The challenge continues as we ride through Kenya

*** I wrote this blog entry about a week ago now and haven't been able to post it until now!!! - sorry my blogs out of order now!***

As we descend out of the hills of Ethiopia we hit more unpaved empty roads in the northern desert of Kenya. The roads are rough and bumpy covered in LAVA ROCK! Not nice stuff to pedal on!!! And they call it a highway - average speed for our trucks is 18km/hr! Bicycle is faster sometimes. But me and Mitch the Rockhopper are both tough and handle it ok (although we did truck it for 30km the other day due to a sore knee – feeling good today although it’s a rest day today so it doesn’t have to ride!).

2 nights ago we have our first proper rain. I would like to be as proud of my tent as I am with Mitch the Rockhopper however if I didn’t have such a big addiction to camping I think I would be seriously considering in a new home for the rest of the trip. You see, my tent as lovely as it holds up camping in Aus, just doesn’t like the strong winds you get out in the desert. It won’t stand up without pegs (and sometimes it’s hard to get your pegs in tough ground, or equally tough to get it to stand up in super soft sand!!! The other night however it had a true challenge - lots of wind and rain at the same time – I took a photo and will one day hopefully be able to post it here but this whole continent is doomed with dodgy internet access and sometimes its as much as I can do to actually post these blogs. Thankfully it stayed relatively dry inside but I was surprised. Then last night we were camped in a beautiful campsite in Marsabit Wildlife Reserve – which has baboons everywhere!!! Unfortunately I had to choose the baboon toilet tree to pitch my tent under!!!! I thought there was a few heavy drops of rain over night but when I got up this morning I found that there was a heap of baboon faeces waiting for me to clean up… It was seriously gross –there’s another photo that I’ll post here one day!!! I’m usually ok with that kind of stuff but it was everywhere… everyone had a good laugh who walked passed me this morning cleaning it off… now it looks ok but still smells like baboon manure…. Maybe will spray some perfume on it see if it improves!!! Despite this I still plan to EFT this journey (Every F******* night in a Tent). Haven’t had the urge to take a hotel room yet and aren’t sick of camping despite my tent (which is also the smallest on tour) or my thermarest which has a cancer (this is what happens when your sleeping mat lining comes away from the cells and a big bubble of air creates a tumour which in this case is sadly malignant and I can’t blow up my mat anymore – its still comfy enough with my little 1/2cm thick foam mat underneath it though!!!

Today is a rest day and the thing I like most about rest days is taking a shower. Our vision of a nice shower has changed. All you need is 4 walls and running water and that is a nice shower. Hot water is a luxury. A hook on the back of the door to hang your stuff is a bonus. Yesterday we got to camp to find no water so it was a bucket bath instead. I get the chance to update this blog about the same amount of times as I get to take a shower. Kenya is hard to get water so we’re not allowed to even take a water bottle shower on riding days – it’s strictly baby wipes inside the tent.

Nairobi is the halfway mark and lifes meant to get easier after that!