THE RECOVERY OR THE BITS THAT I REMEMBER

I was discharged about 6pm and decided to fly to Addis Ababa the next morning at 06h30. Was completely exhausted and saw the Hilton had a desk at the airport so that was the easiest route, although not the cheapest as I discovered on check-out, US$550 for 2 nights.

I spend most of my time sleeping as I was still completely exhausted. I bought a ticket to fly to Bahir Dar to meet up with group again , the Sunday flight was full so I had to take the Saturday night flight. I was still not myself when I had to check out the Saturday. I wandered around Addis the afternoon and got completely lost.

Somehow got to airport and on the plane, flight was delayed for 2 hours and we arrived about 10pm. I notice a sign for a resort that was advertised in the inflight magazine so again, that was the easiest option as I just wanted to sleep. Turned out to be a very nice resort but again spend most of my time sleeping. You get a complementary massage everyday but I had no energy to get me to the spa which was 200m from my room.

Started feeling better the Monday. As I was checking out some of the riders arrived to check into the hotel. They were supposed to have arrived the Sunday but was delayed as they had quite a rough time as well, so I was very relieved that I could check back into the hotel for 2 more nights. I had a 1.5 hour massage and manicure & pedicure so looked at least better and started to feel it as well.

My energy levels started improving steadily from thereon. I rejoined the tour officially the Wednesday morning but decided to ride on the bus and see how I feel and might start cycling from the lunch stop. Not to be, all a bit hazy so all day on the bus. Spend the next day on the bus again but at least had more energy and was quite frustrated that I could not cycle. So when we reached camp I climbed on my bicycle and cycled to the nearest town about 20km away to try find internet and airtime, without any luck but it was nice to be on the bike again. Was quite tired when I got back to camp. Also got my 1st stone after 10 min on the bike, so it was a good introduction.

During my absence the tour had quite a few events. One truck broke down and all our luggage was transferred to another truck. The few days from my fall to the Ethiopian border was unbelievable tough as it was a new route, only 13 riders could finnish all the days. Some 15 riders took a bus to the next rest day and skipped the 1st 2 days cycling in Ethiopia, so it was not only me that was struggling. Unfortunately my tent got lost in all the chaos so sleeping in one of the crew tent, which weighs a ton.