My alarm was set for 4:45. I didn't sleep a wink as I was too excited to get to Khartoum and get to my oasis of rest, relaxation and recovery.
At 4:45 it was still pitch black and the stars were still out and glowing like the sequins on a Shirley Bassey dress. I put my tail light on Nigel and headlight on me. All I could see were the two lines of the road either side of me, the darker outlines of trees in the distance and the glowing constellations ahead. It was absolutely magical, I felt like I was in a spaceship taking off. The road fell away into darkness no more than 20 feet ahead of me so for the first hour I was just cycling towards a line of 4 bright white stars.
It got a bit hairy as lorries passed in complete darkness so I would stop and brace myself and just hope the driver was awake and could see me and after around two hours the sun began to rise.
The noises during sunrise crack me up, more specifically the donkey. You get your typical bird tweets and cockerels but when the donkey wakes up, he tells everyone about it! They sound in so much pain and with that you get the dogs barking and the camels...well the camels sound like they're burping. Despite my health and my situation, I did manage a smile at the morning noises.
I had a few plans that could help pass the time. I purposefully change my odometer as I've done a few times but now I had km markers so getting away from the count down couldn't be avoided. I struggle to know what's better, would you rather know that you still had 100km to go and your legs felt like they couldn't go anymore or would you just keep going and get disappointed when it felt like you cycled 10km and it turn out to be 4!!
I used the markers as a reward system. I had two bottles of .75 litres which were full. I decided to take a sip every 2.5km and hopefully by the time I had drunk it all I would be in Khartoum and I would just unleash fury there in the closest hotel I could find. My system was working, I was averaging 12mph which is not at all impressive when you're fully fit, if you consider I was averaging 18 just two days before I got struck by Africa's superbug! However 12 mph was ok and 2.5 km seemed just about the right distance before I got so tired and needed another little sugar boost (incidentally I had tablets of flavoured electrolytes that I put in both drinks) I soon had an issue with the flavour however. These fancy tablets were fruit punch flavour, the sort of flavour that makes you thirsty like pure lemon, grapefruit or cranberry. Why on earth would you every want a "thirst quencher" that makes you thirsty. It completely defeats their whole objective!!! So I found myself still 80km from Khartoum, more dehydrated than a weetabix with two bottles of water that made me thirsty and a stomach bug that somehow managed to give out more than it was given.
This is the stage where I resorted to grit, determination and Robbie Williams. With "Angels" on repeat I got my head down and grunted my way across the desert. Second by second I knew I was getting closer just as long as I didn't stop turning those peddles.
The markers went from 80s to 70s to 60s, I was getting there. Slowly but surely I was getting there. The legs were screaming but the mind wasn't listening. I had got so far there was no way I was giving up now.
On the 48km marker I noticed another cycler who had stopped on the side of the road. Beet and Duncan said I would meet an English guy and a South Korean lady, unless the English guy was from the shire I could guess from a distance it was the lady. Shall is stop? I thought. I've come so far, my average is still 12mph, if I stop that may be it, I may have to wait until the evening before I make it and right now I was on course for a 12 o'clock finish.
I stopped. Jean her name was and she was the kindest Korean I've ever met. She obviously had no clue what I had/was going through but I think when I slammed my heavy head down onto my handlebars as i pulled up to her, she got the inkling that I was a wee bit lethargic and possibly quite parched.
Jean was packing! She had bags full to the brim of everything you could imagine as she's been cycling for over two years. I briefly and exhaustedly told her why I was such a state and she gave me 1.5litres of water. I didn't think, I just downed it. We stood and chatted for around 25 minutes. I told her where to go and what to do through Egypt and she gave me a contact that she stayed with in Khartoum as well as 3 cake bars.
We said our goodbyes and I was amazingly revitalised. Was Jean my Angel from the South? I felt amazing, the pure water had refreshed my drying sugary mouth and If I could hold my guts from exploding I could push on. My legs felt brand new, I couldn't explain how but I wasn't going to wait around to find out why. The next 40km I averaged 20 mph!!!! I was helped a little by the increase in tailwind and a slight slope but I absolutely flew! With my held held high I even mustered a few hellos and waves whereas before Jean I gave them nothing. 20, 10, 5, km's were getting eaten up and for the first time I could see the skyline through the desert dust.
The last km's are always tough because your body thinks its made it before the fat lady has even warmed her throat. I got to the 0km marker and days ago I was dreaming that the 0km marker would be where the lights, fanfare and marching band would be. I gathered ths was not the case when I was 2km away and the skyline was still exactly that, a distant dusty skyline. On top of this I had a police stop where I kindly told them that my body was in a very fragile state and if they could hurry up that would be greatly appreciated. Trying my hardest to not mention the words, "time" and "bomb" I pushed on towards the skyline with now no clue how much further it would be.
I'm looking for the Hilton Hotel. The man that I met in the Goldmine 5 days ago told me to see his friend at the rowing club behind the Hilton. That shouldn't be too hard to find I thought...
Before I knew it I was thrown back into the mayhem and dust of an African market and Khartoum is big, we are not talking one stand out building with a big "H" on it. I found myself weaving through the noisy market asking anybody and everybody where the Hilton was. I felt like a right snob, "oh excuse me, do you know where the Hilton residence is" I felt like saying but I honestly couldn't care. I was happy to be in Khartoum but I still had the ever growing issue of a gut that was about to explode and I knew I couldn't properly rest until I found the Hilton or any nice looking hotel.
After some terrible directions, I found a guy who knew what he was talking about. Unfortunately, what he said, I didn't want to hear. "You have to cycle to the end of this road then go right. When you see the bridge, go over it and there is the Hilton." "That's amazing and how far is that?" "That's about 25km".
Just when you think you've made it, you've given everything, not just today but over the last three days I was told I still had a good hours riding left! As always, I sucked it up. Breathe and believe Harding you're almost there. The mayhem of what was going on around me could've been a bit overwhelming for most people, I was immune to it. Just focused on getting to the hotel and not soiling myself I kept the legs going.
Eventually I got there, it wasn't as far as 25km thankfully but I will have words with the guy that put that 0km marker in because I did an extra 20km in total. My thinking of what must've happened when Khartoum began was they did the road from Khartoum to Wadi Halfa and thought how convenient it was that it was 900km exactly. Then some guy came along and said, "yeah but lads, the Nile is 20k over there, what's the point in building a city here" so they all just moved along a bit and left me ever hopeful as i counted down the markers to yet more desert!
Anyway, it didn't matter, I found the hotel and the most amazing toilet in the whole of Africa. I'm sure there are better but right then, it was a porcelain throne of pride, endurance, self belief and an achievement that probably goes down as one of the biggest in my life.
I now just had the small issues of cheap accommodation, obtaining money from a country whose banks are not connected to anyone other than USA and getting antibiotics to kill my chronic megabug. Just a regular Tuesday for me it seemed. I started with meeting the hotel manager and putting on the charm offensive. I felt on fire, cracking the jokes, impressing with stories, I was just happy to be alive but it was rubbing off in forms of molten confidence.
He showed me around the different rooms and he gave me his best price, 70USD a night!!!! Talk about ball buster! There was no way I could do that, I only had that in total and I still hadn't figured out a way to get money into the country. The manager very kindly gave me an orange juice and let me use the hotels Internet. This is where I had to get thinking and get searching quick. The best I could find in the whole of Khartoum was a guesthouse called Bourgainvilla guesthouse, 35USD a night. After that it jumped to 60. Little fact for you, Khartoum is NOT cheap. Yes it's in Africa where all the other countries are cheap but just because all the others are doing it doesn't mean they have to follow suit.
Amazingly for someone who has never been to Sudan I found myself with a few contacts and a few options to choose from. They were all possibilities but that was precisely the problem, they were just "possibilities" and I still hadn't even addressed the fact that I had no money and there is no physical way I could get it quickly.
Despite the rowing club being just opposite the Hilton, I don't know why I just rang this guesthouse to see if they had a room free. They did, well that's a start i thought, even if I stay just one day I could at least regroup and maybe invite myself around the house where Jean had previously stayed. I memorised the directions and it was about 8km from the Hilton on the other side of the airport.
Back on Nigel and in focused mode I was calm on the outside as I manoeuvred through the traffic but frantically thinking of different ways I could get money. All options were either far fetched, would cost a lot of money or a lot of time. The option of finding a job and earning my Sudanese pounds was creeping up the ladder as actually a viable option. So then my mind shot off again, I could clean for my accommodation and maybe do some coaching. The bike "ride" was soon becoming a 2 part thing with a work placement in Sudan!
I got to the guesthouse and I was immediately impressed. Gated, guarded, clean, tidy and I was greeted with a lovely smile from a lady named Freta. I clocked two white folks in the reception and I even thought about tapping them up for some Sudanese pounds and making a money transfer to them externally. Good news to begin with, the room was knocked down to 25USD, why? I still don't know why. It was spotless, Aircon, free wifi, TV, fridge, everything the Hilton had bar an en-suite but the shared toilet was spotless anyway. I had found an absolute gem of a place but still had a massive life changing cloud over my head.
I told Freta my situation and she understood completely and rung the manager to tell him. Then I got on the phone to the manager and the words I heard almost reduced me to tears. "No problem, my sister lives in England you can transfer to her and I will give you cash"
Now I have had some situations this trip that have led to huge amounts of relief, finding racks, finding keys, getting boxes, surviving a desert to name a few, but nothing was as amazing as how I felt right then. When you consider the situation I could've been in if I couldn't get money then that just makes this little guesthouse stand out as the biggest godsend of the trip so far. I thought Jean was an angel after the way I felt when I left her but I didn't know I was cycling at 20 mph into anther cyclone of unbelievable circumstances.
On top of everything, there is a restaurant on the roof that serves amazing food, I get free breakfast and the guesthouse is opposite the pharmacy. In the space of around 20minutes of being dropped with the 70USD a night Hilton bomb and all the possible problems I still had yet to address. I had wiped away all the problems and was laid on my bed skyping my mum telling her all about it.
This day was UNBELIEVABLE!!! A blog does not do it justice. I woke up a drained zombie in the desert at half 4 in the morning with a multitude of pains and problems taking chunks out of me with every step I took. I went to bed in a castle of comfort and kindness having just eaten the best meal and drunk that long awaited bottle of fanta.
When you consider what could've happened over the last three days you can start to realise how badly things can go wrong in such extreme environments.
When you look at where I ended up and how I got there, all I can say is. "Breathe and Believe" it's amazing what those two things can do.
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