I’m now in Dar es Salaam, the largest city in Tanzania. The nine-day journey from Hargesia, when I last posted here, was long and difficult. On my first day (19 June), a taxi and two minibuses brought me from Somaliland to Harar in eastern Ethiopia. After the first of several nights with no hot water, a bus brought me to Dire Dawa, where I attempted to catch a flight to Nairobi. Alas, Ethiopian Airlines refused to sell me a ticket, so I was forced to spend the night (again, no hot water). When I dropped my bag in my room, I mentally compared the concrete cube to a prison cell. I wasn’t aware how accurate that comparison was to be come.
The next morning I intended to catch a bus back to Addis Ababa, Ethiopia’s capital city at 6am. I awoke and packed my bag in darkness – there was no electricity – and went downstairs to find the entire compound locked up tight. After half an hour of knocking on doors in an effort to find someone to let me out, I decided I had to find my own way out. I forced open the door of an upstairs room, climbed onto a narrow ledge outside, and dragged my backpack out after me. After crossing the corrugated tin roof (taking care to step only where the screws held the metal to the roof beams below) and up a wall, I was faced with a two-storey drop to the street below. A conveniently located tree provided an apparent means of descent, so I tossed my backpack over the edge and prepared to climb down.
My prison wouldn’t have been complete without a guard, who at that moment emerged from the shadows – and probably slumber as well – to inspect the backpack that fell from heaven. I shouted down to him and he looked up, clearly startled to see a foreigner in a tree in the predawn hours. As I moved to climb down, he picked up a large rock and held it over his head, as if to hit me with it when I reached the ground. I paused my downward climb, preferring the safety of the tree. The guard then decided to throw the rock, but despite it being a perfect bludgeon, it was far too heavy for him to throw effectively. I finished my downward climb towards the disarmed guard, who managed to do what I could not – wake up the hotel’s owner. The owner cleared up the confusion and the guard was made to get me a taxi to the bus station.
The day’s busses had gone, so I was stuck with a metal bench seat (see the photo below) in an overcrowded minibus for the 11 hour trip back to Addis.
By the halfway mark, the minibus had melted its brakes, which sent molten rubber everywhere and emitted plenty of smoke as we stopped for lunch. This wasn’t enough to faze the driver, but he was forced to resign after his vehicle stalled at every stop. I was transferred to an even more overcrowded bus that wasn’t going to Addis, but instead to Awash, an intermediate stop. There I found a nice and comfortable minibus that flew up the Chinese-built expressway (the finest road I’ve seen in Africa) to the outskirts of Addis, where I found another minibus to my hotel. It was a long day.
After a day of planning and much-needed rest in Addis, I was up early for the two-day bus journey to the Kenyan border at Moyale. On the second day, about half the journey was on muddy dirt roads. After a night on the Kenyan side of the border, I changed my remaining Ethiopian Birr to Kenyan shillings at a terrible rate and got on a bus to Nairobi at 4:30am. We didn’t arrive until 8:30pm, sixteen hours later. I made a rather unceremonious crossing of the equator, marking the beginning of my second trip to the Southern Hemisphere (my parents brought me to Australia when I was two).
A large part of the journey was over unpaved roads (the Chinese are working on fixing this), and my seat over the rear axle meant I was in the bounce zone. Twice my head hit the ceiling 18 inches above me. It was far too rough to sleep or read. There was one thirty minute stop for lunch and the toilet.
I was now two days behind schedule, which I decided to make up by leaving Nairobi after only one full day in the city. I used my full day to visit the National Museum and eat at the famous Thorn Tree Cafe. The acacia tree in the courtyard has served as a message board for generations of travellers in East Africa. The lamb burger was fantastic.
My bus to Dar es Salaam left at 5:45am for what I was told would be a twelve hour journey, but was actually sixteen. The traffic in this town is incredible. Today is Sunday, so Dar is a sleepy place. Tomorrow I intent to take the ferry to Zanzibar, the fabled Spice Island.
