September 2001
Leaving the UK
It's not unreasonable to say that a tour like this starts when the planning starts. The day we picked the bike up it felt good, we'd chosen the BMW specifically for this trip and felt that the first hurdle was cleared and we were now on our way. Effectively we were but the fun was still a long way off.
The research, although time consuming, had been relatively straight forward and fruitful, we felt that we had prepared ourselves and the bike as best we could for the terrain, the bureaucracy and the cultural changes awaiting us. We had contingency plans for most imaginable events from punctures to write-off's and hangovers to hospitalisation but nothing in our foulest nightmares could have prepared us for the events of Tuesday 11th September and the overall effect it would have on our plans.
As our route page indicates our desired itinerary lead us directly through not only the Middle East but also several other Muslim countries. With our leaving date just five days after the destruction of the World Trade Centre we felt it was prudent to employ an entirely pragmatic approach, which for the immediate future at least had us avoiding such countries.
Our plans have had to change several times. First, it was civil strife in the central African countries that prevented us from travelling down the west coast to Cape Town. Then, the sheer weight we're carrying ruled out Sudan and Chad - too many of the roads are sand and our half ton of bike and equipment would either sink or break in half - we can really only travel on gravel or tarmac. Now politics have barred the northern African countries and the Middle East - all in all not a good start. We really did want to be setting off from the UK but world events dictated otherwise. The bike is now to be shipped to Cape Town and we fly this Saturday to Windhoek in Namibia.
17.09.01
Photograph by Bournemouth Daily Echo
Leaving the UK
