After checking the condition of the road from Dodoma to Iringa with our contacts, we opted on taking the bus.
Even getting your ticket is different.
You go to the bus station and the ticket offices are brightly advertised shacks, all with names like “Flying Horse”, “SupaCoach” and my favourite was “Pole Pole Express” which translated means “slowly slowly”, and claimed to be the fastest bus to Morogoro and Arusha.
There is no structure at the ticket office. You don’t queue – you bundle. You stand around the table and once you have chosen you seat on a bus map you pay and get your ticket while everyone pushes and shoves, waving money under the ticket issuer’s nose. If you’re transporting a bicycle you pay for two tickets. Once for your ticket and the same amount when you reach your destination, for your bicycle.
We were up early and partly excited for our first dose of real public transport in Tanzania.
Check in was at 7 o’clock and we loaded the bicycles on the roof of the bus. The staff made a pathetic attempt at fastening the bikes to the roof racks. There were no straps just string, so Marc and I climbed up and tied them down properly with our own straps. The joke was that the clown who tried to tie them down still expected payment, which he did not get.
Bikes and luggage safe, we boarded the bus. The seats are minute, but at least there is leg room. Comfortable and ready to go. The bus starts and people start flooding in. All the seats full, and everyone is safely seated. Policemen board the bus and check the seating arrangements. A quick head count and they leave giving the bus driver the nod of approval. We start to move. 500 meters from the bus station the bus stops.
People start packing into the already full bus. Seats are now being doubled up, people are sitting on the floor while more people stand over them holding the railings. We thought it would be impossible for the bus to carry anymore passengers. We were wrong! Five minutes out of town it stops again. No one gets off. No one can fit inside. Six people now climb up onto the roof and hang on for dear life.
The bus starts to get its momentum on the bumpy dirt road. Everything starts rattling and dust starts to cloud in the bus. All the windows opened to try blow the dust out. We hit our first big bump. Mothers catch their babies mid air as they pop off the tit while feeding, people frantically grab at anything for support, everyone lets out some kind of moan as they land back in their seats. This would be one of many!
We both looked at each other, laughed,shook our heads and turned our music up to deafen the noise caused by the constant rattling and crying children. For a very short period of time I dozed off. I felt back in St Francis, rolling and bumping in a small east swell out at sea. No direction, just a haphazard roll and bump. A mouthful of dust woke me up as another bus passed us. I looked down into the isle to spot a nice patch of fresh baby burp next to me. Happy days!
After five hours and covering only 180km, we stopped, not to pick up people but for lunch. Marc and I had not expected a break and had packed our own lunches. We climbed off the bus to stretch our legs and check on the bikes. I looked up and stopped breathing for a moment. Our bikes could not be seen under all the sacks of coal that they loaded on top. The coal was not tied down either, just 50kilogram sacks laid down on our wheels, gears and cogs. We were livid, and it was to late to complain, the damage was done if there was any.
We rolled into Iringa just before five o’clock that afternoon, nine hours after leaving Dodoma, a mere 250km away. We were dusty and tired. But first a quick stop to get the extra passengers out before the bus station, just in case the police are at the bus station. Once at the station we jumped up onto the roof of the bus, to have a whole bus station watch the two of us moving coal bags and bring down our bikes. Luckily the damage to the bikes was minimal.
Once we had received all our panniers and loaded up we paid for our bikes’ tickets, only to have a man insisting we ride in his taxi. I’ll never understand! We were sitting on our bicycles! Rather try sell ice to an Eskimo!
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