FEBRUARY 27th 2025

A MZUNGU COFFEE FARMER, AND THE MOSQUITO, SWATTED AT LAST..?

It’s been a costly but rather exciting time, these past two weeks. I’ve become a land owner in Uganda again (by proxy of course, since it’s really Alex that benefits), half killed my ageing body in equatorial heat on a near-vertical slope at 7000 feet, stayed five days doing NO work at Rock Gardens in Sipi (unheard of), spent a shedload of money, and probably said goodbye to my trusty, flighty friend, the Mosquito.

It all means thinking anew about my African safaris…

****

Slightly overlapping with the last episode, I’ll start with the exhilaration I felt at purchasing what must be about two and a half acres of Uganda for Alex. (Well, actually, to be honest, probably for Keilah!). We hike one day, dropping down into the hot plains below Sipi, a dramatic walk, slithering down the steep escarpment, the heat increasing with every metre. The red cliffs soar over us, trees fringing the top edge with a feathery silhouette against a huge blue sky. It’s beautiful on these slopes, many shades of green, colourful bushes decked with blue and yellow flowers.

As we walk, Alex’s phone beeps constantly, an irritating jingle that indicates messages. Many of the interruptions are bookings for Rock Gardens, such a success story. Today, though, it’s busy with a series of voice calls that take his attention. Something’s afoot.

****

A young man overloads a decrepit boda – almost nothing of the motorbike seems to work, except the engine – just. The clutch pivots on a bent three inch nail. The rider is securing – riskily – a VAST load of weighty matoke banana bunches on the 100cc machine – of which probably few more than 50ccs are operable. The curving green fruit-laden branches scrape on the dust but he ties another hundredweight bunch on top. He’s going to ride these grossly overburdened bits of motorbike about fifteen miles, sitting on the tank, to a village I know, where Alex and I have walked. I wonder that these red tracks even join up, let alone that what’s left of this wheezy machine can wend around these bumpy mountain lanes. How the heck does it get up the hills? Alex give him a bump start. It’s not difficult to turn over the few ccs of engine that are left. The rider wobbles away. I think of the banana that breaks the camel’s back…

Alex’s phone rings again. You’re never alone with a mobile phone, certainly not in Africa, where phone ownership is higher than the EU. Alex’s conversations are in Kalenjin, so I understand nothing, but there’s an urgency to the repetition, and Alex’s mind is elsewhere, only reluctantly pulled back to my questions and observations like a good host and son. I know Alex so well that I recognise his preoccupation and earnest talk. After all, I see so much of myself in him. It’s a deep bond. He really does feel like a son by now, just as Wechiga in Ghana feels like a true brother. But Alex isn’t sharing the calls with me. In time, I know, he’ll tell me what’s up…

****

We get home in the late afternoon. The guest house is full again. It’s such a success! I smile to think that I’ve been partly responsible for lifting this charming family into another sphere of confidence that’s securing their future. Yes, it’s taken the sort of money that many, back home in profligate England, spend on a totally unnecessary, planet-threatening modest 4X4; but isn’t THIS a better use? The future of my ‘grandchildren’ is assuredly more positive, and that effect is exponential. It’s like planting and nurturing a small tree: one day maybe there’ll be a forest.

****

Next morning, I’m at my breakfast when Alex comes to greet me. He’s already been out somewhere, since he got up to prepare our buffet meal at 5.30. I woke briefly to the sound of chopping wood for the cooking fire: a sound that daily prompts my earplugs before dawn.

Later in the day, as the heat wanes from the intense sun – it’s forecast to be 35 and 36 degrees in Sipi all week, and the rains look to be coming late this year – Alex encourages Precious and I to a walk. “There’s somewhere I want you to see…” He fools Precious that it’s not far, although it’s probably a couple of miles of hills. The final hill, “Just one last hill..!” is steep. Precious rebels. She’ll wait for us at the bottom. I tell her she might get attacked by bears – of which there are none within several thousand miles! It’s enough to spur her up the last sharp incline, where a small gaggle of local people await us.

Above the road, atop a ten foot embankment, we are shown the plot for which Alex has spent the past 24 hours negotiating! I’d suspected this. I sort of know what’s coming next…

It seems that this family has been given the land by their grandfather, but there are many brothers (no women of course) who want to share the proceeds of selling it. Most of them are scattered about the area, but not here in Chelel. With his new status, Alex has been identified as a potential buyer. It’s a large plot; I can’t believe quite how big it is, it looks well over two acres. I’m keeping a low profile as I don’t want them to think a mzungu is behind this deal: the price might go up. The land slopes steeply upward to a 50 foot bluff dominated by some slender eucalyptus trees. It’s been hoed. There are some waving matoke trees, quite a few old coffee bushes – and a wonderful view back towards Sipi.

“This will be at least twenty million!” whispers Precious. “TWENTY MILLION!” I wander away with one of the nephews. The soil looks very fertile, even to me. Best of all, there’s a stream burbling down one side. But 20,000,000 Uganda shillings..? I clamber to the top, pretending to be disinterested in the discussions below. The view expands, but we’re not here about views, this looks to my untrained eye like valuable land.

I slither back down the turned clods of earth to Alex, Precious and the assembled sellers. Alex confides that he’s bargained down to fourteen million shillings. But I know it means a quick agreement. It’s £3200 and I can’t get that much immediately! I do agree, though, that it’s a great purchase! We all shake hands and Alex, Precious and I walk home in the setting sun. It’s so beautiful along this escarpment at this hour. We are a bit excited, even me, who’s about to shell out a large chunk of my annual state pension!! “This is the BEST coffee growing area around Sipi! Chelel it’s called,” says Alex.

“If this goes ahead, Alex, I expect a lifetime supply of my own branded coffee! And I mean that. You have to find a way to send it to me!” He laughs happily.

****

Tonight, another bloody disco funeral thumps expensively and disrespectfully away at the top of the road, about 400 yards from Rock Gardens. I hope I can cut most of it out with the earplugs. What a ghastly parody of culture all this is. Bass notes pumping. Thankfully, I’ve agreed to return to Kitale tomorrow.

The man who’s died, in his 60s, was the one who spread the mean opinion that Alex was stupid to cut down the matoke and try to build a resort here. It’d never work, he told the neighbourhood. Alex was a fool. “Well, at least he lived long enough to see Rock Garden’s success!” says landowner Alex with a chuckle and a confidence that is heartening.

He won’t be paying his respects at THAT funeral!

****

Next day, I ride back to Kitale. The thumping funeral lasts for several days this time, Alex tells me in a WhatsApp message. Some of the children had to gather from far away and the noise pollution continued until the final burial. He also sends me pictures of a gathering of his clan elders under the shady pine tree at Rock Gardens. One photo shows the chairman of the clan handing a five inch wadge of crumpled Ugandan banknotes to the family head of the Chelel field.

Later, he tells me the story of that picture. “Hey, I was busy! BUSY! It was a long day for me! The five million (£1126) you transferred to me that morning was enough to keep them interested, but there was another man, one of the RICH men of Sipi, who wanted the land! He was offering a million more. So what I did was, I sent motorbikes to collect all the selling family members and all my clan elders to Rock Gardens. I told Precious to make plenty of tea and chapatis!” Alex laughs as he tells me. “Then I raced to the bank in Kapchorwa… I asked the bank manager for a loan of six point five million (£1500) and said I’d pay it back in two weeks. He wasn’t sure. But I convinced him I already had the five million. I sent transport to bring the old grandfather who was giving the land to his family. I phoned Precious to supply beer and more chapatis! Eh, it was close! I got in by inches ahead of the rich man!” Canny Alex, he deserves his growing reputation. I’m so proud of him.

We are now coffee farmers. In one of Uganda’s best Arabica coffee growing areas. And coffee is one of the country’s richest exports. People in the know tell Alex that properly managed, his land could return the investment in two to three years. What’s more, he repaid the bank in nine days, gaining the manager’s confidence and paying just £12 in interest.

****

Meanwhile, I ride away to the Rift Valley for some days. Then I’m back to Sipi to see Debra from Melbourne, and her protege, Rebecca, an AIDS orphan from Jinja, a sweetly innocent young woman with a warm heart. They visited last year and quickly and instinctively became part of our family.

Debra, at 67, is an older traveller who’s seen a lot of the world and 30 years of Africa, in the old pre-tourist-trail days. We share many similar views on travelling and the world – both widely influenced by our travels. She seems comfortable in her skin and is probably enjoying her 60s the way I did: nothing much left to prove, knowing herself well, a good social presence and a great sense of humour and way of looking at life. Alex has invited Rebecca to join his small staff at Rock Gardens to cement the friendship. He’ll be a good mentor and protector for the young woman. She will develop confidence there.

****

A few days after Alex has signed and sealed the deal, we all set out to walk back to Chelel, a happy, rather excited bunch, going to look again at what’s now OUR land. Alex, Precious, Debra, Rebecca and I are joined by Tom, the wood butcher and friend of Alex, and Moses, the best worker he’s ever had at Rock Gardens – who already has plans for terracing and water channels as he and I clamber about the slopes of the plot. We are all exhilarated to be here. Precious has brought a pineapple for the first picnic. Tom climbs up the mountain to a small village with a kiosk, for sodas and biscuits. He comes back and relates that the gossip around is that a mzungu has bought the big plot.

I’m a bit embarrassed. I don’t like this perception of my privileges. But Alex is delighted! “That’s GOOD!” he exclaims to my surprise. “You see, JB, if they think a mzungu owns our land, it will be MUCH more secure. Mzungus don’t mess with wrongdoing: they chase and prosecute! We Africans just shrug and say, ‘that’s Africa’.”

As we drink our pop in the shadow of a big rock (“Very good rock for building!” exclaims Moses happily) we are all a bit high on the ownership of Chelel Coffee Garden, as I’ve begun to call it. We’re already planning a small terrace from which Alex’s customers can enjoy the spectacular view, fresh coffee and our own coffee tour hike from Sipi.

“But remember, Alex, I expect a lifetime supply of ‘Chelel Jonathan Bean Speciality Coffee’!”

“Oh, I’ll find a way, JB!”

****

In the midst of all this excitement, I rode back through Kitale to Kessup and some hiking I’d planned with William. In Kitale, Adelight has employed a ‘house girl’. She’s there to look after Maria when she comes from school while Adelight is busy at her new work site, overseeing the construction of a government primary school, now that she’s licensed for that work. My families are entrepreneurial and prospering. It’s so satisfying that their initiative, given a leg up by my support, leads to success. House girl, Brenda, is quiet as the proverbial church mouse, and terrified of mzungus. I don’t know her story, but I know she was abused in her previous job. She finds a mzungu who helps to clear the table, does his own washing and is polite, something of a mystery. She lives in a corner of the living room, no privacy, no independence. What an odd life, typical of so very many here: grateful to have some form of work, however menial. She’s a hard worker but a completely blank page of personality for me. Ah, Africa: STILL a mystery…

****

In Kessup, William is so proud of his cow, Dutch, a Fresian, and her male calf, British. Dutch is pregnant again, with a guaranteed female Holstein. Even I’m learning about cattle these days! Apparently, with semen imported from Netherlands, William gets a female milk cow or compensation. Holsteins, he says, can give up to 20 litres of milk every day. “Eh, JB, you’ve made me a dairy farmer!” says William proudly, stroking his pampered cows.

Next day, we walk up to the main road and take a boda to Iten, the town on the lip of the great valley. We’re going to hike in Singore Forest again, a favourite of ours. I’m glad I’m not running though, like the Olympic athletes who train here at 8000 feet… The forest is protected government land, edged by shambas and grazing. It’s handsome scenery, dappled by the high sun, blazing from a deeply blue sky. The undergrowth is thick and the tracks red dust and rock. It’s peaceful and restful, filled with huge mature trees; pity so many are eucalyptus, the thirsty weed of Africa, but they’re still giants: some must be 80 or 100 feet high, soaring overhead. It’s magnificent. In one place very tall conifers dance together in the stiff breeze. As they wave high above, they make a wonderful clattering, groaning noise as if they were talking. Magical.

It’s tiring up here. We greet and chat as we walk. William’s an easy companion. I shake a hundred hands and return a multitude of smiles. Away to the east, the great valley plunges below; the giant void that splits the length of Africa.

****

The following day, despite weariness, we launch ourselves into the enormous valley. Crazy? It’s very hot at present, up in the mid- to high-30s.

It’s a hard walk, down a new track. I don’t like the loose rocks. I’m more anxious and wary now. I know that a slip can be disastrous. I don’t think I like old age much!

Still, we make it down yet again. An uncomfortable hike, dropping 2700 feet. This is a remarkable part of the world. I do love this region. The expansive views are astonishing, stretching into the heat-hazed distances and depths; overhead, the blue sky seems almost a physical surface, rather than an intangibility of air and light.

At last, we are at the bottom. We meet people again, a group of older men, watched by youths and children, sitting on a big low rock amongst homesteads. Friendly folk, a woman brings us a giant, ripe pawpaw. It’s a welcome to strangers. A fine gesture. As usual, it’s the people with little to give that prove to be the most generous.

We need the fruit and sugar; I’m exhausted, more than previous years. I suppose it’s inevitable… And it’s as hot as Hades down here. On the boring white road in the valley bottom, we take a boda to a tea house, and then the very basic hotel at Kipkoywo, to a bucket shower in water warm enough to make tea, and meagre food.

My room’s a hothouse; no more than a bed with a sheet, a basin and a burning tin roof. It hardly warrants the name ‘hotel’. Sweat pours as I go to bed at the bottom of the Kerio Valley.

****

A sweaty night and a second HARD day. Never too old, but sometimes I wonder… Maybe this should be my last climb out of the Rift Valley? I’m almost beaten where the unfinished rock road turns into a rocky clamber for 850 feet, straight up the crumbly mountainside. Last year, I laboured, this year I’m REALLY struggling!

But the day IS extremely hot, floodlit by the immensity of the equatorial sun, half a degree north of the Equator. We climb 2663 feet in eight and a half miles, having somehow survived on half a litre of warm water, a mango and some peanuts. At the top, I shock William. “You’ll not believe this, but I’m craving a bottle of pop!” Last time I drank high fructose corn syrup poison is years ago! Thankfully, a kiosk provides a small bottle of ‘energy drink’, a disgusting concoction of chemical sugars. It works.

And I DO prove I can still hike into and out of the 4000 foot Rift Valley, even if it’s becoming more challenging.

****

So what of my poor Mosquito..? Ten days or so ago, I was riding to Uganda, the engine misfiring and hesitating. Twenty kilometres from Kitale, I did a U turn, deciding to send my ailing motorbike by road to the Suzuki dealer in Nairobi. Perhaps I should’ve done this months ago? Before I spent all the money that Kato the mechanic wasted on bodged repairs.

A week later, after a trip to Sipi and back by other means, I flew down to Nairobi, hoping I’d collect the bike and ride it home. Some hope. I came back the 250 miles by bus yesterday!

The owner of the dealership is a Sikh, proud, honest people. He broke the news, telling me in no uncertain words the state of my poor butchered Mosquito.

He’s amazed that it’s still running; that the clutch hasn’t seized, since much of the clutch-plate material was littered in the housing and infiltrating the engine; the crankshaft is loose, missing a C clip that should locate it, causing a leaky seal; the electrics are a knitted, knotted mess; the control unit (that Kato replaced at huge cost – best part of £300? “It’s original!”) is for a boda-boda and unsuitable to run the 200cc engine; the regulator for which I paid £90 is worth about £20; the rings need replacing as the barrel is a mess; the inlet valve has a ridge in it from the use of an incorrect size of front sprocket sometime in the past, and a list of disasters.

To put right just the engine parts, not including the electronic bits, would cost £980! The control unit would be hundreds of pounds more! So, after an hour’s discussion and helpful compromises from these decent people, they will rebuild the machine with some substitute parts, get it running (without a new control unit) and ship it back to Kitale, all for about £150.

Now I must make decisions: sell it as seen, for which I might get between £400 and 600; risk riding it more – but with a dicky control unit, or..? Well those are the choices. I’ll have to rethink my winter journeys.

I could buy a boda-style machine perhaps, but they’re small and uncomfortable and unsuitable for the trails I still enjoy. I could travel by public means – a terrible hassle as a mzungu. Not coming isn’t an option, when the families mean so much, especially Keilah, Jonathan and Alex, and I can’t stand the thought of winter in Devon until there’s no choice!

I could afford a new ‘proper’ bike, but it’s a lot to spend on a few journeys for however long I’ll be able to do it… I’d rather have a trail bike, but don’t want to keep eating my savings. If only we knew how long we had to live, life’d be simpler economically!! Oh dear, I hate these decisions!

Said my German friend, Jörg, when he and Wanda stopped in Sipi overnight last week on their way back to Tanzania, “Wanda and I think you are sponsoring all these people; you should sponsor yourself! To a new motorbike…”

To be continued.

****

To finish on a cheerier note…

I went back to the Uganda border by matatu while my motorbike was in Nairobi. The slow matatu minibus took an hour and a half to travel 44 kilometres – 18mph, slowing to a crawl for every speed hump, of which there are 60 between Kitale and Suam. None of the doors opened from the inside, there was a pungent stink of petrol, the seat had lost its springs, elbows poked, we were four people including the taciturn driver across the narrow front seat, passengers shouted into phones. The reality of African travel. Another reason for some hard thought about future transport.

Alex arranged for Boy to ride to Suam to pick me up; one of the only riders I can contemplate for this journey. Like most untrained African riders, he can’t quite understand engine braking as a concept, so it’s a bit jerky, but he rides quite well and looks after his TVS 150cc bike, that’s surprisingly able to deal with the hills. The bike is small and my knees seize up by the time we reach Sipi – but I might ask for a test ride next time…

Sitting on the back of Boy’s bike winding along the wonderful mountain road between the border and Sipi, I’m thinking what a charmed life I lead. Not bad thoughts to be having. The scenery’s spectacular, even if it’s become rather familiar, the times I have ridden the road. The sun’s blazing down and Boy rides reasonably safely, such that I can gaze over the wide views of northern Uganda. I’m fit as a fiddle despite my age, no worries, surrounded by caring friends and self-created families, seem generally liked, financially stable, doing what I want, have a lifestyle full of incident, interest and friendship.

It’s been a life of riches: no wars to fight (I remember the day military service was abolished – with relief even as an eleven year old!); we had antibiotics, the NHS, free tertiary education, now pensions, bus passes and senior citizen rewards, and possibly we’ll be one of the longest lived generations too. But most of all, of course, we’ve had the unearned wealth from the housing boom (that at the same time will prevent future generations from ever enjoying our comforts).

I DO get tired more quickly. I DO get more irritable when things go wrong. But I’m also finding that the satisfaction of my relationships and families overwhelms my restless escapism and search for new experiences. My urge to see new places has reduced. A bit. My ability to relax has increased. A bit.

I’m in Africa, making stories. What fun!

****

Alex visited the children on Sunday. He Whatsapped happy pictures. “I didn’t want to leave them!”

When they were left at school a couple of weeks ago, Alex had to rush to the supermarket to buy supplementary treats. The school allows them to augment their basic school diet with biscuits, bread, peanuts and treats.

Six year old Jonathan had finished his considerable supply.

“Where’s it all gone? You can’t have eaten it all already!” asked his astonished father.

“Well, Daddy, I have a lot of friends now. I shared it with them!”

Alex went to the supermarket again…

I’m on my way back this weekend. We’ll take the children out for ice creams!

****

FEBRUARY 10th 2025

BLOODY ENGINES… ROCK GARDENS TO MOROTO, NORTHERN UGANDA

As well as discovering a real love of the small children, this journey is notable for the amount of work that’s been required on my ageing motorbike, now 17 years old. It HAS had a hard life since I bought it seven years ago, with 45,000 miles on the clock. It’s done 25,000 more varied miles, on all sorts of terrain from smooth Chinese tarmac to appalling rutted, bumpy, sometimes risky mountain goat tracks.

I’m riding into northern Uganda, going to the desert town of Moroto, remote, and home to the Karamajong people, colourful tribes with a bit of the feeling of ‘old Africa’. Out in the country, I see the lithe young women sporting their swinging, flared, multicoloured pleated skirts – above the knee, and men draped in coloured cloths, wearing the most bizarre headwear: crocheted hats like something Chaplin used to wear for laughs; tall, ringed with bright colours of wool, sort of bowlers crossed with top hats, with small upturned rims, often surmounted by a big feather – an ostrich for the fortunate.

****

As I ride north from Sipi, the engine starts to stutter. I put it down to the blustery wind. I’m really not sure if I’ve another problem with my engine, perhaps as a result of all the bodging repairs done over past weeks? I remember that ‘Karachi’ will be in Moroto. He’ll help if required. Five years ago, by odd coincidence to the very day, he supplied a new front tyre for the Mosquito.

I treat myself to the pleasant Mount Moroto Hotel, £18 for a room opening onto the large garden, and a view of Mount Moroto beyond the french window, chuckling at how my travelling life has changed since my all-time accommodation lows in Coatzacoalcos, Mexico, and Yusekova, Turkey, many years ago. Moroto’s a hot, pleasant town, calm and clean, probably thanks to the army presence.

Next morning, I buy a new front tyre from Karachi and set off to investigate the mountain range that borders northern Kenya. I bounce along uncomfortably, the new tyre is rather harder than the old one. It isn’t long before I begin to ask myself what I’m doing. I’m riding on uncomfortable, dusty tracks in hot sun to go to look for a view that might not even be there! What am I proving? That I can do it? Well, I know I CAN do it, but do I WANT to? What will be my reward? Why am I bothering? That’s the trouble with lone journeys: all the soul searching and personality analysis.

Then my decision is made for me. The engine starts running unevenly again. This time it’s not the wind, it’s as if it has dirty petrol. Could be, I think: I was forced to purchase that Coke bottle of fuel in Sipi. I’ve a reason to turn round. I ride back to Moroto, and ‘Karachi’.

****

I sit in hot sun outside the workshop, watching Francis, a mechanic who gives me confidence, try to identify the problem. He appears methodical, disciplined and efficient – rare qualities. He’s worked for Ali for nine years. Ali, AKA ‘Karachi’, a Pakistani motorcycle dealer here in remote Moroto, came from Pakistan in 2002, opening a business in Kampala. Somehow, he ended up with this up-country offshoot in the deepest north, supplying the large army garrison in town.

Francis strips and services the carburettor. It takes most of the rest of the hot day. In the evening I take it for a fast test ride but it still coughs and stutters. Back I come on day two for further adjustment. Another test ride. After 30 kilometres the machine dies, fortunately just two kilometres from Karachi’s workshop. Francis rides to the rescue. Immediately – and rather impressively – he goes straight to the source of the problem: rough, twisted connections by Kato, the Kapchorwa mechanic, who hasn’t got a roll of insulating tape!

I ride the bike 20 kilometres round town in case it stops again, but it feels like my old Mosquito at last. Now I have to decide which way I’m going, north to hot remote mechanical uncertainty or back south to green mountains and family?

I think the decision is contained in the semantics of the question.

****

To go back a bit… On January 28th, I rode back round the mountain to Uganda. I’d spent a few relaxed, enjoyable days in Kitale with Adelight and the children, and Wanda and Jörg, now old friends from Köln, who keep a camping car in Tanzania and, like me, travel to escape European winters. They are cheerful, curious and kind people who’ve made many friends in Africa.

Ugandan schools would start the school year on the 3rd of February, after a nine week holiday. I wanted to spend the last of the holiday with Keilah and Jonathan. I rode back.

The standard of Ugandan education is dreadful. I’m tempted to say that it’s a policy of the dictatorship to keep their vast population (49% below 14 years) in ignorance: it makes for easier control. In rural districts a minority attend school. Government schools are lamentable, while private schools operate as a business (many of the better ones mysteriously owned by government officials…)

My mission, having accepted the education of my two ‘grandchildren’, was to find a better school for them. They’ve been at a boarding school in Kapchorwa, 10 miles from home: boarding being a choice forced upon us by the lack of safety of the school transport, with 50 or more young children packed in a minibus on the dangerous mountain road. Last year, an exhausted driver from their school caused an accident that killed a family on a boda-boda. The school paid off the police and relatives to avoid bad publicity. At that point, in disgust, Alex and I made the decision that Keilah and Jonathan should board at school. Their attainments suffered, the food was negligibly poor, they often had to share beds with older pupils in search of owners’ profits and Jonathan was sometimes sick and losing weight. Precious had many arguments with the administrators, to no avail.

Alex’s brother, Cedric, whom I like a lot, told us of Tower Primary School in Mbale, 30 miles down the mountains. Cedric, as a computer technician, runs the school’s gadgets and knows the staff. We went to inspect – and were impressed, instantly enrolling the children for the year about to begin. The school’s not cheap, almost certainly owned by someone in government, as is everything of quality in this utterly corrupt regime; it was rated seventeenth in the country in the recent academic year.

The children will live in basic dormitories, each overseen by apparently kindly matrons. They will eat not very interesting food: mainly carbohydrate and oily stew, little meat or vegetable, and very few luxuries, unless supplied by parents. It’s a hard life – but Keilah and Jonathan are wildly excited by the news that they are to go to a big school in the city, which boasts a (rather small) swimming pool! Their delight knows no bounds. In the evening, after I pay £250 for registration and uniforms, they dance about my room, climbing all over me exclaiming at their new clothes and wondering at the coloured pictures on the school’s 2025 calendar, thrilled by the swimming pool!

Next comes shopping for the long list of requirements. Alex takes the cost of that, another £250-plus from his guest house income. I transfer the £500 to cover the term’s fees for the two gleeful children. Half a day is spent sorting and packing new tin trunks with copious amounts of toilet paper, kilos of soaps, no less than FIVE KILOS of sugar each (with, happily, four tubes of toothpaste and a toothbrush!), pens, pencils, bedding, books, paper, buckets and basins. The children dance and exclaim in delight. They LOVE school, and this is an adventure.

Reporting time is 07.00 on Monday the 3rd. It takes a hired car to transport all the mattresses, buckets, bedding, blankets, basins and trunks – and two ecstatic children and their parents. I wisely stay in bed. I’m missed on the journey down, Alex tells me later, “Oh, I wish Uncle Jonathan was driving us!”, says Keilah, but I’m soon forgotten in the excitement of arrival. “There were BIG people there!” exclaims Precious proudly, “The parking was FULL! Big cars! Rich people. A lot of fat children!”

Soon Keilah and Jonathan dismissed their mother – Alex was at the bank paying the fees. “We have to go to class with our friends!” And away they ran, to their new adventure.

I’m delighted that my sponsorship of these two lovely, lively small people will provide a secure future for at least two African children, and ease the burden from Alex, a man of great integrity, who would struggle to see his children do so well. They are bright sparks, Keilah and Jonathan, now with a lot of exposure to so many mzungus. With the correct direction they can go far. I tell Keilah, who told me she wanted to be a nurse, that she, “can be a doctor, a surgeon, anything you want! Don’t ever let anyone tell you otherwise. You are equal to those boys.”

****

The children safely at school, the compound quiet, it’s time to continue my travels. BUT, the Mosquito isn’t working. Now it won’t start. Back it goes to Kato, the mechanic in Kapchorwa. It needs a new rectifier, he says. Kato always appears honest and decent, but he never tells me a price, getting me to look up the European price for parts and telling me that ‘original’ parts are expensive in Uganda. I wonder if he does deal with his suppliers? I’ve no way of knowing, and no one in this cash economy has heard of receipts. But what am I to do? He may not be Africa’s best mechanic, but he’s the best I’ve found (except in remote Moroto, a 200 kilometre ride into the sticks). I am dependent upon him. I have a trusting nature, judging others by my own standards, but when he says he paid £90 for the rectifier, that in the Netherlands costs €86, I begin to wonder. Am I paying the mzungu price? Is it an original item from Japan? I have no way of proving anything and must just trust him, I suppose.

After lunch on the third day he roars into the compound at Rock Gardens. “Your bike is good, very good!” It sounds good, and he sounds confident. “I took it to the Yamaha mechanics in Mbale (the Mosquito is a Suzuki) and they told me the rectifier wasn’t matching the control unit we replaced so it was not charging the battery. Now with the new part – original! – it’s good, very good!” Apparently, the mismatch was frying the cables in the charging circuit. I hope he’s right as it’s cost me another £120… Keeping the Mosquito running this year has already cost me £750.

The tacho tells me Kato’s ridden 230 kilometres. It reads 384 since I last filled the tank. “I’ve never seen it so high on one tank of fuel! There must be just a smell left!” He likes to ride my bike.

“No, it will be very OK!”

We get him a boda-boda to take him back to Kapchorwa. It’s too late for me to ride north now, it’s already 3.00. I’m desperate to leave Rock Gardens. Desperate.

****

On the 2nd, Enoch died 100 yards down the lane past Rock Gardens. I remember Enoch, a cheerful child who looked about seven when I photographed him a few years ago. Alex reckons he might have been fifteen or sixteen when he died a couple of days ago. “They are small, they don’t grow with sickle cell disease. They don’t live past teenage.” So poor Enoch had a short spell and is now gone. I’m sorry of course. But death here means ersatz ‘culture’ intervenes, this godawful travesty of ‘tradition’. The new habit began just a few years ago: amplified pop music throughout nights until burial. A truck weighed down with speakers the size of capacious wardrobes pulls in to the bereaved compound. It’s big business, along with the rented gazebos and Chinese plastic chairs.

Now, after a night of pounding, unimaginative ‘music’ from gigantic loudspeakers 100 yards away, in this ghastly, disrespectful exhibit of local ‘culture’, I am determined to leave. But it’s too late. It’s after 3.00. I’m condemned to another night, tossing and turning with earplugs pushed tight, that can’t shut out the ‘thump, thump, THUMP, thump, thump, THUMP, thump, thump, THUMP, thump, thump, THUMP, thump, thump, THUMP, thump, thump…’ I can shut out the ‘music’ but not the sub-bass vibrations.

This is not culture or tradition, it’s just amplified noise pollution of no relevance whatsoever to a funeral, that’s become a habit. It provides excuses for morally bankrupt locals to get drunk and attracts disruptive youths and idlers. “But if you don’t have this music, no one will come,” protests Alex’s father. But who wants these elements at the memorial of their dead son?

Tradition used to be wailing, and in much of Africa, drumming. Then came amplification, generators and sub-bass speakers that vibrate for kilometres, and music made not by musicians but technicians and toneless singers (shouters) who rely on mechanical repetition for effect. So tradition sinks to exploitative commercialism.

And of course, it all costs a lot of money that poor rural villagers don’t have. Wood butcher Tom is part of the burial committee, being of the same clan. The estimates for burial are around three million Uganda shillings: £600+. No one in this community has that sort of money. Neighbours must chip in. Crooked politicians will come and harangue the mourners and use campaign funds to buy votes. The average manual worker gets about £4.50 a day, and most here don’t work anyway. Think of the school fees that money could pay.

Alex and I had planned a long hike for tomorrow, but he can’t go now. It would be an insult for him to leave for a walk while the burial is going on. And people in this poorly educated, jealous, conservative village take offence on a whim. So I’ll ride north instead.

After another noisy night.

When I DO leave, the petrol runs out 500 yards from Rock Gardens! Fortunately, I can freewheel downhill to Sipi centre and buy a Coke bottle of petrol, probably pinched out of someone’s tank. It’s JUST enough to reach a petrol station in Kapchorwa.

Bloody Kato, I think, as I fill up the entire tank.

****

Leaving at last after the second disturbed night, I go to the ATM in Kapchorwa for cash. Somehow, Kato and Alex have eaten my previous £225, and I’m heading into remote areas. I’ve determined on a ride into Karamoja, the northern tribal regions of Uganda that border South Sudan. There’s a short cut that drops steeply down the mountainsides into the scorching plains far below. It’s bumpy and very dusty, with vistas of central Uganda fading in the misty distance. I’ve been told there’s now a tar road all the way to Moroto when I reach the valley floor. But somewhere after a few miles, I take a wrong turn and end up with 30 miles of disgusting earth and stone, smothered in red dust that infiltrates every nook and cranny of the bike, me and my bags. It’s disgusting, and the scenery is not attractive.

It’s my second attempt at investigating the tribal north. Five years ago, I turned round in the face of relentless mud and rain clouds. I struggled north through craters and ponds of clay mud, blathered and filthy, tired and wondering what the hell I was proving.

And, oddly enough, it’s much the same now… Maybe Moroto is my travelling nemesis! A place I reach, and wonder why. I go through the same soul-searching for 48 hours. Admittedly, a malfunctioning motorbike in these remote regions does focus my thoughts. Perhaps too, the vast and unleavened landscape doesn’t help. It’s scrubby bushland: dry, stunted trees – almost none of which reach maturity as everyone here depends on firewood and charcoal for domestic needs and rural cash sales – and spiky, sketchy growth spread over dull grey brown earth. The scenery is uninspiring. Very uninspiring. Just scrubby dry lands backed by ranges of blue mountains and the bland blue of the huge desert sky.

****

It’s the people I’ve come to see, I suppose: these left-behind vestiges of an old Africa of colonial era encyclopaedias. These days though, I know much of this is just a facade: imposed by poverty, not culture. The colourful clothes are certainly for real, and the people often friendly, but I get edgy about the ethics of passing by and gawping, as Tourism booms in such places. It’s the only way to encourage any economy here, to bring in hard cash: exploit the curious ways of indigenous peoples… Tourism is becoming ugly as it’s now the richest business for so many African countries. The money falls overwhelmingly into the pockets of corrupt politicians and fat businessmen, not filtering down to rural communities who provide the ‘colour’. We come, we look, we take a selfie, we post our ‘exotic adventures’ on Instagram.

But do we really learn much about what we are looking at..?

****

Sometimes I ride through small towns and remote villages, past isolated dwellings, and wonder what it must be like to LIVE here, and in all likelihood, know nothing else but a stick and thatch hut in a vast flat expanse of bush land, with few trees that reach any size before they are culled for firewood and charcoal burning? No shade from the searchlight sun. Most here don’t go to school, and learn nothing of any wider life than this circumscribed poverty and drought, both physical and intellectual. Boys tend the family cows and goats; girls carry heavy containers of water and head-loads of firewood and become pregnant in early teens. Women have average six children, risking death in childbirth many times over, doing all the household and farming chores, and slaving over smoking sticks to make some sort of food for their multitudes of children dressed in rags and their useless men – who do nothing.

The landscape is denuded and dull, parched in the fiery equatorial sun. Knowledge, and perhaps curiosity, is limited to the immediate surrounding, augmented perhaps by tinny basic phones, the only possession for most. If accident or ill health intervene it’s ‘God’s will’ and just your bad luck. You probably die, or become crippled and beg. This is the reality of life in much of rural Africa. No comfort, a terrible diet of carbohydrate and starch, little stimulation – balancing on the knife edge of existence. It’s no romantic ideal of the ‘simple life’, just lifelong hardship little better than that of the desiccated animals ranging this dry scrub and desert. Experiencing all this changes my appreciation of the privileges of the life I lead. Unless devoid of compassion, you can’t ride through this without a certain horror that THIS is how most of the world lives, not with the comforts we take so much for granted.

And with a very deep gratitude that I am one of the lucky ones.

****

It’s more fun, I realise, to indulge in the warmth of my families. They too add a sense of the exotic as I get inside their lives, but with a reality and depth that is rewarding. Anyhow, after most of two days sitting outside the workshop of Ali Karachi, I’m not entirely trusting my Mosquito any more. Do I really want to venture into the remoter north, or will I be more confident riding back towards family, help and some good hiking with my companions for now? Probably.

I think I’ll cut and run again from Moroto. Back to the green mountains. And family.

****

Spotting that my Ugandan bike insurance has run out I find that Moroto has just one agent. I’m now insured by the Catholic church, the richest organisation in the world. What power they have! One of the major Ugandan banks is also Catholic church owned – the Centenary Bank. Some pray, all pay, that’s the reality of Catholicism. Peddling hope and platitudes while the peasants pay, and faith leaders cosy up to the dictators to keep the people subservient… Cynical? You bet I am! I’ve seen a lot of these countries.

Cheerful Juliet, with an itchy hair weave that requires poking with a ballpoint at regular intervals, renews my annual insurance for £11, typing the document, one-fingered, on an old Olympia manual typewriter with a dicky ribbon, a machine I haven’t seen outside a museum display for four decades. Well, the Catholics don’t waste their astronomical wealth.

“Insured by the Pope!” exclaims Alex as Precious laughs at my story later.

****

Then I’m on my way south again. The sun hammers down out here in this vast burned expanse. I can’t escape it. There’s no ‘in-the-shade’ temperature on a motorbike. I leave Moroto behind, beating down the tar road with big views on both sides: scrubby growth dotted with pimples of ancient volcanic plugs, sometime backed by hazy, jagged mountains. But it’s too empty; and if it’s empty here, what the heck is the rural north like? With company I’d probably have gone on, on my own perhaps my discretion is wise: up there, the roads are dirt, and I don’t really trust the engine yet, although it does FEEL more like my old Mosquito after Francis’s care and attention.

People walk the roadside, sometimes a nod of acknowledgement of my wave, but these are reserved people. They have no discernible destination, loose-limbed, tanned black by the relentless UV from the big star overhead. It’s an African mystery. Where are they all going, miles from anywhere? A constant feature of this wonderful, strange continent.

Even on the endless valley floor, most of the time I am higher than Ben Nevis. We forget how high so much of these east African countries is.

Baked to a crust, after about three hours I take the short cut again, steeply and rockily up the side of the mountains to Kapchorwa. In six or seven of the ten miles I battle up two and a half thousand feet. Serious trail riding; great exercise and good for flexibility as I dance on my footpegs over rocks and dirt. The bike enjoys the cooling air; it’s funny, I can FEEL the difference, as if it’s grateful for the coolness of the altitude. I am too. And it’s green again up here.

Back at Rock Gardens, I am warmly greeted by all. Alex now has a small staff. Celestine is a sort of deputy manager; Shiela and Marion do the chores, and Eric works with the guests as guide and messenger. It’s bringing some efficiency, and Precious is better tempered now she has relief. It’s still difficult, running a popular guest house with no electricity, and currently no water. We DO have a better three quarters of a mile of gravel road from the centre of the village, but in grading that, they broke the water pipes! There’s no planning in Uganda. It’s been a week now – of carrying hundreds of jerrycans from the spring. It’s been going on so long that Alex now hires a group of boda-bodas to lug the water up the hill. More loss of profits.

There are always guests now; they’ve started sending one another – the best marketing, I tell Alex. They love the welcome, the atmosphere and the ‘traditional’ rooms – that I’ve invented! There’s just one left to decorate now before I leave in March.

Last week, Rock Gardens got its second award from the multinational giant booking company. “You can call yourself ‘Award Winning’ now,” I say. “Getting a Traveller Review Award two years running is not bad!” Best in Sipi, and probably in the region. He’s quietly proud of achieving his dream, is Alex. So am I. I never expected this success. But Alex has an attribute rare in Africa: he plans ahead. He’s canny too. As we walk locally, he shows me that he is quietly purchasing bits of land, four plots so far. He’s respected by his clan chiefs and does honest but smart deals with them, spreading the costs of the land over time, so they get an income, and he slowly gets the land.

Land is wealth in Africa. “Anything can change here. When this president dies, he intends his son to take over, but there are generals who object. Who knows, there could be civil war again. Businesses will suffer, but people will always need food. Land will always have value, especially with our high birth rate and belief that sons must own land…”

He’s already using the plots to grow potatoes and matoke, and planning far ahead to planting trees. Smart man, thinking ahead. I’m so happy that all my instincts proved so accurate. He’s a fond friend now too. And I a father figure to advise and guide, and an intercontinental scenery designer whose skills have helped his business become a real success story.

Funny how things turn out.

****

AFRICAN FAMILIES

23 JANUARY 2025

On December 28th, I arrived in Sipi, Uganda, home of my ‘Ugandan Family’, Alex, Precious and the two lovely children – my surrogate grandchildren – Keilah, eight and Jonathan Bean, six. I so much enjoyed the children’s company that I stayed over three weeks. And in answer to the common question I am asked at home, “What do you DO in Africa?” I can only respond, pretty much what I do at home: work rather hard and expend a lot of energy on practical projects. My ‘rest days’ involve long hikes up and down very high mountainsides… It’s a perfect ‘holiday’ for me: plenty to do physically, sunshine to do it in, and well fed and sufficiently beered by my hosts. Warm beer, of course…

My practical role is to provide design advice, paint and decorate the houses and redo most of the work done by inept Sipi workmen. Two of the new rooms had water drains connected directly to the soil pipe, without U bends, resulting in foul gases pervading the rooms. This, by an arrogant ‘plumber’ I dislike, who exploits Alex’s total impracticality. I’ve had to replumb most of his work. Twice, I lost my temper big time, berating ‘workers’ who refuse to invest in tools and rely on the bent hammer, a machete and hoe to do carpentry, make furniture and fittings. Tom, the wood butcher, won’t now come to Rock Gardens if I am there!

Our quirky guest house, named after Rock Cottage in Harberton, comes along apace, with its six detached round houses. Actually, one’s rectangular: the Kampala Bungalow, as I rudely call it: Ugandan guests don’t want to stay in the ‘old fashioned’ thatched houses so popular with mzungu guests! The place is unique, with its quaint wooden restaurant up on stilts, its excellent food and its welcoming atmosphere that feels very ‘African’ by design. We are attracting many customers; some days, it’s booked to capacity. Just a day or two ago, we hit a record of 15 guests, having expected a quiet day with just two and me. That night, we had two young Israelis sleeping in a tent, one under the stars and all rooms occupied, even the ‘emergency’ rooms – the rather basic ones in the original family block. It begins to make some money for Alex at last; it must do, because the demands on my wallet have reduced. I still pay much of the capital cost, but running costs and maintenance seem to have devolved onto the Rock Gardens cash box, such as it is in a hand to mouth economy. It’s still the biggest expenditure of my life, with all my pension coming here, and a good deal more to the other African families, but I am financially secure now – something I never planned nor expected, but a benefit of being of the Baby Boomer generation, perhaps the most fortunate in history.

All this gives me the opportunities to indulge my passion of travel. For decades it wasn’t this easy; I had to make choices – sometimes difficult ones. I remained freelance and childless, I sometimes had periods of relative poverty while I had no income, and I always scrimped and saved for my journeys. Obsessively, some would accuse! But in the end, it’s all worked well, and I now have chosen families in several countries and can share some of my privileges. I can also travel pretty much at will, despite the economic turmoil of the world.

****

It’s been great to be in rural Africa, totally avoiding all recent ‘news’. I’m told that the ignorant reality TV failure, now ‘leader of the free world’ (derisory laughter) who called all Africa ‘shithole countries’ did not invite a single African leader to his recent inauguration. Having studiously avoided even opening my Guardian subscription for over a month, I’ve been able to avoid witnessing the degradation and shame now being visited on the people of USA. Poor USA is now the shithole country. How angered he’d be to know how Africans laugh at him with such derision!

****

We hardly ever meet Americans travelling in Africa (except for hunting and expensive safaris: very few backpackers), but if more Westerners travelled in Africa (and thank god they don’t!), there would be a lot more understanding of the modern problem of immigration, and the reason that so many are willing to risk everything, even their lives, to achieve the vain dream that so many Africans (and Latin Americans) harbour: that riches and ease of life await them in the rich countries of the North.

At least every day, I converse on the futility of the African Dream. The Dream is that by getting somehow to Europe, Australia, Canada, USA, all problems will disappear and wealth will flow without limit. To understand it all, just look at what Africans see of life in our countries: not poverty, homelessness, white beggars, unemployment, racial prejudice, meagre living conditions, bad health, child poverty, unfair opportunities, divisive education – well, I could go on. What they DO see, on TV and media, and now overwhelmingly in the exploitative videos they watch endlessly on their phones, is glamour, rampant consumerism, commercial exploitation, wealth, fast cars, palatial houses, fashion, possessions, triviality and untruth: the myth that you are what you own. It is unfiltered, made to exploit, made to create customers. This great lie is taken as truth. It’s on TV. It’s on YouTube. We all live like this in our rich countries.

And of course, the only mzungus they see are tourists. I explain that we tourists are APPARENTLY wealthy when we come here because of the relative value of our money. But how do I make people BELIEVE me? I tell them that my 20 bob cup of tea in Kenya (12p) will cost them the best part of 500 bob in England. That a cheap room to rent in London will cost them at least 130,000 Kenyan shillings (say £800), and that if they are fortunate enough to even GET a job legally, they are likely to be on minimum wage (£10.90 I think). A meal will cost them that much, a bus fare to work a minimum £3. I tot up my monthly electricity bill in Ugandan and Kenya Shillings. They gasp. It’s more than most earn here in a month…

But The Dream lives on. Not a day goes by without someone asking me for help to reach Europe. Marion, a smart, clever young woman working at the Kessup guest house, passed out of school with the highest marks: university place almost guaranteed despite, William informs me, coming from a very humble family. But she’s fixated on The Dream, which will solve all her problems and make her rich. I point out that if she has any hope of raising the airfare, visa costs and the probably exploitative fees for some unknown university in UK, that is most likely nothing more than a sham business, then she has every chance of raising the deposit she needs to secure a government loan in Kenya to study at university, without wasting her resources on the chimera of The Dream, and suffering the prejudice, climate, restrictions and dislocation of family and culture. Stay here and do good things, where you have friends and family and are culturally secure, I tell her. She appears to take it in, but the lure of The Dream and all its glitz and glamour is very persuasive. Life to most young East Africans is on their phone screens now, and all they show is the consumerism and superficial wealth of our countries. All fake. All exploitation.

I’ve seen the other end of The Dream: Africans living in austere conditions in illegally sub-let council flats in London; a trained doctor selling train tickets for British Rail; a smart Ghanaian woman married to an elderly British manual labourer of very little education, living in a dowdy mobile home in dismal Lancashire; the prejudices flamed by the rightwing hate-speech of the Reform Party and their ilk; the inflammatory language of the Daily Mail and rightwing TV; violence of the ignorant; selfishness and mean-spiritedness of so many ‘superior’ white people. For god’s sake, I was just in Texas for the Trump election, so I’ve stared into the depths of the abyss! I’ve seen how mean and selfish man can become, when his own livelihood is threatened. That’s why Trump succeeds in his vicious, lying poison.

But this is the reality behind the desire to get to Britain, despite the appalling risks. Britain raped and pillaged for 150 years, and through some ancient propaganda, many still see those times as secure and stable. “You were our masters,” they say, with a misplaced nostalgic respect for a time when politics were stable – because dissent wasn’t allowed.

This is why so many risk all, even their lives, to reach The Dream… It is impossibly sad. I’m ashamed to be upheld as an example of living The Dream. I know the reality is SO devastatingly different… Poor exploited Africa.

****

Last weekend, Alex and I rode to a HUGE, extravagant wedding in Lira, in the middle of northern Uganda, 170 miles away and a couple of thousand feet below Sipi’s mountain shoulder elevation. On the first night, we stayed in Dokolo, in a calm, cheap £5 hotel of round thatched houses, setting off early next day to catch up with the Kapchorwa clan in Lira.

Thank goodness we decided to ride there. The local clan, from Sipi and Kapchorwa, travelled by a school bus, driving half through two nights, while we enjoyed a couple of nights away from home. The clan members are expected to attend, but it appears that the bride and groom, a mature couple with three teenage children, paid for everything. Alex guesstimated that the whole event may have cost at least £6000 or £7000, a massive sum in Uganda. It was a fine example of high African bling, and an occasion to dress up: women wearing all manner of African fashion, from traditional swathed African print dresses to clingfilm-tight fabrics that left little to imagination. The men, as usual, wore ridiculous, impractical, ill-fitting western suits (not me, of course, for I have only a pair of slightly grubby zip-offs and a relatively clean, crumpled long sleeved shirt!)

The ceremony began in a big born-again church on the edge of sprawling Lira, an unattractive, surprisingly large town on the hot, swampy plains of central Uganda. 500 people packed into the tin-roofed church, including one very conspicuous mzungu, making it impossible for me to get out my phone and read a book during the extended shouty sermons and formalities by half-crazed business pastors. I could understand nothing, with the amplification of chest mikes, and exaggerated accents. I sat – as I have become accustomed in so many African events – with a smile and look of apparent interest fixed on my face, the sinecure of a thousand eyes. I’ve no doubt that the bride and groom, when they sit to watch the HOURS of video, will wonder who the hell the freeloading mzungu was! If they were listening attentively, they’d’ve heard me introduce myself on the microphone, as requested by a ranting pastor, to the entire throng. My years as a mzungu in Africa have accustomed me to such spotlit moments.

The ceremony over, we repaired to the Lira Hotel for a splendid glittering wedding feast, with gazebos decorated in orange and white furbelows, gold-encased Chinese plastic chairs and a white and orange arched bridal walkway to the high table with its acres of fake florality, golden chairs and backdrop of autumnal Canadian woodland. By some odd chance, Alex and I were not directed to the Kapchorwa clan tent, but to the ‘Church’ tent, a source of much private hilarity for a couple of avowed atheists. One of the pleasures of the serendipity of travelling is the play acting often required. And as members of the ‘Church’ contingent, we were then ushered to the front of the pressing line of hundreds of jostling diners, anticpating a free meal. A good meal it was too, cooked by outside caterers and served with aplomb by the hotel staff.

Speeches were long and very tedious. Give an African a microphone and they seldom know when to stop. Everyone must be introduced and their status paraded at length, all pride and name-dropping. The MC decreed two minutes per speaker. Some chance. He gained a round of amused ironic laughter when he wrested the microphone from the bride’s sister after 25 minutes of tedious introductions, suggesting that we had already met every one of her aunts, uncles, sisters, nephews and nieces, and her children could just wave from the crowd to satisfy the final introduction he was allowing her. We all applauded the MC.

We were entertained by a small troupe of male dancers from the northern Karamajong region of Uganda; energetic and lithe, they danced frenetically and often with humour. One supple young fellow was particularly humorous, dancing provocatively feminine roles to great effect with shaking bum tassels. They leaped in fast acrobatics, formed human towers, somersaulted through hoops and breathed fire. It really did seem that no expense was spared by the bride and groom – a professor at one of the universities. But quite what they thought of the unknown mzungu, now an honorary part of the Kapchorwa clan, I do wonder.

Alex and I stayed the night in Lira and rode the 170 miles home on quiet Sunday roads across the flat interior of Uganda, where swamps and sinuous lakes make up some of the landscape. It was my third ride through the area, but Alex’s first, an experience – and well earned rest we both relished.

****

In Alex, I see a lot of myself… It must have been this early instinct that formed the bond, that first evening, seven years ago. Funny how instinct is often the surest guide.

In him, I see shades of my own somewhat obsessive, sometimes compulsive nature, my restless need for activity and order, my extreme sense of justice, impatience with meanness of spirit and my irritating ‘White Anglo Saxon Protestant’ work ethic, to say nothing of my obstinacy! Half my age, he never stops, is upset by injustice, has a great sense of integrity and thinks and plans ahead, vanishingly unknown qualities in so much of Africa. He’s become a steadfast companion, it’s easy to travel together, especially away from the stresses of Sipi. We both like people.

****

A day’s hiking in the rural beauties away from the tourism of Sipi, is Alex’s and my idea of relaxing, despite the energetic nature of walking in this steep country, with its dramatic cliffs and red mountain tracks. It’s hard countryside to tame, prone to many serious landslides and with tiny terraces of fields battled from the steep slopes over many generations. We seldom pass beyond populated places, every inch used for subsistence crops. But we DO get quickly into areas where a white visitor is rare, and I am feted all day by countless excited children (in this country where half the population is younger than 14 years) and shake their grubby hands hundreds of times. It’s fun progressing through in this celebrity manner. Alex and I chuckle at the antics of distant, often invisible children yelling, “Mzungu! Mzungu!” and calling their friends to look.

One day, we clamber down the ladder on the cliff near to Rock Gardens and drop to the slopes below, following a sinuous red dirt road through lovely scenery and many hamlets. At every house, crowds of children gather to stare and call. We stop in a scruffy village on the steep slopes for tea and chapatis. The people tell us that their community is due for resettlement to the hot dry plains far below, after the giant landslide that buried 12 hamlets and about 200 people last rainy season. Climate change is making many disasters in Africa, the continent that causes least pollution and is least prepared to deal with its consequences.

We’ve spotted a track winding up the steep slopes. It rises from this decrepit hamlet. It’s a huge staircase of rock-built steps, rising over 650 feet! It’s a rarity here, where the paths are always informal, made by a million plastic flip-flops and Chinese sandals over many years. It’s amazing! A giant stairway to heaven, built in 2024 at the behest of a rare generous politician, the local MP, to get his constituents up this precipitous mountainside.

The steps end at a metal staircase, the last 100 feet up the cliffside at the top. Unfortunately, a rock slide has already carried away the top 30 feet or so and it’s been replaced by the usual rickety stick ladder above a dangerously slippery rock face. Some acrobatics are required above the cliff face to transfer from formal steel to the crazy sticks.

At last we are on top. We’ve climbed over 1300 feet since we spotted the path, straight up the side of the mountain, and now stand well over 6500 feet high. The air is thin, it’s good training. The views are magnificent from up here, but I know that our hike home will be relentlessly up and down, and still three hours or more. It’s great to be here. Great to be in rural Africa, with a smiling companion who treats me with fatherly respect and fondness.

****

It’s now January 23rd. A couple of days ago, I rode back round Mount Elgon to Kitale. What used to be a derelict goat track that took all day to ride, and made me arrive beaten, battered, smothered in dust (and highly exhilarated), is now a smooth road belonging to the Chinese government. “Cheap loans from China are VERY expensive!” I say to the staff at Suam border post.

The journey takes a record short time, door to door in two and three quarter hours, including half an hour of bureaucracy crossing from Uganda back to Kenya.

We are expecting Wanda and Jörg to visit today. I met them on my travels about four years ago and we became instant friends: an older couple from Köln, with an old camping car that they keep in Tanzania and use, like me, to escape from winters in Europe. They made friends with Adelight and Rico and now stop by most years on their wanderings.

As at the remote international border post, where I’m known by my first name, I’m recognised all over town in Kitale; even the street traders welcome me back, the shopkeepers, supermarket staff, all give me warm welcomes. What is there to be afraid of in Africa, the commonest question I am asked at home? Implied, of course, is a immense misapprehension of Africa, encouraged through 150 years of English culture, as we colonised and controlled ‘the natives’. Buried in the question is a huge sense of cultural superiority. It’s all so far from the actuality of what’s around me; of what brings me back year after year; of what’s caused me to form families across this misunderstood continent – where I am greeted hundreds of times a day, made welcome, respected and befriended.

****

Next week, I’ll ride back to Sipi. We have to find a better school for the two children. The quality of education in Uganda is abysmal, and they have not been doing well, despite their intelligence, at the best school available, 10 miles away in Kapchorwa, where they had to board thanks to the dangerous driving of the school minibus, packed with small children on the dangerous road. It’s likely that they may have to travel to Mbale, 30 miles down the mountain, to find a better education. Life is tough in Africa. Whatever age you are.

This year’s journey is remarkable for my delight in the small people around me. Perhaps they – and I – am at an age to appreciate this. Keilah is the eldest at eight, followed by Maria in Kitale at seven, Jonathan in Uganda at six, Wesley in Kitale at five and his brother, the wonderful Wayne, whom I could pick up and bring home, at eighteen months, a serious little boy with the biggest eyes and a habit of attracting attention by tapping you, rather than speaking.

I’ve come to adore them all! A fine gift for the mzee mzungu – the old white man! They are making this safari a delight. Who’d’ve thought it?

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