Singida to Dodoma – Saturday August 18th

A strong wind howled throughout the night and the window and mosquito screen rattled incessantly. In my half sleep I imagined that it was raining but thankfully that was not the case.

I watched a nice sunrise over the lake as I got dressed. Over breakfast I toyed with the idea of pushing on past Dodoma as far as Morogoro to try to claw back a day but decided against it because I could never be certain about the roads. Anyway this trip is not a race and it’s good to take time to explore a town while there.

The wind got stronger as I rode out of the town into the open countryside. It was twenty degrees but felt quite cold and this was the first time in ages that I wore riding gloves. That of course is not something very smart to admit to as, in the event of a spill, your hands will cut to shreds on contact with the road. Anyway thankfully no spills and touch wood.

For about an hour I rode through these very weird rock formations. They were scattered everywhere over about a one hundred kilometre stretch. They can’t have been deposited by the ice age but, given that this part of east Africa is a volcanic region (Kilimanjaro is not far away), perhaps they are a result of eruptions. I must Google it.

An interesting sign which reminded me that every person’s home is their own palace.

And everywhere people carried on with the chores of their daily lives.

On my last trip through Africa I came across up to half a dozen wrecks a day. On one occasion I recall two people dead in a lorry that had just crashed.

So now this was starting to become a more frequent sight and served as regular reminders to adhere to the Kaylee option. The standard of driving is appalling and I have scarcely even seen a lorry or car use an indicator.

It only took about four hours to get to Dodoma which is a big crossroads town in the middle of nowhere. As the place where I was staying was on the far side of the town I parked up for a while and wandered about. I always look like an alien in the heavy gear and somehow or another I think that it spooks people. Once again I was likely the only white person around for miles but I was getting used to the unwanted attention by now.

After a while though it gets wearing so I headed on to my digs for the night and had a long shower as they had a luxury that has been rare for a while, hot water. They had a common room where I sat for a good while with a bunch of local guys who were getting very excited over a great game on tv between Chelsea and Arsenal. Stamford Bridge seemed like another planet…..