Days 116-119
Sleeping location: Sama Alsaeeda Hotel, Khartoum, Sudan
Distance (km today/total): 9 / 9262
Estimated climb (m today/total): 0 / 61300
Days spent in bed: 2.5
Day in three words: Khartoum hard work
Four days spent in the city, although as we will see they weren’t all spent exploring. Khartoum is a strange city, it’s incredibly spread out and has no discernible centre, to the extent that the airport is within the city, just a couple of kilometres from where the centre would be if there were one*. As a result it has no real identity, nothing that makes you think “aah yes this is Khartoum”, so to me it felt like we could have been in a nondescript part of Colombo or Phnom Penh or Lima or [insert random tropical dusty city]. In its defence it’s pretty chilled out for a big city, you don’t get that much hassle at all, and people are friendly.
Day 1 was Rebecca’s birthday so we enjoyed a lie in with some present presentation (yellow mug, pen, notepad with cats on) before heading out to the nearby “Greek Club” which we had heard had a pool. It did indeed, and a nice one, but it was completely empty apart from a security guard who waved us in. We made ourselves at home and after about two hours an employee showed up and we got some food then played some chaotic basketball. On leaving we did have to pay a small entrance fee, but it was totally worth it. Rebecca’s birthday dinner was at a fancy Asian place which was very tasty and a much needed change from Sudanese food. We got excited and outrageously over-ordered but thankfully they did takeaway. On the way home we got ice “cream” and went to a cool cafe where they had pool tables. The table was outrageously wonky and at one point I had to steady the white ball whilst Rebecca hit it, much like you would a rugby ball when trying to kick for goal in high winds. They gave us our tasty lemon drinks for free so we like this place.
Day 2 saw Rebecca on errand mission and me on tourist mission. First I got a tuk tuk to the national museum and spent a pleasantly ramshackle hour there. It had similar things to the Egyptian version, but with a Nubian twist. The exhibits didn’t have the same wow factor but the labelling was actually better, it was way quieter (in between groups of bored kids) and it was also over 100 times cheaper to get in. They also had some small temples rescued from Lake Nasser in big sheds outside, and some beautiful Christian frescos (Nubia was Christian until the 14th century). In the museum I started to feel ropey and decided to head back, but instead of getting a taxi I stuck with the original plan and walked 90 minutes under the hot sun, which did not help matters. Back at the hotel I went to bed and was soon feeling very bad, with a sharp headache, general weakness, a fever and a cough. My first aid kit contains some emergency Jakemans cough sweets and I got them out, only to discover that dozens of ants had somehow got through two zips and were having a whale of a time in there. I turfed them out and got two bites for my troubles. Rebecca came back and looked after me as I wasn't up to much by mid afternoon.
Day 3 I felt a little better, which was good because we had to get up at 6 and go the Ethiopian embassy to get our visa as it was closed for the following few days. I had foolishly run out of passport photos** but the advice we’d seen said that you could get them done onsite. At the embassy everything was as expected, apart from (wait for it) they didn’t do photos. I went off on a solo mission to find some whilst Rebecca did our forms. I had no idea where to get them so I took to asking random street vendors. One guy gave me some detailed instructions that I totally didn’t understand, then decided this wasn't helpful enough and walked with me for the best part of a kilometre to a government building. Here he asked around and took me to a little hut where they were miraculously doing passport photos (which had no sign so I would never have spotted it) and helped me to procure some. There was no question of him wanting any money for this, he was just genuinely happy to help. What a lovely man. Back at the embassy Rebecca had accidentally got me a place in the (much shorter) women’s queue and we were able to present our forms and pay our $60 pretty quickly. But my photo exertions had drained my limited energy and soon I was in a bad way again, curled up on the floor, shivering despite wearing a jumper and Rebecca’s scarf. Luckily the embassy staff noticed this and fast tracked our visas, which was very nice of them and probably saved us a few hours. Rebecca went to run further errands and I headed back to bed, where for most of rest of the day I had blinding headaches that were too severe to allow me to do anything, even sleep. In the early evening the painkillers finally started working and life became a bit more bearable.
Day 4 started early as I woke up in the small hours in a semi delusional state and drenched in sweat. For the next hour or two I kept having waking dreams about digging (?!) and was unable to fully wake up or fully sleep. Eventually I managed to get lucid enough to take some paracetamol and subsequently managed to sleep again. In the morning I felt better (perhaps all that digging helped) but nowhere near enough to leave as we had planned to. I spent the day in bed, still weak but at least able to watch tv and write the blog, which would have been impossible the day before. Poor Rebecca was going stir crazy by this point, wandering round the neighbourhood just to have something to do. We deduced that I probably had a sinus infection and it was clearing up now, although it had now spread to the balance bit of my ears which meant that I had to shuffle around like a tortoise all day. Went to bed early in the hope that I’d be well enough to leave tomorrow.
*Although despite staying pretty close to it we didn’t see or hear a single plane in four days.
**Or as it turned out I hadn’t, they were just in the “wrong” place in my bags
Distance (km today/total): 9 / 9262
Estimated climb (m today/total): 0 / 61300
Days spent in bed: 2.5
Day in three words: Khartoum hard work
Four days spent in the city, although as we will see they weren’t all spent exploring. Khartoum is a strange city, it’s incredibly spread out and has no discernible centre, to the extent that the airport is within the city, just a couple of kilometres from where the centre would be if there were one*. As a result it has no real identity, nothing that makes you think “aah yes this is Khartoum”, so to me it felt like we could have been in a nondescript part of Colombo or Phnom Penh or Lima or [insert random tropical dusty city]. In its defence it’s pretty chilled out for a big city, you don’t get that much hassle at all, and people are friendly.
Day 1 was Rebecca’s birthday so we enjoyed a lie in with some present presentation (yellow mug, pen, notepad with cats on) before heading out to the nearby “Greek Club” which we had heard had a pool. It did indeed, and a nice one, but it was completely empty apart from a security guard who waved us in. We made ourselves at home and after about two hours an employee showed up and we got some food then played some chaotic basketball. On leaving we did have to pay a small entrance fee, but it was totally worth it. Rebecca’s birthday dinner was at a fancy Asian place which was very tasty and a much needed change from Sudanese food. We got excited and outrageously over-ordered but thankfully they did takeaway. On the way home we got ice “cream” and went to a cool cafe where they had pool tables. The table was outrageously wonky and at one point I had to steady the white ball whilst Rebecca hit it, much like you would a rugby ball when trying to kick for goal in high winds. They gave us our tasty lemon drinks for free so we like this place.
Day 2 saw Rebecca on errand mission and me on tourist mission. First I got a tuk tuk to the national museum and spent a pleasantly ramshackle hour there. It had similar things to the Egyptian version, but with a Nubian twist. The exhibits didn’t have the same wow factor but the labelling was actually better, it was way quieter (in between groups of bored kids) and it was also over 100 times cheaper to get in. They also had some small temples rescued from Lake Nasser in big sheds outside, and some beautiful Christian frescos (Nubia was Christian until the 14th century). In the museum I started to feel ropey and decided to head back, but instead of getting a taxi I stuck with the original plan and walked 90 minutes under the hot sun, which did not help matters. Back at the hotel I went to bed and was soon feeling very bad, with a sharp headache, general weakness, a fever and a cough. My first aid kit contains some emergency Jakemans cough sweets and I got them out, only to discover that dozens of ants had somehow got through two zips and were having a whale of a time in there. I turfed them out and got two bites for my troubles. Rebecca came back and looked after me as I wasn't up to much by mid afternoon.
Day 3 I felt a little better, which was good because we had to get up at 6 and go the Ethiopian embassy to get our visa as it was closed for the following few days. I had foolishly run out of passport photos** but the advice we’d seen said that you could get them done onsite. At the embassy everything was as expected, apart from (wait for it) they didn’t do photos. I went off on a solo mission to find some whilst Rebecca did our forms. I had no idea where to get them so I took to asking random street vendors. One guy gave me some detailed instructions that I totally didn’t understand, then decided this wasn't helpful enough and walked with me for the best part of a kilometre to a government building. Here he asked around and took me to a little hut where they were miraculously doing passport photos (which had no sign so I would never have spotted it) and helped me to procure some. There was no question of him wanting any money for this, he was just genuinely happy to help. What a lovely man. Back at the embassy Rebecca had accidentally got me a place in the (much shorter) women’s queue and we were able to present our forms and pay our $60 pretty quickly. But my photo exertions had drained my limited energy and soon I was in a bad way again, curled up on the floor, shivering despite wearing a jumper and Rebecca’s scarf. Luckily the embassy staff noticed this and fast tracked our visas, which was very nice of them and probably saved us a few hours. Rebecca went to run further errands and I headed back to bed, where for most of rest of the day I had blinding headaches that were too severe to allow me to do anything, even sleep. In the early evening the painkillers finally started working and life became a bit more bearable.
Day 4 started early as I woke up in the small hours in a semi delusional state and drenched in sweat. For the next hour or two I kept having waking dreams about digging (?!) and was unable to fully wake up or fully sleep. Eventually I managed to get lucid enough to take some paracetamol and subsequently managed to sleep again. In the morning I felt better (perhaps all that digging helped) but nowhere near enough to leave as we had planned to. I spent the day in bed, still weak but at least able to watch tv and write the blog, which would have been impossible the day before. Poor Rebecca was going stir crazy by this point, wandering round the neighbourhood just to have something to do. We deduced that I probably had a sinus infection and it was clearing up now, although it had now spread to the balance bit of my ears which meant that I had to shuffle around like a tortoise all day. Went to bed early in the hope that I’d be well enough to leave tomorrow.
*Although despite staying pretty close to it we didn’t see or hear a single plane in four days.
**Or as it turned out I hadn’t, they were just in the “wrong” place in my bags
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