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13th - 22nd March 2002

Cycle to the Summit Part 13 - Northern Ethiopia

Toby Hammond
2006-06-25 19:53:22

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a distinctively Ethiopian skyline. The road building continued and we were able to cycle on some of the flat hard-core surface of the new road. On the plus side it was much smoother than the old road and there were no other vehicles, but on the down side the contractor had left building the bridges till last and so every so often the road just ended and we had to find our way across small ravines. Towards the end of the day our friends travelling in convoy with two motorbikes and a Landrover caught us up, and we camped rough with them updating each other of our experiences.

14th March 2002 - near Metema to Maka 38km

We were up at dawn with fresh enthusiasm to explore our third African country. Stopping in the first town called Shady for breakfast we were subject to more attention than was comfortable. There are so many children. Many people greeted us by shouting 'you, you, you!' which we agreed sounded mildly abusive. The dirt road through the town was lined with primitive looking houses made from a combination of stone, eucalyptus trees, mud and corrugated iron. We stopped at one with a teapot outside and sat on benches / beds made with wood and goat skin webbing. Looking around I decided 'it looks like something straight out of a film set', quite detached from reality, in another world without anything modern or plastic in site. We enjoyed the usual sweet spicy tea and some donut-like bready things. Mmmm, I think we are going to enjoy Ethiopia. The atmosphere suddenly changed with the roar of motorbikes. Our friends had caught us up again. Come lunchtime, things changed for the worse when Owy looking decidedly ill declared he 'couldn't go on'. He had rapidly come down with a bad fever. We flagged down some German tourists in an oldish Toyota Landcruiser to try and parcel him off in the direction of a comfy hotel or a hospital. The voice of doom was heard in the form of the driver who declared it was Malaria; ...