DIARY
PROLOGUE
Does the water in the toilet bowl in Cape Town whirl in opposite direction than in Finland? This very question has preoccupied these three Finnish fellows in such way that they have to drive there to find it out. Along this, they intend on breaking the existing record by driving from Cairo to Cape Town in merely 6 weeks.
WEDNESDAY, 26TH APRIL, 2006
Finally in Cape Town
Today on 26th of April, 14:39 Finnish time, we reached Cape Town. The distance from Finland was altogether 18 814,6 km, and it took us 46 days to travel it.
Then, lets move on to more interesting statistics. We left from Cairo on 28th of March, 06:00 Finnish time. To finish the leg Cairo -Cape Town took us 30 days, 8 hours and 39 minutes. In other words, we managed to accomplish the leg under six weeks. Furthermore, we made thru the leg faster than the Norwegian expedition.
How does it feel to see the cut-through of the Africa just in four and a half weeks? The feeling is relieved and partly enlightened. Part of the prejudices against Africa and the African turned out to be awfully true, and in some cases they proved to be childish assumptions. The people in the darkest africa can truly feel the rhythm and are cheerful chaps. White teeth shine from the dark faces. Sudan turned out to be a safe place, if you'll just be a bit careful. Thru the dusty windshield you could see how the violence and insecurity does much harm for the whole society.
It was nice to see as the population boom makes the street scene younger all around the Africa.
Now we'll hand over the car for the Customs of South Africa and get plane tickets back to home. Thanks to Boers, and for their well-organised society in South Africa, you'll manage from the paperworks without a much of a hassle.
MONDAY, 24TH APRIL, 2006
Windhoek, Namibia
We are like animals in the forest. After the charger had broken down, our daily rhythm is bound to the circulation of the sun. In the dawn, we push our car on the way, and drive till dusk without having any breaks. We maximize the use of the daytime. We have to reach the destination before dark, beacause we can't use the lights anymore. Not until it gets dark, we'll eat the second meal of the day.
Yesterday we left from Lusaka and on the way we checked the Victorian Falls. Zambesi dashes into the deep ravine. On the location, because of the splashes, it rains 24/7. We had to dry our passports in the dashboard all the way to Namibia. We crossed the border on the same evening without any expenses. For Finns it isn't even compulsory to have a visa to get into Namibia. We slept the night in tent, near the road, in the middle of the savannah.
Namibia is truly a wonderful place. People are friendly and crime rate is seemingly low. When driving, you have to be careful of elephants and cattle, but that's all. Speed limit has been 120km/h almost the whole time. The roads in the savannah are as straight as an arrow, and the visibility is for tens of kilometers. Diesel costs for 85 per litre. You can't see litter anywhere, and on the whole, comparing to other African countries, Namibia is quite a gem. The price level is North European.
If everything goes as planned, we should get into Cape Town on the day after tomorrow.
SATURDAY, 22ND APRIL, 2006
Lusaka, Zambia
19th April, 2006 >>>
Because of the deteriorated state of our car, we decided to change our route by going from Tanzania into Zambia and from there to Namibia, instead of going straight to South Africa via Mozambik, like we had planned. By doing this, we will mange to avoid the bad-conditioned roads, even though the route will be a bit longer.
Our charger had broken before we reached Nairobi, and we had to fix it. We were able to continue our journey towards Nairobi on 19th the April. It cost us USD 25 (plus USD 30 transit visa for 14 days) to get the car into Tanzania. We went to sleep at the foot of the Kilimanjaro.
20th April >>>
The roads in Tanzania were in good condition and the society seems to be quite developed when comparing to other countries in the southern Africa. Nature is really amazing. In the North the terrain is forested and in South, there are savannahs covered with grass of the length of a grown man. Just by the road we saw elephants, giraffes, monkeys, water buffalos and antiloops.
Unfortunately, we don't have much good to say about the Tanzanian people. Police try to get small briberies in the road blocks. In the tourist regions, such as Arusha, white people get good service, but in the remote district the the will to help is really vague. Salesmen, restaurant owners, mobile booth entrepreneurs etc. don't even try to understand what a tourist, without a knowledge for the language tries to signal.
By the evening the car's charger broke down again and we had to fix it in a parking lot till small hours. The repairman in Nairobi had done an awful job and desparately we fixed the mistakes with rapid glue and jumpers. The result was half-self-made battery charger which lasted for one day until it broke down again. For now, we don't even try to fix it. Instead we charge the batteries in gas stations and drive only during daytime.
21st April >>>
Crossing the border over to Zambia is easy and it costs for USD 25. We drove the whole day and went to sleep i Isoka, 100 kilometers from the border of Tanzania. The roads in Zambia are surfaced and in quite good condition.
22nd April >>>
The ordinary Zambian people are more friendlier than the Tanzanian, but the officers are even more ruder. We were stopped in a road block where they first insisted us to pay penalty for 20 euros, then three and finally 35 euros - just because we didn't have reflecting stickers on the car, which are "allegedly" compulsory in Zambia. Police kept persistently Juhani's driver's license in his jacket and kept raising the penalty whenever we had reached a some sort of understanding. The situation didn't solve until we left the road block after an hour of fighting to get a chief of some kind from the police station. We got the driver's license back without paying any penalty. Instead we had to buy the demanded stickers. On top of this, Juhani and Mikko had to give a written apologies for behaving disobediently.
On the next road block the more friendlier officer told us that the road was built on Finnish donations. Hopefully, this is the first and last time when the Finnish tax revenues are used to develop the Zambian infrastructure.
Now we're at Lusaka. We weren't able to find a hotel, so we sleep in the car. Tomorrow we continue our journey by driving via Victoria Falls into Namibia.
TUESDAY, 18TH APRIL, 2006
Mikko was robbed outrageously in Nairobi
It was half past ten, and I was walking back to hotel from an internet cafe. It was only four blocks away. The city was calming down: salesmen on streets were gathering their belongings. The homeless were laying under the eaves and alcoves. It was raining warmly. Just three hours ago I had asked the local police whether it is safe to wander around in the city. The officer convinced me that the city is completely safe. So I strolled carefree.
By the half way, I noticed that a black man, 170 cm by height, was following me about 40 meters behind. I didn't realise the critical nature of the situation. I thought that I would be safe. The city center was filled with armed police men and private guards. Nevertheless, I thought that what could one local homeless gangsta do?
Then, suddenly, in the dark part of the alley, I realised that I a whole gangfull of black men began to run towards me. I tried to flee, but it was hopelessly too late. I was being grabbed from every direction. In the darkness I tried to smack the bandits in to the face. i screamed for help like a siren, until big black and dirty palms grabbed my throath and began to choke me. I was afraid that they would choke me to death. Is this how it's all going to end, I thought. The criminals hadn't been able to get the shoulder bag in which I was carrying my camera. I thought that if I'd let go of the camera, maybe the bullies would save my life. And so it happened as I let go of the shoulder bag. Seven black men ran away via subway into a dark, muddy park.
I screamed the men to give back even my passport, and they dropped it on the ground.
From the crime scene it was only 70 meters to the front door of our hotel. There were three guards on duty. They had heard me screaming, but didn't have the courage to come and help me.
The homeless criminals received a considerable cleptocratic income transfer from a Scandinavian insurance company. They got our videocamera, still-camera and my mobile phone. Luckily a humble man can protect oneself with insurances. The most irritating in this, is that we lost all the footage we had shot in Africa.
The next episode was, naturally, repoting the offense to local authorities. During the investigation, I sat between two prostitutes, aged 25-30. It is true, during the night time, the head police station of Nairobi is also a bordell. The police gets their monetary share in the form of protect money and "pimping" money. The whores are afraid of being mugged by their customers, and what would be more safer place to meet their questionable customers than a police station? When I told the chief policeofficer, with my sore throat, that I was just nearly been choked to death, and I wasn't interested in having fun with the ladies, he was clearly disappointed. For an hour the poor ladies tried to lure me into using their services, but eventually gave up.
Kenya is really criminal, two-parted and immoral place!
Greeting,
Mikko, Nairobi
MONDAY, 17TH APRIL, 2006
Kenya, Nairobi
By accident, in Addis Abeba we ran into a couple of Germans, who enthuasiasticly told us, how they had heard from their cousin that heavy rains had cut the rain road of North Kenya and because of that, the region was suffrering from acute starvation. Despite these rumours, we headed for the North Kenya, like we had planned.
It was quite sad to leave Ethiopia so hastily that we did. According to advance information, we would face a much hotter and more criminal, people's republic, called Kenya, in which the roads would possibly be cut. Our feelings were sad and mingled with fear as we began to head for the south
Right on the border of Kenya it came to our acknowledge that the roads weren't cut, and cars had gone thru after the heavy rains. The condition of the road was suitable for four-wheel-drive.
Just after driving 80 kilometers on the rain-damaged roads, the back spring, which had broken/fixed earlier in Sudan, broke down again. The feeling of frustration was infernal. With three wheels, we limped (180 km with the speed of 15km/h) into the next village where we were able to weld the spring.
In addition to the damages for the car, we had to confront the following misfortunes:
- The fierce diarrhea of Juhani.
- The tribe warrior's emerging attempt to rob us
Now we are happily in the capital of Kenya, Nairobi.
THURSDAY, 13TH APRIL, 2006
Addis Abeba
8th April - 11th April - Khartoum >>>
As we reached Khartoum, we checked the state of the car. The rough conditions had taken its toll. Leaf springs had been broken from the both sides in the back. The clip of the spring had torn from the rusty chassis balk. The left front brake was dragging and left rear brake had broken down completely.
Fixing the car in Sudan.
We thought that the brand company was too expensive for our budget, so we decided to take the car into a repair bazaar. Five black men were busy with our car for two days. Welding rod was burning and parts taken from old junk cars got a new life as the street mechanics showed their amazing skills. In the afternoon, on 10th of April, the car was back on the road.
11th April - 13th April >>>
In the morning, 11th of April, we left Khartoum. After Khartoum, the picturesque landscape was just like you might see in a geography book's chapter dealing with savannah. Mainly the road was in good condition, and we reached the border of Ethiopia in the evening.
On the morning, in the border station, we debated for few hours about the registering fee they insisted us to pay. After we all had lost 45 dollars, they let us go. On the Ethiopian side, the border formalities took a couple of minutes in a mud hut, and didn't cost us a dime.
The women in the Arab countries are like sirens, who, continuously, get drivers into close call situations. The skin of the Ethiopian women is quite light for African and the seducing glance in their eyes is alluring, to say the least. Lauri is already suffering from aches in his neck
Because of the open, flirtatious behaviour of the young women, the young men weren't too pleased with us. Although, according to GNP, Ethiopia is seemingly poor country, its inhabitants are very proud for the countrie's history. Especially the mountainous countyside is really beautiful and taken good care of, despite the poverty and severeness. Ethiopia is much more rainier than Sudan. Valleys are cultivated and in the mountains it grows forest and bushes.
The road from the border of Sudan to Addis Abeba is in good condition. Last night we drove 740 kilometers of empty road from Gonder to Addis Abeba. Diesel cost 40 cents per litre and no one else used the road, besides donkeys and cattle. The price level is seemingly low. Yesterday we all ate for 1,5 euros.
Today we should get our visas for Kenya. Tomorrow we head for Nairobi.
MONDAY, 10TH APRIL, 2006
Greetings from Khartoum
We arrived Wadi Haifa on Tuesday, 4th of April, and got the car out of the customs the very next day. Instantly, we continued among the Nile towards the capital of the northern province, Dongola.
The road was in mysteriously bad shape in those parts where it even existed. The road ran in the desert, approx. 10-20 kilometers to east from the shore of Nile. From time to time the roadway vanished completely, but was located after a little search. The feeling was euforic. This was just the kind of experience what we had come to look for. The Turbo was growling and the sand was whirling as our stuffed vehichle was plowing the desert.
When then dawn descended, we noticed that our fuel tank had seriously been damaged. Diesel was leaking as a solid stream in to the sand. We managed to drive to the next oasis to get some sleep and ponder the situation. In the morning we examined the damages. There was nearly a hole in the bottom of the tank, and we coudn't drive before it was fixed. Luckily we had a barrel with 160 litres of diesel and some hoses. We built a whole new set of hoses past the original tank, into the barrel in the back of the car. In the construction process we used Coca-Cola bottle and two-component-glue. So far, the scribble has worked like a charm!
The offroading went on for two more days. The road went from the desert next to Nile and through some small villages. People there live happily their simple lives among their corn plantations and goats. The adobe-made houses are kept in great shape, and there aren't junk lying around the yards as in many other countries. The people in Sudan are extremely friendly and very hospitable. Comparing to Egypt, the overall situation is much more harmonic, and not once we'd had to be scared of criminals. The images given by the Western and the Sudanese media differ greatly from each other. If you ask a Sudanese common man the reasons for the crisis in Darfur, he'll tell you that it is the result of the imperialistic colonial policy of the United Nations and America.
Despite the couple of civil wars and genocides, the Sudanese are proud, hard-working and honest people. Ordinary people invite strangers in to their homes and show great hospitality. The Sudanese women are slim and big-breasted. Their features are beautifully harmonic and they don't have to use lots of make-up and jewellery in order to please the male-gender. The manager of one restaurant suggested that we would stay in his place for three weeks, turn into islamic. On top of this, he offered to get us all wives from Wadi Haifa. Despite the temptations, we arrived Dongola in the evening.
7th of April
From Dongola we drove along the main road to Khartoum. On the other hand the road was in rather good shape, on the other, it didn't even exist. The travelling speed varied between 20 and 110 km/h. On the way, we had to sleep in a tent in the desert beacause we had lost the road in the dark. We reached Khartoum in the evening of 8th of April. The park areas in Khartoum are well kept and the air isn't thick smog as in Cairo. The riverside of the Nile is very pleasant and we are sleeping on the campsite of a local yacht club. We have already got our visas for Ethiopia. The passports we get from the Embassy tomorrow.
Next we will continue into Addis Abeba.
TUESDAY, 4TH APRIL, 2006
08:25 am
Currently we're at the Lake Nasser, in Abu Simbel. According to our schedule we should reach our destination in three hours. Yesterday it took 50 stevedores 12 hours to load three large scale trucks. This 30-meter-long ship is stuffed with 500 passengers.
SUNDAY, 2ND APRIL, 2006
Sudan, finally!
The Defense Department of Egypt was reluctant to grant us special permit to cross the border by land over to Sudan. Because of this, we had to take a ferry from the Assuan Dam over to Wadi Haifa, Sudan. The Egyptian Embassy in Helsinki and the Embassy of Sudan told us that crossing the border by land would not be a problem. That's why we've been rotting here in Assuan for four days. What a waste of time! Mikko is displeased. It costs 630 euros to ship three skinny students and one car. Lauri is displeased. Drug dealers, pocket pickers, hustlers and hawkers in the bazaars are getting on to our nerves. Juhani is displeased, to say the least.
Our amfibious attack to Sudan will be done in two waves. We will take the ship, which will arrive in Tuesday. Nisse is going to be put in a slower boat, and will arrive in Wednesday. The local shipping company appears to be trustworthy, but we do have our concerns: in our first meeting, the manager himself didn't have a slightest idea where his boat was sailing. WeŽll see how it goes.
WEDNESDAY, 29TH MARCH, 2006
Aswan, Egypt
Yesterday we left from Cairo. You can drive upstream the Nile either via the traffic jammed main road or the desert road, which goes on the east side of the Nile. For 100 kilometers North to Cairo we were rolling smoothly.
When we deciced to stop at El Minia to have a luch, we were directed to wait at the roadblock. We were accompanied by a pickup, in which there was four armed guards. The guys led us to Kentucky Fried Chicken to have our lunch. There they were waiting in the back of the truck, sweating as we were slurping Pepsi inside the air conditioned fast food restaurant for couple of hours. Eventually we continued our journey and drove back to the desert road. At least for 90 % of the leg between El Minya and Aswan we were escorted by the armed guards. Somewhere near Luxor we drove for ten kilometers in tourist bus convoy, but otherwise the service was organised just for us.
Along the way you could see the consequences of the local traffic culture. We saw crashed cars, still smoking, and next to them, a long line of identically dressed women, who were crying almost in a ritual manner. Very touching sight.
Today we oraganised the export of the car. We have to stay here at least till tomorrow, 'cause Lauri is having problems with his stomach. The sickness wouldn't actually stop us from moving on, but during next leg we have to drive a long way across the desert. In a case of an emergency, the conditions would be too extreme for a sick man to cope with and we have to wait for him to get better.
THURSDAY, 23RD MARCH, 2006
Getting robbed for the first time
One can concider the custom formalities of Egypt as organised robbery. The tourist police guides you from one counter to another and helps you to get rid of your belongins. You need to have an import permit (505 Egyptian pounds), permit to drive in the desert (10.5 pounds), Egyptian registration book and plates (100 pounds) and a humorously cheap traffic insurance (50 pounds). All together, this cost us more than $125.
From Nuweiba we drove across the Sinai desert, past the Suez and on towards Cairo. Sinai is a magnificent place. First it's mountains, then rocks and finally dunes. Here and there you can see a few palm trees and oasises. The temperature of the desert was over 40 degrees celsius. Camels were toddling near the roads, which was a real desert road. In the middle of Sinai (which means in the middle of nowhere) there were a couple of gas stations. Besides this, we were surrounded by sun, sand, rocks, hot asphalt and nothing else. Nisse endured the heat really well - temperature of the motor kept stable all the way and we had no problems whatsoever.
We reached Cairo at dusk and were noisily welcomed by an ugly, trafficjammed, polluted and utterly disgusting metropolis. We were readily displeased because we knew that we'd need to spend a few days in these conditions. We had decided that we would sleep in hotel for the second time of the trip. Then again, we were really tired and a decent hotel was awfully hard to find. Therefore we chose to drive to the west of Giza to find a quiet, deserted place which would be suitable for camping. We found a nice place, put up our tent and went to bed around 8 o'clock.
After a couple of hours, I woke up to a loud, incoherent babbling and mumbling. I got out from my sleeping bag, merely wearing boxers. Outside our tent were standing three, twenty-something Beduins, interested to have a peek inside our tent.
I prevented them from entering. The Beduins got more and more arrogant. In the distance, someone shot a fire or two. The fuss got more intense. I yelled Lauri to get dressed and asked him to come outside - I wouldn't make it myself.
The Beduins started pushing us around. I was able to keep the men out of the tent so that Lauri had time to get out. I could see it from Lauri's eyes that the Beduins should brace themselves to get a proper beating. Finns have never been too willing give up their belonings without a fight.
Just then, behind the dunes stepped out fourth Beduin, who was a bit older than the others. He was clearly the leader of the group and our motivation to fight for our rights decreased rapidly - the man was wielding a damn AK-47.
He ordered us to get on the ground. While laying half naked on the sand of Sahara, I had time to think things over. When I come to think of it, I really didn't care about the men snooping around in our tent. I didn't care that I was threatened with a frigging machinegun. I didn't even care about the few smackings I got from one of the younger Beduins as the revenge for my prior brave acts. I was thinking about home. I thought about my mother and my girlfriend Hanna.
The snooping was soon over. Men gave us incomprehensible orders and left. We went through our stuff and found out that almost everything had been stolen, besides our clothes and papers. Even my glasses and Nisse's keys were nicked. We pondered for a moment. We decided to pack what was left, brake the steering wheel lock with the ribbed bar that the Beduins used as their weapon, then jump start the Patrol and drive to Cairo.
We weren't even finished with the packing when the foreign babbling started once again. The idea that the robbers regretted of leaving eye witnesses crossed in to my mind. I said to Lauri that, man, now we should run!!
I've always considered myself as quite a runner, but with heavy boots in soft desert sand and without glasses it's not that easy trying to escape armed robbers.
First the villains caught Lauri, who of course surrended without a fight. There was only one man chasing us, and he couldn't force us both. For a moment I stood there like a fool. Should I surrender, so that Lauri wouldn't be harmed, or at least not harmed alone, or should I keep on fleeing? I yelled at Lauri. He answered, but I couldn't make out what he said. I kept on running, but after a short while, I got caught, too. I was taken into our tent where the Beduin leader and Lauri were waiting.
The previous threathening behaviour was a thing of the past. Now it was all about pure business. Our negotiation position was "quite" bad. Anyways, we got back my glasses, the car keys, knife, both cameras, head lamp, GPS and binoculars. Besides money, sunglasses and some hygienic products we got back all our stuff.
The leader asked us by signaling how much money we have. Lauri drew numbers on the sand. The leader took me and one of his man with him and ordered us to get into the car. Lauri stayed behind with two of the younger Beduins. With the help of the light inside the car I got a glimpse of the Beduin leader. He was a man in his forties, sporting a funky moustache and wearing a brown robe. On his head was a white cloth, under which I saw my Veikkaus-ballpoint pen.
The robbers drove into their base, some half a kilometre away away from our tent. Outside there were two middle aged men puffing a water pipe. I was escorted into a grey brick formation, which distantly reminded me of a house. Inside there was this old man in his fifties, with grey hair and everything. He handed over a pile of Egyptian pounds and asked me to count them. I pretented to count them and acted satisfied.
We got back to the scene of robbery. I visited the base again with another, younger Beduin. The man clearly couldn't drive. The breaks and the clutch were smoking and the gears grumbled. This was the second time I was really afraid for my life. The young maniac drove recklessly in the dark. We only turned around in the base and drove back in to the crime scene. I have no clue what purpose this roundtrip served. i guess he just wanted to go for a spin with our cool car.
The leader made it clear that the negotiations were over, and we should now go to sleep. Then they left us. Lauri and I sat down, quiet, for a while. It was a bit hard to fall asleep. We were thinking of leaving and started putting down the tent and packing our stuff.
This appeared to be a mistake. The leader came back and was clearly disappointed with us. Then he insisted that we should join him to go do drugs and have sex with prostitutes. We turned down this "interesting" offer. Lauri said that as a single man he's willing to take one for the team, if the situation gets into that point. After all, the guy still had his AK-47 with him. Eventually the leader let us go. We drove off to Giza where we slept in the car under the street lights.
Facts from the robbery:
- They got:
- 160 USD
- 615 Egyptian Pound
- Sunglasses
- Dirty socks and underwear
- Deodorant and shaving equipment
- Driving license, student card and wallet
- I got my mobile back but it got lost in the sand during the negotiations.
- Other relevant stuff:
- Weapons: Ak-47. Ribbed bar.
- Crime scene: 30 01 14 N, 030 59 78 E appox 400 meters to north and approx 100 m to east. Chack it out if it sees in the Google Earth.
- Base: approx 500 m from the crime scene to, possibly east.
Eastern Sinai, notice the yellow license plate
WEDNESDAY, 22ND MARCH, 2006
To Egypt with an Arab drill rig
On the morning we pondered our situation. We could drive via Eilat into Egypt in half an hour. But a stamp of Israel would make the authorities angry when we get visas in Sudan. With the help of Finnish embassy in Cairo, we clarified the subject on our hands. You have no business going in to Sudan if you have been in Israel. They are aware of this in Israel and you can get the stamps in to a separate piece of paper. But still, we would get a stamp from the boundary between Jordania and Egypt in to our passports anyways. We sat quiet for nearly ten minutes and considered our situation. $219 does great harm to our budget! Then again, we decided to play it safe and we chose the overpriced ferry.
The ferry would descend on the evening. We hung out on the beach and fixed our equipment. In the evening, we paid for the ferry trip, unwillingly, and drove aboard. It was an old ship, which once sailed between Norway and Denmark (M/S Skagen).
On the floor of the bar there were piles of Arabs sleeping. The sight was allmost the same one can see on the notorious student cruise, Goom, except here no-one was drunk. The departure of the ship took an awfully long time. Therefore we did not reach Nuweiba in Egypt before morning.
TUESDAY, 21ST MARCH, 2006
Syria and Jordania
After leaving Damaskos, we headed directly to the border of Jordania, where our intention was to fill up the tank. Alas, every possible gas station in Der had run out of diesel. We had no other choice but to do a 180 and head back ti the previous city to fill her up. After this incident we made a promise from now on to fill up the tank when it's still half full.
Crossing the border of Syria and Jordania went really smoothly. In Syria we had pay exports custom toll which was 150 Syrian pounds (only a couple of euros). The visa for Jordania cost us roughly about 10 euros, the car insurance for three days was 9,7 dinars and import permission was 11 dinars. Carnet document was not needed.
We drove through Jordania to Aqaba the same day we left Damaskos. We had a dinner in Amman and supper on the shores of the Dead Sea. The roads in Jordania are in excellent condition and diesel costs only about 25 cents per litre. On the road near the Syrian border was a vast amount of road blocks, in which they asked to see our papers. Then again, no bigger inspections were made. Funny thing was that alonside the road there were camel warning signs.
We reached Aqaba somewhere around midnight, and drove straight to harbour. We found out that a ferry to Egypt would cost us $219, which made us quite mad. The lenght of this ferrrytrip is roughly the same as from Helsinki to Talliin in Estonia, but the price many times higher. Pissed off and tired, we went to sleep on a piece of wasteland outside the city
Anyways, Syria and Jordania were very nice places, a real positive surprises. The people were utterly helpful and friendly - not greedy at all. The gas was basically for free, and it could be seen on cars people drove. Such diamonds as Dodge Coronet from the 70's and Chevrolet Caprice were very popular car as taxis. The upper middle class drives with 60's Mercedesses which are in great shape. Working class drives with Ladas, Uazes or, as in some cases, donkeys.
TUESDAY, 21ST MARCH, 2006
Odour of a rotten egg
About technique upholding the life>>>
We are abunch of fools. We should have relised to add water into the batteries in time, but didn„t. The odour of hydrogen sulphide, which reminds the smell of a rotten egg, came from the motor. The smell was also a reminicent to the hot springs at the Caucasus mountains. The source of the smell was the batteries, in which the electrolysis was going on strong. To tame Nisse's thirst, we had to add 14 bottles of distilled water into the batteries. That's quite a lot of water.
Our videocamera was also "broken". In this case the real failure was the unskilled users. Also with the digital camera we are having some problems, and we are not able to send pictures to our server. With the right driver we able to get the pictures out from the camera. Still, I wasn't able to attach them into this post, because the server doesn't accept them for some reason.
Proceeding>>>
After the repairings, we drove straight to the border of Syria. We got across it not until this morning, beacuse we had to visit the bank to get cash for Syria.
In here the credit cards are not yet the hottest hot but nonetheless we got money. We also managed to get some backup fuses for the GPS. The Turkish electronic shop didn't even accept money for it, which was nice.
Last night, before crossing the border, we slept on the yard of a gas station in a car. In the middle of the night the owner of the gas station came in yelling, insisting that we should leave his premises. I didn't give rat's ass about him, and just turned my back to him and kept on sleeping. After a while in came a police. I asked what seemed to be the problem. Acoording to him, everything was cool, he only wanted me to move the car and then come inside the gas station. I did as he told and went inside. There were the owner, three policemen and one man, whom I didn't recognice. The policemen offered me some tea and explained that they„d only want to hava a little chat with us.
It never got quite clear why they really had asked me to come in. The time was 01:30 am, we had had a really long, exhausting day, and being tired as hell I wasn't too talkative. For a while I just sat there, surely looking stupid, then I shook hands with everyone, excused myself and went back to car. I drove the car back to where it was in the first place and went back to sleep. Lauri had been sleeping all this time.
Today we went over the Bab el Hawa, between Iskender and Aleppo and currently we are in Damaskos, where we arrived in the evening. Crossing the border from Turkey took awfully long time (2h) and it cost us 5 euros. Officially there is no such payment, but once again tourists got screwed.
In a way we got our lost money back in Syria. Officially, when importing a car, you have to pay $40 for traffic insurance, $10 for road tax and $100 for diesel taxes. Don't tell anyone, but we didn't pay the diesel tax, instead we bargained a bit and gave 5 bucks as bribery.
When we got into Syria, we filled the tank with 60 litres of diesel and it cost us meager 8 euros! The roads in Syria are in excellent condition and it„s nice driving there. The people are very friendly and scenery reminds from tundra. In all it's a really nice place.
On the way to Damaskos we passed a crossroad in which the other sign directed to Damaskos and other to Bagdad. Dasmaskos was really a positive surprise. In here people don't paddle in shit up to their knees like in many other undeveloped big cities. Instead, here you can enjoy cool architecture, beautifull garden paths and veiled women with tight bottoms. Such a nice place.
Tomorrow we send in the application for visas to Jordania. We located the embassy and our intention is to sleep in the car somewhere near it. I hope we get the visa as soon as possible, so we would reach the Cairo in schedule.
FRIDAY, 17TH MARCH, 2006
Turkey, Alanya
In Bulgaria we drove fast. We removed the badly wried bumber and straightened it with a concrete element we found on the construction site. Now it didn't caught the police's attentions.
The border between Bulgaria and Turkey in Svilengrad was closed due to a flood. We had to take a detour which consisted of 100 kilometers of small roads. Crossing the border to Turkey took three hours. The formalities were quite straight, though the Asian chaos could be seen in queuing behaviour.
Luckily we didn't fill up our backup fuel tank before crossing the border. The Turkish were more than interested of our tanks.
We came in to a conclusion that we wouldn't have time to aply the visa for Jordania before weekend. After spending the night near Bulgarian border, we continued through Istanbul, straight to south passing Ankara from its west side. We slept the night in the mountains of Eurk, and in the morning we drove through Antalia to Alanya, where we are now.
For the first time during this trip the weather is descent. It doesn't rain sleet or snow. We also slept in a hotel for the first time and paid 15 euros for it. Tomorrow we will continue towards Damascus, from where we will get the visas for Jordania.
Diesel in Turkey costs for 1,3 euros/litre. Nisse has worked like a charm. For the most the fuel expenditure has been 10.3 l/100km. And this has been in the mountain terrain. Not bad! And there has been no need to add oil. So, we can probably donate our 25 litres of fully synthetic motor oil for the Cristian mission work in Ethiopia.
In Turkey the roads are basically in the same condition as in Eastern Europe. Naturally there are also a few exeptions.
A piece of road in Turkey
TUESDAY, 14TH MARCH, 2006
An Unfortunate mishap in Belgrad
We crashed with a Serb. The load bandaging seemed to work. Nearly 300 kg of stuff stayed still. Lauri spent seven hours in the station with the locals, trying to find out the causes and outcome of the collision. Nisse's damaged a bit, but nothing serious happened. Nisse is truly quite piece of work. We can continue our journey, unlike the car which Nisse collided with - it doesn't move without a tow truck.
Hopefully our bad luck ends here, and the rest of the journey from Belgrad to Cape Town goes smoothly, without these kind of mishaps.
Prices of diesel: Estonia, Lithuania and Serbia: 0.9 euros; Latvia, Poland and Hungary: 1 euro; Slovakia: 1,1 euros.
In Hungary there were road customs but no beams. In Serbia there are a lots of beams.
SUNDAY, 12TH MARCH, 2006
Poland
We are almost in Krakov. We had to tighten some pump belts already at Helsinki-Tallinn ferry. After this compulsory maitenance, large Nissan Patrol has been a pleasure to drive. Fuel consumption 9l/100km, and doesn't burn oil at all. Polish polise forces gave us 100 zl (29€) penalty fee near Latvian border - we didn't have other choices but to pay. It still freezing cold.
An ice road somewhere in the Baltic states
SUNDAY, 5TH MARCH, 2006
Medication
Contrary to wild urban legends the malaria prevention medication turned out not to have any side effects. We'll also take with us some paracetamol, ibuprofen, antibiotics, cough medicine, disinfectant, wound treatment equipment, syringes, IV needles, bandage, and hand cleaning agent.
TUESDAY, 28TH FEBRUARY, 2006
Vaccinations
Had my last two vaccinations today for meningitis and polio. Previously we have taken vaccinations against typhoid and hepatitis. Kenya demands that tourists entering the country have an up to date vaccination against yellow fever and an International Certificate of Vaccination which you can get from your doctor. A tetanus shot doesn't hurt either.
We'll test our malaria prevention medication (Lariam) next weekend. Some people react quite strongly to it. Known side effects include psychosis and it has even triggered off latent schizophrenia in some people. Check back next week for a report.
SUNDAY, 26TH FEBRUARY, 2006
Final preparation of the car
We equipped the car with two 200 litre barrels. One is for water and will be sufficient for at least a week. The other is for diesel and along with the car's 70 litre tank will give a range of approximately 2.500 km. We have five extra tires, seven inner tubes, and one rim for punctures. We also constructed a sleeping plane from wood so that we can sleep inside the car.
The sleeping plane inside the car
