Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
tracks in the sand, but for several days the only people I saw were illegal fishermen across
the water, or the distant glow of a campfire at night. Turbo was never far away, and always
on the end of the satellite phone, but this was the first time in the trek I'd felt truly alone:
no Boston, nor Moez, nor any porters constantly chirping in my ear.
On the fifth day, mindful of Turbo's advice, I crested a sand dune and, for the first time
since setting out, the stark landscape was broken by human habitation. About a mile away,
at the bottom of a valley, completely isolated from the main body of the lake and access-
ible only by a small channel, sat what looked like a farm. Even at this distance I could see
the glint of a tin roof, and the shapes of disused tractors rotting in the scrub.
For a long time, I stopped and stared. There was no way around the valley, not without
making a twenty-mile detour to circumnavigate the channel. I was not sure my legs or feet
could take that - but, more importantly, I was not sure the permissions allowed it. I dreaded
to think what it might mean if my government overseers discovered I had gone off-piste.
But, all the while, Turbo's words were in the back of my head:
This is a place for smug-
glers, Lev. If they see you, they'll kill you. The supply lanes are too important.
I proceeded carefully, keeping low amongst the boulders on the banks of the lake, and
following natural
wadis
- dry, ancient riverbeds - to get as close to the farm as I could
without being seen. With the sun beating down, I stopped to catch my breath where a fish-
ing boat was tied up among the reeds. In its meagre shelter, a thought hit me: perhaps I
could steal the boat and avoid the house completely, by rowing through the lake until the
coast was clear? For a moment the temptation was too much - but then I imagined being
caught in the act, and consequences that didn't bear thinking about. No - I would have to
do as I'd done so many times before: put my life in the hands of a complete stranger.
The farmhouse sat on the other side of the channel. Cautiously, I waded through the wa-
ter, my boots sinking deep into the mud as I cast stones into the deeper parts to scare away
whatever crocodiles lurked there. On the far bank, a few camels grazed, unperturbed by
the stranger clambering out of the creek, and fish plopped around in the shadows.
No sooner had I set foot on the bank than there was sudden movement up ahead: the
unmistakeable noise of a human being treading on gravel. I took one step, one step more -
and there, between the parting bushes, stood a man in a white vest, a shotgun in the crook
of his arm.
I froze. The man stared at me. In that moment, I imagined a hundred different possibil-
ities - but all of them boiled down to this: I was a trespasser, a stranger in a strange land,
hundreds of miles from the nearest village, staring down the barrel of a gun.
A voice flurried up, somewhere beyond the gunman. 'Lev!'
At first, I hardly recognised my own name. Then, as the man stepped aside, all my terror
evaporated. Behind the man stood Turbo, waving cheerily.
'Where have you been?' he asked. 'I thought you'd have reached here hours ago . . .'
