 The scale and diversity of a 4,000-mile safari (‘journey’ in Swahili) through Kenya, Tanzania, Malawi, Mozambique and Zimbabwe makes it a mind-boggling concept to arrange independently. A spate of deadlines had meant that I had little time to dedicate to research and planning and within the allotted month that I had to hit the road the only way I could hope to get even a taste of such a huge territory would be in an independent vehicle - preferably with somebody who had already been there and knew the ropes.
A stack of brochures from overland companies promised me ‘a secure way to explore an unfamiliar world’ and ‘hassle free travel’ but I pondered the fact that my most memorable trips – at least in hindsight – had always been fairly well fraught with hassle. Security and Comfort seemed to be industry catchphrases with one brochure reassuring the prospective client that he did ‘not have to be Indiana Jones - James or Jenny Jones is quite sufficient.’
It was with a jaundiced eye therefore that I began to scan the brochure of a company called Oasis Overland. Before the second paragraph was through things began to look up when the intrepid James/Jenny Jones was asked if he/she did not mind ‘the odd hiccup.’ After so many promises of security this prose seemed fairly to ooze with the essence of adventure. When the challenge was finally issued: ‘things will not always go according to plan, so if you are not prepared for this and want to be pampered on your holiday then maybe you should think again’ . . . well, what could I do but sign up?
‘Invasion of the Likeminded Fellow Travellers’:
And that was how I found myself heading out of Nairobi on a blissfully bright February day in a monstrous yellow truck full of ‘likeminded fellow travellers.’ Every overland brochure had promised a full cast of ‘LFTs’ (that I imagined as an infuriating blend between the Stepford Wives and the Famous Five) but, looking down along the inside of the truck, I realised that it would be a miracle if - between 10 Aussies, 6 Brits, a Kiwi, a Canadian and 4 Argentines - there were not a few ne’er-do-wells and nymphets . . . or even the odd anarchist.
‘Jenny Joneses’ outnumbered ‘Jameses’ by two-to-one, we ranged in age from 18 to 37 and came from all walks of life. In addition to Paul, the South African driver, and Lisa, the English guide (with the regulation Aussie accent that comes with overlanding  territory), we boasted a medic, a mechanic, a fireman . . . and a social worker. So what could possibly go wrong?
The greatest fear in signing up for an overland trip (whether it be a 10-day ‘Zimbabwe Explorer’ or a 6-month London to Cape Town epic) is that these fellow travellers have a great influence over whether your trip is a success or a failure. In a large group like ours it seemed fairly certain that anybody should be able to find at least one or two bearably ‘likeminded fellows’ and our first beery evening at a barbecue in Nairobi (during which we did our best to deplete the local population of impala, eland, ostrich, wildebeest and zebra - prior to spending weeks gazing adoringly as they frolicked in their natural habitat) did not betray any great rifts in our solidarity.
The Great Rift:
My first sight of The Great Rift Valley the following morning was sadly devoid of those poignant thoughts that are supposedly evoked by a return to ‘the Cradle of Mankind.’ I struggled for a few minutes to grasp the significance of three million years of collective history and then turned my attention to trying to make it back to the truck without buying a carved rhino. This was, as I had imagined, the downside of overlanding: whenever you arrive at a tourist spot so too does a big yellow truck and 21 LFTs.
I can’t say in all honesty that I was looking forward to spending our second night in a Masai Village where we would ‘get to experience first hand the village way of life of these nomadic herdsmen and warriors.’ In recent years more and more overland companies have made a policy – either out of a genuine interest in protecting areas that they will frequently be forced to pass through or as a sensible marketing ploy – of embracing environmentally and culturally sensitive local projects. All too often it sounds suspiciously convenient and uncomfortably intrusive.
But the headman of this village, near the Tanzanian border, was an unusually eloquent man and a far-seeing spokesman for his people. He had clearly embarked on a mission to impart at least a basic understanding of his culture to whatever mzungu passed through and he managed to infect most of us with an interest in the Masai that was completely out of proportion with the short time that we spent with them. His village, though established as part of the overland truck route, had – probably more by accident than design (i.e. it was missing from the ‘Backpackers’ Bibles’) - remained almost unknown to independent travellers. The only Masai manyatta that Lonely Planet’s East Africa lists is a place where you’re lucky even to be able to talk to the villagers and where you’ll ‘have the crap hassled out of you to buy trinkets and beadwork.’
We were likewise unable to speak to the majority of the villagers but the reason here was linguistic rather than commercial; it seemed to be a proof of their isolation that English was almost unknown and even Swahili had made little headway in a community that still speaks almost exclusively Masai. While there was still occasionally that unnerving air of voyeurism that invariably comes with even the most sensitive ‘cross-cultural exchange’ it was clear that the young men of the village were first and foremost Masai moran (warriors). They were apparently happy to display their skills and fitness around our campfire at night . . . and their makeup and jewellery for our cameras by daylight. But it was good to see that they felt comfortable about drawing the line when they considered that they had posed for enough photos. They still spent their days, as had their fathers, guarding their precious cattle and their heavy spears were not unaccustomed to fending off ‘competition’ in the form of buffalo and leopard.
Savanna Dawn:
 The Masai word ‘Serengeti’ (meaning endless savanna) is one that has become evocative of all the light, space and natural splendour of Africa and the nine thousand square-mile Serengeti National Park was sure to be one of the highlights of the entire trip.
We were already getting used to the routine of truck life by the time we arrived at Meserani Snake Park in northern Tanzania. We hastily set up our two-man tents and - apart from those on cook-duty - adjourned to the bar where an elderly lady, who invited us to call her Ma, was expertly flipping the tops off frost-beaded bottles of Kilimanjaro beer.
Next morning – barely a few hours after we had made our stumbling way back to our tents - six open-topped Land Rovers, from ‘Fun Safaris’ in nearby Arusha, arrived to take us to see what has been described as one of the natural wonders of the world. A wavelike cloud was breaking in a crest to run down the south-eastern walls of the great Ngorongoro Crater and, looking over the rim, five hundred metres to the crater floor, it was hard to get any idea of scale . . . until one of the guides spotted a herd of elephants – mere dots on the lush carpet beside the gleaming Lake Makat. For a moment it was possible to grasp the life-and-death dramas that were going on in the 160 square-mile amphitheatre that lay before us.
Ngorongoro Crater is renowned as one of the best places in the world for viewing wildlife but even so we were amazed to have ticked the Big Five off our must-see lists by midday. Some connoisseurs will tell you that safaris can be judged solely on the all-important sightings of elephant, buffalo, lion, rhino and leopard but to have ‘bagged’ them all by lunchtime was just a shade too convenient. As large as the Ngorongoro Crater is, you are never out of sight of other safari vehicles and the single dozing leopard that we saw was simultaneously being sniped at by a barrage of at least fifty other telephotos.
Yet beyond the walls of the crater lay those endless sunburnt savannas of the Serengeti. This was listed in the brochure as an optional excursion and as such was subject to a supplementary fee. The buying power of a large group however meant that the £80 supplement brought 2 days in the Serengeti within the range of most budgets; the near solitude of the savanna (with only three to a Land Rover) is often prohibitively expensive for most fully-independent, solo travellers.
Our guide Humphrey shuttled us between amassing herds of thousands of wildebeest, circled by skulking hyenas and yelping jackals, and the shady kopjes where lion and cheetah waited for the migration. In these 9,000sq miles it was possible to get a real idea of the scale of Africa. At night I lay under my mosquito net beneath the immense canopy of Serengeti stars that were undimmed by anything but the faintly glowing embers from the campfire and listened to the nearby territorial cough of a lion and the wicked cackle of hyena, wishing him luck in the kill.
The amount of time that we had to spend in each location was often frustratingly limited and this complaint was most loudly voiced when we returned to Snake Park after our game-spotting days in the Serengeti. Even in the taste that we had it was conceivable that you could spend an entire lifetime roaming that magnificent wilderness and still complain that you didn’t know it well enough!
The Snows of Kilimanjaro:
Our planned four-day sojourn in Zanzibar had been cancelled because violence in the wake of recent elections had convinced the Foreign Office to advise against ‘all non-essential travel’ to the Spice Island. Fortunately democracy stilled ruled back in Ma’s bar and, although we had an option to sign off the truck temporarily and set out alone, we voted unanimously instead on an impromptu visit to Kilimanjaro. This would be new territory for Oasis but Paul’s and Lisa’s understandings of how to get things rolling in Africa (coupled again with the buying power of 22 people) meant that, within hours of our arrival in the foothills, guides had been appointed to lead us up to Maundi Crater, at about 2,700m. It was true that we were only getting the merest taste of what it would entail to actually climb the highest mountain in Africa but, as we snaked our way up though the dripping forest, it seemed inconceivable that only 36 hours earlier we had still been in the Serengeti!
For anyone who claims that there is nothing intrepid in an overland truck tour consider the prospect, from the driver’s point of view, of taking 22 paying passengers over an unknown route (shown on the map partially as a dirt-track) from ‘the snows of Kilimanjaro’ to the soup-warm Indian Ocean and down through Dar es Salaam - for 400 African miles . . . or 2 days.
There seems to be divided opinions among the connoisseurs of overland trucks as to which of the many designs is the best. There are those who favour open-topped (others say it’s too noisy/cold/dusty), others favour a sealed, air-conditioned cocoon (too restrictive/bad for photos). The consensus seems to be that traditional ‘in-line’ coach seats where you sit two-by-two at the windows are preferable so I was dubious when I first saw the two rows of inward-facing seats that Oasis rig their trucks out with.
The brochure explained that this was to give more leg room and storage space for souvenirs . . . and by the time fireman Matt and  his fiancée Charlotte had trawled every market in Malawi for carvings we were grateful for this. But the biggest redeeming feature of this arrangement was that during long journeys the inside of the truck (fitted with ‘library’ and stereo) took on the familiar, homely atmosphere of a sitting room in some mobile Earl’s Court doss-house.
The cool-boxes/eskies/ice-boxes that were regularly refilled with cans of Castle became card-tables and foot-rests; Shannon contorted herself into athletic-looking sleeping positions in the spaces between them; Helene passed around photos of her absent boyfriend and the Argentine contingent passed around the ubiquitous flask of maté tea; Tank inserted potato puffs into his orifices . . . and Bundi and I accompanied the whole shebang to a soundtrack of ‘Rhinestone Cowboy.’
Either you’re the sort of person who loves being on the road and covering long distances or you hate it and in the back of the truck opinions were occasionally divided . . . not least with reference to ‘Rhinestone Cowboy.’
Jumping ship on Lake Malawi:
When you sign up for an overland trip you don’t necessarily need to sign away your independence. Although you may be loathed to squander your hard-earned cash by deserting the truck altogether, there are ample opportunities to jump ship for a couple of days or so and to catch up again later. Arriving late at night at Giza’s Campsite at the top end of Lake Malawi I decided to do just that.
The group would be spending five days here and at the lovely Kande Beach and, although I could appreciate the lure of all that swimming, sunbathing, volleyball, canoeing, windsurfing and diving, I had an ambition to travel by local boat down the 363 miles of this legendary inland sea. Most of the campsite was still sleeping off a party that had lasted until the sun rose over the silvery lake as I made my bleary-eyed way towards the little port of Chilumba to test myself anew against the rigours of African solo travel! |
"He who dies with the most experiences wins"
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