Living the Dream Solo Around the World Trip

[TornadoF5]

I have these days at work chasing my tail doing this and doing that, try to conform to being part of something I didn't create aka the "rat race" and not very good or successful at it and neither liking it.... THEN I read this and as if I disappear into Schalk's world and everything is great in Africa & everything has profound meaning and everyone survives. Thanks old mate:thumleft:

 

[schalk vd merwe]

I have these days at work chasing my tail doing this and doing that, try to conform to being part of something I didn't create aka the "rat race" and not very good or successful at it and neither liking it.... THEN I read this and as if I disappear into Schalk's world and everything is great in Africa & everything has profound meaning and everyone survives. Thanks old mate:thumleft:

Having been in the rat race for 41 years I just had to make this move. One can carry on working till you die and then you have not lived yet. To me this-traveling and meeting people from different cultures is living and when I come back I can live on the memories. I was going to postpone this trip until I read in February that Lodie de Jager died of brain cancer on Christmas day and also a friend of mine who was a sportsman at the age of 56 got Parkinson. That made me decide that life has got to be lived to the full and rather sooner than later.

 

[schalk vd merwe]

Sorry vir die Hi-Jack Schalk, maar daai krater en die METEOR CRATER wat ek op my Route 66 trippie in Amerika gesien het lyk BAIE dieselfde.
Amazing om te sien hoe so 'n klippie 'n GROOT gat maak as hy ons tref.... wonder of ons een KZN se kant to kan stuur...  eepwall: :imaposer:

Ja so min of meer Nkandla se kant toe wanneer die helicopter daar staan.

 

[schalk vd merwe]

 
. . asb, net nie retire nie.
Is dit sommer daar ? Kan jy die voel , dis koel in PTA, in die middle van winter hier. 

Enige iets van 28 tot 35 grade hier. Net koud as jy hoog oor die berge ry.

 

[schalk vd merwe]

Briljant!Kan sien jy geniet dit!
Sterkte met daai tyre and alles wat mooi is vorentoe. Dankie, geniet jou trippie saam met jou baie! :drif:

So ver so good. Sien hulle sal voor my in Khartoom wees. Die hele tyre storie kos my al seker R10 000 in for a penny in for a pound

 

[schalk vd merwe]

:sip:

Hoe gaan dit met die karietjie mense

 

[schalk vd merwe]

Sorry vir die Hi-Jack Schalk, maar daai krater en die METEOR CRATER wat ek op my Route 66 trippie in Amerika gesien het lyk BAIE dieselfde.
Amazing om te sien hoe so 'n klippie 'n GROOT gat maak as hy ons tref.... wonder of ons een KZN se kant to kan stuur...  eepwall: :imaposer:

Ja nee die natuur vat nie nonsense nie

 

[schalk vd merwe]

Eks ingeteken Schalk. Veilig ry en weet baie v ons wens ons is daar

Jy is welkom my maat

 

[BB King]

Een moer-cool foto die!!!

 

[Bushtrotter]

dankie vir die saamvat.... nog n uur van my dag weg :laughing4:

 

[GSpear]

Thanks for sharing Schalk, really enjoying your posts.  :thumleft:

 

[schalk vd merwe]

Update 29/06/2015
So the next morning we were ready to travel to Bahir Dar which is on the south side of Lake Tana where the Blue Nile begin. Flavio had a pick up arranged the day before to take the one KTM and David the American who fractured his leg along the same route as us but came the next morning the price for the transport was all of sudden much more. If a local can get ripped off like that imagine what they will do to a tourist. This upset Flavio and he decided that David would rather fly to Addis Ababa and he will fly back later to come and fetch the bike and ride the 700km back again. Flavio loves to ride his bike and the way he says that in a semi Italian accent is just too quit. So we were off after filling up. Later we got rain and I only put the top part of my rain suite on as my BMW boots with metal little plates in front tore a huge hole into the pants and England with rain every 2nd day is still coming. Eventually my Jeans was soaked and fortunately I changed my cloves from off road cloves to leather cloves. It got ice cold up in the mountains and for the first time I missed a Wimpy and a nice cup of their coffee. We were on a 60km gravel road and next to the road were trees when I felt this pain on the right hand side of my right leg. Immediately in a split second I had a flash back of when a Bush Buck hit me on the left leg in the Transkei 2 years ago and fractured my Tibia but then I realized it was a stone from one of the kids between the trees and I could see him in my mirror peeping at me. I felt like turning around and take my belt off and giving him a good old style hiding but I was nursing my petrol as one pump after the other was dry. Flavio told me that he also got hit on the ribs as they don’t know that he is a local. He already gave 5 kids a hiding in the past and when he asked them why they do it they cannot say. Any way I must grand this to the kid who got me it was a crack shot and if I was not going to leave the country shortly the ketty idea would have become a reality. When we finally got to a pump that had petrol I filled 14, 75 litres to my 15 litre tank and the speedo indicated I have done 320km on that. So 0, 25 of a litre were left in the tank. Flavio and I stayed ahead of the 2 Americans and every 50km or so we waited for them at strategic points until we reached Rabir Dar next to Lake Tana on the south side. Flavio showed me a cheap pension where I booked in at 220Brr (R 132 per day as cheap as camping) while they booked into a 5 star hotel for the 2 Americans sake. If he is by himself he also normally book into cheap places. I went over for dinner at their hotel but I had an upset stomach for 3 days as my body is not used to the germs here so I ate very little over that time. Flavio had an upset stomach for only one day.  The next morning the two Americans and I went for a boat ride on Lake Tana to see the start of the Blue Nile and a Monastery. It was special but we had to cut the trip short due to Flavio and the two Americans who had to do 275km for the day toward Addis. We had lunch together and after that it was time to say good bye to the 3 of them. I must say it was nice to have company for a couple of days and Flavio and I always arguing who the best Moto GP rider is, Valentino Rossi “The Doctor” or Marc Marquez. Flavio invited me to come and see him in Italy when I get there as he will be there as well during that time. So it was good bye for now and off they went. The next day I was off to see the Blue Nile Water Falls. It was only 36km away but the worse gravel road in Ethiopia so far as it took me more than an hour to get there through the mud and holes. It boggles my mind that the tourist department don’t fix a road to one of the biggest tourist attractions but then I remembered that I promised myself before the trip that I won’t criticise any country on my way, I am just here to observe. I was grateful for being on knobblies and my bike took it better than any other vehicle on that road. At the fall you had to pay 50Brr and also 100Brr for the guide and 50 Burr for the guy to watch my bike. In the end I paid the guide 150Brr as he spoke fluent English and he was a very likeable guy. 250Brr is about R150. It was an half hour walk to the falls and I had my bike boots on but never the less I made it over the mountain to the falls. The government of Ethiopia really stuffed up the flow of the water 12 years ago. They built a hydro power station and used 75% of the water to go through that and only 25% of the water flow now comes over the water fall, that for only 83 Megawatt of power. In October when the big rain comes then there is sufficient water to cover the whole 400 metre wide falls which must be spectacular to see. Ethiopia apparently exports electricity but at Rahir Dar 35km away, the power goes off just about every day as it did in Addis, apparently due to bad maintenance of the infrastructure, the same as we are having in SA at the moment. After the falls I went back over the same bad road but just much quicker and then I tried to get fuel but to no avail. I did not realize that most pumps in the whole country were dry until I read on Uwe’s post on Facebook. So this morning I phoned Degu our guide on the boat trip and he took me to a petrol pump that had fuel but there were a line of Baja 3 wheel shooter that would take about 2 hours to fill before me. He knew the owner and manages to get me right to the front of the que and only one Toyota owner got upset and all the Baja owners just accepted the state quo. I must say I would have got upset as well if somebody do that to me but I left Degu to do the talking. I filled my tank and a 5 litre tin which will get me to the Sudan border tomorrow. So this afternoon I and Degu is going to watch birds of the feathered kind next to Lake Tana and the Blue Nile as I am a bird watcher as well.

 

[schalk vd merwe]

Ready and packed to leave Lalibela

 

[schalk vd merwe]

60km Gravel road over the mountains

 

[schalk vd merwe]

1st Photo   Flavio with his beloved KTM
2nd Photo  Rain suite on but my Jeans were soaked
3rd Photo   Beautiful view on the way

 

[schalk vd merwe]

1st Photo  Beautiful view
2nd Photo  Ditto
3rd Photo  Eagles Rock. There were a whole lot of Eagles on top of that roack and that is where they breed

 

[schalk vd merwe]

1st Photo  On the way to go and explore Lake Tana and the Blue Nile
2nd Photo  View from Lake Tana
3rd Photo  Ditto

 

[schalk vd merwe]

1st Photo  Jean and Joe
2nd Photo  View over Lake Tana
3rd Photo  New hotel under construction

 

[schalk vd merwe]

The start of the Blue Nile

 

[gwild]

Have i said awesome  :thumleft:
I also want to do something like this
Keep it coming  eepwall: