The voice of the very long Arabic registration which I do not seem to recognize among the many heard in this stretch through Sudan surprises me, it is followed by a very short ‘the number dialed is out of coverage area’. It is about 5,30 in the afternoon in Zambia, at the last phone call around 5 the ferry had not left yet, there was a terrible noise on the background, I could not hear much only the ‘call me later’ … I assume the ferry has left and that Matteo with his bamboo bike is in the middle of Lake Nasser next stop Aswan in Egypt. Shame! The children and I had prepared a support phone call to celebrate the end of Sudan, Chimba too was practicing on the phone and kept repeating ‘Matteo, how are you?’, the phone call will be postponed to tomorrow for the arrival in Egypt. Continue reading →

Today I want to rest …

Yesterday I fell asleep at nine, this room does not offer the natural silence of Abu Sara or Melik el Nasir, and in a hotel more or less conventional like this one you cannot take the bed outside, if you wake up you cannot see the stars and moon around you, surrounded by total silence, you see only the light of the fridge and hear the noise of the air con and of the blades of the fan, it is cool like outside but with a energy waste extremely superior. Continue reading →

Wake up at 4,59 in the morning …

I do not want to get trapped in the grip of the heat and wind even today, I snooze the alarm clock just once, everybody around me is sleeping, some on beds like mine, others on carpets and one in front of me on a heap of grey sand which seems very comfortable judging from how he sleeps …

While I fold the sleeping bag, which I used up to knees, and I do the panniers I force myself to eat about ten digestive biscuits and some dry figs which I bought in Dongola, I take on credit some pockets of very sweet milk from the freezer of the cafeteria and take some pictures. Continue reading →

‘Now you cannot go ahead! You are welcome to the house of the teachers …’ told me my guardian angel, an old teacher at the school in Akashah.

I do not fight it.

As soon as I laid down on the bed with a Nile view, in the shade of a big thatched shelter, I fell asleep, on the bed net to mine the Head Teacher was sleeping deeply covered by a blancket good enough for an Italian winter … it was three in the afternoon … I slept about one hour and I woke up only because I had a crazy thirst … I could have stayed there but I had done only sixty kilometers … and I would like to be in Wadi Halfa tomorrow evening … Continue reading →

I do not think hell really exists …

… but if I am wrong it probably will be similar to today’s stage …

On the map a semi stage to get closer to Wadi Halfa, I thought I was going to be there before one, instead I arrived at six … 13 km/h on average … hotter than yesterday and a adverse wind and very strong … it seemed to have a air-drier pointed straight all over the body but where it is the most annoying is on the face … I feel the need to breath like when you are swimming … I have a constant thought to the Picornell my favorite swimming pool … I see myself diving in … doing a couple of laps and drinking a ice cold beer with the Monjuic around … instead on my stops I have to make do with some drinks, a yoghurt, and a lot of water a bit sandy of the water containers which I drink only when my mouth risks the spontaneous combustion … beers are forbidden in Sudan … that may be why you can find a series of fizzy drinks in the taste of apple, cherry, mango, … which I can manage to drink only in extreme cases … bottled water cannot be found often … it makes me laugh that at times these fizzy drinks have the bottle and the label similar to those of a Belgian beer … Continue reading →

‘Today it is not very hot there are 57 degrees’ … told me a policeman …

My today’s objective was reaching Delgo about 130 kilometers from Dongola, I arrived there relatively early and I found out it is not a town, but a big and convulse market frequented by thousands of gold diggers who every day fathom the surrounding mountains. They do not have the sieve of Uncle Scrooge and Rockerduck, but they are equipped with some kind of sounder, Made in China I assume, which they keep over the shoulder at the market and use as a hoover on the ground, seeing them busy sounding the ground they seem CIS on the crime scene, or NASA analyzing the surroundings where it is thought a alien ship landed … Continue reading →

Semi stage, flown away in a bit less than two hours …

The favorable wind today that I had to do so few kilometers … it seems almost a waste…

I have just arrived back from the Nile where I had a fast swim, ten arm strokes all together, because the manager of the Nubian Guest House told me that from August to September it is very dangerous and every year more or less twenty people die, the current is very strong, certainly on a canoe I will arrive quicker to Wadi Halfa, … the color today is always the same brown, yesterday in Al Khandaq it seemed more light blue and the play if lights of the evening must have mislead me, even if looking back at the pictures of this morning it did not seem as brown as here … Continue reading →

I did not sleep well in this cafeteria, too much music until late, then the proximity to the check point with the buses stopping, and finally … the laziness of not getting the sleeping mat out … contributed to a night with too much waking up … 

I saw from the map that it was about 60 kilometers towards North-West, so I was expecting the wind which punctual gave me no truce until the afternoon, today the heat is bastard since the beginning luckily there are many water containers, some with water, nobody knows how, very fresh, others boiling like the surrounding air, the reduced traffic does not help in my battle against the wind … Continue reading →

214 km by bicycle I do not think I have ever done them … 

I slept well on my bed under the stars, I blew up the sleeping mat too, and I slipped myself in the sleeping bag and put the panniers by my head to protect myself from the strong wind. Continue reading →

Post sent from the laptop of a policeman from the middle of the desert

No I did not consider the blinds …

Last night I was so tired that I did not realize the there were the window blinds, so this morning after dismissing the alarm clock set at 6 for the great stage, I slept until ten! Not too bad because during the night there was a huge storm, the officers from the Immigration Office arrived late, and my documents came ready around midday and myself … a couple of hours later … Continue reading →