Since Dar was only about 120 miles from Morogoro, we were in no particular hurry to get on the road. Our plan was to stay at the Jambo Inn Hotel in Dar Es Salaam, and I found it listed in my GPS, so I set it as our destination. After another delicious breakfast at the hotel, we loaded up the bikes and headed for the nearest gas station. When we pulled in, I saw several men crowded around the pump, and one was holding what appeared to be a filter. As we pulled up to the pump, they waved us by, and as the station only had one pump, we continued down the road to another station I had seen on one of our walks. What I apparently didn't notice at this point was the GPS recalculating our route. We made it to the next station and through some sign language got enough petrol to get us to Dar.



We turned back onto the road and followed the GPS directions. Since there are so few roads in Africa, I normally don't depend on the GPS, but instead rely on the map. However, when we arrived in Morogoro, we got ourselves completely turned around while searching for the hotel, and I honestly couldn't remember the way back to the highway. So, GPS it was. After a few miles I started getting a little concerned, because I thought I had remembered from my cursory glance at the written directions earlier that morning, that it should have been under two miles back to the highway.



My suspicions were confirmed when the road turned to hard-packed dirt. I'm pretty sure I would have remembered riding on a dirt road coming into town. We pulled over, and I took a better look at the route and realized that yes, in fact, the GPS recalculated our route due to our side trip to the petrol station. It appeared that the dirt road would last for about 6.8 miles before rejoining the highway. Re and I discussed it quickly and decided that (in light of my hatred of backtracking) we would continue down the dirt road. The road was very rough and rutted and became more so as we rode on. Our average speed fell to under 20 mph as we picked our way through the rocks and ravines.

After about 5 miles, we came upon a crossroads and an odd road feature. It appeared that someone had planted a row of stones across the width of the road. These stones stuck up about 8 inches out of the dirt, but there were a couple of motorcycle size gaps between them. I aimed for one of the gaps that was about 10 inches wide and did not make it. Re however, made it through with no problem. As I passed between the rocks, I felt a sharp impact, and the bike lurched sideways. After clearing the gap my bike slowed drastically. Well now, this can't be good.


(This is what it looked like after I pried it off the footpeg)

Before I even hopped off the bike, I looked down and saw the damage. I'd hit one of the rocks with my rear brake lever, and it bent back so far that it was now caught on the footpeg. This was also causing the rear brake to bind, hence the slowing. We hopped off the bikes and looked underneath to see the deep gouge in the rear brake lever. As we were on a dirt road in the middle of nowhere, we needed to effect a quick repair. Not wanting to remove the rear brake lever at the time (and not really knowing how to remove it) we did the next best thing and got out the hammer. I pounded on the brake lever, trying at least to free it from the footpeg, but was only able to move it about 1 inch. As it was now at least 4 inches farther back than it was supposed to be, it made for a difficult ride. After stowing the tools, we got back on the “road” and made our way to the highway.


(This is what it should look like, as seen on Re's bike)

Back on terra firma, we pulled into the first layby and inspected the bike for any more damage. It seems the lever took all the impact and was just deformed. The good news was that the brake was not binding, the bad news was that I had to ride the next 115 miles with only the very tip of my boot on the footpeg. If I shifted my foot any farther forward, it applied the rear brake. When you're a big man on a little bike, you don't need your riding position to be restricted any more than it already is.

Fortunately, I did not remain focused on my brake problem for too long, as traffic today was even worse than the ride to Morogoro. As we frequently took to the hard shoulder to dodge oncoming traffic and to pass slower vehicles in order to prevent being run over from behind, we decided this was good practice for our upcoming rides in India. The closer we got to Dar, the more insane the other drivers became. At one point in time, I was “passed” by a UN Toyota Land Cruiser that came within two inches of my handlebar as he jammed in beside me. As I was already at the edge of the pavement and there was about a 6 inch drop off to the dirt below, I was a little irate. I'm glad to hear that the US will be withholding some funds from UNESCO. To add to the excitement, there were suicidal baboons everywhere.

We lived in California for about 18 months many years ago, so I'm fairly comfortable with lane splitting. Re however, never got used to it and doesn't enjoy it. Once we reached the outskirts of Dar, lane splitting was the only way to go. Dalladallas are what the local minibus taxis are called here, and they are many and aggressive. Also, many of the intersections are uncontrolled (or at least people treat them that way). If the traffic signals are working, no one seems to care what color they are, they just go. So we ducked and dodged, weaved and wiggled the next 10 miles into town. We found the Jambo Inn Hotel on Libya Street and liked it except for the lack of motorcycle parking. Re spoke with the manager, and he agreed to let us park the bikes behind a locked gate at night. She has discovered that in Tanzania, the best negotiating tactic is to walk away. It's amazing how many times that has resulted in better service or a lower price. We sprung for the air-conditioned room, and as an added bonus, the hotel has wifi from noon until 11:30 pm for 3 bucks a day. As today's ride was especially hot and sweaty, we collapsed into the room, turned on the AC and set the ceiling fan for takeoff speed. After we recovered, we headed downstairs to get some lunch and have a quick walk around the area. Back to the hotel for some more AC and wifi before dinner, and then off to bed for an early night.

120 miles in 4 hours. I'm going to need to fix that brake lever.

On our journey so far we have covered nearly 11,000 miles, 18 US states, and 9 countries. Not too shabby for two little Taiwanese underbones. After 93 days on the road, our average daily cost is 62 USD total (not per person). This does not include air freight, air fares to Africa, and health insurance, but it does include every other expense incurred on the trip.

We spent the morning looking at the map and trying to plan our time in Dar (and maybe beyond). Unable to locate the shipping port on the map, we walked down Morogoro Road to the water. Lo and behold, it was the port! We walked north along the water, past the docks for the ferries to Zanzibar, and around to another local ferry dock. I was extremely disappointed to see one particular boat in the harbor. We stood and watched one of the Hoegh Autoliner RORO ships back away from the jetty. I had found out that this ship comes to Dar once a month, and eventually makes its way to Mumbai, but couldn't find the schedule. We watched as the one option I knew of sailed away. Well, crap.

As we walked back to our hotel, we once again passed the ferries to Zanzibar. This area is full of touts who want to “help” you get a ticket to Zanzibar, or if you're not interested in Zanzibar, they have the safari “just for you.” after repeating no Zanzibar, no safari a few dozen times, one tout asked us, “well then, what do you want?” Figuring it would get him out of our faces, I told him we wanted to ship our motorbikes to India. I almost guffawed when he said, “India? You need to speak to this guy.” He grabbed me by the hand and led me to a tiny office that “unsurprisingly” sold ferry tickets to Zanzibar and to safaris. The tout said something in Swahili to a person in the front office who then led us to the back office and to Mr. Msuya. We were motioned to sit down in his chairs, and he asked us what we wanted. I said we needed to get to India by ship, and he laughed and replied in very good English that there were no passenger ships to India. I explained that we actually wanted to ship our motorbikes to India, fully expecting the same laugh, but instead he said, “we can do that.”

Surprised and suspicious, I asked how they would go about doing that, and he proceeded to explain that he works with cargo consolidators who could “stuff” our bikes in a consolidated container and get them to Mumbai. They would simply need our documents and a deposit, and he could get to work. I asked how much this might cost, and he said he figured maybe 300 USD per bike based on the fact that he had shipped a Land Rover some time in the past, and it was around 1200 USD. Intrigued, I said we would think about it and talk with him tomorrow. He said he would check further into prices and the schedule before we met. Re and I left excited but a little nervous at how irregular this seemed.

As it was nearly 12 noon and we would have wifi, we headed back to the hotel to try and get some quotes on air cargo rates. Since it was Sunday, we didn't expect to get a response from the airlines but hopefully would hear something on Monday morning before we met with Mr. Msuya again. We also found the location of the India High Commission, as we need to apply for visas tomorrow as well. We spent the rest of the day reading about India and a possible trip to Zanzibar.

0 miles. At least we may have a shipping option.

The first order of business today was to procure our visas for India. There is no point in shipping the bikes there if we can't get there as well. The High Commission of India branch in Dar Es Salaam is approximately 3 miles north of our hotel. We did discover one problem when reviewing the visa requirements, namely, our passport photos. Knowing that we would need a bunch of passport photos on this trip, we snapped some photos before we left home and had them printed at the local Ritz Camera. According to the US State Department website, glasses are now okay in passport photos, but according to the High Commission, they are not. Of course in our photos, we are wearing our glasses. But this problem was easily solved when reception pointed us to a local film processor and camera store. For about 3.50 USD we had new pictures taken and each received four prints. If I ever look as bad in real life as I do in the photo, it's time to cremate me.

New photos in our grubby hands, we hopped on the bikes and headed north. The High Commission only accepts visa applications between the hours of 9:00 and 10:30 am, and we arrived at 9:35 am. They apparently only allocate 25 slots per day, and we were fortunate enough to be 22 and 23. After surrendering our helmets and my Swiss Army knife (whoops) to the machine gun-toting guards, we made our way inside the building. It was when we began to fill out the visa application form that we got a little nervous. The application for an Indian visa wants you to provide the names of two referees from the country you are leaving (in this case, Tanzania) and two referees in India. Of the four total required, we had exactly zero. When you submit your application, you are also supposed to show proof of an onward ticket (proof that you will leave the country). Since we are traveling by motorbike and plan to ride out of the country and into Nepal, we also don't have onward tickets. We also discovered when looking at the application fee chart, that since we are American, we are citizens of the only country lucky enough to get to pay an extra fifty percent for our visas. Yay.

Our numbers were finally called, and we headed to the counter. There, the officer questioned our lack of referees, to which we lamely explained, we're riding motorcycles...we don't know nobody. And when asked for proof of an onward ticket, we explained that we don't have them because we will be riding into Nepal. Met with a raised eyebrow, we explained that we could show that we had sufficient funds in our possession for the duration of our trip. At this, she made a cryptic notation on each of our applications and sent us to the next window to pay. Feeling rather unsure at this point, we went to the next window, where the cashier could answer none of our questions and simply took our money. She was able to tell us that the notation was an instruction to collect and extra 9 USD from each of us since we didn't have any referees. I was glad I brought some extra shillings with me in the morning. We left that morning expecting to pay 82 USD, but when all was said and done, we left with our wallets 142 USD lighter. We were instructed to return on Friday between 4:00 and 4:45 to retrieve our passports and hopefully, our visas as well.

We rode back to the guesthouse to pick up some more paperwork and then rode down to the ferry dock to see Mr. Msuya. Mr. Msuya was not in, but he had left instructions with an associate to have them call him when we arrived. I was having a hard time understanding Mr. Msuya over the phone, but the one fact I was able to understand was that the ship would not leave until November 10th, which is 10 days from now. I also understood that the transit time would be 21 days. Bad news, everyone. That means our bikes would not arrive in Mumbai until December 1st. We thanked Mr. Msuya for the information and said we would be in touch with him tomorrow.

By the time we returned to the guesthouse, it was nearly noon, which meant that wifi would soon be available. While Re walked out to get lunch, I got the wifi activated. We checked Re's email and found that she had received a couple of responses from the airlines she contacted. Qatar Airways had a maximum height of 84 cm, which is too low for us. Emirates Air had no problem with the size but gave us a quote of nearly 4 USD per kg. Mind you, we paid 6.52 per kg from Toronto to Cape Town, which is almost three times the distance. Including all the fees this would make shipping on Emirates almost 1500 USD (not including a crate). We spent the rest of the afternoon discussing the new reality of what to do for the next ten days, and more importantly, what to do without the bikes for 21 more days. We decided that we would head to India shortly after our bikes left and spend a couple weeks as backpackers while we wait for them to arrive.

For dinner, we tried a new restaurant called Mamboz Corner BBQ. We had walked by last evening and saw them cooking hundreds of pieces of chicken on giant charcoal grills. It smelled delicious, but we'd already eaten, so tonight we gave them a try. It was delicious! We got the combo plate that included a quarter chicken and three types of beef. We also got an order of the deep-fried fish and shared it all. Everything was delicious, and we vowed to return.


8 miles of crazy lane splitting.

After breakfast we walked back toward the ferry dock to see Mr. Msuya and find out more about shipping our bikes with him. Along the way, we spied the office of a freight forwarder bearing Hellmann logo, which Re recognized from her days in cargo. To compare prices, we stopped in and inquired about shipping our bikes with them. The agent we spoke with said it could take up to 45 days to locate a shipment with which he could consolidate our bikes and could not estimate the cost without more information. I asked what it would cost for our own 20 foot shipping container, and he guestimated it to be around 1500 USD to Mumbai, not including any wharfage, other port fees, or document preparation.

Knowledge in hand, we continued on to see Mr. Msuya. Mr. Msuya had done further checking and had prices for fumigation, “stuffing the bikes,” document preparation, and port fees. I had expected the 600 USD we were quoted to go up (obviously), but when he gave us the grand total of 1300 USD, we were a little shocked. Seeing our faces, he assured us that some of the things, like “stuffing,” were negotiable. So negotiate we did. I pointed out that for that price, we could very nearly ship them by air and gave him the Emirates quote details. Of course, I failed to mention the crating, dangerous goods fees, documentation fees, and delivery to the airport fees. Somehow, they slipped my mind. At this, Mr. Msuya pulled out his phone, made a few calls (of course, in Swahili), and came back with his rock-bottom price of 850 USD and the assurance that it would take less than 21 days to get to Mumbai. He was unable to say how many days less, but less he assured us. Re and I stepped outside to discuss the new deal and decided to commit to this. I will say, Mr. Msuya seems like a very honest and straightforward man, but it was with some trepidation that we left him our Carnets and motorcycle titles in order for the export documents to be prepared. We also left him a deposit of 425 USD, which honestly, was the least of my worries. Re and I walked back to the guesthouse, both feeling a little unsure about what we had just done. But Mr. Msuya provided us with multiple ways to contact him and a receipt.

Later in the afternoon, Re emailed Alan and Maggie (fellow travelers from our time in Malaysia) for advice on India. Alan and Maggie are an amazing couple who have traveled extensively over the last 20-plus years and have spent a considerable amount of time in India. After returning from dinner, we found a return email from Alan, and shortly thereafter got an incoming Skype call from him as well. I spent an hour or so catching up with Alan and Maggie, telling them about our travels, and getting advice on all things India. It was a nice way to end the day. We headed to bed with visions of thalis dancing in our heads.

0 miles. A little nervous about surrendering our Carnets and titles (at least I have a receipt...).

While we have too much time off in Dar Es Salaam waiting to ship our bikes, I thought I would do two special posts about our gear and our impressions of Africa. As the gear requires some less thought, I decided to start with that.


This is not another gratuitous bikini shot, if you look very closely you can see how fast the rear tire is wearing...

SYM Symbas. Life in Africa has not been easy for the Symbas. The roads have been rough, and we've spent most of our time at or near wide-open throttle, but the bikes continue to chug along, asking only for petrol and periodic oil change. Overall, we've been happy with our choice. They have made the trip entertaining, to say the least. The drawbacks have been the occasional hydraulic-ing issue (which we've hopefully figured out), the sprocket carrier bolt problem (which Loctite seems to have fixed), and the limited fuel capacity (which our bigger jerrycans solved). Additionally, a little surface rust has begun to show in some areas on the exhaust and on other areas where the chrome or paint has cracked. Some of the bolts and other fasteners are getting a little furry from corrosion. Re's factory front rack bent under the weight of the 10-liter jerrycan to the point where it contacts the front fender, but surprisingly, none of the welds have cracked. The paint and plastic have done well, with just a few wear marks and scrapes that were mostly our own faults. The white plastic leg shields show some staining and marks from our boots that don't wash off. After replacing the crappy stock chains in the US, daily maintenance has dwindled to checking the oil level and tire pressures. We are still running the stock front tires and they have yet to reach the end of the wear bars with over 11,000 miles on them.

Michelin Gazelle M62 tires. These are the tires we used to replace the stock rears. While handling and grip have been good, the wear has been poor. Whereas we got more than 5,500 miles from the stock rears, the first set of Gazelles only yielded 3,300 miles, and the second set appears to be wearing at the same rapid pace.

Garmin GPSmap 60CSx. The surprise of the trip for me. Initially we did not plan to bring a GPS and only bought it two weeks before we left. I'd never used a GPS before and found the learning curve a little steep. But after using it for a couple of months, I can't live without it. It has made our lives easier many times, finding fuel stations, guesthouses, and campgrounds. Our maps are the freebies from OpenStreetMaps.nl, and they have been pretty good. There were some problems in Zimbabwe, but we muddled through with paper maps. It is also durable, as I have lost count how many times I have dropped it.

Pelican Storm iM2600 top cases. Work as advertised. So far, they are 100% waterproof and dustproof. The two padlocks have given us peace of mind when we are away from the bikes. Re's suffered some scrapes and gouges in her 30mph desert oopsie, but they continue to work perfectly.

Ortlieb 49-liter waterproof duffel bags. Very happy with their performance, also 100% waterproof and dustproof so far. White, however, might not have been the best color choice, as they have discolored a bit where the spare tires rub. Combined with the Pacsafe covers they have given us secure storage.

Rok-straps. 100% bombproof, even when muddy or sandy. Just make sure they're cinched tight.

Darien Lights. Can't say enough good about them. They are waterproof and comfortable for extended wear in a variety of temperatures. Re discovered that they crash well, with no damage from her 30mph faceplant in the sand. They armor is stiff when it's cold, but that hasn't been of much concern in Africa. The amount of air they flow when riding has made the very hot days tolerable, but they do get sweaty when standing in them for 1.5 hours at a border somewhere.

Nolan N90 helmets. Overall, we're happy with the helmets, though they are noisy at higher speeds (which usually isn't a problem for us!). The built-in sunshield is great, and the flip-up chin bar has served us well at petrol stations and police checkpoints. The liner is easy to remove and wash, and it dries quickly too.

Vasque hiking boots. We opted for these boots in lieu of specialized motorcycle boots due to our limited carrying capacity and the amount of time we plan to spend off the bikes. They have worked well as riding boots as they have relatively stiff soles and are Gore-tex. They are also comfortable for walking but can be a little hot for extended hikes.

Gloves. My Aerostich elkskin ropers have held up well but are getting rather dirty. Since the Aerostich gloves do not come in a size small enough for her, Re bought a couple pairs of gloves at a local motorcycle store. One pair of deerskin gloves lasted less than 3,000 miles before the leather wore through. She has had better luck with a pair of Tourmaster summer weight gloves, but even they had a few stitches pop loose (easily repaired with her sewing kit).

Mountain Hardwear Drifter 2 Tent. We chose this tent for the small size and claims of 100% waterproofness. The size has been a positive and a negative. It certainly packs small and is lightweight, but it is also very small inside. Essentially, the tent is wide enough for our bags and pads but no more. We have enough space at our feet for our daypacks and helmets, but that's it. The cramped quarters give us no room to bring anything else in out of the weather and require us to be creative with other “endeavors.” Other than the size issue, the tent has been great- 100% waterproof and good ventilation with or without the rainfly. If we had to do it again, we would upgrade to the 3-person version of the tent, the Drifter 3.

Big Agnes Yampa sleeping bags and Air Core pads. Love the system. The bags are an oversize mummy design, which gives a little more room to roll over. We ordered ours so that they zip together on chilly nights. They pack extremely small and are lightweight to boot. We had an issue with Re's pad very slowly leaking air, but eventually found an outdoor bathtub(?) in which to submerge it, where we located an apparent weak spot in the material. We used the included patch kit to fix it- so far, so good. We tried to get the Big Agnes Air Core pillows before we left, but they were out of stock everywhere, so we ended up with the REI dogbone shaped, inflatable pillow, which is not great. It's too small for either of us, and we've taken to wrapping our polarfleeces around them to give them a bit more size and fluff.

Sea To Summit silk sleeping bag liners. Shortly before we left, we sprung for a pair of these bag liners and are very happy we did. They pack to the size of a can but unfold to a spacious size. On hot nights, we've slept inside of these on top of our sleeping bags, and on cold nights have used them as an extra layer inside the sleeping bags. They are definitely worth the money.

Coleman Exped 442 stove. Has worked well, but doesn't simmer as well as we'd hoped. It seemed to work better in the US, so it may be due to the variable quality of petrol in Africa.

MSR Quick 2 cookset. Disappointed in the quality. Overall, it's worked okay, but the nonstick finish on the one pan is flaking and peeling. The bowls are getting discolored where they rub against the nonstick pot, and the cup lids stopped fitting tightly after only half a dozen uses.

First Need XL water purifier. Extremely easy to use and fast. We can fill our 10-liters of capacity in less than five minutes, and no drops are required. Screws directly to our MSR Dromedary bags and Nalgene bottles. It removes everything from the water, including bad tastes and odors.

MSR 4-liter Dromedary bags. They work great and are easy to strap to the top of the pile. Re's developed a small leak as a result of her oopsie in Namibia, but she was able to turn it inside out and repair it with the patch kit from the Big Agnes pads. Over a month later, there are still no leaks.

All in all, we are happy with most of our choices in gear. We are especially glad that we brought good quality binoculars, a hammer, flashlights, extra passport photos, Cipro, clothesline and clothespins, and a laptop. There are a few things we wish we had brought, including a bigger tent, a DSLR camera, and waterproof gloves. We could have left behind our Big Agnes chair kits and our poop trowel (we fortunately have not needed it (yet!)).

Bad news, everyone. Bike stuffing day has come and gone and our Symbas are still sitting forlornly in the parking lot at the hotel. Around 2:30 pm local time we received a message from a courier that the departure date for the ship has now been moved to the 21st of the month. ****. That is two weeks from now. I was stunned, to say the least, and we are both gutted by the prospect of being bikeless in India until the 13th of December. Fortunately we haven't yet bought tickets to India, so at least we avoided that problem. After staring blankly out the window for several minutes and silently cursing everyone involved, we fired off an e-mail to Emirates Air to find out more details on the quote they had given us. Basically our choice is to hang out in Tanzania until after the 21st, ship our bikes by sea, and hope that the ship actually goes this time or try to ship by air. (I guess we could also head to Kenya and try from there, but we have already wasted a week waiting in Dar). The real problem with changing our plan to shipping by air is that the sea agent has our Carnets, titles, and our 850 USD. Ugh, I hate this shit. We are awaiting a reply from Emirates and will see the sea agent tomorrow. Wish us luck. We just want to be riding, somewhere else than here.

11/2

Having paid our 425 bucks and left our documents with Mr Msuya yesterday, we didn't have much to do today. Tanzania is experiencing problems with their power supply, and sure enough, the power went out at the hotel around 10:00 am and stayed off all day. The hotel fired up their generator around noon, which gave us power for the computer, which allowed us to work on ride reports and blog posts for most of the day. We also read quite a bit of the Lonely Planet India book and took notes on the places that interest us.

Dinner was the highlight of the day, as we visited Mamboz Corner BBQ for dinner again. We looked Mamboz up on the interwebs and discovered that it was listed as the #1 restaurant in all of Dar according to TripAdvisor.



It doesn't look like much, with large, outdoor, charcoal grills set up on the sidewalk every night that are surrounded by plastic tables and chairs, but the food is delicious and the service was excellent as well.

11/3

Since we have become disenchanted with the Jambo Inn, we decided to look for a better hotel. Around the corner from Jambo is the Starlight Hotel, which appears to be a slightly rundown business hotel where we were able to get a room at the same price as Jambo. Advantages to the Starlight were a bigger room, ceiling fan, the large wall of windows overlooking the city from our fourth floor room, and better bike parking. Another big advantage to this hotel is their internet service. We had been paying about 3 USD per day for wifi at Jambo (that only worked from noon to 11:30pm and not while the generator was running), the Starlight has cellular modems that you can borrow and only have to pay for the air time, which was about 4.50 USD for 7 days of unlimited usage.

Also staying at our new hotel was Patrick, a white gentleman from South Africa and his Triumph Tiger 800XC. He invited us to the very much swankier Peacock Hotel next door for s at their top-floor, open air bar. Patrick is an interesting fellow, he was born in Dar Es Salaam and lived there until he was about 4 years old, when the political climate changed and his family left Tanzania for a stint in the Seychelles before settling in South Africa. Patrick is visiting Dar Es Salaam and Zanzibar for an extended period of time as a trial run to see if he likes it enough to make it his permanent home again. After too many s, we all wandered back to Mamboz and another delicious dinner. After we finished dinner, we walked around the corner to a small grocery store and cups of saffron almond ice cream. Today was a fun day.

11/4

The big event of the day was (hopefully) picking up our Indian visas at 4:00 pm. Since we had nothing else on the agenda for today, we posted the ride reports and blog posts we worked on a few days earlier and also posted the rest of our photos to our Smugmug account. Around 3:30 we set off for the embassy, battling traffic and lane splitting the entire way north. We arrived at the India High Commission and joined the queue outside the gate. At 4:00 pm they opened the gate, and we rushed along with the crowd into the visa section. We waited patiently for our turn and were overjoyed when we received our passports and shiny, new Indian visas.

After leaving the High Commission we rode directly to Mr Msuya's office to let him know the good news and make final confirmation of our shipping plans. He was not in his office, but one of his staff called him on his phone, and Mr Msuya said he would stop at our hotel at 8:00 am. Happy that we got our visas and our shipping confirmed, we returned to the hotel and shortly, went out for dinner at the New Zahir Restaurant.



New Zahir is a local “non-tourist” restaurant across from one of the big mosques in Dar, and they have excellent and inexpensive Muslim and Tanzanian food. The interesting tidbit about New Zahir is that it has quite a history as a hangout for revolutionaries. Most notably, Che Guevara and Malcolm X used to frequent the place back in the day.



We weren't there for the politics, however, we were there for the chicken biryani (which may be the best we've ever had).

11/5

One of the reasons we want to get out of Tanzania soon is that the “little rains” start in November, and that's what we woke up to. Mr Msuya was supposed to be at our hotel at 8:00 am, and we needed to get some copies of our passports before he arrived. I went out in search of an open copy shop in the rain. I finally found one and returned to find Mr Msuya waiting. We provided him with the copies and the other information he needed and confirmed that we could pay the remaining 425 USD in Tanzanian shillings (TZS), but at a very disadvantageous rate. You know a country's currency sucks when even the people who live there don't want it.



Later in the morning we hit the ATM for the 755,000 TZS we needed and walked down to Mr Msuya's. While we sat in Mr Msuya's office sweating our asses off, I noticed that he seemed a little eager to get the rest of the money. He once again assured us that we would be stuffing the bikes on Tuesday, and he would let us know what time soon. On the way back to the hotel we stopped at a nice grocery store and picked up muesli, juice, and yogurt for lunch. Our big complaint about Dar Es Salaam so far (other than the daily power outages, high heat and humidity, and insufferable taxi drivers) is the lack of variety in food. Regardless of which restaurant you go to, the menu is virtually the same. It is very difficult to avoid greasy foods and find anything with fresh fruits and vegetables. Re has been hitting the local fruit vendors and we have enjoyed a smorgasbord of bananas, watermelons, papayas, mangoes, pineapples, and raspberries. So for lunch today, we had yogurt with muesli and mango accompanied by glasses of 100% fruit juice.

We spent the rest of the day hiding from the heat in our room with the AC set on comfortably frosty. We worked on firming up our India itinerary. For Africa, we had no real plan and found that a bit frustrating, so for India, we want to at least have a better idea what we want to see before we get there. Dinner? Where else but Mamboz?

11/6

Re and I are both getting a little antsy from the sitting around and waiting for bike stuffing day. We have researched hotels in India and flights to Mumbai as well, but will not commit to anything until our bikes have left the country. Another piece of advice gleaned from other people's travels is to never leave the country before your bikes do.

So today we decided to repack all of our luggage for shipping with the bikes and carrying with us on the flight. We aired our our sleeping bags and Re washed the tent, inside and out, down in the parking lot. She also laundered our silk sleepsacks and polar fleeces that we'd been using as pillowcases. Since we do not plan to do any camping in India, we wanted to get all the camping gear clean, dry, and packed well. We stopped for a lunch of more fruit, muesli, and yogurt and then spent part of the afternoon figuring out exactly where each piece of gear would spend the next few weeks.

Dinner? Do you really have to ask? Once again, it was Mamboz, for too f#!%ing hot chicken. Re and I decided to try the Gajaar Sekela, which we had been warned was extremely spicy chicken. Since we are gluttons for punishment, we also ordered it with masala chips. Re and I both love hot food, but later agreed that this meal may have been too hot. To try to damp the fire in our bellies, we returned to the store for another round of saffron almond ice cream. Later in the evening, we were both laying on the bed, holding our tummies, and swearing we'd never, ever do this again.

11/7

Since our bikes were going to spend three weeks in a shipping container before they'd arrive in India, we decided to do a little maintenance and oiling of the metal parts before we sent them off. After my hydraulic-ing problem in Malawi we changed my oil but not Re's, so I decided to only change hers. I headed up to the BP to pick up some oil and nearly choked when I saw that one liter of 20W-50 was over 9 USD. I was glad we didn't have to change the oil in both bikes. Back at the ranch, we unlocked the bikes and got to work. We have been using one gallon Ziploc bags as oil drain pans, but that makes the oil change a two person job – one to do the work and one to hold the bag. I pulled the drain plug, dipstick, and cleaned the oil screen while Re held the bag. At some point I looked down and noticed that the used oil in the bag didn't look too bad. It was at this point that I looked up and saw that the bike we were working on had a brown seat. Well, poop. Re's bike has a black seat, my bike has a brown seat. Sigh. Back to the BP station for another 9 bucks worth of oil. While we had the tools out, we adjusted the chains on both bikes and the clutches as well. Maintenance done, we squirted a little WD-40 on the bare metal parts like the sprockets to hopefully prevent any additional corrosion and also oiled the locks on the Pelican cases, our Krypto cables, and put a squirt in each of our ignition locks for good measure.

Job done, we rewarded ourselves with a lunch of falafel sandwiches and samosas. We spent the afternoon in the room, waiting for a call from Mr Msuya informing us of the bike stuffing time tomorrow. The call never came. While we were waiting, we finalized(?) our India itinerary. Finally at around 5:30 pm, we called Mr Msuya, but he had no news. He assured us that he would stop by at 8:00 am tomorrow with the good news. We had dinner at a new place called Zaiqa (quite literally a new place as it had just opened on 11/1). Their specialty is Pakistani food, and we had beef Nihari, a type of stew, and it was deeeelicious.

11/8

Will we stuff today? No. We waited downstairs at the hotel for Mr Msuya, but he never arrived. Instead, at around 10:00 am, one of his flunkies arrived with a note. Good news? No, bad news. The date of the ship's departure had been moved to 11/22, fourteen days from now. Stunned, I walked back upstairs to the room and gave Re the bad news.

The rest of the day was a blur. It seemed like a bad dream. What I do recall was Re emailing Emirates Cargo and confirming that they could ship our motorbikes, getting the name of the freight forwarder that we should use, and determining that the forwarder could arrange for crating our bikes. We also found out that they could ship our bikes any day we wanted them to, except Sunday, when the Customs office is closed.

We also visited Mr Msuya at his office and informed him that the departure date change was unacceptable, that we needed our documents returned, and that we needed our money refunded. He looked shocked at this and stammered something about meeting us at our hotel at 4:30 after he spoke with the shipping company. He also tried to convince us that two weeks wasn't that long and that he could get us cheap tickets to Zanzibar while we waited. We said no and that we had already arranged shipping by air. We left his office feeling angry and vaguely nauseous and went back to the hotel to wait for the man who never arrived.