"The Dust Bin of Africa"

 SUDAN is  nicknamed" The Dust Bin of Africa " for many good reasons. It is also the country in sub-Sahara Africa with the largest amount of bureaucracy of any on the continent.  The Sudanese stamps in my passport that recorded the endless details that seem to serve no purpose, are also my favourite!  My interest in the desert started as a child and a grade school science project. Now many years later I am still learning. Carcasses of hundreds of camels that have perished along the road, gives "reliability" a whole new meaning when trusting a motorcycle to get me to my next destination.
This is my adventure.  Some of us may enjoy the excitement of Disneyland, or a trip to the lake fishing, but for me it's adventure of overland travel on a motorcycle.
Now after almost two years in Africa I find myself completely within my comfort zone. Negotiating with street traders for the best currency rates of the day, setting GPS coordinates for pyramids, or understanding security considerations of an area, is all part of everyday travel. The warm welcome I received from so many children in Sudan made it difficult to see the last bits of Africa fade into the horizon.

 YES:  Africa is SAFE ... My own lack of knowledge usually had me on guard for the first day or two in any given country, but I constantly learned for myself, not from the 6:00pm news, that there is nothing to fear. The best example of safety was Egypt. If you look at the numbers of murders the: US state department should have{ travel warnings} to many of our own states and not Egypt .

 In total the trip was about 30,000 miles? Lots of new Chinese parts on the BMW and tires. A counter clockwise trip of Africa..as well as several countries.. The motorcycle accidents I could always walk away from, and items lost or stolen I could easily replace !
Arrived in Turkey last week ... Garth