Day 12
We did not want to end up in the wrong place at the wrong time when leaving Mbuji-Mayi. As "the wrong time" takes about whole day long here, we ask one of the guardiens at CTB to guide us out of town. The road to Kananga, our goal for this day, is not really connected to the city. The neverending expension of Mbuji-Mayi has swallowed the road and now one has to drive trough the kilometers of shacks to get to city end.
Once again we are asked to pay toll, we do not complain too much this time as the previous toll had brought us a nice tar road. Not so this time. The road was not horrible, but it was not exactly good either. It certainly wasn't maintained. The scenery on the other hand was stunning. It was great to finally see a bit around us as we were usually stuck in dense jungle or high grass.
We did not want to end up in the wrong place at the wrong time when leaving Mbuji-Mayi. As "the wrong time" takes about whole day long here, we ask one of the guardiens at CTB to guide us out of town. The road to Kananga, our goal for this day, is not really connected to the city. The neverending expension of Mbuji-Mayi has swallowed the road and now one has to drive trough the kilometers of shacks to get to city end.
Once again we are asked to pay toll, we do not complain too much this time as the previous toll had brought us a nice tar road. Not so this time. The road was not horrible, but it was not exactly good either. It certainly wasn't maintained. The scenery on the other hand was stunning. It was great to finally see a bit around us as we were usually stuck in dense jungle or high grass.
The going is though and slow. About 50km before Kananga to road is blocked. The bridge is gone.
This happened very recently. People there pointed us to a detour. We had to take bicycle tracks all the way to Kamwanda (+- 30km) where there is another bridge and then continue from there.
We set off on a much to narrow track trough dense jungle.
It was getting late already and we were not sure if we would make it to Kananga today. Depending on the state of the bicycle tracks, we would have to stay in a village again.
The first village we encountered seemed deserted at first, but as soon as we entered the village we saw people coming at us from all sides. They had machetes and sticks and were shouting. "Des Blancs. Argent!" - "White people. Money!". They were all over the place. This was not good! I floored it and sped out of the village. A rock hit the back of our car.
What in gods name was that all about?
Very few Congolese had made us feel welcome, but this was plain agression! It scared the hell out of us.
We passed another village, and once again a mob formed as soon as they heard us coming. Machetes flying round, racist slogans shanted. Once again we did not give them the chance to get near us and blasted out of the village. They tried following us. This was turning ugly, if we would get stuck here we would be in big trouble, these people did not want a chat!
With half an hour of daylight left we knew we had a problem. We tried sending our coordinates to the homefront with the instructions to call the embassy if they did not hear from us within the hour. Despite us having bought SIM cards of the two major GSM operators, we did not have reception.
With our hearts racing we neared another village.
This happened very recently. People there pointed us to a detour. We had to take bicycle tracks all the way to Kamwanda (+- 30km) where there is another bridge and then continue from there.
We set off on a much to narrow track trough dense jungle.
It was getting late already and we were not sure if we would make it to Kananga today. Depending on the state of the bicycle tracks, we would have to stay in a village again.
The first village we encountered seemed deserted at first, but as soon as we entered the village we saw people coming at us from all sides. They had machetes and sticks and were shouting. "Des Blancs. Argent!" - "White people. Money!". They were all over the place. This was not good! I floored it and sped out of the village. A rock hit the back of our car.
What in gods name was that all about?
Very few Congolese had made us feel welcome, but this was plain agression! It scared the hell out of us.
We passed another village, and once again a mob formed as soon as they heard us coming. Machetes flying round, racist slogans shanted. Once again we did not give them the chance to get near us and blasted out of the village. They tried following us. This was turning ugly, if we would get stuck here we would be in big trouble, these people did not want a chat!
With half an hour of daylight left we knew we had a problem. We tried sending our coordinates to the homefront with the instructions to call the embassy if they did not hear from us within the hour. Despite us having bought SIM cards of the two major GSM operators, we did not have reception.
With our hearts racing we neared another village.
Once again thanks for all the great comments. Seeing people enjoying the report sure makes up for all the work it takes to type it out.
So-so. The initial nervousness when entering Congo remained with us for the rest of our trip. We were hoping it would go away as it always did before but it didn't. It is a great feeling not knowing what you are up to next, but up until now almost all of the 'surprises' were not so pleasant. The anticipation for the next 'bad' thing to happen made sure that our adrenaline levels were always high.
In Josephine's case that resulted in a sort of insomnia. She really slept bad all trough Congo. Always on the lookout I guess. Our leaking tent did not help either.
In my case it resulted in a lack of apetite. My stomach felt like I was desperatly in love. I really had to force myself to eat something.
In both our cases this meant we were getting physically exhausted.
Me too 
That was the kinky side of me popping up ;-)
I just reread the report and I am a bit embarrased about the amount spelling mistakes and typo's. I can do a better job. I make these reports during breaks at work or in between other things, so it's always a quick write-up and I post it immediately, without spellchecking. Sorry, but I am sure the message gets along.
I presume you are referring to the "not so nice" role Belgium has had in the history of Congo. For a while I thought that would be a problem as well, but it isn't. Just about anything that still exists in Congo is made by the Belgians. The older generation who had their education from the Belgians really have fond memories of that era. And at the moment Belgium is still one of the main funders of the country (via aid). The dark pages of history during the Leopold 2 era is not what the Congolese people think about. All in all I think being Belgian was actually a plus. As a matter of fact, a lot of people asked how things were going with the "war" in Belgium :-o
[/quote]
Better is a relative term ofcourse. Infrastructure wise it was pobably a lot better. Nothing constructive happened since the 80's. I would have loved to see the country then. And even more so in 50's when it must have been really easy (relative) to travel in the country.
Same could be said about the "bad" areas all major cities in the world have. You are quite right about the fact that we had nowhere to run, we were really on our own. That also leaves you with just one option: continue.. and that's what we did :-)
When this report is done I will post some aftertoughts about the various aspects of this trip.
Quote:
Originally Posted by zeroland  How were you managing your stress levels? |
In Josephine's case that resulted in a sort of insomnia. She really slept bad all trough Congo. Always on the lookout I guess. Our leaking tent did not help either.
In my case it resulted in a lack of apetite. My stomach felt like I was desperatly in love. I really had to force myself to eat something.
In both our cases this meant we were getting physically exhausted.
Quote:
Originally Posted by rdraider I love Belgium beers  , |
Quote:
Originally Posted by goodwoodweirdo I know English is your 3rd language (puts to shame us “English speaking”!!) I especially love the little typo of biting your tongue and not “thong”  being underwear, or maybe that’s what you really meant  . |
I just reread the report and I am a bit embarrased about the amount spelling mistakes and typo's. I can do a better job. I make these reports during breaks at work or in between other things, so it's always a quick write-up and I post it immediately, without spellchecking. Sorry, but I am sure the message gets along.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Frankspinz Absolutely great to read you ! Belgians in the Congo ! You must be nuts ! |
[/quote]
Quote:
Originally Posted by Frankspinz I travelled in Zaire in the early 80s. I guess things were better under the rule of Mobutu, but just barely ! |
Quote:
Originally Posted by jpvm there is nowhere to run since you don't really know if what comes ahead is friendly or not. If you don't know if you are driving through friendly or hostile cities or neighborhoods (was there any way of knowing this before?) |
When this report is done I will post some aftertoughts about the various aspects of this trip.
Now seems like a good time to pause the report :twisted: and have a little flashback to the period before we entered the DRC.
We made the decision to tackle this part of DRC when we were in Egypt. It would take us about 4 months to drive from Cairo down to the Zambia/DRC border. We immediately started our quest for information. It would soon become clear that very little information was available. We did not know of a single traveller that did this traject in the lat 20 years. We knew of two who tried (both on motorbikes) in recent years. One crashed after a few days and got evacuated. The other got arrested and deported. Both didn't get very far.
So we had to be creative and think of other sources of information. A small overview of some of the responses we received from different instances we contacted
1) MONUC. The UN mission in DRC (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_...ublic_of_Congo ). They have almost 20.000 people on the ground, they must have some information. Actualy their website has some useful information.
We contacted the "Cellule Infrastructure" and received the following reply (excerpts):
"Unfortunately, the stretch between Likasi-Mwene Ditu is, from our part, considered impossible. We did not receive any detailed information for a long time. One has to consider that no maintenace has been done on this traject in the last 15 years."
This stretch we already passed by now.
"Concering the Loange river, the ferry is not operational and there is no bridge. According to our latest information the transport of goods is done by pirogue (canoe?). Maybe there is a possibiliy to cross with a vehicle by buidling a vessel with several pirogues. But nothing is certain"
We still haven't reached the Loange river... great prospect ;-)
And then the most worrying bit:
"Certain parts are infested with 'coupeurs de route' (http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coupeur_de_route), especially the following parts: Likasi-Kolwezi and Tshikapa-Kananga"
These 'Coupeurs de route' are lawless gangs. 'Road bandits'. They have a nasty reputation in that they have little value for human life. Rape is a common working method for them.
These people I wanted to avoid. On the other hand, one has to read between the lines here, and it was pretty obvious to me: monuc did not have a clue what was going on in the area. They just did not have reliable and up to date information. Do note that monuc is mostly active in East Congo (Goma, Kisangani,..) not in the more 'stable' south/south-west were we are travelling trough.
2) Coca-cola company: If there is ony thing you can find anywhere in the world it is Coca-Cola. They should know how to get their goods in the country. We had no response on mails, so we called them up. Their answer was pretty short: They do not have a distribution network outside the major cities in Congo 8O And it proved to be true, Congo is the first country we have visited were Coca-cola is hard to get once you leave the major cities.
3) About a dozen of NGO's, all answers were negative: they did not have any information
4) Journalists from press agencies and the author from the only guidebooks that exists on the DRC (Sean Rorison): We received a few interesting adresses and contacts in cities, but nothing on the roads. They only travel by air. From a few journalist we received warning on recent events of aggressive attacke by "coupeurs de route" in the area between Kananga and Tshikapa.
5) Foreign affairs office of our own country and several other countries (US, France, ..): they told us we would die if we only thought about the DRC ;-)
6) The Congolese "Office des routes". I was not expecting an answer from them, but they did reply! From a personal mailadres somebody from the Congolese ministry told me that they had no information whatsoever on the condition of their road network. But they would appreciate any information that we could obtain!
The moral of the story was: nobody knew anything about the road conditions. The worrying bit were the "coupeurs de route". Different sources talked about them, and always in the Kananga-Tshikapi area. This seemed like the area to avoid. We had already decided to drive to Kananga but then go north from there to Ilebo as to avoid the Kananga-Tshikapi area.
In my last post I told we had to make a detour because a bridge was out. Guess in what area that brought us?
We made the decision to tackle this part of DRC when we were in Egypt. It would take us about 4 months to drive from Cairo down to the Zambia/DRC border. We immediately started our quest for information. It would soon become clear that very little information was available. We did not know of a single traveller that did this traject in the lat 20 years. We knew of two who tried (both on motorbikes) in recent years. One crashed after a few days and got evacuated. The other got arrested and deported. Both didn't get very far.
So we had to be creative and think of other sources of information. A small overview of some of the responses we received from different instances we contacted
1) MONUC. The UN mission in DRC (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_...ublic_of_Congo ). They have almost 20.000 people on the ground, they must have some information. Actualy their website has some useful information.
We contacted the "Cellule Infrastructure" and received the following reply (excerpts):
Quote:
Originally Posted by MONUC Malheureusement, le tronçon que vous mentionnez: Likasi - Mwene Ditu est considéré à notre niveau comme impraticable. Nous n'avons pas eu d'informations détaillée depuis longtemps, mais il faut considérer que depuis environ 15 ans il n'y a pas eu d'opération importante d'entretien sur cet axe. |
This stretch we already passed by now.
Quote:
Originally Posted by MONUC Concernant la rivière Loange, le bac n'est pas en service et il n'y a pas de pont. Les infos dont nous disposons mentionnent que la traversée de quelques marchandises se fait en pirogue. Peut être est il possible de faire traverser un véhicule en faisant un radeau avec qq pirogues, mais rien n'est moins sûr. |
We still haven't reached the Loange river... great prospect ;-)
And then the most worrying bit:
Quote:
| Certains tronçons sont infestés des coupeurs de route, il s’agit des tronçons : Likasi-Kolwezi et Tshikapa-Kananga |
These 'Coupeurs de route' are lawless gangs. 'Road bandits'. They have a nasty reputation in that they have little value for human life. Rape is a common working method for them.
These people I wanted to avoid. On the other hand, one has to read between the lines here, and it was pretty obvious to me: monuc did not have a clue what was going on in the area. They just did not have reliable and up to date information. Do note that monuc is mostly active in East Congo (Goma, Kisangani,..) not in the more 'stable' south/south-west were we are travelling trough.
2) Coca-cola company: If there is ony thing you can find anywhere in the world it is Coca-Cola. They should know how to get their goods in the country. We had no response on mails, so we called them up. Their answer was pretty short: They do not have a distribution network outside the major cities in Congo 8O And it proved to be true, Congo is the first country we have visited were Coca-cola is hard to get once you leave the major cities.
3) About a dozen of NGO's, all answers were negative: they did not have any information
4) Journalists from press agencies and the author from the only guidebooks that exists on the DRC (Sean Rorison): We received a few interesting adresses and contacts in cities, but nothing on the roads. They only travel by air. From a few journalist we received warning on recent events of aggressive attacke by "coupeurs de route" in the area between Kananga and Tshikapa.
5) Foreign affairs office of our own country and several other countries (US, France, ..): they told us we would die if we only thought about the DRC ;-)
6) The Congolese "Office des routes". I was not expecting an answer from them, but they did reply! From a personal mailadres somebody from the Congolese ministry told me that they had no information whatsoever on the condition of their road network. But they would appreciate any information that we could obtain!
The moral of the story was: nobody knew anything about the road conditions. The worrying bit were the "coupeurs de route". Different sources talked about them, and always in the Kananga-Tshikapi area. This seemed like the area to avoid. We had already decided to drive to Kananga but then go north from there to Ilebo as to avoid the Kananga-Tshikapi area.
In my last post I told we had to make a detour because a bridge was out. Guess in what area that brought us?
With our hearts racing we neared another village.
We tried to sneak in the village but failed miserably. Same thing happened again, confused looks at first, as soon as they saw us they shouted at eachother and then came storming after us.
What did we do to these people that they wanted us so badly?
Like thieves in the night we raced trough the bush and stopped as soon as we had cell phone reception. We sent our coordinates home and called our Belgian friends in Lubumbashi to see if they could give us a contact in Kananga. They responded quickly (Thanks Valérie!) with a phone number of the "procure" (mission) in Kananga. But no answer there... :-(
From what we saw on the GPS it would be at least another 2 hours before we would arrive in Kananga. It was getting really dark by now. We had no choice, we had to reach Kananga!
These were some of the scariest moments in my life. Everybody we crossed here was mad at us. We sent our coordinates to the home front every 10 minutes or so.
Relentlesly we continued. It got pitch dark and the road was really difficult. We could not afford to make mistakes now, but we also did not feel like getting out of the car to inspect any obstacles. The dark was actually good for us as people would not see that we are white. This seemed to make a major difference in the reaction of the people.
But we made it. We were so happy to reach Kananga and at the same time scared to death that people would react the same here. Fortunately the town was quiet and actually looked friendly in the moonlight. Due to pure luck we drove straight into the compound of the procure and at that into safety.
The friendly father-abt allowed us to camp in the garden. He looked genuinely surprised if we told him about our bad experience but at the same time it was as if he was avoiding the subject too.
We put up the tent, got out our chairs and opened one of our "emergency beers". We just sat there a long time without saying a word to eachother. The sky was beautiful and the sounds of all the insects was magnificent.
We tried to sneak in the village but failed miserably. Same thing happened again, confused looks at first, as soon as they saw us they shouted at eachother and then came storming after us.
What did we do to these people that they wanted us so badly?
Like thieves in the night we raced trough the bush and stopped as soon as we had cell phone reception. We sent our coordinates home and called our Belgian friends in Lubumbashi to see if they could give us a contact in Kananga. They responded quickly (Thanks Valérie!) with a phone number of the "procure" (mission) in Kananga. But no answer there... :-(
From what we saw on the GPS it would be at least another 2 hours before we would arrive in Kananga. It was getting really dark by now. We had no choice, we had to reach Kananga!
These were some of the scariest moments in my life. Everybody we crossed here was mad at us. We sent our coordinates to the home front every 10 minutes or so.
Relentlesly we continued. It got pitch dark and the road was really difficult. We could not afford to make mistakes now, but we also did not feel like getting out of the car to inspect any obstacles. The dark was actually good for us as people would not see that we are white. This seemed to make a major difference in the reaction of the people.
But we made it. We were so happy to reach Kananga and at the same time scared to death that people would react the same here. Fortunately the town was quiet and actually looked friendly in the moonlight. Due to pure luck we drove straight into the compound of the procure and at that into safety.
The friendly father-abt allowed us to camp in the garden. He looked genuinely surprised if we told him about our bad experience but at the same time it was as if he was avoiding the subject too.
We put up the tent, got out our chairs and opened one of our "emergency beers". We just sat there a long time without saying a word to eachother. The sky was beautiful and the sounds of all the insects was magnificent.
So, what was that all about?
In all honesty, we don't have a clue! I only know that this ranks very high in my top 10 scariest moments. Everybody has their limits, well this was over mine. I do not want this to happen to me again.
- Where we just panicking for no reason, paranoid by all the (mis)information we received? Did we create the danger in our minds?
Maybe, I really can't tell. We discussed this afterwards, and we did not make up those mobs that charged at us. They had machetes. They did chase us.
We have a few theories though:
- These villages were on a newly created "detour". Normally no motorized traffic would pass trough here. Bicycles only. Maybe they saw this as new way to generate money, and they wanted their part of the cake. Although somebody should explain to them that this is not a good way to ask for a toll fee.
- We had the feeling that they were focussing on us, not only because we were in a vehicle, but because of our skin color. Did a white person do something wrong here? Where they trying to seek vengeance? I wouldn't surprise me if a white person in car ran somebody over, or destroyed something and then fled away.
- Some fetish reason. Witchdoctors have a lot of influence here. If they had casted a spell of some sorts. Or predicted that something bad would happend if a white person would pass trough here.
- ...
I guess we will never know.
In all honesty, we don't have a clue! I only know that this ranks very high in my top 10 scariest moments. Everybody has their limits, well this was over mine. I do not want this to happen to me again.
- Where we just panicking for no reason, paranoid by all the (mis)information we received? Did we create the danger in our minds?
Maybe, I really can't tell. We discussed this afterwards, and we did not make up those mobs that charged at us. They had machetes. They did chase us.
We have a few theories though:
- These villages were on a newly created "detour". Normally no motorized traffic would pass trough here. Bicycles only. Maybe they saw this as new way to generate money, and they wanted their part of the cake. Although somebody should explain to them that this is not a good way to ask for a toll fee.
- We had the feeling that they were focussing on us, not only because we were in a vehicle, but because of our skin color. Did a white person do something wrong here? Where they trying to seek vengeance? I wouldn't surprise me if a white person in car ran somebody over, or destroyed something and then fled away.
- Some fetish reason. Witchdoctors have a lot of influence here. If they had casted a spell of some sorts. Or predicted that something bad would happend if a white person would pass trough here.
- ...
I guess we will never know.
Progress after day 12. Kananga
