Day 232
Sleeping location: Lutheran Hotel, Kayanga, Tanzania
Distance (km today/total): 41 / 14713
Estimated climb (m today/total): 800 / 117400
Comic relief: Umbrella Man
Distance (km today/total): 41 / 14713
Estimated climb (m today/total): 800 / 117400
Comic relief: Umbrella Man
Day in three words: Back to civilisation
At 3am we were woken by a noisy motorbike and some drunk men started shouting random things in a mixture of Swahili and (bad) English. We lay there quietly, thinking there might be some trouble, but nobody tried to get in and after about 15 minutes they buggered off again. Then at 7am we were woken up again by an angry little man, wearing oversized green wellies and waving a little umbrella around like a sword, who barged into the room and started shouting gibberish. He claimed to be with the government but quickly lost credibility by threatening to throw a rock at us then demanding our dollars, so we just assumed he was a drunk idiot, removed him and shut the door on him. We packed up quickly and set off into thick fog and drizzle, which was oddly English. As we left the guy who lived across from the barn asked for 5000 shillings, which is less than £2 but in the context of African hotel prices an absolutely outrageous amount to sleep on a barn floor. This had not been mentioned the night before and was handed over with reluctance.
We popped in to thank Christa for her help, then on the way out of town were flagged down by some guys on motorbikes, including Umbrella Man. One of the guys said he was government and seemed to have authority, and he told us to cycle on to an office and wait there for immigration to come up from Kayanga. As we were going to Kayanga anyway, and as we had done nothing wrong, we thought this was stupid and told him so in no uncertain terms, but he insisted, so we did. Fears about coronavirus are making our travel increasingly more difficult. At the office we were told to sign in then wait, so we got some minor kicks by putting purpose of visit as “prisoner”. The more time we spent around UM the more we realised he was a total arse. He had the most incredible sense of self-importance and his minor governmental role seemed to have given him the impression that he was to be feared and respected, which made it more funny that we had called him an idiot and told him to go away when he first tried to apprehend us. He left his umbrella in the office so we hid it, then he saw me blogging and demanded to know what I was doing, so I told him I was writing a letter to the president of Tanzania saying how much of a dickhead he was. He seemed genuinely scared of catching coronavirus from us so I also kept amusing myself by walking slowly but inexorably towards him.
Eventually our captors relented and said we could cycle towards Kayanga and meet the immigration people on the way (OBVIOUSLY). As we left I noticed that UM’s wellies had “Papa” written on them, which was strange and made me briefly very sad. A little way down the road the immigration car appeared and we stopped in the road* and talked with them. It was immediately clear that they were proper, intelligent, sensible people and they very quickly ascertained that there were no issues, then offered to escort us to Kayanga and find us a hotel. They seemed to think that we would be ok for us to continue cycling, from a Tanzanian perspective anyway.
Cheered up by this news, we showered and headed out to see the town, where we quickly met a Danish lady who gave us some updates on the coronavirus situation (us having been off the internet since Uganda due to lack of Tanzanian sim cards). She lived in Kayanga so was not leaving, but most of her European colleagues have. She then told us, in no uncertain terms, that she didn’t think it was right for people to be travelling around, risking spreading the virus. Which we hadn’t really thought about, but annoyingly she was absolutely right. Yet more things to think and worry about.
We bought sim cards from a guy at the hotel, which was initially convenient but then very inconvenient once we realised he was totally useless. He couldn’t figure out how to register us so just gave us cards in his name, then when we asked about putting data on the card so we could actually, you know, use it, he had no idea and we had to do everything out ourselves. Once sorted we got up to date with all the news from friends (bad) family (bad) and the world at large (BAD BAD BAD). Food for thought, or more accurately an all-you-can-eat buffet for thought. We did then get some actual food, which was a cheap and tasty stew with mashed green banana, and tried our first Tanzanian beers, although they were warm which sums it all up really. It feels like everything is falling apart and we are frantically failing to catch all the pieces.
*Notable for UM’s last act of twattishness, where he flagged us down with the most flamboyant arm gesture imaginable, which I had great fun imitating in front of him
At 3am we were woken by a noisy motorbike and some drunk men started shouting random things in a mixture of Swahili and (bad) English. We lay there quietly, thinking there might be some trouble, but nobody tried to get in and after about 15 minutes they buggered off again. Then at 7am we were woken up again by an angry little man, wearing oversized green wellies and waving a little umbrella around like a sword, who barged into the room and started shouting gibberish. He claimed to be with the government but quickly lost credibility by threatening to throw a rock at us then demanding our dollars, so we just assumed he was a drunk idiot, removed him and shut the door on him. We packed up quickly and set off into thick fog and drizzle, which was oddly English. As we left the guy who lived across from the barn asked for 5000 shillings, which is less than £2 but in the context of African hotel prices an absolutely outrageous amount to sleep on a barn floor. This had not been mentioned the night before and was handed over with reluctance.
We popped in to thank Christa for her help, then on the way out of town were flagged down by some guys on motorbikes, including Umbrella Man. One of the guys said he was government and seemed to have authority, and he told us to cycle on to an office and wait there for immigration to come up from Kayanga. As we were going to Kayanga anyway, and as we had done nothing wrong, we thought this was stupid and told him so in no uncertain terms, but he insisted, so we did. Fears about coronavirus are making our travel increasingly more difficult. At the office we were told to sign in then wait, so we got some minor kicks by putting purpose of visit as “prisoner”. The more time we spent around UM the more we realised he was a total arse. He had the most incredible sense of self-importance and his minor governmental role seemed to have given him the impression that he was to be feared and respected, which made it more funny that we had called him an idiot and told him to go away when he first tried to apprehend us. He left his umbrella in the office so we hid it, then he saw me blogging and demanded to know what I was doing, so I told him I was writing a letter to the president of Tanzania saying how much of a dickhead he was. He seemed genuinely scared of catching coronavirus from us so I also kept amusing myself by walking slowly but inexorably towards him.
Eventually our captors relented and said we could cycle towards Kayanga and meet the immigration people on the way (OBVIOUSLY). As we left I noticed that UM’s wellies had “Papa” written on them, which was strange and made me briefly very sad. A little way down the road the immigration car appeared and we stopped in the road* and talked with them. It was immediately clear that they were proper, intelligent, sensible people and they very quickly ascertained that there were no issues, then offered to escort us to Kayanga and find us a hotel. They seemed to think that we would be ok for us to continue cycling, from a Tanzanian perspective anyway.
Cheered up by this news, we showered and headed out to see the town, where we quickly met a Danish lady who gave us some updates on the coronavirus situation (us having been off the internet since Uganda due to lack of Tanzanian sim cards). She lived in Kayanga so was not leaving, but most of her European colleagues have. She then told us, in no uncertain terms, that she didn’t think it was right for people to be travelling around, risking spreading the virus. Which we hadn’t really thought about, but annoyingly she was absolutely right. Yet more things to think and worry about.
We bought sim cards from a guy at the hotel, which was initially convenient but then very inconvenient once we realised he was totally useless. He couldn’t figure out how to register us so just gave us cards in his name, then when we asked about putting data on the card so we could actually, you know, use it, he had no idea and we had to do everything out ourselves. Once sorted we got up to date with all the news from friends (bad) family (bad) and the world at large (BAD BAD BAD). Food for thought, or more accurately an all-you-can-eat buffet for thought. We did then get some actual food, which was a cheap and tasty stew with mashed green banana, and tried our first Tanzanian beers, although they were warm which sums it all up really. It feels like everything is falling apart and we are frantically failing to catch all the pieces.
*Notable for UM’s last act of twattishness, where he flagged us down with the most flamboyant arm gesture imaginable, which I had great fun imitating in front of him
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