve still [...]