Day 168
Sleeping location: Taro Family Guesthouse, Konso, Ethiopia
Distance (km today/total): 92 / 12004
Estimated climb (m today/total): 700 / 88700
Deadly weapons: 2
Distance (km today/total): 92 / 12004
Estimated climb (m today/total): 700 / 88700
Deadly weapons: 2
Day in three words: Children of terror
After ploughing through a lot of our mango stash for breakfast we set off at the inexplicably late time of 10am. We’re going to need to get better at early starts once it gets really hot again (which is soon). Out of Arba Minch was a swift descent down a crappy road onto a level but still crappy road, on which we saw more baboons stealing fruit from the nearby plantations. After 10km we saw a sign for Nechisar and a dirt road, so went to see what was what. It turned out that this was the boat departure point, and we would have come here by car on a tour. Being here for free we tried to negotiate a reduced rate boat trip, but couldn’t get the price for 2hrs below £60. Whilst we were making up our minds two American ladies got off a boat, and I went to ask them if it was worth it. They said they didn’t see much because the water was high and the animals were all hiding, so our minds were made up and we went to leave. At this point another troupe of baboons appeared, plus a load of smaller monkeys who were scampering around stealing all of the fruit remnants from the bins. Whilst Rebecca pushed her bike back to the entrance one of the smaller monkeys followed her and scoped out if it could steal a full mango from the the front of her bike, which was very funny.
On the way out of the park I found a porcupine quill and attached it to my bike to deter any menacing kids. But it turned out I already had a deadly weapon on my bike, as I went to adjust the position of the poo trowel 2.0* and gave my finger a nasty cut on its sharp inside. In the heat it bled like crazy and I quickly had to “treat” it with some toilet roll and PTFE tape. Some kids were annoyingly invasive during the procedure and I had to chase them away by threatening to bleed on them. In general the kids became way more invasive today, always running alongside and/or trying to grab our bikes and/or steal things. At lunchtime we went through a town as school was kicking out for lunch, which was absolute chaos and terror, little hands everywhere. I scared them off by slowing right down, then rode to Rebecca’s rescue and gave a kid who was trying to steal from her rear pannier a slap around the back of the head, then felt a bit bad about it. I am really looking forward to Kenya, and hopefully an end to this kind of nonsense and its effect on our behaviour.
We stopped for lunch in a place with great views over Lake Chamo, and had fish injera for the first and probably last time (7/10, pretty good). Shortly after this the road unexpectedly went from crappy tarmac to pure dirt, rock and bump for 30km, which slowed us right down. Helpfully there were loads of rogue kids to contend with along here, which meant concentrating on the treacherous road was often difficult. At one point Rebecca fell off quite badly, which was not caused by a child, but one did stop and help her afterwards and didn’t ask for anything, so they aren’t all annoying. As we proceeded the people and the village got more and more poor and tribal, which may explain the amplified kid behaviour. Pretty much every kid, and many adults, asked for money or a pen or a mango** (or they may have been offering mangoes in return for money). Towards the end of the day we came across the gauntlet of hundreds of kids just released from school; thankfully the road was sloping gently downhill, and by now was tarmac again, so I managed to sprint through them unscathed, shouting “farenji farenji” so they scattered and gave me a clear path.
There was a long climb up to the town of Konso, and on the way up it I hit the milestone distance of 12,000km. Milestone because based on my original estimation it makes up 2/3 of the total distance to from Lands End to Cape Town, but as it turns out my original estimation wasn’t very good. According to google there is still 6,400km to Cape Town, which is going via the most direct route, which I am not going to be taking. My new estimate is 19,500km. Konso itself was a bit of a disappointment, as it was a “tourist town” but had none of the nice places to stay and eat that tourist towns usually have. Whilst we were looking for somewhere to stay a guy shouted the usual “where are you go” at me. I have taken to saying “China” as the real answer is never understood***, and did this time, but the guy looked alarmed and pointed back to the road we’d come from, saying “no no China is that way”. To be fair to him, that was the road you’d take if you were going to China. We eventually found a budget guesthouse at a non-budget price, had some very budget food at a budget price****, then went back to the room and ate biscuits and half of the massive papaya to make ourselves feel better (it worked).
*Replacing the original version, which was stolen near Lalibela. Version 2.0 is a pineapple chunk can which is caribener’d onto my tent strap.
**Although one kid asked for a “Lexi” which I’m sure you will enjoy Lexi
***Though down in this part of Ethiopia I can, should and often do say “Kenya”
****In an illustration of Ethiopian service, we were asked if we wanted bread or injera with our meal, so we asked for bread, and the lady immediately replied “there is no bread”
After ploughing through a lot of our mango stash for breakfast we set off at the inexplicably late time of 10am. We’re going to need to get better at early starts once it gets really hot again (which is soon). Out of Arba Minch was a swift descent down a crappy road onto a level but still crappy road, on which we saw more baboons stealing fruit from the nearby plantations. After 10km we saw a sign for Nechisar and a dirt road, so went to see what was what. It turned out that this was the boat departure point, and we would have come here by car on a tour. Being here for free we tried to negotiate a reduced rate boat trip, but couldn’t get the price for 2hrs below £60. Whilst we were making up our minds two American ladies got off a boat, and I went to ask them if it was worth it. They said they didn’t see much because the water was high and the animals were all hiding, so our minds were made up and we went to leave. At this point another troupe of baboons appeared, plus a load of smaller monkeys who were scampering around stealing all of the fruit remnants from the bins. Whilst Rebecca pushed her bike back to the entrance one of the smaller monkeys followed her and scoped out if it could steal a full mango from the the front of her bike, which was very funny.
On the way out of the park I found a porcupine quill and attached it to my bike to deter any menacing kids. But it turned out I already had a deadly weapon on my bike, as I went to adjust the position of the poo trowel 2.0* and gave my finger a nasty cut on its sharp inside. In the heat it bled like crazy and I quickly had to “treat” it with some toilet roll and PTFE tape. Some kids were annoyingly invasive during the procedure and I had to chase them away by threatening to bleed on them. In general the kids became way more invasive today, always running alongside and/or trying to grab our bikes and/or steal things. At lunchtime we went through a town as school was kicking out for lunch, which was absolute chaos and terror, little hands everywhere. I scared them off by slowing right down, then rode to Rebecca’s rescue and gave a kid who was trying to steal from her rear pannier a slap around the back of the head, then felt a bit bad about it. I am really looking forward to Kenya, and hopefully an end to this kind of nonsense and its effect on our behaviour.
We stopped for lunch in a place with great views over Lake Chamo, and had fish injera for the first and probably last time (7/10, pretty good). Shortly after this the road unexpectedly went from crappy tarmac to pure dirt, rock and bump for 30km, which slowed us right down. Helpfully there were loads of rogue kids to contend with along here, which meant concentrating on the treacherous road was often difficult. At one point Rebecca fell off quite badly, which was not caused by a child, but one did stop and help her afterwards and didn’t ask for anything, so they aren’t all annoying. As we proceeded the people and the village got more and more poor and tribal, which may explain the amplified kid behaviour. Pretty much every kid, and many adults, asked for money or a pen or a mango** (or they may have been offering mangoes in return for money). Towards the end of the day we came across the gauntlet of hundreds of kids just released from school; thankfully the road was sloping gently downhill, and by now was tarmac again, so I managed to sprint through them unscathed, shouting “farenji farenji” so they scattered and gave me a clear path.
There was a long climb up to the town of Konso, and on the way up it I hit the milestone distance of 12,000km. Milestone because based on my original estimation it makes up 2/3 of the total distance to from Lands End to Cape Town, but as it turns out my original estimation wasn’t very good. According to google there is still 6,400km to Cape Town, which is going via the most direct route, which I am not going to be taking. My new estimate is 19,500km. Konso itself was a bit of a disappointment, as it was a “tourist town” but had none of the nice places to stay and eat that tourist towns usually have. Whilst we were looking for somewhere to stay a guy shouted the usual “where are you go” at me. I have taken to saying “China” as the real answer is never understood***, and did this time, but the guy looked alarmed and pointed back to the road we’d come from, saying “no no China is that way”. To be fair to him, that was the road you’d take if you were going to China. We eventually found a budget guesthouse at a non-budget price, had some very budget food at a budget price****, then went back to the room and ate biscuits and half of the massive papaya to make ourselves feel better (it worked).
*Replacing the original version, which was stolen near Lalibela. Version 2.0 is a pineapple chunk can which is caribener’d onto my tent strap.
**Although one kid asked for a “Lexi” which I’m sure you will enjoy Lexi
***Though down in this part of Ethiopia I can, should and often do say “Kenya”
****In an illustration of Ethiopian service, we were asked if we wanted bread or injera with our meal, so we asked for bread, and the lady immediately replied “there is no bread”
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