#RolexInTanzania Vast, Empty Dryness

South Africa to Egypt, is the ultimate cross-Africa trip. In late 2018 – early 2019, I did half of this from Uganda to Cairo through Kenya, Ethiopia and Sudan with the Great African Caravan and it was a phenomenal experience. Since then, the remaining half of the journey to South Africa has been on my mind. Covid happened, other life things happened and that plan has been on hold till now. Now felt right because beyond just travelling for the sake of it, which I’m perfectly happy doing btw, Muwado – my long-time creative passion project had grown up and was ready to serve the bigger Africanstorytelling community tangibly with content monetisation tools for its storytellers. I was finally able to achieve the very first slogan of the platform; business and pleasure. I could fulfil my travel goals while building up the business. South Africa to Egypt, let’s finish this!

So now, I am in Harare, Zimbabwe in the third week of my journey. The goal is to do a week minimum per country and the countries planned after are Malawi, Zambia, Angola, Namibia, Botswana, South Africa, Lesotho, Eswatini, Mozambique and then back to East Africa. It’d be nice to visit the islands of Comoros, Madagascar and Seychelles to complete the SADC but the trip is too budget for flights and there don’t seem to be boats that go all the way there. If you are reading this from any of the listed locations, drop a comment and let’s hang out. I’ll be sharing my experiences on the road here while you can follow the official Muwado promotional activities on the platform account. Simultaneously, I will also be sharing experiences from the Uganda to Cairo trip with the Great African caravan on the account here. The original idea was to make a book but a blog series seems more practical. Gear up for a lot of stories. 

Let’s start with the bus journey through Tanzania.

You can get a Classic Bus bus that goes directly from Kampala to Harare from Namayiba bus park. It departs 3 times a week on Saturday, Tuesday and Thursday and the journey takes 4 days. It costs Ugx500,000 to get to Harare and Ugx 450,000 to get to Lusaka. My first destination was Victoria Falls so I got a ticket to Lusaka from where I would switch and get a bus headed to Livingstone, which is the Zambia side of Victoria Falls, and then cross the border into Zimbabwe from there. 

This was going to be a long journey with very many stops and I wanted to be as efficient as possible so I packed only a medium-sized laptop backpack worth of luggage. Regular washing and repeating of clothes seems more efficient than breaking my back with heavy luggage and I can always get replacement clothes along the way. This was also going to be an experiment in minimalism pro travelling.

The first twist to the journey came when I was told the bus I’d booked wouldn’t be setting off on Saturday because it had been delayed at the border with the luggage clearing. We’d be setting on Sunday instead. One more day to say my goodbyes. Sunday arrived and I arrived 30 minutes before the communicated departure time of 7.00 pm. Shiba, the lady who’d guided me through what the journey would be like had forgotten to mention the Namayiba Classic office was just a booking office and the bus parked at a separate location not too far away. But that’s why you go early so I quickly jumped on a bike to the boarding location. I reached there and the bus hadn’t left me. In fact, they hadn’t even started loading it yet. I readjusted my expectations because this wasn’t the punctual out-of-country bus I had gotten accustomed to.  

They started loading luggage onto the bus and from the quantities I witnessed, I wasn’t sure there was going to be enough space for passengers. After about 4 hours, they were done loading and we finally set off for Tanzania through the night. I promptly dosed off –thankfully, since the road there after Masaka was in a poor state – and woke up 4 hours later as we arrived at the Mutukula border post with Tanzania. 

I’ve been through here before and we the passengers were quickly done with clearing, no visa fees were required because of the East Africa Community cooperation. The luggage though needed time for inspection and the entire process took another 4 hours. In that time, I walked to the nearby shops and overheard the guys on the Tanzanian side speaking Rukiga. Ah, you mean my people have branches here. Upon closer listening, I realise there’s a slight difference and a shopkeeper I buy snacks from informs me they are Bahaya. Issa Bantu connection. Luggage inspection done, we off into Tanzania as the new day dawned. 

The entry to the country is swampy, then rocky, then misty. Turns out it is smoke because of dry bush burning in anticipation of the rains. 

Tanzania police stops are as frequent as speed bumps in Uganda and you should have your loose change ready to reduce the time spent at each stop. It seems things haven’t changed since the last time I travelled here by road. TIA. The road itself is not bad though. At some point, the conductor was having a back-and-forth with a Mzee seated behind me. It sounds heated. Heated Swahili. I feel Ugandan PTSD. We enter a bus park of sorts for a short break. The vendors arrive and it’s grasshopper season over here. I resist temptation. My stomach isn’t what it used to be and we still have 3 days on the road so I’m not trying to have a running stomach. There’s a stop in Kahama town for lunch and then we are back on the road. 

This side of Tanzania is vast, dry and empty savanna terrain and I soon sleep off.

We stopped in Morogoro at night and were told this was where we would switch buses instead of Dar Es Salaam – as originally communicated by Shiba. This made more sense route-wise but Shiba really needs to get her information right. She’d told me we would have a long stop in Dar and the bus would get us rooms to rest and freshen up before resuming the trip. I’d even made plans with friends there to hang out while I waited. 

Instead, we shower in the bus stop toilets, a standard practice apparently. To their credit, they were clean. I can’t vouch for other days, or the variances in definitions of clean. I noticed other passengers disgruntled after examining their damaged suitcases that were squeezed into the boot and I felt clever about my simple backpack. After another 4 or so hour wait, the connecting Classic Bus pulled up with the passengers from Dar Es Salaam and we were off to the Zambia border. 

We had a stop for lunch and spotted some zebras as we moved through Mikumi National Park. The landscape was also a little less dry now. We moved into the Udzungwa Mountains National Park and embarked on a steep climb. The bus driver pulled fast and furious stunts to pass the endless line of trailers trudging up the hill. My blood pressure probably significantly rose just because of this stretch. This route seems to be for trailers and buses mainly. 

The conductor passed through telling us to be careful about shady characters at the Zambia border. Ah, African road border issues still persist I see. There’s one more stop where more luggage is piled onto the bus. These chaps are luggage-packing miracle performers because I didn’t think there was more space in this bus. Passengers really are an afterthought. 

A theory one of the passengers gives me is that having passengers helps the bus bypass the trailer line at the borders which they’d have to join if they had cargo only. We arrived at the border around midnight, done with the 2 days of Tanzania and out of the East African Community’s comfort zone. Time to see what the Zambia border is like…

PS: Follow the Tanzania tag for more Muwado member stories out of Tanzania or join the Tanzania forum to start and join conversations about Tanzania affairs