I managed to get a semi ok nights sleep in the Happy Hills Hotel in Iringa, even though the local dog decided to go into song at 2am for about 30 mins, but then was woken up again at 5am when Mustafa the cleric decided to do his prayer sessions over the mosque loud hailer. At that point I decided to get up and make an early start so that I could make it to Malawi and meet up with the 4 bikers I had met the previous day.
It was going to be a long day as I needed to cover over 300 miles that included a boarder crossing and on these roads where my average speed was in the 50’s with the temp rising to 28 degrees, I was sure it was going to be extremely tiring.
After a couple of hours of riding I was getting into the rhythm, speeding up, slow down for speed bumps, speed up, slow down, photo opportunity etc when in the distance approaching a village I could see a Policeman standing in the road. Sure enough he pulls me over to tell me I was speeding. The fact he did not have a speed gun and I had seen him from way back and slowed down, there was no way he could prove that I was actually speeding. Unfortunately he was not having it and started to threaten to arrest me and take me to the station. After 10 mins of negotiations he then decided he wanted $100 to let me go on, but after telling him that I didn’t have any US Dollars he asked , ‘What have you got?’ I ended up giving him TS 100,000 (£30). My 1st brush with a bent policeman in Tanzania.
Jumping back on my bike quickly before the policeman tried to extort more money from me, I shot off up the road.
The remainder of my journey was relatively uneventful apart from the deterioration of the roads with pot holes that would have swallowed my front wheel and the sunken tarmac ruts where the lorry wheels had formed ridges in the road. This meant the bike wheels would track these ridges which was a bit unnerving when you are doing 70 mph.
Along the route there plenty of dead lorries, either broken down or destroyed from crashing and if you were unlucky enough to follow a running lorry you would be surrounded by a black cloud of diesel fumes. There are certainly no emission restrictions on lorries in Tanzania.
I could see the border in front of me with a long line of Lorries, all parked up. I pushed my way to the front, parked up and went into the Tanzania boarder crossing office. To leave Tanzania and get my carnet stamped took all of 20 mins, amazing!
Unfortunately that wasn’t the case on the Malawi side. First I had to get an entry visa which is $50. I gave the customs official my passport and completed entry form and he said $75. I then had to argue with him as the Malawi consulate in London informed me that it was $50, so I new I was correct. This smelt of more corruption. I stood my ground confirming I should pay $50. With that the customs officer ushered me into a back office behind the counter where there were 2 officials in a small room. On the desk was a pile of US dollars along with an open booklet of visa stickers. They told me to sit down whilst the 2 of them had a long discussion, clearly about me but not in English. 5 mins passed and they eventually said, ‘ok $50 but only for a 7 day visa’. I handed over the money and the official put it in his shirt pocket and then usher me out. Definitely odd.
The carnet was handled by a separate official who was larger than life. To get the carnet signed was relatively quick even though I had to pay a road tax fee and a carbon emissions fee. When I was handed my carnet the customs official looked at me smiled and then said ‘something for me?’
I couldn’t believe it, they are all at it. After giving her 3000 Malawian Karcher (£3) she then insisted that I take her telephone number! Lucky me!
Finally I was ready to leave the border crossing to continue on to the hotel to meet my new found friends, the 4 bikers from the previous day. They had stayed in a town about 70 miles further along the route, so already had a head start on me. So I thought they must already be at the hotel. Wrong... As I walked out of the border crossing office they had just arrived. I had been ahead of them all day due to my earlier start. I decided to hang on for them so that we could ride the last 30 miles together to the hotel as they knew where it was. They managed to sort their entry visa’s out relatively quickly but didn’t have a carnet for their bikes so had to arrange a TIP (Temporary Import Pass). Unfortunately that counter had just closed and the officials would not issue a TIP as the banks had closed early. This was a potential nightmare for them as they were currently in no mans land. They had left Tanzania and now couldn’t get in to Malawi with their bikes. This meant, potentially, that they would have to sleep on the bench in the border office reception for the night. Clearly this was not acceptable, especially for 4 ladies to do this. So after a lot of negotiation the customs officials agreed to let the bikers through on condition that they returned the next morning to purchase the TIP....That was a lucky escape for them.
We finally left the border crossing and made our way to the hotel on the edge of Lake Malawi where a cold beer and yes another cold shower were waiting!!!
