Day 123
Sleeping location: Mini tree forest 14.02N 34.68E, Sudan
Distance (km today/total): 88 / 9619
Estimated climb (m today/total): 200 / 62000
Main product of the region: mini trees
Distance (km today/total): 88 / 9619
Estimated climb (m today/total): 200 / 62000
Main product of the region: mini trees
Day in three words: Hot hard cash
We didn’t have much food so decided to have breakfast in a cafe 15km down the road, though sadly a headwind and a bad surface turned this little jaunt into an hour’s slog. The place was thankfully worth the effort and we got a good feed to restore our spirits. Whilst we were eating a grasshopper the size of my little finger landed on Rebecca’s shoulder and enjoyed itself for a few minutes before abruptly launching itself to the ceiling 2m above. It must be fun being a grasshopper. As well as eating we took this opportunity to change $50 into Sudanese money, which is hopefully the last we will need. The owner seemed to have some real trouble with the conversion, initially giving me just $5 of SP, then agreeing that this was insufficient and wandering off for ages, then giving some random amount, then giving in and allowing me to just count it myself. The advantage of this process was that I got mostly big bills, so it didn’t take up my entire handlebar bag for once.
The terrain for the morning was more scrubland, but to make it interesting there were now some watering holes dotted around, and some low hills rising from the plain every so often. The watering holes would often have livestock at them and/or great flocks of egrets. There were lots of donkeys* and we started to see conical huts made of mud with straw roofs. The whole scene felt very African, more so that at any point on the trip so far. Later in the day we began to see forests of small red trees that appeared to have been planted by humans, although goodness knows for what reason.
It was very hot again and my brain was in first gear for most of the day. This spread to my phone when I tried to charge it at lunch; I successfully hooked it up to the solar charger but forgot to put the phone itself in the shade, and came back to find a very hot phone displaying a fun new error message about being too hot and shutting down all non-critical functions. It took a good 15 minutes to calm down again.
There was so much mini tree forest that it was easy to find somewhere good to camp, and we picked a pleasant glade with good cover behind a big bush. There was a shed snake skin next to the tree where I parked my bike, but that just added to the excitement (right?). Dinner was a mixture of pasta, tomato purée and sardines which we liked very much.
*Two of these donkeys chose the middle of the road to get amorous, slowing down traffic but also hopefully amusing a lot of people. As an aside, I also now understand the phrase “hung like a donkey”
We didn’t have much food so decided to have breakfast in a cafe 15km down the road, though sadly a headwind and a bad surface turned this little jaunt into an hour’s slog. The place was thankfully worth the effort and we got a good feed to restore our spirits. Whilst we were eating a grasshopper the size of my little finger landed on Rebecca’s shoulder and enjoyed itself for a few minutes before abruptly launching itself to the ceiling 2m above. It must be fun being a grasshopper. As well as eating we took this opportunity to change $50 into Sudanese money, which is hopefully the last we will need. The owner seemed to have some real trouble with the conversion, initially giving me just $5 of SP, then agreeing that this was insufficient and wandering off for ages, then giving some random amount, then giving in and allowing me to just count it myself. The advantage of this process was that I got mostly big bills, so it didn’t take up my entire handlebar bag for once.
The terrain for the morning was more scrubland, but to make it interesting there were now some watering holes dotted around, and some low hills rising from the plain every so often. The watering holes would often have livestock at them and/or great flocks of egrets. There were lots of donkeys* and we started to see conical huts made of mud with straw roofs. The whole scene felt very African, more so that at any point on the trip so far. Later in the day we began to see forests of small red trees that appeared to have been planted by humans, although goodness knows for what reason.
It was very hot again and my brain was in first gear for most of the day. This spread to my phone when I tried to charge it at lunch; I successfully hooked it up to the solar charger but forgot to put the phone itself in the shade, and came back to find a very hot phone displaying a fun new error message about being too hot and shutting down all non-critical functions. It took a good 15 minutes to calm down again.
There was so much mini tree forest that it was easy to find somewhere good to camp, and we picked a pleasant glade with good cover behind a big bush. There was a shed snake skin next to the tree where I parked my bike, but that just added to the excitement (right?). Dinner was a mixture of pasta, tomato purée and sardines which we liked very much.
*Two of these donkeys chose the middle of the road to get amorous, slowing down traffic but also hopefully amusing a lot of people. As an aside, I also now understand the phrase “hung like a donkey”
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