Atbara to Meroe to Khartoum

Khartoum, Sudan

 

Tuesday morning, I got up early and headed over to the Ministry of Tourism office in Atbara to get a permit to visit the pyramids of Meroe. In Sudan, you pretty much need a permit to do anything and while there are reports that it's possible to just pay for the permit upon arrival, I figured that if I could get it ahead of time then I would. Getting the permit requires little effort on your part but, like everything in Sudan, costs money. In this case, it's 10$US for the permit. For some reason, locals love to quote prices in US dollars, but when you actually pay in dinars, they are a year or so behind when it comes to the current exchange rate. In the case of the permit, it's 10$US or 2500 SD, which is a bit high given that the current exchange rate is around 230 SD to one US dollar, so I had to haggle a little bit to get 200 SD back from the Tourism officer since I was paying in dinars. Luckily, he didn't put up much of a fight and sort of chuckled in that "yeah, you're right" sort of way when I told him that 10$US is really 2300 SD and not 2500 SD. So that was a savings of around 80 US cents that went towards lunch...

 

With the permit in hand, it was time to check out of Atbara and hop on a microbus to the next town over called Ed Damer. In Ed Damer, I was able to catch a minibus (not to be confused with a microbus) destined for a town called Shendi, about 2 hours south on a beautifully paved highway.

 

The only way to get to Meroe is to just have the driver of the Shendi bound bus stop on the highway to let you out, since Meroe is somewhat in the middle of nowhere when it comes to nearby towns or cities. In my case, the minibus stopped to pick up someone waiting on the side of the road and since I could see the pyramids off in the distance, I figured that this was where I was supposed to get off. I asked the driver and he pretty much seemed to agree, so I hoped out, grabbed my bag off the roof and starting walking towards the pyramids.

 

It didn't take long before I realized two things: 1) The driver could have let me off a lot closer to the pyramids and 2) Distances across open deserts are very deceiving. After about 20 minutes of walking, I set my bag down to get out my camera and discovered that distance had struck in my bag. The chocolate bar that I had been carrying around with me for the last few days had melted in the Sudanese heat and there was liquid chocolate all over the inside of my bag. It was a complete mess. There's a rule of thumb when traveling that says that anything that can leak, will leak so you best double bag that stuff but for some reason it never dawned on me that the chocolate bar would be a problem. (After all, it had "survived" around 2 weeks in Egypt...)

 

So, here I am halfway between the highway and the pyramids, in the Sudanese desert, the heat is pretty intense and I've got melted chocolate over just about everything in my bag. Needless to say, I was a little grumpy. As luck would have it, some of the local children from the nearby "village" came over to start offering me donkey and camel rides, as well as the usual assortment of colorful rocks, jewelry and what not. Normally I don't mind all this attention and after a month in Egypt I had gotten pretty used to it, but when you're trying to scrape melted chocolate out of your bag in the middle of the desert with the relentless sun overhead, it can really give your patience a test. The kids were also a little more pushy then usual with the circular conversation going something like:

 

"Mister, mister, ok donkey ride, 1000 dinars, ok, ok?"

"No thank you, no donkey ride."

"Ok mister, why no donkey, ok 1000 dinars, ok, mister, donkey."
"No, no donkey ride for me."

"Mister, mister, ok, 1000 dinars, camel, mister, mister, why, ok, ok"

 

And so on. Even the most battle hardened traveler (and I'm not yet one) will get a little annoyed as the sales pitch doesn't stop and I can't move on without taking care of my little chocolate problem. In the end, I managed to remain composed and even though one of the kids tried to steal my alarm clock (which was covered in chocolate), I didn't crack and say or do something that I would have regretted later. That said, it was definitely the closest I've come on this whole trip to blowing a fuse and for those that wonder what it takes for me to get angry and really show emotion, well cleaning melted chocolate out of my bag in the hot Sudanese desert with a constant donkey, camel, jewelry sales pitch going on is almost enough for me to crack... Almost... ;)

 

After about 30 minutes, I realized that cleaning out the chocolate would be futile so I just stuffed everything back into my bag and continued on to the pyramids. The pyramids themselves are nothing like the ones in Egypt in either size or importance, but there is something special about visiting, well, anything, in Sudan, particularly something that requires you to just get off a mini-bus on the side of the highway. There's a small gate at the entrance that checks your permit after which you're free to wonder the grounds. 

 

There are around a dozen or so pyramids in various levels of decay. You can't really go into any of them, though there are a few tomb entrances that you can explore, though they are quite shallow. For the most part, the adventure is just being out in the Sudanese desert among these structures. 

 

Along with myself, there were some Italian tourists and three English teachers from the UK and Ireland who I sort of befriended. This probably constitutes a "very busy" day at Meroe since most travelers recount of having the place to themselves. The Italians left before sunset, but the teachers and I all just hung out together watching the colors of the sand and pyramids change as the sun went down. 

 

Many backpackers make it a point of spending the night among the pyramids so that you can experience both the sunset and the sunrise, and my plan was to do just that. Once the sun goes down, there's not much to do other then gaze at the stars and nibble on whatever food or snacks you have brought with you. The four of us all realized that none of us really know anything about astronomy and other then the constellation Orion and the Big Dipper, we really didn't have a clue what we were looking at. (Debates as to where Venus and Mars were ran all night...)

 

By around 10pm we started wandering around the site looking for a place to sleep. For some reason, you're not allowed sleeping within "200 meters" of the pyramids and frankly that sort of rule just goes in one ear and out the other when you're in the middle of the desert. But, to our surprise, within minutes of us moving from the temple that we had been star gazing on to a sand dune about 20 meters away, two security officers appeared out of the black night to tell us that we couldn't sleep there. Neither of them had a flash flight and they genuinely just appeared out of no where. One thing it tells you is that in Sudan, there is always someone watching you and we could only imagine that they saw our flashlights move from one spot to another and decided to come visit us.

 

After some moaning and groaning on our part, we agreed to move to the "other side" of the valley, which is home to a few more of the pyramids and apparently an area where you can sleep. Well, no sooner had we stopped to get out our sleeping bags on that side of the valley did the officers appear again out of the dark to tell us that that spot wasn't good either. You can't help but laugh a little bit at them when you look all around you and see nothing but desert, let alone any other tourists and they say that you have to go another 100 meters or so before we could camp. Well, this time we fought a little harder and ultimately they gave in and let us sleep there, I mean it's not like they would have picked us up and forcibly moved us or anything. 

 

Under a clear sky with no moon (at least no moon until early in the morning), I rolled out the sleeping and was reminded that no matter how careful you are, sand will get anywhere and everywhere when you're sleeping in the desert. You're also reminded that when it comes to sleeping, sand isn't as soft as one would think and while it's certainly fun to camp outside sometimes, I think my "nearing 30" body is starting to prefer beds, or at the minimum air mattresses to help soften things up. 

 

To no ones surprise, the sun rose the following morning just as expected and painted the pyramids in a soft light that probably made sleeping outside worth it. (Though for the record, I think I prefer sunsets to sunrises, the colors seem so much more intense during a sunset as compared to when the sun rises.)

 

We had a quick visit by the local jewelry vendors, as well as the donkey and camel touts but none of them seemed all that fired up and for the most part they just hung out with us without much sales pitching going on. One thing that I did notice is that I had several dozen flies all over me, no doubt attracted by the fact that I most likely looked like one big chocolate bar to them. God, never again will I put a chocolate bar in my bag without double bagging it for good measure. Lesson learned.

 

We packed up and the four of us headed back out to the highway, which is when I realized just how far away I was let off the bus the previous day. It didn't take long before lorries and buses started stopping to offer us a ride, but with four people and their gear, we had to pass on a few of the offers and some of the transport already had people hanging on to the sides and back, so I have no idea where they expected us to go. Eventually, an Italian guy and his friend drove by in their Jeep Cherokee and all four of us piled into the back seat. This guy runs a rather upscale "camp" not far from Meroe for tourists who want to sleep in the desert, but have a bed and all the amenities of a hotel nearby. No idea how well business, but we learned that the Italian tourists that were in Meroe the previous day were staying at his camp, so I guess he had some guests...

 

It took about an hour to get from Meroe to the next "major" town called Shendi, from where we easily caught a bus to Khartoum. After the transportation I had experienced earlier in Sudan, this bus was positively luxurious with air conditioning, reclining seats, juice service, curtains and the loudest music I've ever had on a bus, bar none. For the first half of the 2.5 hour trip, it was classic Arabian music, which means high pitched, distorted sounding noises to my Western ears. I had to put in my ear plugs and even then I thought it was still loud. The second half of the trip, presumably as we got closer to Khartoum, it switched over to some "Khartoum Top 40" sounding station, complete with all the "cool woosh" sounds that normally accompany any "Top 40" station back in the West between songs. They also had some call-in thing going on, so maybe it's a Rick Dee's knock off or something, all I know is that it was damn loud.

 

Once in Khartoum, I sort of followed the teachers as they navigated the local microbus circuit to find us some transport into the center of Khartoum, which with a little help from a local, proved to be not all that difficult.

Downtown, we went out separate ways and I hunted down some hotels with a little help from the Sudanese guidebook that I have. Compared to Egypt, Khartoum is down right expensive when it comes to hotels and most single/double rooms are around 15-20$US/night, and that's without hot water or even a bathroom in some cases.

 

After checking out a few, I ended up splurging on a way over priced room at a place called the Central Hotel for 26$US/night. It didn't have hot water, but it did have a reasonably clean room and, more importantly, a private balcony which I could use to dry my belongings since I still had that little melted chocolate problem to deal with.

 

So, I spent all afternoon yesterday cleaning just about everything that is in my bag, including the bag itself. It's not easy getting chocolate out when all you really have is an overhead shower and a small bucket, but I think I managed. For some reason, my room had some drapes hanging on a blank wall. There was no window behind the drapes yet they had the ability to be open and closed, if you know what I mean. I didn't think that was needed so I cut the cord off and used that as a laundry line on my balcony, apparently carrying rope is something seasoned travelers in Africa already know about. Now I've got some rope for the rest of my travels... ;)

 

Once everything was cleaned, I finally got to clean myself after going without a shower for a period of time that I will not mention on this public blog. Clean and refreshed, I cranked the AC and kicked back to watch a little Animal Planet. For some reason, the satellite feed for the TV has only two English channels, CNN and Animal Planet. I though the American version of CNN was pretty bad, but the International version is completely void of any content. In the few hours I had it on while cleaning, I think they mentioned maybe 3 different stories (Disney/Pixar, Davos 2006, Palestinian Elections) and the weather. And if you think watching the local weather for your city is somewhat pointless, you should see when they show you a map of Europe or Africa. Who actually benefits from this information, let alone makes rational decisions based on the fact that the saw some "green band" stretching across the entire African continent is beyond me. All I knew is that it was still stinking hot outside and Animal Planet was my only option.

 

By night time, it had cooled down enough for me to venture outside and as I walked towards the Nile, I bumped in Mark, the traveler from LA who I had met on the ferry but separate from in Wadi Halfa. He had some good stories to tell with respect to traveling south along the Nile and as expected the journey was rough and long.

After almost 2 weeks of eating the same stuff in Sudan, last night I found a nice pizza spot that had a perfect outdoor setting in a park complete with a decent sized water found (that was actually working!), so I enjoyed a large cheese pizza in the comforts of a small oasis of fresh air and after almost two weeks of pretty rough travel and living, I could feel my batteries recharging.

 

After dinner, I headed back downtown to find a stationary store to get another notepad. When I first started traveling, I used to carrying around a full size diary to write down daily happenings, but over time I found that a small pocket sized ring notebook is indispensable while traveling, both for use as a journal and just for jotting down random things that you come across.

 

At the stationary store, Jafa, a Ugandan studying here in Khartoum started talking to me. English is the official language of Uganda so it was refreshing to speak to a "local" but in a first language. We both had places to go, but we're supposed to meet back up tonight so hopefully I'll get to pick his brain a bit about Uganda, since I'm thinking of heading there after Kenya.

 

Kenny