19 April - Kondoa

Today we did only 28km and it was awesome to get a little bit of a rest. That said, we did hike 18km this morning in order to see rock paintings in Kolo, and then it was a ridiculous 28 km on a sand road that made the concentration levels peak. It never seems to be that easy.

It was the most spectacular piece of cycling though – the road is lined with majestic baobabs that reign over the sunflowers set against the moody skies. Gorgeous.

We are staying in Kondoa tonight and have settled into some great accommodation that costs us R18 each for a decent room. Dinner was rice and veggie soup with beans – basic, but heavenly.

There was a classic moment in the street this evening as we stood outside the local corner store, although this is a one road town, with not much at all and it appears that this is more like the equivalent of the Engen pie shop at 2am in Claremont, Cape Town… the only place worth visiting and the only place that has everything you need. I digress… Gareth stood there with ear phones on having a little dance to Tanzanian music much to the amusement of the owner of the earphones and to the horror of the four year old who clearly had never seen Mzungu, much less dancing Mzungu. Rich and Matt stood at the counter beyond the throngs of locals whilst they bartered down our price of tomorrow’s dinner down to R20 a head… on the front step a woman sat frying Kasava chips (a staple diet vegetable that tastes a little like a sweet potato) and her friend sat next to her frying small fish… in between them was a heap of newspaper to wrap the sales in. Fish and Chips Tanzanian style!

It’s off to bed now – we have 170km to go to Dodoma, two days of hardcore dirt roads and if the last few days are anything to go by, this is unlikely to be too much fun. But with a new resolve of I am a happy person and this is the most awesome time of my life to date… bring on tomorrow! And I will do my best to drop the cheese… good night.