Welcome Back!

My return to South Sudan has been quite abrupt.

In early/mid April I made the journey between the two towns that I've lived in while out here in around 7 hours. The end of last week, it took me 29 hours. 116 miles in 29 hours. Good times. And to think that a week before on U.S. roads, I watched 2 movies at the drive-in theatre (the new Indiana Jones wasn't quite as good as I had hoped, but at least it wasn't as bad as the new Rocky), ate a steak dinner, stopped to fill up on fuel and drove 116 miles in less than the 7 hours it took at the end of dry season back in April to cover that distance alone without any of the extras on South Sudan roads. Why didn't I travel to the States during rainy season instead of just at the beginning of it?

Actually, the condition of the road has gotten considerably worse already because of rain, but it was a bridge that had been broken by two separate transport trucks overloaded with goods that caused the problem. The latest truck had fallen in a day before I made the journey, and we hadn't received the information before leaving town. When the bridge had broken the earlier time, people began trailblazing through the swamp beside the road and forded the river at a rocky spot as the water level was fairly low and the rains hadn't picked up so much to make the swamp too wet. By the time I reached the location, many heavy trucks had already begun trying to get through the swamp again, but this time the rains had saturated the ground and many trucks were getting stuck, and those that weren't just created deeper and deeper ruts.

After walking through the area and doing a quick assessment of the conditions, I saw that one by one, trucks which made it to the new river crossing area were able to slowly be pulled up the hill on the opposite side of the river. Trusting in my tough 4-wheel drive LandCruiser and my superior off-road driving abilities, I determined a route that I thought would avoid the paths completely blocked by large stuck transport trucks and enable me to reach the river crossing and make it across the thigh-high river and continue my journey.

Either the truck or my driving skills let me down. I'm inclined to blame it on the tires as the truck I had did not have our heavy-duty mud tires that many of our LandCruisers do. The truck sank too much and I bottomed out and got stuck in the mud. It's a good thing the truck had a winch (which I knew would save me even if my driving didn't). So, as I go to use the winch, it releases only a little before it stops and will no longer go in or out. Apparently when it had been used last, it was wound in without being held taut, and the cable cinched on itself so tight that it was not free to be released or pulled in. Then, as we began to try to dig out and jack up the tires to put branches and logs under for raising the body and getting better traction, it began to rain heavily. After a while, it was still raining and it was too dark to even bother trying more.

So, we slept in the truck. During the night, the rain continued and the water in the swamp continued to increase as the ground got softer and softer. At dawn, there was still a small drizzle, and we got out to assess our current situation. Ahead, we found the river above waist level, and with the water flowing with more force, we determined that proceeding forward was a lost cause. The swampy area we were stuck in also had much more water in it, and the ground was softer, so we knew it would also not be as easy to head back the way we'd come. With all the stuck trucks, there were quite a few people around eager to make a few bucks assisting in cutting branches, helping dig, and assisting in trying to get trucks such as my own out of the mud. Quite a few bills and several hours later, we emerged from the swamp and got back on the road with no option of continuing forward. As we had some items urgently needed in the town we were headed to a couple hours beyond the river, a vehicle from there was headed to the bridge to meet us. When it arrived, I and the items were able to walk across the narrow section of the bridge still intact and complete the journey in another two hours while a different driver took the truck back to the town we had come from.

There is another route that we will now be taking between the towns, but it will now be over 200 miles and maybe 14 or 15 hours if not getting stuck on the road again. Of course, some local guys will again "fix" the bridge by cutting some more trees that they will tie in to the bridge for vehicles to pass on and thereby open up the shorter route again. But, with the size of loads that will be crossing the new makeshift bridge whenever it is completed, it will not take long before another large truck weighs too much and breaks through the bridge again resulting in continued problems traveling.

What a great thing to go through 2 days after returning to Sudan after 3 weeks in the States. Might as well dive in head first. No point in just dipping the toe in to test the water here. That's the only way to do it. But, it's also necessary to have a working winch. They really are life-savers.