Welcome to Sudan
Sudan is awesome … a beautiful country and beautiful people – everything and everybody wants to give, give and give more!
The initial arrival is quite stark …lots of sand and no great roads. Although there is sand everywhere – it is also very rocky and rocky hillocks abounding all round. Everyone is always greeting, smiling and trying to interact and talk to us … even with the language barrier we are able to converse to various degrees. We always get offered tea all over and some of us have been offered lunch, dinner, a bed to stay and even a daughter here and there … Nels has actually had two different offers of a daughter to marry.
Although they are busy building the road all the way from Wadi Halfa to Khartoum – the Northern sections up to Dongola are still in very early stages of construction and no use to us. South of Dongola the roads are nearly completely finished or already compacted and ready for the final process of tarring – meaning a high speed freeway for the Lycra Train.
Sudan offers endless feelings of freedom – although there are several villages along the way and the Nile (and it’s lush verge) pop up here and there along the way – we mainly ride thru open desert and nothingness! The first few days were stifling hot. Sand and dust gets in everywhere! And our cycles took a beating and a half.
The later stages – after Dongola have been cooler during the days and at night … but still comfortable to lie with the tent open or without the flysheet. The full moon has also been spectacular!!
Our Routine
Since Wadi Halfa we have been escorted by the African Routes backup … thanks guys and welcome! We all received a RED Box which has all our daily goodies including tent, clothes and bike spares. This goes into the larger truck … or rather Dorris. Betsy – the smaller truck – is the daily lunch truck.
In the mornings we get up between Six and Six-thirty … official wake up with the hooter and music is at 06h30. Breakfast is between 06h45 and 07h15. Departure for the Racers is at 08h00 and for casual cruisers at any time after sunrise. I generally crawl out of my sleeping bag at about six fifteen … cursing and complaining about my sore legs. Roll up my sleeping bag, pillows, etc and crawl out to breakfast and coffee … lekker porridge and bread/peanut butter/jam. At seven I’m getting dressed, packing up other goodies, normally roll up my tent by seven-thirty and stash my red box by ten to eight.
Many thanks to Alice for some of her RED Box space during the first week … I must take after my mom cause I just had to take too much stuff and couldn’t fit it all in my own red box!
