Everyday is BEAUTIFUL!

I have three pairs of socks here (although I seem to only have worn two pairs so far...which are now hanging to dry in the sun after I did some wonderful hand washing of all my laundry this afternoon!). One of my pairs of socks has "Everyday is Beautiful" and a picture of a sun on them, which is a pretty good picture of life these days!

Starting from our last night in Egypt... when we got to camp there was definitely no celebration going on.... it was already 10:30 pm... which is ridiculously late for us cyclists, haha! We get up at 5:45 am (6:45 am now that we are in Sudan and the time has changed) and ride 90 to 160 km.... hang out, have some supper and go to bed pretty soon after the sun sets. The next morning, however was a slow start since we didnt need to leave camp until 9 am... everybody was up by 6 or 7 anyways and a lot of us wandered over to a nearby bakery for some breakfast, or to the Macdonalds for a last little bit of internet. We rode 17k as a convoy, part of which was over a dam in the Nile which (Ibelieve) creates Lake Nasser (which is essentially a big widening of the Nile).. and we were lucky to be able to, cyclists usually arent allowed over the bridge but they closed off part of it for us because of our huge numbers and TDA's good relationship with the people in the area. I road with one of the Egyptian riders for a while, who finally spoke English to me... we were all under the impression he didnt speak English! He said his English improves after the TDA (he does the Egypt leg every year). It was just as good to hang out without speaking with words before anyways! I also road with one the riders, Dana, who works in Emergency Consulting in the States who told me all about her work at the scene of Hurricane Katrina. Then was the ferry.

We were the first one's on the ferry, so after we loaded our bikes and our bags onto the deck or cabins, whichever we were in, those of us who were sleeping on deck scoped out good spots and then we all sat and read, chatted, and watched the boat get loaded with more and more things for the next 6 hours. I loved people watching as the boat got loaded... trucks would come up the top of the hill, maybe 200 meters from the boat, loaded twice their height with cargo, then the driver and passenger would get out, climb on top of the truck and push everything off the truck, then load it onto little karts and make many trips down the hill to the boat... and then, try to find space to stuff it onto the boat!! Mike, Lynn and I found a nice little corner on deck, put our bags around us as a barrier and put a tarp up over us for sun and wind protection.. and then eventually got barricaded in the sides with boxes people brought up. It was actually a perfect place.... although I can't take too much credit for it. Mike and Lynne are pretty tough and I was more interested in exploring, so they did most of the work in protecting the area and I would come stand guard everyonce in a while when they wanted to go to the bathroom or something (I'm not sure they completely trusted me, haha). It was the best sleep I've had all tour! I was against the wall, then Mike had his feet in the opposite direction between Lynne and I, and then Lynne was on the other end, against our bag-barricade facing the face way as I.. we fit together like a jigsaw puzzle and were really quite warm! There were stars in the sky and tons of fresh air to breath (no smoking on deck... too dangerous with all the cargo... I was pretty surprised and impressed with this policy!).
The bottom of the boat was "low class". It was chaos! People fighting with fists to try to get in with one more thing and find a place. Super smokey, just a whole bunch of benches (which means all those who were down there made the 18 hour journey seated, sleeping seated too). I got escorted out pretty quickly when I went down to have a look with a few other riders. Then the middle of the boat was for first class... all TDA riders. There were cabins with bunkbeds and cockroaches but not anything else too bothersome. Those who slept in the cabins even got some soft drinks brought in to them in the middle of the night! The rest of us were on deck with many ... I guess more well off locals.. the best place to be! We were all surprised to get meal tickets for a quite impressive large meal in the dining room (same floor as cabins) and we all got woken up in the middle of the night for passport checks, forms to fill out and a medical check, which was just a check of the temperature of the inside of our ear (which was really inacurate!). When we arrived in the Sudan, there was no dock... just a random island in what seemed like the middle of nowhere with a sandy stretch of land that connected the island to the main land. The load off was considerably shorter... maybe 3 hours. We got stickers on our bike and were off for our first ride in Sundan! A five k ride to camp, which was greated with a police entrance ceremony!

I have not by any means begun to describe why life is BEAUTIFUL!!! out here, but more of the riders have discovered the interenet cafe in this town we are in for our rest day (Dongola)... and there is quite a line up. So I leave Sudan for tomorrow!

Bundles of radiant energy to you all!