| Dr. Gregory Frazier - Road Report |  |
| Riding in Zanzibar, Africa January, 2000
SPICED AND DICED IN ZANZIBAR I made two mistakes before leaving Jo'burg. The first was not to put on a fresh rear tire. Maybe it was my Quaker upbringing that made me not want to throw away a rear tire that I could see still had half a life left on it. Or maybe it was foolish thinking to speculate that I would find a new tire up the road. Whatever it was, I left with a rear tire that did not have "complete trip" written on it, and complete the trip it did not. The second mistake I made was leaving a perfectly good rear shock absorber in Jo'burg believing that the one on the bike still had enough life in it to make the complete trip. It, like the tire, voodooed itself away mid-trip. My being stranded 1,000 miles from anywhere with a broken rear spring and tire made for a motorcycle half the size of mine made me test my improvisational skills, part of what I have honed over the years, but that is another story. For this thread I would like to share with you some of the road between Zanzibar and Jo'burg in South Africa, a few thousand kilometers behind me. Shortly after leaving Jo'burg I was able to chase down some of Africa' s best motorcycling roads with South African riding friend Shaun Powell, these being near Hazyville in South Africa. After two days of twisties and mountain scenery I waved good bye to road guru Shaun and moved on alone to Swaziland, which let me enter without needing a visa or paying any money. >From Swaziland I crossed over to Mozambique, where I did have to purchase a visa and which took nearly one-half day to secure, which was about two days faster than if I had gotten it in Jo'burg. Mozambique was expensive, the roads were bad and people spoke Portuguese, which I remembered a little of from my time in Brazil, at least enough to say "toilet "and "thank you." On the road there were numerous police checkpoints and once I was asked to open my entire luggage. Another time, when I stopped to take a photograph of a bridge, a man stepped out of the bush with an AK 47, not carried over his shoulder, but carried at ready as he walked towards me. One of the things America has taught me (Waco, Ruby Ridge, New York City police Department, etc) is that authorities like to play with their guns, so rather than wait for him to get close enough for a sure shot, I quickly started the motorcycle and rode off, waving as I rode away. I half expected to feel something hit me from the rear, but nothing did. I had been warned that in this area of Mozambique bandits were busy, but this guy looked more like military than a bandit. But then again he could have stolen the uniform. In Mozambique I also spent time with a mine clean-up crew. They told me they were quite busy, as there are still a lot of land mines in Mozambique left over from their civil strife several years ago (financed in part by some Americans). They also told me of the numerous times their crew had lost members to mines. Risky business, cleaning up land mines. One night I had to camp in a motel's playground for children. I had ridden about 800 kilometers and could find no camping or hotels as dark approached. Figuring anything was better than riding in the dark (in Africa, like Mexico, a sure way to end life early) I opted to try a motel, but was confronted with a $50.00 US room charge. Being on a tighter budget than $50.00 US for a room, I declined, and asked if they knew of another place I could go. They offered their children's playground for $12.00 US, which was within their "compound" and watched by their private security guard. They also offered the use of a shower in the toilet for the restaurant, so I took it. I figured that once I got the tent put up and a couple of cold beers downed everything about my long, hot sweaty day would be better. However, this was not to be, as Muslims owned the place and they served no alcohol. I took it as a sign, and I started on a thirty-day alcohol fast. I am not sure I would have done the same for soap and water if they had no shower and the sign was not that strong Into Malawi from Mozambique was another border exercise with paperwork, but still no Carnet de Passage was required. Malawi I found to be much cheaper than Mozambique and most of the roads better, except for two. Those two pounded the snot out of the motorcycle, and me so much so the shock absorber died, at nearly the same time as the rear tire gave up. Being stuck in Africa with a blown shock and bald tire can be an adventure, but that is another story for another time. I have learned my lesson, and now, some days later, have sorted out both problems. I found an Internet cafe in Malawi and got some of your mail. I am sorry that I can not answer all you mail personally, but they charged me $10.00 per hour for connect time so all I could do was read. Further up the road I found an Internet cafe (in Tanzania) where I could send (this) for $1.25 US per hour. Malawi introduced me to a world full of church groups spending billions of dollars on a mishmash of projects, all in the name of religion, but about as disorganized as our USA federal programs for the poor. It also introduced me to a PHD in math from UCLA who was back in his home country teaching math. What a surprise to find in a third world country, a guy who could intelligently converse with me about the beta factor of a stock portfolio. It was in Malawi I also me my first real bad guys. I may have come across others in the last months, but these were the first to try and liberate me of something that was mine while it was still on my person. I had been walking through a busy area of town when I realized two guys had been following me for a block or so. Seeing that I was headed to an area where there were less and less people, I decided to cross the street and reverse direction. The two bad boys did the same, so I knew I was marked. Rather than get caught from the rear, I decided to face them head-on, and turned to walk directly at them. As I got to about three feet from them, one showed me a knife and said, "Gimme yur money and dah boots muthafuka." His buddy, the back-up guy, moved to my side. I hesitated, and the knife guy made a threatening move at me and said, "Quick, muthafuka, or I cut ya!" Those of you who know me personally know what a nice, even- tempered gentleperson I can be most of the time. Those of you who do not know me well should expect a Mr. Nice Guy most of the time, but Mr. Milk Toast I am not, especially when some guy holding a knife not much larger than the one I cut bread with is calling me "muthafucka." Sheep can be muthafuckas, but not the son of a US Marine, and someone who has hammered motorcycles and been hammered by motorcycles for over a million miles. And I would hate to lose my boots; some Combat Touring Boots from Aerostitch guy Andy Goldfine. The boots have been with me for nearly 100,000 miles and a couple of BIG DOG RIDES, which makes them part of my immediate family. My motorcycle helmet, a new Shoei Syncrotec, was in my right hand. I slowly bent down, moving my right hand and the helmet lower and behind my right leg. I said to the knife guy, who was directly in front of me, "Look here, I can't take this boot off because of the glue," and pointed, with my left-hand index finger at the toe of my left boot. Oldest trick in the book, and I felt a bit like Lucy Brown when suckering Charlie Brown into trying to kick the football she is holding on the ground and which she will invariably pull away at the last moment. I think Knife Guy in Malawi is the first cousin to Charlie Brown. As Knife Guy Brown bent to look, I brought my fully cocked right hand with helmet from behind me and gave him a healthy love tap to the left side of his face. Mike Tyson would have liked the hit, underhanded as it was. Had I hit him any harder I think I would have lifted him out of his knock-off Nike running shoes. He straightened up, and kept right on going over backwards. His buddy, the back up guy on my right, was useless. He just looked at his pal laying on the sidewalk, out cold, and when I bent to pick up the knife, he took off running like Jessie Owens. The interesting thing about all this was the people who saw it happen. They actually came over and wanted to shake my hand. It seems these two bad guys had made a nuisance of themselves for quite a while and I was they first one to take them on. They told me not to wait around to explain anything to any authorities, so like smoke I drifted away. I did notice, when I checked the downed guy to see if he was alive, that he might be in need of some dental work in the coming weeks. There may have also been an imprint on the guy's face that said "Shoei Syncrotec", but I did not look that close. Africa has bugs, some of them nice and some not so nice. I killed one in my room $5.00 hotel room last night about the size of my thumb. In the morning it was gone from the floor where I'd smashed it and no maid had been in my room. Whatever carried it off was big. Africa also has something called a Mango Fly that lays eggs in your clothes as they dry on the line. The eggs hatch when you are wearing your tee shirt or underwear from the heat and sweat, and what hatches burrows into your skin. Popping a zit like boil some days later produces a bunch of squirming maggots. And then there is the malaria from some super strains of mosquitoes that resist Deet, mosquito coils and whatever sprays you want to try to fool them with. A good bout of malaria can knock you down for a couple of weeks harder than any love gone sour. Malawi has them all. I managed another border and got into Tanzania but the cost was $50.00 for my 90-day visa (which I purchased at the border) and about 50 cents for some forms I filled out for the motorcycle. Insurance was required and set me back another $10.00 US but I got a nice sticker to go on my motorcycle. Tanzania i8s home to "Kili," the nickname for Mount Kilimanjaro, which was something I wanted to see (snow) so I rode to Moshi. The tour guides milling around the entrance to the Kilimanjaro National Park tried to sell me on a climb to the top, a five day deal called the "Coca Cola Trail", which is slow and gentle. The permit to climb is $350.00 US, the guide $250.00 US, then tips for the cook, porter to carry your gear and a tip for the guide bring everything to about $750.00 US. I passed on their deal. I told them, "I'm a biker, not a hiker." $750.00 is about three weeks of food, gas, sleeping and border crossings for me verses five days of climbing up and down a mountain. The Tanzanian government shot themselves in the foot this year when they decided to raise the permit fee from $310.00 US to $750.00 US for the 6000 reservations they had for climbs of a "Millennium" nature in and around New Years. 5,000 climbers cancelled and a couple of bureaucrats lost their jobs. I spent three days in and around Kili trying to catch a glimpse of the elusive mountain which usually hides behind clouds. I had no luck. The only "Kili" I saw was printed on the label of a bottle of water I bought, but not seeing it gives me a good reason to return in the future. Kenya saw me, but only briefly. I picked the smallest, most obscure border crossing I could find (Taveta) and got in for a few hours but went right back out so as not to lose my visa for Tanzania (which I paid $50.00 for) and my vehicle entry permit for the motorcycle. I will have to be in Tanzania for another week so did not want my visa cancelled and was not sure I could get the motorcycle back in if I came in from Kenya through a major border crossing. I crossed over to Kenya to find something called the Cave of Skulls but could find no one who wanted to take me there (it was Sunday). Now to Zanzibar and how I found the spice houses, the flying carpet (actually the Flying Horse, the boat that took me to Zanzibar, and how the chances of me meeting the Sultan (who lives in exile in Portsmouth, England) are about as good a rolling a thirteen with a pair of dice. However, I think I will leave the story of Zanzibar to my upcoming book as this treatment is far too long already. I will close this email transmission by saying the heat, humidity, sickness, breakdowns, sand, mud, bugs, river crossings, snakes, crocs, bad guys, dodgy border crossings, guns, crazed drivers, pot holes, land mines, sand storms, wild animals (two legged and four), solitude, and many nights sleeping on the ground have all been worth the ride to Zanzibar. I have covered nearly 30,000 kilometers since arriving in Africa, gone through three rear tires and nearly two front tires, eaten a chicken farms worth of scrawny birds, a hundred orders of greasy chips (French fries), and sucked down a couple of fifty-gallon drums of Fanta, Coca-Cola and beer. My tee shirts should be burned (along with my socks and underwear), I have holes in the soles of my boots and my riding pants look like something used to mop floors. My adventure through Africa will now wind down. I still have a challenging 8-10 day ride back to South Africa through Zambia and Zimbabwe with plenty of room for unplanned events but having reached Zanzibar makes that leg of my trip feel anti-climatic. As I sat on the upstairs veranda of The Africa House (a famous watering hole here in Zanzibar) this evening and watched the sun fall into the Indian Ocean between here and Tanzania I was struck with the thought of how I would have liked to share the experience with you. I hope this has given you just a slight taste of what has been mine and maybe you too will want some day to ride into Zanzibar. Gregory, on the road
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