Ethiopia

5th December

We have reached Marsabit, the largest place in between Isiolo and Moyale on the Ethiopian border, and a welcome change from the surrounding desert. Marsabit sits in a green and lush national reserve, 1500m above the rocks and sand below. Despite the climb, it is a huge relief for us, as not only have the roads been astonishingly bad, but there has also been almost nothing to break up the hours and absorb our attention. The last four days have been some of the hardest so far, but at the same time we have been extremely lucky. Firstly, we've had cloud cover through most of the areas where the temperatures regularly get over 45 degrees, which made a massive difference; secondly, we had Lenjho, a local safari guide who knows the area very well and could find out where was safe for us to go and where wasn't.

Lenjho made us feel a lot more confident about setting off into the bandit ridden desert and when we asked him about the risks of being held up, he reassured us that there were few problems at present. When he told us about an MP and his family being shot dead on our route, we imagined that it was not only a politically motivated killing, but also that it must have happened a long time ago. The end of the story was that this had happened last April and the bandits had no idea who they were. Laughingly, Lenjho also told us that he had also been shot at several times.
Thankfully, the road to Marsabit was safe, and we only saw a few people with guns, who smiled and waved as we passed.

9th December

We've made it! No shootings, no robberies, and no hold ups. The road, however, got much worse, and for the first time on the trip we had to push or carry our bikes. Before this, though, came the rocks. On the map, part of our route was covered in little dots, showing volcanic rock areas, which didn't mean that much to us at the time. When we stopped for some lunch in a tiny village on the fist day we asked about the state of the road from there on, having had a very tough morning on the worst surfaces yet. We were told that it got worse for a while, then a little better, then if it rains after that…'eeeeeeee, sha!' was all he could say. I very stupidly turned to Rob and said 'there's no way the road can get worse than that last section.'

Try and imagine cycling though one of those children's play-pens full of multi-coloured balls, only the balls are rocks and the play-pen is an endless desert, and you have some idea of the hell Becks and I were in and the fun that Rob was having. If you stood up to avoid certain impotency, then there wouldn't be enough weight on the back tyre to grip and if you sat down everything went worryingly numb. It was undoubtedly the hardest bit of the trip so far, but it was do-able, unlike the next day. The rain started at a very bizarre moment when we were having lunch. Two dogs had found a romantic little spot in the middle of the road and were just getting going when a third dog, obviously very unhappy to be left out, rudely interrupted them, scaring the female and causing her to try and scarper. Unfortunately, in her panic, she was unable to "release" her pal, thereby dragging him very painfully along behind her. This continued for some time, and as we watched through the gaps between our fingers, it began to rain very heavily. Relief was followed by horror, as the dogs disconnected, but decided to try again, resulting in exactly the same jealous and agonizing outcome. The rain got heavier, and the dogs got more stuck - a period of rest would inevitably be interpreted by the jealous suitor as a new sexual position, and so he would charge, making her run and him squeal. Little did we realise that this unbearably awful spectacle was making the rest of the day very difficult, as the rain was quickly turning the road into slush. We were desperate to try and separate the unlucky pair, even if the entire village were cheering with delight, but decided that there was nothing we could do and we set off in the torrent.

The first 20km covered us in mud and chucked us off our bikes a couple of times, but was just a preamble to the very thick and sticky 'cotton mud', which was where we had to start carrying our bikes. Every time we tried to get back on, either our wheels and brakes would get completely clogged, or it was just too soft to support the bikes. At one point all the cyclists were stuck, the Land Rover was stuck and an Overland truck going in the other direction was also stuck. Jono amazingly managed to manoeuvre the Land Rover through massive lakes of mud and water, and even when the distributer was flooding, water was streaming in through the door and the road disappeared, the Landy ploughed on behind the bikes. Jono also had to cope with four very immature English idiots throwing mud at each other and paddling in the puddles.

After a very good wash at Sololo we made it to Moyale the next day, which included the first of many 1000m climbs on our way to Addis Ababa. Having felt very nervous about the bandit situation, we were relieved to be safe and out of the desert. There hadn't been any situations where we felt threatened, and for a moment we felt a bit silly for getting so worried. This quickly faded, however, when we met two Danish travellers who had been making their way from Nairobi to Addis on a cattle truck a few hours ahead of us. Just beyond the area where we had got stuck in the mud, their truck was ambushed by twenty men carrying Kalashnikovs and one with a machine gun. All the passengers had been ordered off at gun point and everything had been stolen, even their shoes. Bizarrely, the Danish men had seemed to get favourable treatment being white, as the bandits chatted to them about where they were from and even gave one of them their bags back and the other his passport - all this while the rest of the victims were getting thrashed with sticks. We had been very lucky, as we passed through the same spot only an hour later.

11th December

As with everywhere we have been, we were drawn a clear picture of Ethiopia by the travellers we have met over the last three months: beautiful and surprisingly fertile, but full of children aiming stones at white people. A couple we met on the road out of the Dida Galgada Desert in northern Kenya seemed to have been driven slightly mad by the behaviour of Ethiopian children and were very glad to be out of the country. However, we had also heard that the food gets much more imaginative, which after months of goat and maize was very good news, and, more importantly, that from Moyale on the Ethiopian/Kenyan border to Addis Ababa, 800km away, the road was perfectly tarred. The ball blasting layer of rocks that had congregated over most of the road from Nairobi to Moyale was very much at the front of our minds when we heard this and so to us Ethiopia sounded like paradise.

Our first day at the border was therefore our honeymoon period, as not only did we have a delicious and cheap meal, but we also all felt like hugging the road and worshipping its smoothness. Ethiopians are also extremely proud of their road in comparison to the Kenyans', so when we arrived covered in Kenyan mud they were delighted to expound the glory of Ethiopian road building. One of the men we met even got a bit carried away by the superiority of his country: 'Here, in my country, you can wash and eat and sleep, do whatever you like!' I hadn't realised that we looked quite so awful. Moreover, the children were delightful, waving excitedly yet calmly from the side of the road as we set off the next morning. We also seemed to be able to disarm any aggression with a bit of a wave. The countryside, as we had expected, was beautiful. Ethiopia is extremely mountainous, which has made some of the days' cycling hard work, but the landscape and views are incredible. We have also arrived at the end of their rainy season, which means that everything is green and lush in the southern regions.

13th December

Having been in Ethiopia for three days the cultural and social differences are becoming more and more obvious. The food seems to have got better and better. The basic meal is made up of dishes of richly spiced meat and vegetables on a mat of what looks like old soggy dish cloth, but is in fact a flat, pancake-like bread. As in many African counties we have been through, the spirit of eating is very much communal, and on our first night here we were told that the eating of these dishes is supposed to signify unity. Sharing fatty goat did very little for our unity, but this food certainly does. On the other hand, we are starting to understand what other travellers said about Ethiopian children, who are amazingly forward. We have definitely established that every child in the county knows at least two words of English: 'you' and 'you'. These are often combined to form casual hellos ('you, you'), angry demands (YOU, YOU!!) or entire conversations (YOU, YOU, you, YOU, you, you, you). Consequently, as we pass through villages we normally experience: you, you, you (thousands of children running very quickly towards us), you, you, you, you, you, YOU, YOU(getting closer!), YO, YU, YA, YU (blurring of loud, screaming youers), YOU, YOU, YOU (some of the older youers still able to keep up with the bikes), you, you, you, you, you, you, you…you….you(continuing further than it can seem possible as no-one can still see any of the children or the village, until you realise that a tiny youer has been chasing the bikes for about four miles), you, you, you, you (the noises are in your head until you reach the next village).

Throughout the trip we have been surrounded by hundreds of children, but until now they have been content with the odd 'money me' or 'dollar mine now yours give'. In Ethiopia they are far brasher. The odd youer has learnt a few more words of English and so is able to intermix them with the 'you' and 'you' they already know, to create a 'you, money, you, you, sweet, pen, me, you, mine, now, you, you' effect. This is combined with a finely tuned poking and tapping method that is aimed at any bit of the body or head within reach. Such daily excitement turns us into major local celebrities, which often means that where we eat has to invest some serious time in crowd control. This more than often involves a slightly older boy with a stick making the youers more excited, or a man with a stick making the youers cry. Either way, the stick person demands a price for his thwacking which we are very reluctant to give, not least because he has either attracted a lot more attention or maimed several small children, neither of which we are particularly grateful for.

14th December

Ethiopian children are going to take a lot of getting used to. As in all the countries we have passed through, most children are really excited and enthusiastic, but they are just so aggressive and brazen here - and there's so many of them! This is the most populated African country we go through, with a population very similar to Britain's, and so there are almost no points when we aren't overrun with people when we stop. We try incredibly hard not to get annoyed, but at times it's just impossible. Today, for example, Becks had stones thrown at her, Rob and I were hit with sticks by the same little git, my bike was karate kicked as I went down a hill, the pin was stolen from the bike rack, they changed the route map on the Land Rover so we now arrive in Sweden and, worst of all, a passing cyclist hocked up a huge greeny and spat it right into the middle of my face…what on earth was that about? We wave, we smile, we don't mind being called 'YOU, YOU' by everyone, and all we get is a 20km/hour phlegm. Ethiopia is a beautiful country, the food is delicious, the roads are excellent, the people are hospitable, there is very little crime and they humiliated the Italian army with spears 100 years ago, but the kids…the kids are Satan's spawn. Even Becks, with the patience of Mother Teresa and Florence Nightingale put together, chased one of the little stone throwing buggers down the road today.

16th December

Addis Ababa, finally. We have cycled for 14 days straight, through desert and over big mountains, and it has been an amazing fortnight, but also the hardest yet. Addis itself is very exciting, and is also a pretty big landmark for us. From here we climb again through eastern to the Sudanese border, to avoid Eritrea, where border clashes between the two countries make it impossible to cross - although having looked at the map they seem to be wrestling over a bit of desert, and the tiff has been described to us as 'two bald men fighting over a comb.' From the Sudanese border we have over a week to Khartoum, hopefully in time for New Year, and then north through the 'no-road' of the Sahara towards Egypt. After joining the Nile we follow it all the way to Cairo, where it's a short cycle to Port Said, where the boat to Italy waits (we hope!). All of this doesn't seem such a long way away anymore, and we are starting to plan our return.

We think that we will arrive in England at the end of February, having caught a ferry to Newcastle from France, Belgium, or Holland. Over the following two weeks we will cycle down England trying to raise as much money and awareness as possible in some of the major towns and cities. Some of the certain dates are Oxford on 6th March and London on 13th March, where we hope to have an event organised in the centre of the City and then a party in the evening…so get it in your New Year diaries!

With Christmas on its way and all, we thought this would also be a good time to tug some heartstrings! We have raised about 18, 000 pounds for Anti-Slavery International, and despite so many people's enormous generosity we still need so much more and desperately want to double that by the time we finish. Having spent a lot of time meeting people who have been victims of the slave trade, or have had to deal with the physical and psychological consequences of such tragedies, we feel passionately that this is something that needs so much more attention, and so much more time and money invested in it. In Lilongwe we interviewed a woman who had been rescued from enslaved prostitution in Holland, where she had been physically branded by her brothel and mentally wounded for the rest of her life. In Nairobi, we met children who had been child labourers all their lives and are now being sponsored to stay in school by the partner organisation of Anti-Slavery. These children can only now start to enjoy their childhood in any normal way. In Sudan, our next country, tens of thousands of very young boys have been taken or bought from their families and forced into the brutal and cruel arena of the Sudanese civil war. This is happening all around us, and all around England in more subtle forms, and we think that if we can raise another 2 or 3 thousand pounds this Christmas then it would give us and Anti-Slavery a real boost. So, tell all your friends, family and rich second cousins to get onto our website and go to 'Help Us' where you can donate money tax free!