We have called her home for the last seven months and she has finally been passed onto her new owners, who are looking forward to her guiding them back up towards Kenya over the next few months. If there is one recommendation I could give to any overlander thinking of doing a similar adventure to what we have done going overland through Africa, it would be to buy a Toyota Landcruiser above any other 4×4. What is the reasoning behind it? Let me spell it out for you.

Toyota are the most common vehicle anywhere in Eastern and Southern Africa

You have the advantage with a Toyota. When times get tough (and I can guarantee that they will) not only are parts available in every country, at any time of day, bush mechanics can pull apart and repair almost any part on a Cruiser. The rival 4×4 on this continent is the Land Rover Defender, but no word of a lie, almost 95% of locals and travellers that we have met on our journey have voted Toyota.

Our experienced with broken roof racks, blown clutch cylinders, leaf suspension, and water pump failure all occurred in the middle of nowhere. Whether it was atop the Zomba plateau in Malawi, the desert savannah of the Serengeti, or the mountainous ranges of the Drakensberg the local mechanics have always had us up and running in a few hours, each time, every time.

Toyota’s hold their sale value

South Africa and Kenya are the two countries most recommended to purchase a 4×4 prior to your intrepid adventure through the ‘dark’ continent. Both countries have ample supply of vehicles of varying ages, quality, and price. Out of all of the vehicles we had the pleasure of test driving or inspecting the Toyotas (between the ages of 1980 and 1996) held their value at resale. With any purchase you will generally lose a small amount on its resale, especially if you include all of the gear you aquire during your trip, but for the most part your initial investment will be returned if you are able to advertise the resale and close a deal in either Kenya or South Africa.

Note that at the moment South Africans cannot ‘legally’ import a vehicle (which means convert the foreign registration to South African) but individuals are more than willing to purchase and use on their farms or jump the Botswanian border and register it over there. An import duty of around ~20% is applicable there.

Toyota engines, especially older more hardy engines, will run for 1,000,000 kilometres

Although the 1 million figure is slightly metaphoric, the older Toyota engines are built strong, solid, and will run forever. With general maintenance and care the engine will need minimal work done in order to keep it in top condition. Our trip across Eastern and Southern Africa called on us to replace a few work parts such as front propshaft, wheel bearings, and similar items but after 15,000kms of African ‘roads’ it is to be expected. All of this, yet no work needed on the engine. Experience speaks for itself here.

So to sum it up, we will be handing Helga over to her new overland owners once the cash clears, and then we start the planning for our next adventure…

Now with two sets of potential buyers for Helga once we finish up our travels, and knowing that our new friends from Hluhluwe were rustling up as many funds as they could before giving us a formal offer, we left Sodwana Bay happy and relieved.

Driving back along the N2 through Pietermaritzburg and out to Underberg, we camped the night out at Sani Lodge for a second time. If you are planning on coming out to South Africa you must visit the Drakensberg, and Russell and his crew at Sani Lodge, located on Sani Pass road just out of Underberg are tthe best in the business. Having written the ‘Backpackers Guide to Lesotho’ and helped create many of the walking trails and activities in the Underberg area, Russell is an endless knowledge source on everything to do in the mountains. We picked his brain the next morning after chowing down on cereal with fresh Jersey milk that Sani Lodge produce onsite (also you can’t pass up buying a block of the stunning Jersey cheese from the Giants Cup Tea Garden, next door to Sani Lodge) and started Helga for the mission up Sani Pass.

For those of you that haven’t heard about the Pass, Sani Pass is the only entry point into Lesotho for the Kwazulu-Natal region of South Africa. It also happens to be one of the most hectic 4×4 roads in Southern Africa, so much so that the road is sponsorsored by local 4×4 clubs and tour guides take travellers up Sani Pass as a dedicated expedition. Knowing all of this we were keen to tackle the road in what may be the final mission in our beloved Helga.

It was just around lunchtime that we received a phonecall from our friends in Hluhluwe. Chris and Joanna has scrapped together some funds and gave us their final offer on purchasing Helga, our 1983 Toyota Landcruiser. Before we could agree, they also threw in a night at the Hluhluwe River Lodge… we couldn’t refuse! With the deal done, and the money transfers underway we took off along Sani Pass road towards the South African border post. Receiving our exit stamps for South Africa we started the climb up the Pass just ahead of a number of minibuses and ultra-heavy laden bakkies (‘utes’, in Australian language). The drive in low-range the whole way, gentley and slowly edging up the twisted rock faces, being careful to dodge the boulders and slippery gravel the whole way up. Watching the temp gauge for the entire 5km we stopped several times to allow crazy minibus drivers to  scoot past us and also to admire the stunning views back into the Drakensberg. After the most intense 2 hours of driving (yes, 2 hours for 5 kms…) that we have ever had the pleasure of completing, we made it to the Lesotho border post, at the top of the Sani Pass.

It was here that we learnt a very valuable detail about the Toyota Landcruiser. After making our way through customs we noticed a decent amount of smoke billowing from Helga’s exhaust on startup. Now normally on a cold startup the 4×4 will smoke for about a minute and then stop (an issue with the cold startup solenoid running rich) but we had just driven the most intense 4×4 track in South Africa. Ben almost had a heart attack, especially given we had just sealed the deal on the vehicle sale! We drove on to the highest pub in Africa (although I have heard that there is a pub in Ethiopia that may challenge this!) just over from the border post and sank a Savannah cider, thinking about our options, watching the Basotho people wearing their thick blankets and tending their goats, all while taking in more stunning scenery on the mountian ranges. After lunch we walked back to the our vehicle and noticed something odd at the right front wheel. Looking closer, we found that the rough terrain and intense rock hazards of Sani Pass had snapped one of the leaves in our suspension! Not suprisingly, we made the decision to head back down the Pass to camp the night out at Sani Lodge again before finding a suspension house that could repair Helga’s suspension.

But back on the exhaust smoke and the Cruisers. Once back on level ground we had a phonecall from friends in Durban. We explained the unlucky events of the Pass; the suspension and of course the smoke. Before we could explain anymore Trevor said in passing, “Oh yeah, its just altitude, all Toyota Cruisers run extremely rich as you climb up in altitude. A small adjustment to the fuel by leaning it out fixes it every time.”. Thank god for that. With our minds slightly more at ease we arranged Midland Springs in Pietermaritzberg to replace our springs in the front (which they did an excellent job, for around R700) and started our drive down towards the coast. Funnily enough the lower we came down in altitude the less the car blew smoke, and once at sea level there wasn’t a sign of any unburnt fuel making its way out of the exhaust. There’s a trap for young players. Remember, if you own a Cruiser and are heading into altitude, don’t stress about unburnt fuel blowing out.

With our failed mission into Lesotho now over, the suspension fixed better than new, and the smoke being no issue we both decided to head towards Umkomaas to try and take a break from the four wheel driving and dive with the resident sharks of Aliwal Shoal!

Our voyage over the border between Tanzania and Malawi at the Kasumulu/Songwe post was painless. We had no problems, other than a lack of kwacha (Malawian currency) which is very hard to find ANYWHERE in Tanzania and in fact outside the country at all. The lack of kwacha meant that when we were faced with the TIP costs on the Malawian side, we were stumped.

These you can only pay for in kwacha, and so we had to swap $US10 with a random man in the customs queue with us to make sure we could get Helga into the country. Once we had been stamped by immigration and given our free visa to the country, we had to show health officials our ‘yellow card’ to prove we’d had immunisation against yellow fever. Once this had been finalised, and we’d sorted out the TIP, we had to swap some of our US dollars for kwacha with some of the moneychangers lingering on the other side (technically not permitted but we’d been instructed to do so by customs officials…. go figure) and headed off for Livingstonia.

We flew into Africa a little apprehensive about a number of things that we expected to encounter during our trip across the sparse continent, but the number one concern (not quite fear, but awfully close) is crossing borders in Eastern Africa. The stories you hear online or in the news about corrupt border officials and the bribes that travelers pay for seemingly unnecessary ‘fees or permits’ worried us and even all of the research we undertook online and through friends couldn’t calm the feeling. Driving ‘Helga’, our ‘83 Landcruiser, is the unknown side of our trip and crossing the borders was one of the major concerns until we made it through the Kenyan to Uganda border in under an hour and a half.

In fact the first two borders that we have driven through Malaba from Kenya into Uganda, and Mutukula from Uganda into Tanzania have both come in at under an hour and a half each. When crossing from Kenya into Uganda you do not need a clearing agent. Dozens of men will come out of nowhere to help take your paperwork and get it sorted but DO NOT give anyone other than an official sitting as a desk your original paperwork. At the Kenyan border crossing into Uganda you need to go straight to immigration and have your passport stamped, then head to room one (1) where a customs official will issue your TIP or stamp your carnet  if you have one. We did not use a carnet and had to have a lengthy discussion with the officials about taking our Kenyan registered vehicle out of the country but you can read more about that in our previous posts. From customs you scoot down to the police room at the far end of the building and they check you out of the country again. The Ugandan side is much easier, with us already having our visa prepared in Nairobi, but if you are self-driving then you will need to visit immigration first and then down to a semi-official looking building with a boom gate and have your vehicle paperwork stamped and approved. Again, if you need a TIP then you need to pay in local Ugandan shillings (which we always recommend getting a reasonable amount before trying to enter the country) into a bank account upstairs. Make sure you get a receipt from the bank manager and then have that receipt stamped by the customs official downstairs again. Then, you are free to drive on into Uganda.

The same process applied to crossing from Mutukula in Uganda into Tanzania except we almost tried to run through the Tanzanian side of the border, accidently missing the immigration and customs buildings on the left as soon as you go through the second gate as the myriad of trucks blocks your view. Just be careful!

We stick to two simple rules and so far, touch wood, have not experienced any issues whatsoever. Our rules are as follows:

1. Try and cross the border early in the week, or mid week at the latest.
   This helps eliminate the possibility of bribes or the raising of visa prices, TIPs (Temporary Import Permits for your vehicle), or just blatant demands for cash, on the basis any corrupt officials needed money for the weekend. Obviously corrupt individuals can demand cash at any point in the week but from what we have read and heard from fellow travelers it just eliminates another avenue and will help get you through the border easier.
2. Cross the border as early in the morning as possible.
   Imagine the day of a border official or customs officer; starts work and after clearing a few trucks and a number of overlanders, he comes across an arrogant traveler who demands a speedy visa application and is generally an ass. What happens if after lunch the official runs into another of these troublesome travelers? His friendly or easy going attitude turns sour. If you can be one of the first overlanders to cross his border post in the morning then you boost your chances of catching a happy, willing to help official, making your crossing so much easier.

As we cross additional borders further south into both Malawi and Mozambique we will update this post with the events and issues (if any) of each border but if you apply the rules above they will help minimise the chance of corruption.