London to Capetown October-ish 2015
 

I'm currently planning a trip from London to Cape Town, keen to start in October but could postpone for a short period if the right person/people are keen to join.

At the moment I'm leaning towards going the eastern route through Egypt, Sudan, Ethiopia, Kenya and beyond. I potentially have a friend who lives in Kenya joining for the last half half and someone else in Addis Ababa is also interested. I speak a bit of basic Swahili and hoping to be better by the start of the trip.

I'd love to take a route down the Western side but I'm apprehensive about doing that route solo.

I'm thinking of doing the trip on a DRZ-400. I'm 26 and fairly easy going. I've learnt basic repair skills on a 3 month course and hoping to have another three months of learning under my belt by the time I leave.

If you're interested (for part or all of the route) or know anyone who might be please let me know!

Jimmy


EDIT:***********************UPDATE**************** **********************

Now settled on doing the Western route, a couple of people are keen to join but we could do with a with a few more interested riders!

Hi Jimmy, I did the Western Route, London to Cape Town solo last year, it was great fun and believe me you wont rely be alone as you will always meet other travellers.
I am going to do the Eastern Route back up to Europe in 2016.
Have you found a way into Egypt from Europe yet, if so please send the info as it seems to be very hard to do.
Cheers
JC

Thanks JC, how long did it take you? Did you have any problems with any of the borders?

Egypt looked pretty tricky, from what I could see most of the ferries from Venice, Cyprus and Crete have all closed down to passengers. Apparently some of the RORO cargo boats will take passengers if you talk to the right people, I've heard that its easier to get a boat into Israel than Egypt. Apparently Israeli customs are happy not to stamp your passport which means you can still get into the various countries that would normally ban you.

Hey Jimmy, I'm starting late September or early October in the other direction -- riding from South Africa to Egypt, then east to the Pamirs, Himalayas and India.

Flying my DR650 from Toronto to Johannesburg on South African Airways (maybe Cape Town, but Jo'burg is less shipping expense).

I have a post here http://www.horizonsunlimited.com/hub...starting-80476

bier

Wow that looks like quite the trip! The more I look into it the more I'm thinking of doing the west coast. I'll probably come to a decision in the next few weeks.

London to Capetown
 

Hello Jimmy,this is a trip ive wanted to do for along time ,my partner has been none to happy about me doing it by myself but with someone else maybe.My partners father lives in South Africa in Pretoria so that was someone to head for .Time scale October could be agood time for me as well anyway would be good to talk regards Richard

Fantastic Richard, I'll send you a private message with my contact details in a minute!

Hello Jimmy,

I too, have wanted for years to ride this ride.

A few basic questions come to mind:

Have you gotten quotes on a carnet for riding through Egypt versus not going through Egypt? I would be curious to what prices you have found, and what value you placed on your bike. I live in the US and the only North American agency, the CAA, no longer sells carnets. The little research I did do on carnets showed Egypt costing far more than most other countries.

My other question is how much time do you intend to devote to this ride?
Sounds like you will be on a small bike, which means slower travels. I would be on a KLR which doesn't exactly inspire high speed riding either, though it can be done if needed.

Would you be camping? Or small cheap hotels?

Thanks and good luck.

Crawford

Hi,

I'm interested. I'm currently in Kyrgyzstan, coming from Japan, heading to Europe and maybe Africa. Will be in Turkey for the month of Sept. I'm currently riding a Yamaha wr250r but am thinking of buying ktm 690 enduro r when i reach germany, which will solve a number of problems e.g. carnet, bigger bike for europe/africa, and back to australia. Yeah, i'm australian....

so, i probably couldnt start until nov2015 or maybe a little later.

what do you guys think? I'm pretty keen to go down west coast and up east coast and didnt want to tackle this alone.

Hi Regie,

Have you ridden a WR250R all across Asia? Kudos to you if you have.

I rented a KTM 690Enduro for a week last September and rode Colorado jeep trails all week. Its a great bike, with a very small gas tank. Would you buy a larger aftermarket tank?

As much as I would love to ride to the pyramids in Egypt, their extreme high cost of a carnet and potential difficulties of getting out of Egypt have me wondering if the west coast might be best. But I would definitely hope to get over to a couple of the big animal parks over on the east side if I do make it to Africa.

My schedule is flexible, as is the route. I stay in cheap hotels as opposed to camping. I`m not keen on loading up the back of my bike 5 feet high with all that extra gear.

I am not ready to commit to anything yet, but am serious about exploring the possibilities, but like you, don't want to tackle that continent alone.

Crawford

Hi Crawford,

Yep, bought the bike in Japan, spent couple months in Japan riding, ferry to Vladivostok, rode to Baikal in a month, south to Mongolia for 2 months, back into Russia, altai region for a month, Kazaskhstan one month, then Kyrgyzstan for the winter. Heading to Tajikistan and Pamir highway 23 May, then Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Turkey.

Awesome bike, did everything I needed it to do, got to many more places where bigger bikes couldn't and still going strong. Would not hesitate to take it to Africa except for the carnet issue - getting a carnet for this bike would tie up a heap of money, whereas, if I have a local bike I may not have to pay the huge deposit. Still not sure about this though, requires further research.

I do like the sound of the KTM - not much heavier than the WR! and 690! woohoo. Also, they seem to get good fuel economy and i think they have good service intervals as well. Not so sure about the valve adjustment etc though, i think every 10000km (wr trumps here - 1st service required 40000km).

Bigger tank? i didnt do it on the wr so cant imagine i would do it for the ktm. Maybe to make the bike lighter if anything? do you know what their tank is made from? I tried the 14lt safari tank on the wr i had in oz and i thought it just made the bike too big! didnt like it, so chose to use collapsable fuel bladders when needed. Might do the same if i buy the ktm.

I havnt done alot of research on africa yet, but i do know egypt poses some logistical problems. Does anybody know of possibilities to ride across nth Libya or Algeria to Tunisia - from there you can get ferry to italy etc?

My accommodation is always a mix. Cheap hotels, homestays, airbnb, couchsurfing, camping etc. I have good lightweight gear and am usually self sufficient, so can camp anywhere e.g. in japan, in the middle of town in the park!

Cheers,
Regie (Karl)

Hi Karl and Crawford,

Crawford:
The Carnet for Egypt is much more than the rest of Africa. I talked to the RAC in the UK and working on the assumption my bike cost £2,000 before I modify it the Carnet works out at roughly £1,600 (£2,000 with all the admin costs) but I get half of it back eventually. I think I'm going to put Egypt on anyway as if I do get to Cape Town I would quite like the option of going up the east coast afterwards.

I'm not going to have any particular time frame, leaving my job so happy to for it to take as long as it takes. Saying that I don't want to take forever as I wouldn't mind tackling something else afterwards.

I'm probably going to be pack a tent but fairly relaxed about where I stay, do you have any idea of hotel costs in that part of the world?


Reggie:

That sounds like an epic trip, would love to join you for both sides of Africa if it works out. Fairly relaxed about timings and November would be fine to set off.

From what I've heard Morocco, Northern Algeria, Northern Tunisia and most of Egypt are safe. The rest of North Africa is pretty bad right now. Libya is certainly off the cards for me as is most of Mali, Niger and Chad.

I'm mainly going on the fco website (https://www.gov.uk/foreign-travel-advice/algeria) and from forum posts.

Come to angola:scooter:

Hi Jimmy,

Same same, my feeling is...if i'm gonna be there i wanna see it, so egypt is in, and yeah, i like to take my time and enjoy the experience to the fullest.

just about to head through remote kyrgyzstan and onto pamir highway. wont have internet alot, but i will try to keep up to date here when possible.

i guess we should work on a route and other logistics. Read somewhere about wet season in congo, but not even sure when this is, and whether it poses any problems (apart from getting wet).

i currently have a friend living in ivory coast, although she might leave in june. Have to wait and see. I also have a friend in oz who has a house in kenya, near uganda border. She has offered it to me and also said her friends can show us the urban slums in nairobi!!! and it looks like we just got an invite to angola - thanks hugoviegas!

....so, dont know much about africa, but always wanted to go to morocco, mali, ethiopia, ghana, eritrea, egypt, zanzibar...cos they sound exotic or i've seen a photo or somethin.

possible timeframe - leave november, want to be back in europe for a wedding (not mine) around july/august 2016. Not even sure how long people generally do this trip down west and up east.

after africa i will probably want to tour europe then head back to oz via south asia or somethin (maybe back thru kyrgyzstan, china, then either pakistan, nepal or laos - used to live in cambodia so done plenty of riding around there all ready).

anyway...good to hear you are keen and maybe we can spark some interest in 1 or 2 more...

cheers,
karl

Howzit chaps this is a bit like internet dating!
 

Wifey's given me the go ahead she's more concerned about 'online dating' than the safari.

My timescale is loosely departing the UK mid/end of December 2015.

I don't really want to do the Egypt bit and have a massive longing for open deserts.
I don't feel that you get the desert experience in Egypt like you do on the West coast side, and end up on sealed roads being hassled from start to finish by bureaucracy having said that politically its now slightly challenged on the west.

I would head down to Tangiers. via the Millau Bridge (I just want to!)

Not sure, will research and have a first and second launch plan to decide at the last minute. Will then change as I listen to the latest outbreak of whatever!

I do want to tick off Timbuktu (I just do!) and would have loved to do the Algerian side.

I have downloaded the colour charts from the FCO for safety warnings on travel in Africa, its amusingly negative, with more red than you would care to imagine.

So my plan is/was- West Coast, skirt around Ebolaville then South into Angola. From there ideal cut across to Mozambique. I would have liked to cross through Sudan into Ethiopia and into Northern Kenya, but that seems unlikely/impossible.

Perhaps an East coast crossing to the West via Angola makes more sense.

Sahara - monumental sand seas
Ethiopian - highlands and the churches, perhaps some trout fishing.
Kenya - Chalbi Desert - Tana - Mombasa
Tanzania - Mozambique not down Malawi West coast.

Riding 660 Yamaha tenere, time budget 3 months. No fixed plan intention to be self sufficient.