From Mombasa to CapeTown

Good bye (0363)

2010-03-21T16:29:00.000+01:00

Time to say good bye. I fly tonight to Europe because I have a meeting on Tuesday. Thomas stays for another day in beautiful Cape Town. He will load the car tomorrow into a container. It was a great trip.

Cape Town (0359)

2010-03-21T16:27:00.000+01:00

We spent the last two days at a wineyard in Stellenbosch with an friend from my years at the University. Perfect chill out.

South Africa (0358)

2010-03-21T16:20:00.000+01:00

We reached South Africa....800 km of good, tarred roads ahead. Piece of cake.

Hot water (0356)

2010-03-19T08:41:00.000+01:00

There is a hot water source in Ai-Ais. What a pleasure to dive in 37 degrees water when its 42 degrees outside....and sip a real cold coke in the pool.

Canyon (0354)

2010-03-19T08:24:00.000+01:00

There is a huge canyon in the south west of Namibia. We decided to spend the night there, in Ai-Ais. It is a very hot, desertic and beautiful place. The landscape takes your breath away and ther is no one around. On the 490km we drove today we crossed may be a dozen cars.

Landscape (0353)

2010-03-19T08:11:00.000+01:00

Stones and heat (0352)

2010-03-19T08:08:00.000+01:00

We spend the night on a farm, and had a brief talk with the wife. The next neighbours are 10km away, her brother in law. The next grocery is 260km away, i.e. 520km to get some milk. Well you have to love your cattle to accept to live her.
In the morning we wanted to cross the border, but South Africa did not let us in at the Mata Mata border post. There is a National Park on the other side, and we would have had to spend teo nights there. So we backtracked and drove south west towards. The heat is now at 42 degress in the shadows.

Kalahari (0350)

2010-03-18T12:02:00.000+01:00

Carscape (0349)

2010-03-18T11:51:00.000+01:00

Landscape (0348)

2010-03-18T11:47:00.000+01:00

It's the Kalahari and it's hot (38 degrees in the shadows)

Mad Max citiy North (0347)

2010-03-18T11:17:00.000+01:00

This is Stampriet looking North.

Mad Max city South (0346)

2010-03-18T11:11:00.000+01:00

This is Stampriet in Namibia (looking South). On the map it is indicated in big letters like a major city. Actually there areb two pump station, a police station, a grocery store,a kiosk (where we had lunch) and a post office. All buildings are along the road, except for the church which sits on a small hill. It's not the first time that we cross such a Mad Max city. There are just not enough people living in Namibia to populate real towns....

Landscape (0345)

2010-03-17T14:36:00.000+01:00

Circles (0338)

2010-03-17T14:34:00.000+01:00

Thomas is creating some circles of extra terrestrial significance into the salt-sandy ground.

Aminuis (0337)

2010-03-17T14:27:00.000+01:00

In the very western part of Namibia we found some salt lakes.

Buvette (0334)

2010-03-17T14:20:00.000+01:00

Looks like a good place to drink a cold coke. This morning we looked at some land plots for sale in Leonardville. You get 1500sqm in the city center for roughly USD 1'000. It's quite tempting. There is game here, a golf course, a swimming pool, a 4x4 trail for quads and a cavern system. Ok, most of it only exist on paper...but the potential is there. Our Swiss friend is trying to develop the area. Late morning we said good bye and drove off towards the south.

Cute little guy (0333)

2010-03-17T14:12:00.000+01:00

Sheep Farm (0326)

2010-03-17T07:33:00.000+01:00

Namibia does export quite a lot of meat (next to diamonds and uran).

Sheep looading (0325)

2010-03-17T07:32:00.000+01:00

For once I am in the back of the car. We are going to a farm to load some herds of sheep into trucks.

Leonardville (0324)

2010-03-16T17:09:00.000+01:00

We stopped in Leonardville to get some diesel and were greeted by a Swiss. He came to Africa 1978 and now owns farms and houses.... and he loves cigars. So I left him one from my travel humidor. We sat on his veranda and listened to his incredible interesting life: hockey player in the swiss national league, lost a finger to a snake bite, owned a farm in South Africa, loves hunting (a lion's trophy is in the living room) etc.

Heroe's acre (0321)

2010-03-16T17:00:00.000+01:00

Namibia only got independant 20 years ago. Close to the capital city is the memorial for those who fought for the independance.

Windhoek (0319)

2010-03-16T16:57:00.000+01:00

We spent the night in Windhoek, after some troubles finding a place to stay. All hotels were fully booked. Finally we found a place for a reasonable price in the south. This morning we tried to charter a small plane to fly to the north an visit the Himba people. Unfortunately it was not possible. The planes were also fully booked. Seems to be an attractive place. So we went in the city center, drunk a cup of espresso (the first real one in the last two weeks...usually they serve a concentrated Nescafe brew) and drove South-West towards Leonardville on small roads.

Trans-Kalahari Highway (0318)

2010-03-15T15:20:00.000+01:00

We are driving on the Trans-Kalahari highway to the capital city Windhoek. The road is an intermiable strait band in an absolutely flat area (except for the slight hill where I took this picture)

Gobabis (0316)

2010-03-15T15:17:00.000+01:00

Gobabis is the first larger namibian town we are driving though....looks fairly european to us...or may be american because there is so much open space, shops and large roads.

Namibia (0314)

2010-03-15T15:15:00.000+01:00

We arrived in Namibia. The road from Maun in Botswana to Gobabis in Namibia were perfect and we drove an averag of 110km/h. There were virtually now villages as Botswana and Namibia are very sparsely populated - only about 2 inhabitants per sqm.
I forgot to mention that Botswana is the african country with the highest AIDS infection rate. A third of the population is infected. The disease lowerede the life expectancy from 60 to only 31 years. Similar figures are found in pretty all countries we travelled through. I don't think that we get the scale of this disaster in Europe.

GPS navigation (0310)

2010-03-15T15:06:00.000+01:00

We drove some time on very small path, navigating only with GPS and when back on the main road, there were these giraffes on the track...

Animals, animals, animals (0308)

2010-03-15T14:49:00.000+01:00

Animals again (0307)

2010-03-15T14:08:00.000+01:00

Driving south (0304)

2010-03-15T14:06:00.000+01:00

We drove south through Botswana. The roads were bad, but actually more slow than challenging.

Elephant dung (0303)

2010-03-15T14:04:00.000+01:00

At the campsite Thomas is shoveling away the elephant dung.... They are huge, but don't smell.

Boredom sunset picture (0302)

2010-03-15T13:51:00.000+01:00

Bug infested camp site (0301)

2010-03-15T13:49:00.000+01:00

Fed up with seeing animals (0299)

2010-03-15T13:46:00.000+01:00

Thomas just can't stand seeing more elephants...

More and more animals (0298)

2010-03-15T13:35:00.000+01:00

Even more animals (0292)

2010-03-15T13:33:00.000+01:00

May be I shouldn't have flashed this one in the face. An angry elefant can easily overthrow a car...and then don't exit your car. You will be inevitably trampled to death. I am still using the flash. Pictures are better as the flash lowers the contrast to the bright sun.

More animals (0290)

2010-03-15T13:23:00.000+01:00

More animals (0286)

2010-03-15T13:20:00.000+01:00

Animals (0280)

2010-03-15T13:19:00.000+01:00

The unfriendliness of the people were somehow compensated by the incredible number of wild animals. We saw so any elefants, antilopes, giraffes, buffaloes, zwebras that I even stopped taking pictures - which happens seldom to me.

Zimbabwe (0276)

2010-03-15T13:17:00.000+01:00

We only spent about two hours in Zimbabwe. But it was a good and friendly experience. Then we crossed into Botswana...and the unfriendliness and bureaucratic ways reminded us of Mocambique. First payment at customs is only accepted in local currency, the Pula. But you can't exchange at the border crossing. So we had to drive 12km into Botswana without custom clearance to find a bank and go back to the border to find a fee. But be reminded, it's Africa, so this isn't unusual. The unusual part was really the unfriendliness. Later we learned that you have to register for the parks, in some places you are only allowed to camp in state owned camping places etc. So we spent the night on an assigned spot. Original wording from Thomas: 'Never since my service at the army has some told me where to sleep...not until here in Botswana'. The spot was actually on the border of a river and absolutely bug infected. We used all chemical weapons we had and still it was a lost battle. So I spend my time cooking potatoes and fishing out the bugs falling into the pan. Proteines.

Zambezi river (0275)

2010-03-15T13:13:00.000+01:00

Mist (0272)

2010-03-15T13:05:00.000+01:00

Behind the mist are the Vic Falls... The picture was taken from the bridge over the mystic Zambezi river, leading from Zambia to Zimbabwe. You can do there the 3rd highest bungee jump in the world: 110m. We politely said 'no thanks' and crossed into Zimbabwe.

Victoria Falls (0271)

2010-03-15T13:01:00.000+01:00

From Lusaka we drove south to the Victoria Falls, one of the 7 natural world wonders. The chopper ride was lame, but the falls are impressive. The area is very touristic. We spent the night in a backpackers camp. A lot of fun people there...

City centre (0268)

2010-03-13T12:56:00.000+01:00

We drove to the city center and dropped of a german traveler we picked up at the Luangwa river camp and are now driving south towards Livingstone.

Another supermarket picture (0267)

2010-03-13T12:44:00.000+01:00

After the supermarket I tried to buy some local art work and antiques. But I found nothing nice. So I settled for a couple of armrings for Naomi. On the table of a sales man I saw a 20 trillion dollar bill from Zimbabwe. Greetings from hyperinflation. That what we will experience tomorrow after visiting the Victoria falls.

Chutney (0265)

2010-03-13T12:33:00.000+01:00

Various chutneys, in particular mango chutney seem to be popular here. There is quite a selectiojn.

Back in the civilization (0264)

2010-03-13T10:32:00.000+01:00

We found american style malls and supermarkets at the entrance of Lusaka, the capital city of Zambia. We bought some food for the next days and drove off to visit the center.

Luangwa river (0260)

2010-03-13T10:23:00.000+01:00

Spar Supermarket (0266)

2010-03-13T10:05:00.000+01:00

Nothing beats the feeling of an air conditionned supermarket after days driving under the hot sun.

Hot water (0259)

2010-03-13T10:01:00.000+01:00

It's morning and here is the hot water boiler.

Across Zambia (0258)

2010-03-13T09:51:00.000+01:00

We drove 670km today. From the border of Malawi to the Luangwa river in Zambia. We found a very nice camp site.... with hot water shower. The water from the river is stored in a barell and below you light a fire. It takes 30 minutes and the water is warm. While taking the shower you can smell the smoke from the burning wood. Its of course a pleasure you share with some locusts, spiders and other unidentified insects. Tomorrow we try to drive to Livingston. Another 650km. But the roads here are very good and there is little traffic, - and more important - few people on the border of the street (Zambia being very sparsely populated). So we will be able to drive fairly constantly 80 to 90 kmh.
By the way it was pretty hot today, around 36 degrees. Its because we left the plateau. Instead of being at 1500m to 2000m altitude we are now at merely 400m. The difference in temperature is striking.

Roads (0255)

2010-03-13T09:49:00.000+01:00

The roads are better than expected we will exit Mocambique in early afternoon to enter Zambia.

Zambia (0256)

2010-03-13T09:46:00.000+01:00

We are in Zambia. The border control was very relaxed and friendly. While doing the formalities we listened to Senegalese pop music played from the immigrations computer. Later we asked for the speed limits on the road. The answer: "open". We were not satisfied and asked again. The answer now: "In the cities something between 50 and 80. On the highway may be 140". I guess this is a very cool and relaxed country. Let's see.

Landscape (0254)

2010-03-13T08:54:00.000+01:00

Greetings from Mocambique (0252)

2010-03-13T08:40:00.000+01:00

We just met an over zealous police officer who saw me taking pictures. We had to follow him to the police station, then to the district governor's office. We lost an hour but had some nice chats. They let us go without any formalities and we are not sure what the problem was.

Landscape (0250)

2010-03-13T08:37:00.000+01:00

Waking up early (0249)

2010-03-13T08:33:00.000+01:00

No way to sleep long in these places. At 5:30 the first trucks start their engine. We will cross Mocambique in one day using a short cut on small roads. Of course we want stray away from the roads. Still to many land mines around here.

Border to Mocambique (0247)

2010-03-13T08:26:00.000+01:00

After our resting day we drove to Lilongwe, capital city of Malawi. It is a stretched town with two centers. The new center is all isolated offices buildings. It could be somewhere in the US. The old center looks more like a vibrant african city. We had a perfect T-Bone steak in restaurant and drove to the border of Mocambique. We spent the night right beside the immigration office. You can't camp in a safer place.

Friendly company (0246)

2010-03-13T08:17:00.000+01:00

The owners of the lodge were on vacation, so the two ladies on the picture are running the place. If you ever travel to Malawi, don't miss to visit paradise on Makuzi Beach.

Makuzi Beach (0244)

2010-03-13T08:13:00.000+01:00

After the many days with 8 to 11 hours of driving we decided to make chill out day on the shore of Lake Malawi. We found an absolutely marvellous place. We stayed two nights.

Cathedral (0240)

2010-03-13T08:06:00.000+01:00

In the middle of Africa there is this Cathedral. Just impressive... It raises admiration for the persons who dedicated their life to build this mission (including school, hospital etc), on the other hand it shows also how ruthlessly we exported our western culture to other countries. As always, Africa is full of contradiction. By the way, the camera of the cell phone does not handle difficult lightening situations very well. I hope you still recognize something on the picture.

The cathedral (0239)

2010-03-13T07:57:00.000+01:00

Livingstonia (0238)

2010-03-13T07:50:00.000+01:00

Livingstonia became the main site of missionary activity after many missionaries died of Malaria in Bandaweh. There is a small museum with original handwritings and pictures of Livingstone. The village was also the first one in Africa to get a watch tower and to get electricity. It must have been a tremendous logisitical task to bring the material from Europe to this mountain top in th 19th century.

Public transport (0207)

2010-03-13T07:49:00.000+01:00

The roads are better than expected and we are advancing fast. There are mais and tobacco fields everywhere.

Livingstonia (0235)

2010-03-13T07:43:00.000+01:00

We drove up a very steep and narrow road, on the path of Livingstone to the historical village of Livingstonia.

Lake Malawi (0234)

2010-03-13T07:39:00.000+01:00

We drove along the Malawi lake. The roads are excellent and everything seems very well organized and secure. In addition the people here in Malawi are very friendly and warm-hearted. It reminded us Western Africa and Malawi immediately became our favorite country in the region.

Malawi (0233)

2010-03-13T07:35:00.000+01:00

We passed the border to Malawi without problems and found again a very, very beautiful country.

Mbeya (0231)

2010-03-13T07:32:00.000+01:00

We arrived safely in Mbeya and spend the night in a Mission. The guy on the picture lives in a truck an travels from mission to mission and hospital to hospital to make repairs. He has a whole welding workshop in his truck.
There was also a retired guy driving from South Africa to Holland. He used to be a judge in Holland and a couple of years ago he left everything behind and moved to South Africa. There a just a lot of interesting travelers on this continent.

...and out again (0230)

2010-03-10T13:53:00.000+01:00

We the help of the many persons around we were fairly quick on the road again. No damage to the car. We took a danish missionary with us. He was traveling by bus and has been allready waiting two hours there. Later we came to a similar mud hole. Again a blocked truck... But even more people around. I stepped out to take some pictures, while the danish guy walked ahead to look for a drivable path. The people were all walking in the same direction and seemed fairly excited to me. The danish guy came back and told us to get in the car and drive throu quickly. The crowd was becoming unpredictable and unstable. He has been living in Tanzania for many years and understands the local languauge. He explained that the people were here for a witch hunt. To man are said to have bewitched a school and now they have found them. We do not want to know what happend to them. This is the sad and often brutal side of Africa.

Very muddy (0228)

2010-03-10T13:47:00.000+01:00

This time we didn't pass. On a muddy part a lorry blocked the way. We tried to pass next to it, but in the slippery mud our dear Landcruiser just laid itself gently on its side.

Landscape (0226)

2010-03-10T13:46:00.000+01:00

Landscape (0225)

2010-03-10T13:44:00.000+01:00

Landscape (0224)

2010-03-10T13:30:00.000+01:00

Muddy road (0223)

2010-03-10T13:27:00.000+01:00

There are alwasy muddy and watery spots on the road so far we past them without major problems.

Village (0222)

2010-03-10T13:25:00.000+01:00

Tse Tse flies (0220)

2010-03-10T13:23:00.000+01:00

The area is infested with Tse Tse fly. They transmit the deadly (but curable) sleeping sickness. As soon as you stop you have them in the car - and one of this sucker did bite me and lunched on my blood. I killed it and believe me there was a lot of blood. Their blood capacity compare to a moskito like a Magnum Bottle to an Espresso cup.... and it was my last fresh shirt.
I made a quick call to Medi24 to ask for early symptoms and the incubation time for the sleeping sickness. Great service, thanks alot. It is a day since and neither do I have fever nor am I in coma. So everything is fine.

Plateau (0218)

2010-03-10T13:22:00.000+01:00

Since eastern Kenia we are driving on a fairly high plateau. We have always been between 1000m and 2000m over sea level. We left this morning for Mbeya leaving the Swiss family behind. The road should be better now... Or so we hope.

Landscape (0217)

2010-03-10T13:19:00.000+01:00

We are driving through a light forrest... and suddenly there is a giraffe on the street. What a sight! Then we saw antilopes, a buffalo, some elefants and of course monkies... and then the great surprise: laying lazily on the border of the route was a lion and lioness. We approached slowly (windows down of course) and stopped not further than 3 meters from them. They calmly stood up an walked away. I took pictures with my camera.... Unfortunately I didn't have time to make pictures with the phone for the blog. Sorry for that.

Cows on the road (0216)

2010-03-10T13:17:00.000+01:00

There are always some animals on the road... Twice there was a snake (bright green the first, brown the second). Sometimes we also stopped to look at ant trails over the road. Yesterday the swiss family warned us that these ants are very agressive and very fast... and indeed, despite being warned we had these beasts climbing up our legs. I was bitten in the neck and leg. Thomas in the back.

Swiss family (0215)

2010-03-10T13:16:00.000+01:00

On the road to Mpanda we took over a tanzanian car with a european family inside... and were pretty astonished when they adressed us in Swiss german. The family with three girls aged 4 to 6 has been living in Tanzania for 3 years. He was doing repair work on medical devices.
We agreed to drive with them until Mpanda. The route was sometimes really muddy and their car was not as good as ours for difficult terrain. It slowed us down quite a lot. But we used the time for stopping to take pictures - then catching up with them again. In the middle of the forrest we saw a European women sitting on a bench. We stopped and it happend to be a monkey researcher working on her PhD.
We reached Mpanda at night an found a shabby guest house where we could park our cars. Together with the Swiss family we were sitting behind the cars, cooking spaghetti and eating ananas salad. It was a fun evening. The girls are real african and speak fluently swiss german and kisuaheli...

Villages (0212)

2010-03-10T13:11:00.000+01:00

We lost our three external jerry cans. 60 litres Diesel will now be used by some one else. They did most probably fall off because the attachement were worn through by the vibrations. It is no problem because the car has a second internal tank with a 150 liters.

Tanzania (0210)

2010-03-10T13:02:00.000+01:00

We departed the following day. We were told that the road may not be passable because of the rainy season. There is a river with no bridge. The road was indeed bad, but in December 2009 the construction of a bridge over the river was finished - financed by the European Union. So we drove south and found again breathtaking landscapes.

Refueling in Kigoma (0209)

2010-03-10T13:01:00.001+01:00

Very long 50km (0206)

2010-03-10T12:55:00.000+01:00

We expected a short drive to Kigoma...but it took us close to three hours. After the time lost at the border we were forced to drive at night. The whole street was a in construction interspersed with heavy mud. Several times we thought that our good old Landcruiser will not make it through...and after a long day of driving you don't wont to shovel mud to get the car out. In the pitch dark night it was difficult to find the right spot to pass. No other car was around. It was imposible to distinguish between road and mud terrain around. Once we found a dry but steep sidewalk. We climbed it up, only to back track after some time because there were unpassable rocks on the street. Finally we reached the asphalt. Suddenly we were flying again already, already rejoicing for diner we will have at the hotel. Then the road was blocked with construction trucks. No one was around. No way to pass. So we drove back the kilometers until we reaches the mud again. We remembered passing next to a workers camp with red chinese ballon lamps hanging over th entrance door. Today most routes in Africa are build by China and they send their own staff on site. We thought to stay at the camp, but they indicated us the old road to Kigoma. So we were on the way again. After a difficult climb on a muddy road at the beginning, we found afterwards a very narrow (barely larger than the car) but dry road. We were happy to arrive at the hotel and had diner. Thomas, always eager for new gourmet experiences ate Mgebuka fish, a species you only find here.

Port authority in Kigoma (0207)

2010-03-10T12:54:00.000+01:00

Refugee camps (0203)

2010-03-10T12:51:00.000+01:00

Close to the border we see refugee camps. As the situation is now peaceful, they are basically empty.

Getting into Tanzania (0204)

2010-03-10T12:50:00.000+01:00

We had one of the toughest day so far. Everything went fine up to the border of Burundi. We arrived 1h30 before they close..but unfortunately they did not have at the border post the needed stamp for the car's carnet de passage. So we had to drive back 18km of bad road to the next city. There was a customs office there, but the officer already left. Fortunately everyone is friendly and helpful in Africa. The guy came back, put the stamp in the document and wished us a nice trip. We rerturned to the border - just in time to pass through before they close. We drove the couple of kilometers to the border of Tanzania. The road is being rebuild, so we drove on a construction site...and couldn't find the customs until a wildly gesticulating man told us to stop and indicated the border control hidden behind mountains of mud. After some ill attempts for making us pay some bribes (which we didn't) we were through. Only about 50km from Kigoma, a city in northern Tanzania on the shore of Lake Tanganika.

Approachingg the border to Tanzania (0202)

2010-03-10T12:48:00.000+01:00

We are advancing fast and want to get out of Burundi before the night falls. In the worst case there is a missionary station about 20km from the border. Would be a good place to spend the night.

Burundi Hills

2010-03-08T10:10:00.000+01:00

Before crossing into Burundi Thomas cleaned the Swiss signs on the car...you never know.

Green vegetation (0200)

2010-03-07T10:32:00.000+01:00

There are even palm trees.

Corn (0194)

2010-03-07T10:25:00.000+01:00

Thomas is eating corn on the run. Originally we wanted to have lunch in Bujumbura, but despite beeing a small town, there were traffic jams...and the restaurant on the shore of the lake Tanganika was closed. So we continued, driving south along the Lake. Burundi is a nice country, but still we want to be out of it before night falls. By the way there are no obvious signs that there would be safety issues. There are actually more policemen along the road then armed guards.

Beach vacation (0197)

2010-03-07T10:23:00.000+01:00

Lake Tanganika (0195)

2010-03-07T10:15:00.000+01:00

Beautiful, isn't it? On the shore there are beaches with fine, white sand.

Just another road picture (0192)

2010-03-06T20:27:00.000+01:00

Uphill (0191)

2010-03-06T17:31:00.000+01:00

Uphill with a bicycle is a lot easier when you can catch a lorry. This seems to be standart operating procedures in the Burundi Hills... As are downhill speeders on bicycle. We even saw a bicycle over taking a long trailer (correctly on the left).

Mud bricks (0188)

2010-03-06T17:21:00.000+01:00

Everywhere along the road people are digging for mud, squezzing it in wooden forms, then burning them to nice terra cotta bricks.
At least my clothes look clean on this picture. In reality they are brown with sand and mud.

Mud bricks (0188)

2010-03-06T06:36:00.000+01:00

Everywhere along the road people are digging for mud, squezzing it in wooden forms, then burning them to nice terra cotta bricks.
We stop quite of

Market (0185)

2010-03-06T06:31:00.000+01:00

Thomas bought some fabric. You can get this colorful, waxed tissues only in Africa.

Burundi Landscape (0183)

2010-03-06T06:27:00.000+01:00

A poor country (0176)

2010-03-06T06:23:00.000+01:00

The custom formalities were fast, easy and simple We are in Burundi. The country is a lot poorer than Rwanda. But people still seem to smile more....

Burundi (0174)

2010-03-06T06:20:00.000+01:00

We spend the night in a hotel in Butare, southern Rwanda. The owner is a belgian guy who was born there. He says that tourism is slowly picking up in the country of the thousands hills (indeed there are hills oll over the place here). We recieved confirmation about the safety in Burundi, but now learned that the road we wanted to take in Tanzania is not driveable because of the rainy season. If this is true we will have to make a detour of several hundred kilometers. Lets wait and see. We will decide in Kigoma. For the moment lets enjoy a good cigar, a whisky and the birthday cake of Michel, the hotel owner. Tomorrow we will get up at 6:30 to be at noon in Bujumbura and out of southern Burundi before the night falls.