I was tasked with driving down the fairly new section of road from Abu Dom towards Khartoum. No great hardship, in fact a doddle after the last 2 days. It was wonderful knowing we were actually putting some real distance on the clock. My concerns on the tight timescale were getting worse. Previously I was working in days until we had to be at Bahir Dar to meet Jo and Sean. Now I was counting hours and realising that we could only make the deadline by driving constantly at speed.

Eileen took over driving 50km out of the city. As we approached on a fast section of road, travelling at about 50mph, out of the darkness we saw a roadblock of tyres and wood. No lights on it so we both saw it late. I'm not sure which was louder, the scream of the tyres as all 4 wheels locked or us. We stopped with inches to spare and with heart still in mouth and eyes on stalks I had to answer the standard police questions. He agreed that he should really have some lights on his roadblock but making motorists scream seemed to amuse him.

Khartoum is not a fun place to drive. The roads authority have made some significant savings by not bothering with any direction signs. Hence, I was left to jump on and off the bus in the early hours, trying to ask directions from anyone we could find. This may be a dry country, but like towns and cities across the world, Khartoum is full of morons at 2am. Many hadn't heard of the large town of Wad Madani up the road. Some pointed vaguely. We took the road out of town after several suggested this was the right way, only to find the one and only direction sign in Sudan after 40km telling us we were on the wrong road. It finally took us over 4 hours to negotiate Khartoum.

I awoke a few hours later to find we were pulling over. No air in the brakes and no accelerator. 7.30 and we were still 800km from Bahir Dar and Jo was due to land in 1 hour. It felt so disappointing that after 3 full days of hard driving, little sleep and occasional food we were so far away from making it.

Bill took about an hour to work out the problem then we took another few hours to locate the tiny piece of metal that was lodged in the air valve keeping it open. After a 5 hour delay we were off again. Jo was already resigned to the fact that she wouldn't see me before tomorrow, her birthday.

I drove fast for the first 30km. Alas there were some well disguised lumps and bumps in the smooth looking road. I had the front wheels airborne a few times. Bill complained of a bad back and having to catch the spare wheel table before it bounced off the beer terrace. I slowed down a bit.

On the road from Getaref to the border we encountered a toll gate. Well, it was a man in police uniform and another man, with 4 bollards demanding a toll of 13 Sudanese pounds to use the road. We were able to barter them down to 7.5. I took his name and demanded a receipt. We noticed most vehicles went straight through. This wasn't a road toll, it was a foreigner tax. The man agreed that this was correct. Racism is alive and well in Sudan it seems.

Over the next 100km we encountered a further 5 or 6 police road blocks and had to show our passports at each one. We were asked for photocopies at one police hut. No facilities to get a copy, it just seemed like a scam to extract a bribe.. I played dumb, refused to pay and finally we were allowed through.

We were held up to join a convoy, for safety apparently. This was made farcical when the bus in front of us stopped to let off passengers and hence left us well behind the main group.

We sailed through the Sudanese border. Literally. The Ethiopians sent us back over the bridge to complete the exit stamp bit. With the 9pm close fast approaching we managed the Sudanese paperwork in record time and crossed the bridge in to Ethiopia. There is a narrow, rutted path through the undergrowth to the Ethiopian passport office. We got here to find it had shut at 8. Despite begging and pleading, it wasn't going to be open before 7am. We were stuck in No Mans Land overnight.

We spent our remaining Sudanese pounds on a few bottles of beer. Bliss, after 8 days. Ice cold Stim is fine, but not a patch on beer.

I won't be going back to Sudan. Not many good experiences, awful officials and far too much dust.