Ferry (Days 10-11)
By admin. Filed in Egypt, Sudan |
The last two days we have been on the infamous ferry from Aswan, Egypt to Wadi Halfa, Sudan. We had a bit of extra sleep in our camp before heading out across the old and new dams at Aswan in a convoy with a police escort. This was a special allowance made for our group; nobody is generally allowed to ride across the dams. The only restriction for us was that we couldn’t photograph it. After crossing the dams, we arrived at the ferry port on Lake Nasser. Hoards of people were already there, with all their goods to be transported to Sudan. We were let through the gates early to wait in a separate area with the few other foreigners destined for the ferry. There was a German couple driving a very burly Unimog-looking vehicle. Then there was a German/Mexican couple on touring bikes. Both couples were roughly following our route to Kenya.
After about two hours, we said our goodbyes to the Egyptian riders and Emeco (our Egyptian fixers) and were allowed to walk our bikes through the metal detectors (why?) and run our bags through the X-ray machines to wait near the ferry. On the docks sat two lovely cruise ships and a third utilitarian ferry. That was ours. Another half hour or so of logistics and we carried our bikes onto this legendary beast, through the mess hall, and up the stairs to the top deck, where the loading process continued until around 6PM.
As we lounged around the shrinking deck space, more passengers continued to arrive in unexpected numbers, with uncanny amounts of baggage. There were two additional barges that carried larger cargo, including the Unimog, but most passengers brought their wares with them. Some had a dozen or more TV boxes. One guy had more than 20 blenders. A bit of a “mafia” developed as the early arrivals used their boxes to partition off space and then sell it to later arrivals.
The TDA purchased 22 rooms that could house 44 people. They left it to us to decide who got to use them. Surprisingly, most of the riders opted to sleep on the deck, probably mostly for the romantic atmosphere of it, but also because there were rumors of bed bugs and cockroaches. Since there were plenty of rooms, I decided to go for a bed and just visit the deck during waking hours. There were no bed bugs. There were lots of cockroaches. We slept with the light on to keep them at bay.
Everyone got a meal ticket, usable for lunch, breakfast, or dinner. I decided to buy dinner with it but wish I had used it for lunch. I was getting a bit tired of fuul and falafel at this point. Late in the evening, a few of us were playing Uno in the dining room when an announcement came over the PA for all riders to report for a medical check. One by one, the rest of the riders arrived in the dining room in a groggy state. A couple of riders had been boxed in outside and had some difficulty getting through the barricade to get to the dining room. Once we all arrived, we were handed our passports and more forms to fill out, then marched down the crowded hallway in a long queue for someone to ineffectively tap us in the ear area with a thermometer, write a figure on a form, and stamp it before sending us back down the same crowded hallway to return our passport and form to an immigration official in another room.
After this bit of nonsense, I went to bed, only to be woken up at midnight with a 7-Up delivery from the crew. Earlier in the day, fruit had arrived in our room as well. This is an interesting interpretation of “First Class” service. I think the effort could have better been spent on improving the crowded bathroom with its two overflowing squat toilets and overpowering, nostril-burning ammonia presence.
In the morning, most of us got up in time to catch the sunrise. Those of us with rooms emerged with our midnight 7-up bottles. I joined a group on the front deck, climbing around the large pools of water formed by the ballast pump that for some reason emptied on the deck instead of over the side of the ship. As the Sun came up, it shed light on the carnage of the night from the deck-dwellers. There were people sleeping over every dry surface of the ferry except for the prayer areas next to the captain’s deck. People were sleeping in the life rafts, under the life rafts, on the outside of the railings, under barricades of their massive amounts of stuff, and in other precarious positions.
Mid-morning, we passed close by Abu-Simbel, the huge Egyptian monument carved into the mountain that had to be disassembled, moved, and reassembled when the Aswan dam was built and Lake Nasser was created. We also passed the cargo ferry carrying our trucks shortly before we arrived at the port. They were heading for another port.
No surprise, as we were the first ones on the ferry we were also the last ones off. Once all the locals had gotten their stuff piled 20 feet tall onto the trucks that were only 10, and were themselves piled into buses well past their intended capacity ratings, we pulled all our things onto a truck and rode our bikes to the customs office, where our support trucks were waiting for us. After some time, we went into the customs office and waited in line to individually tell the inspector that none of our Camelbacks or bike bottles contained alcohol. Once satisfied, the friendly man applied a sticker and sent us out to a second man who initialed each sticker and pointed us back outside. Eventually, we were allowed to leave in a convoy 5km to our camp on another soccer field.