With a couple of weeks in a relatively remote South Omo Valley in Ethiopia warming us up for the 4-day stretch in a truly remote west Turkana in Kenya we learned what water insecurity means, how nearest power lines 100 km away affect the quality of life, what sand does to your buggers, and what daily 40 degrees Celsius in a shade feels like. As an add on, common things we are used to seeing morphed into new shapes and meanings. Goats The stretch of Omo Valley up to Omorate was just an introduction to the realities of the Turkana. There are a few things in abundance here: sun, sand,…

Captain’s thoughts We are little over two weeks in this unique country. First thing – cycling is really hard here. It is a very mountainous terrain. Every direction which is further than 100 km you will have to do some continuous climbing. On a loaded tandem bicycle climbing is always slow, on your lowest gear. This slow speed inevitably allows all the local children to not only run by your side but also to investigate what is in your panniers, or have a lot of fun while trying to provoke you for racing with them. If you happen to be sensitive to touching and constant attention, well, this might be…

1. Visa. We land from Istanbul on Monday, just around midnight, so it’s nearly Tuesday. We had 7th row seats so we’re pretty much the first to get off the plane and come to the visa-on-arrival windows. Well, guess what, we overlooked that Lithuanian passport is good for e-visa but not for one at the airport. We are nicely asked to fill out the electronic application using a great Wi-Fi at the airport. Then we are taken to their office to wait for approval. The problem is, it’s midnight and consular officers are asleep. After several call attempts to their main office, we’re being told it may take until 12…