Camels and remote lands

After my first camel safari the length of Somalia, I was hooked.  There is only one thing better in life than loading your camels in the pre dawn darkness, with the embers of last nights blaze slowly dying away and another day in the deserts of  Africa and  Asia to look forward to; and that is making the same journey by the light of a full moon.

Camels are so much more than transport. They are perfectly adapted  to semi arid environments; their soft padded feet  suited to the fragile soils and their selective browsing quite unlike the devastation caused by overstocked herds of cattle and flocks of goats.

Breakfast

As for personality, when you get to know them, each has its own character and temper, and if mistreated they will remember and wait for that moment when you are all on your own and no one is looking.  

Camels are bred for a wide range of characteristics be it milk production, riding or pack camels. In the Middle East a good racing camel can be worth a small fortune. For me they are simply the best excuse to travel in and experience remote lands.

one big camel 

Perfectly adapted for semi arid environments.

Northern Pakistan - Takht I Bahi, Churchill’s Piquet and the Malakand Pass.

Northern Pakistan is a land of superlatives.  

The area abounds in Buddhist temples and stupas to remind you of the rich heritage that stretched north to Afghanistan and the now tragically destroyed Bamyan Buddhas.

Takht I Bahi started out as a Zoroastrian temple before it began its long history as a Buddhist monastery. Its magnificent hilltop location protected it from the ravages of wars and invaders that have swept by through the ages. 

As the finest and most complete Buddhist monastery in Pakistan, it was listed a UNESCO world heritage site in 1990.  



Takht I Bahi

 



On the road to the Malakand pass

I first travelled through Malakand and the Malakand pass in the 1990’s. The Chitral relief force passed this way in April 1895 leading to the formation of the Malakand field force.

The Pathan tribes and the British go back a long way.  Serving in the Malakand field force a  young Winston Churchill gave his name to a fort still perched high on the side of the Swat valley.



Lower Swat valley



Churchill's Piquet - high above the valley



The malakand pass today

Upper Swat has been compared to Switzerland for its panoramic landscapes, but any further comparison would be greatly misleading.  As a land of high adventure this really is the genuine article.


Upper Swat

Zwedru - Liberia

Years of working in conflict zones meant inevitably that you had to sit down and deal with some very questionable people.

Often it was just hustlers trying to scrape a living from whatever angle they were touting. Occasionally it was more serious when presented with the option to hire trucks or other equipment that had clearly been looted from their original owners. Peeled off letters from Agency landcruisers, tended to leave a clear outline on the vehicles paintwork.

Then once in a while you met someone who simply radiated bad news.  They could exude the charm of a self confidence backed up by their militia and a terrified local population; or they would just maintain  a brooding silence, their face hidden behind  a pair of dark sunglasses. Some had inflicted considerable suffering on the population amongst which they still continued to live

Zwedru located in the far south east of Liberia was identified as a centre for an agricultural rehabilitation programme. Access at that time was by helicopter, with ECOMOG maintaining a visible presence on the ground.





An assessment of the agricultural infrastructure 

With a Country Office already established in Monrovia,  it was time to identify a suitable base for a field office. Introductions were made and I found myself in the presence of a group who had clearly been actively involved in the fighting. 

Both sides had a vested interest. I needed a compound to rent and they were after hard currency.  Options were limited but in the end I walked away from the deal as actual ownership was unclear. The last thing needed was to find the place had a complex history or worse.

I still remember sitting down in that darkened room. eyes slowly adjusting after the glare of the sun. The militia standing around the room, backs  against the wall whilst  their leader and I weighed each other up across a table.  It was on reflection the right decision.

Hargeisa –'Truly impressive'. - Somaliland

My first visit to Hargeisa was in the 1980’s, walking camels up from Kismayo – it was one of those journeys that shapes your life forever. 

Back then Hargeisa the former capital of British Somaliland  was showing its age. The resident  Isaaq clan were already pressing for greater autonomy, and as the country began its long slide into anarchy no-one could have imagined what the President of Somalia, Siad Barre was about to do next.

I returned again in 1991 during a bleak period in the civil war to establish an agricultural rehabilitation programme in the south of the Country, flying first into Hargeisa.  Alongside the airstrip a nomad was firing his M16 into the air, no-one paid attention. 

Hargeisa was a shock. All that remained of the old cinema was the flat concrete roof on the ground, underneath lay the people that had been packed into the building for shelter when it was bombed flat.

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Yet 1991 was to be the year things began to take a turn for the better in Hargeisa.  Instead of slipping into the grip of warlords, Somaliland chose a different path. Without international recognition and the associated financial support, they began to rebuild Hargeisa with their own hands to create their State of Somaliland. What they have achieved is 'truly impressive' (a quote from the English Guardian newspaper).

Most of the money to fund this miracle has come via remittances from the diaspora, but there is a thriving commercial sector as well.  Against all the odds Somaliland is a  success in a region used to  bad news stories. 

Somaliland is only recognised internationally as an autonomous region of Somalia and not as an independent republic, which remains  at odds with its existence as an independent State prior to  merging with Italian Somaliland in 1961.

The icing on the cake for Hargeisa is the marvellous neolithic rock art cave system at Lass Gaal, discovered by  the outside world in 2002.  Over 5,000 years old, they are some of the most pristine on the Continent. 

 Laas Gaal cave painting

Somaliland now has an elected parliament and a thriving economy, all achieved from the rubble of a bombed out capital without large scale international aid.   It just goes to show what can be achieved with determination and self-belief.

Three Years in Lunsar - Sierra Leone

For a while 33 Portland Place London felt like my second home.  

Like the country it represented, it exuded a rumpled old world charm clearly in need of a makeover. Downstairs across a well-worn counter I accumulated numerous visas as I travelled to and from Sierra Leone. Sadly 33 Portland Place  was later acquired by another leaseholder under very questionable circumstances and as a High Commission it is no more.

Lunsar in the early 1990’s had already taken a battering from the fighting. Buildings still standing showed signs of gunfire.



Outside the town lay the rusting machinery that had once chipped away at Massaboin Hill, a mountain of iron ore which in the local dialect gave the town its name.

Lunsar was the base for a swamp rice rehabilitation programme in the surrounding countryside. Security could best be described as fluid as the fighting ebbed and flowed to and from the south and east of the country.

It was hard to believe that the Queen made a State visit here in 1961. Back then some up country towns had street lighting. 
One day I paid a visit to an old Paramount Chief, reduced to tears as he showed a framed black and white photo of his introduction to the Queen during her tour. Outside few buildings were left standing and the street lights had long since ceased to shine.

What makes Sierra Leone special are the people. They are some of the nicest you will find anywhere, despite one of the world’s worst mortality rates and the horrors of what the RUF rebels perpetrated.

The local blacksmith using hand bellows

By 1995 the RUF had reached close to Lunsar and in places were only 20 km from Freetown. This was the time of Executive Outcomes and their highly efficient campaign to secure the Freetown perimeter and push back the rebels. When their funding was stopped in 1997, the RUF inevitably overran the capital with appalling consequences, leading eventually to the intervention of  British Forces.

Now finally Freetown is again buzzing with new investment. A return visit to River Number Two and Lumley beach, Freetown's cotton tree and Lunsar are long overdue.

Boarding the Lungi ferry at Freetown

A journey across Transnistria

My first visit to Transnistria followed on from a field visit to Moldova, once one of the wine production regions of the Soviet central planning system.  Moldova is holder of a Guinness World record for the largest single underground wine storage area –over 200 km of tunnels - Yes 200 km.

Moldova had gained its independence with the fall of communism and turned toward Romania as its bridge to the west whilst moving to the Latin script. The  Russian minority objected and a short war in 1992 ensued with Russia invited in as peacekeepers. 

The result is Transnistria a small section of eastern Moldova across the Nistria River which has remained determinedly Russian. 

It is not a recognised state and appears more Russian than Russia itself. Entering the capital Tiraspol was quite literally stepping back in time to another era.

Travel across the border is reasonably straightforward and Transnistrians appear to be able to travel to Moldova without any problems. However as it is only recognised by a few equally marginal states such as South Ossetia and Abkhazia you are likely to be without consular support if you have a problem.

If you are in the region it is certainly worth the detour to step into one of the 21^st century's unresolved political dilemmas.  

The people are polite and always excited to try out their English language skills as travellers are a rarity.  The one thing Transnistria is not geared up for is tourism.  Chisinau to Tiraspol to Odessa is in the summer a journey through soviet history in the region.

The Battle of Talas

Based in Osh in the early 1990's, I needed to inspect factories in the Kyrgyz capital Bishkek to see if they could supply the kit I needed for a NGO programme in the central Tien Shan mountains. There was only one route from Osh to Bishkek through the Tien Shan which at that time was difficult even in summer.

With heavy snow on the ground and no local flights operational, the only alternative route was considerably longer. Andijan to Tashkent and then through Kazakhstan via Chimkent and Taraz then back into Kyrgyzstan to Bishkek, effectively circumventing the Tien Shan range.

Fuel was purchased from vendors with glass jars by the side of the road. And then sliding from side to side into banks of deep snow I headed towards the Kazakh border and Chimkent. Away to all sides the snow lay deep and continued to fall.



Soon the snow was blowing horizontally

Back then Chimkent was still a lead smelting centre for the old centrally planned economy. Large clouds of dark brown smoke emitted from huge chimneys offered a distant welcome. One can only imagine what it was like to live there.

Between Chimkent and Taraz a local bus stopped. It was one of those moments captured in time as an old lady alighted and marched off into the deep snow with no destination in sight, The wind chill outside was more suited to a polar explorer.

Off into a polar landscape

The next way point on the journey was Taraz. Nearby in 751 AD the defining battle of Talas was fought between Arabs and the Chinese Tang Dynasty which changed the course of history for Central Asia.

The Abbasid Caliphate won and Chinese influence and Buddhism thereafter faded in Central Asia, with a corresponding rise in the influence of Islam . There is also a belief that Chinese paper makers captured during the battle facilitated the transfer of paper making technology to the Muslim world and later to the West. Until that point the Chinese had kept the manufacture of paper a state secret. 

Then finally I arrived back in Bishkek which is one of the most welcoming cities in Central Asia. Of recent construction, it remains a time capsule of Czarist and Soviet town planning with wide boulevards and a central monument to the Kyrgyz hero Manas.

Manas

The Epic of Manas is a poem of over 500,000 lines recalling his leadership of the Kyrgyz around the 16th Century, making it the third longest poem in history (after the Mahabharata and the Tibetan Epic of King Gesar). 

Traditional Kyrgyz storytellers known as the Manaschi, recite the Epic. Those few that can recite the entire Epic from memory are revered as Great Manaschis.

A winter in Osh - Kyrgyzstan

For over 2,000 years Osh has been a landmark of Central Asia.  Alexander the Great passed through on his way towards India and it was a key trading centre on the Silk Road. It is also one of the few cities left from the old days that retains its statue of Lenin in the central square.

Osh is a gateway to the Pamir Highway that leads to Kherog in Tajikistan and then finally on to Dushambe. It is an epic journey.

I have since been back many times but that first winter in the early 90's was a real shock after Africa. The cold and wind chill ensured every field trip required careful planning.

The old order had departed back to the Russian Federation taking its expertise and Kyrgyzstan existed in a surreal twilight zone, quite unsure of what was going to happen next. 

People made the best of a difficult time. Dances were held in the Hotel Osh. The heating had failed and in that sub zero freezer, people danced dressed in thick fur coats and hats. Stalls out in the snow sold shashliks and plov and champanski and beer. Soft drinks and beer were hopeless as they froze in the bottle before you could swallow them. Some local vodkas were drinkable, but many tasted suspiciously of diluted diesel.

Above Osh is the Sulayman Mountain, Kyrgyzstan's only world heritage site. A mosque on the top was built by Babur a decendant of Tamerlane. Streams of ribbons attached to branches mark the way to the top, left to invoke prayers and wishes, particularly by women hoping for children.

On top of the Sulayman Mountain

Osh Market is one of the biggest in Central Asia and that winter it was encased in thick ice which made staying upright virtually impossible.

The crowd was so dense it was also virtually impossible to fall over, so when you began to slide it was a human version of pin ball as with increasing speed you bounced off the Kyrgyz around you until someone would grab hold until you regained your balance. Most fruit were  seasonally available and non existent in winter. The pickled variety for winter consumption left a lot to be desired.

Bus stop in the shape of the national hat

When spring arrived the city was transformed into a carpet of blossom. The snows finally melted and travel into the surrounding mountains was at last possible.

Hanoi & the hill tribes

Hanoi in the early 1990’s was different from Saigon. Much more a sense of State control. 

The museum's tribute to the war of independence included a panoramic model of Dien Bien Phu surrounded by French tourists of a certain age recalling their place in the battle. There are numerous collections of arms, munitions and pilots helmets recovered during the fighting.

A military history museum

The traffic in Hanoi even then was becoming a challenge. The side roads were still quiet, but in the busiest hours the main streets were a continuous flow of mopeds and motorbikes moving at speed and stopping for nothing. You really did take your life in your hands when crossing the road.  These days it's much worse.

Before the traffic really deteriorated

At night the streets came alive to the noise and smells of Hanoi street food. The locals set out their stalls on the pavement and start cooking.  My favourite was an elderly lady who turned the front of an oily garage into her emporium, producing the most amazing chilli beef on a two upturned crates.

The Hanoi Flag Tower.
Over 200 years old with views across  the city .

Hanoi was the base to travel upto the Sapa hill tribes for a proposed development programme. In the early 1990's  Sa Pa District was just opening up and outsiders were a rarity.

Sa Pa is a land to take your breath away, but only when the sun comes out. Otherwise the view is restricted to a few metres of fog and drizzle and there are many days of fog in Sa Pa.

Rice terraces

Zanzibar - The Spice Islands

Zanzibar is a unique place that draws you back. 

An immense sense of history pervades the main Island Unguja, from the first Portuguese explorers  through to the rule of the Omani Arabs and  Livingstone’s last lodging before he left for the interior.

The magical Stone Town is now a UNESCO world heritage site, and the cathedral of Christ Church  built on the site of one of Africa’s biggest slave markets with the altar sited over the location of the main whipping post.  The Cathedral also holds a wooden cross made from the tree under which Livingstone’s heart was buried at Chitambo.

It is also as everyone keeps reminding you  the birthplace of the Parsi - Farrokh Bulsara whose family practised the Zoroastrian religion first brought to these Island's by Persian traders around the time of the decline of the Roman Empire. Farrokh was better known to the wider world as Freddie Mercury – lead singer of Queen.

On the beach

Zanzibar also comprises the smaller island of Pemba to the north of the main Island.  Here there are far fewer visitors, but many who do come, often across vast distances are there as students. Pemba remains an important centre of learning for voodoo and traditional healers.

Stone Town remains a must see and my favourite place to stay is the great Emersons House, a restored Omani Palace. 

The east coast beaches border crystal clear waters and the smell of cloves drifts across the Islands from the plantations.

seaweed farming

   

 

There are many layers to the history and culture of this place including a volatile political record since independence from Britain in 1963.

When you scratch the surface, there is a great deal more to these islands than most travellers will ever see.


Sunset

30,000 feet over the Sahara - Flying in Africa & Central Asia

Across Africa and Central Asia international flights are by and large uneventful, with  regional hubs such as Abidjan and Nairobi perfectly OK.   However, mention old favourites such as N’djili and Murtala Muhammed and hardened field workers will wilt at the memory.

In fairness many of the truly awful anecdotes hark back to darker times.

Murtala used to be nothing more than an organised crime shakedown from the plane to and including the taxi outside.  No one who knew would go anywhere near the place. You either flew to Kano or over to Togo and drove back across the border.

These days it is a revelation in comparison. This was certainly helped by a shoot to kill policy, to deter the habit of blocking international aircraft taxiing on the ramp and then robbing the cargo hold as passengers looked on through the plane windows.

N’djili in DRC certainly has seen better days. Today it is OK getting in if you retain a steady nerve, though more of a challenge getting out. 

International flights from the better organised hubs can still be interesting.

Two from memory are a hard landing at night in Jomo Kenyatta. The pilot of the twin prop came on the tannoy to announce that whilst we may have considered it a hard landing he thought it was excellent, as the airport had just had a total power failure including the landing lights.

Having found our way into the customs hall by a set of stairs (it was pitch black), I spent the next hour  standing over the customs officer with my torch whilst he stamped everyone’s passports.

At Dushambe the plane was wildly overloaded.   The standing passengers forced off through the front exit, promptly ran to the back and returned through the rear exit. This continued in suffocating heat until the guards finally closed the front exit and stood with pointed rifles at the rear.

A vivid memory was an airbus flight from Abidjan on a European airline that thankfully no longer exists. Suffice to say it was the national carrier for a country created in 1831.

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Somewhere over the Sahara on a beautiful moonlit night one of the engines made the sort of noise you really do not want to hear at 30,000 ft, on a two engine plane.

Then slowly and inexorably we began to descend.

Absolutely nothing was heard from the flight desk as crowds began forming at the windows pointing excitedly. Time passed the dunes grew larger, and ground speed increased.  By now the passengers was really excited, some were kneeling and praying.

The sound of the landing gear going down caused even more panic as belly landings are not performed well with wheels extended. Looking out the windows there was absolutely nothing to see apart from high moonlit dunes, speeding past just below us. Then suddenly we flared and with a loud bang we were down.

All was still and calm. There was no communication from the deck. Time passed until an exit door slowly opened and a head appeared in the darkness. We were all marched down a set of steps and into a small passenger holding area. The crew disembarked separately and vanished forever.

It turned out that we were in the Algerian Sahara. Our onward journey to Europe was finally accomplished in one of the decrepit Russian planes that abound Africa.  After the fall of communism, they just never went home.