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Road Trip Packing List
After writing an article about how to pack your motorcycle for a trip now it’s time for your road trip packing list. I will not write down every little detail about what we took with us but just a list of things what for us are absolutely essentials to take with you on a long distance motorcycle trip. Like I said before as well, we are not traveling light. We like our comfort, we are camping most of the time and we cook our own meals. Of course this things matters with what you want to take with you, also the time you will be on the road. If you go on a trip for 2 weeks in the summer you might consider taking a chair and table with you, we are on the road for multiple years so for us it’s like our way of living. There are moments we literally live in our tent so you can imagine we need some comfort as well at that moment.
Road Trip Packing List
Let’s start with the basic needs camping equipment essentials packing list;
- Tent
- Sleeping bag
- Mattress
- Pillow
You don’t need to carry so much winter stuff to make yourself warm. In Africa we hit cold just few countries and we bought blankets to keep ourself warm after that we gave them to local people in villages who need them.
There are some things you can add to this list like;
- Small hammer for the hooks (or find a rock on the road and put it in your pocket)
- Small pump for your mattress if you don’t have automatic air one.
- Ropes to make your tent windproof if necessary or hang on clothes or tide something.
- A tarp shelter, we used it a lot; under the rain can be a roof for us or motorcycle, a footprint to protect our tent from needle or sharp stones.
- Extra hooks, you will loose them sometimes and you need them if you want to make your tent windproof in a storm. Also you can use them if you use your tarp shelter separately.
Extra to carry to make your life comfortable;
Cooking set essentials for motorcycle camping;
- Stove
- Plates
- Fork, spoon, knife
- Sharp big knife
- Pans
- Coffee/Tea cup
- Lighter
- Little wind protection shield for stove
Extra cooking equipment; ( if you have plan to cook almost everyday like us.)
- Bowl for salad or soup
- Wooden spoon
- Cut board
- Little grater 🙂
Emergency cooking food;
Also you always want to carry some food with you so you can cook something if you end up somewhere you won’t be able to find something. Your motorcycle can break down, the road conditions are so bad you won’t make it to your planned destination etc. There are multiple reasons to always carry some basics with you. We always had this with us and after we used it we bought it as soon as possible again.
- Pasta or rice
- Onions and garlic (very small)
- Salt & Pepper
- Tuna in a can (or vegetable)
- Tomato paste
- Cookies (as a back-up snack)
- Water
Clothes:
Don’t take too much you can wash and wear your clothes multiple times no worries;
- 3 or 4 underwear
- 3 t-shirts
- 1 short
- 1 swimming short (what you can use as a normal short as well)
- 1 jeans
- 1 sport outdoor walking pants
- 2 pair of socks (excluding riding socks)
- 1 jacket to keep you warm or protect from wind and rain. We have been carrying our motorcycle jacket inside for multiply use.
- 1 pair flip flops
- 1 pair of shoes (walking/running)
- 1 set thermal clothing
When we need extra warm clothes we bought from bazaar or second hand cheap. When we were leaving the cold we gave who need it.
Another essential part for packing list;
Your toiletries some things are the basic ones and you can add a few things that are always easy to carry;
- Wet tissue (you can use them for everything)
- Bar of soap (for dishes, hand, body and face)
- Toothbrush
- Toothpaste
- Small towel (easy dry)
- Shaving stuff
Electronics, you want to take nice photo’s and keep in touch with the world around you 🙂
- Laptop
- Camera
- Action Camera (helmet)
- Phone
- Cables to charge everything (more then 1)
- Good external charge (ours is 20.000 mah so we can charge our camera as well)
- External hard disk (if you go for a very long time like us 3 TB)
- Multi usb plug (so you can charge more when there is electricity)
- Extra SD-cards
- SD card reader
- Extra battery for the camera
- Batteries (extra for head light etc.)
- Earphones
Other things that are essentials on your road trip packing list for a long distance;
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- Sunglasses
- Headlight
- Water purification tablets
- Sunscreen
- Hand sanitizer
- Mosquito spray (a good one)
- Bandages
- Blisters
- Pills against diarrhea
- Painkillers
- Paracetamol
- Malarone malaria pills (as a anti dose against it) if you come in risky areas
- Drugs what you need to use daily or what you need to be on the road for you and your body.
- Small sponge and soap for cleaning your dishes
- Pen and paper
I think we have quite a list so far, it looks like it never fits on a motorcycle but if you pack it correctly it does 🙂 We are traveling as a couple so we have more space as when you travel alone but still it’s possible to take it with you, just make your own choice and take a look what you think is essential to you. A lot of stuff you can buy small nowadays as well, like a tent or mattress you will pay a bit more but if you use it a lot it’s worth it as well..
Of course you need to bring extra spare parts of motorcycle to long distance as well, you can read here what we all carried with us.
You can check all our equipment for long distance motorcycle road trip packing list
And here also you can read the riding gear for our world trip by motorcycle.
FS
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How to pack for a trip
When you are preparing a long distance motorcycle trip there always comes a point, how to pack a motorcycle for a trip?
When we started our motorcycle journey around the world in 2016 we sit in our room and looked to all we wanted/needed to take with us and we thought it will never ever fit. Now after a lot of experience I would like to share this with you, we changed our bags dozens of times but eventually I think we found for us the best way to pack. I must say, we are not traveling light, we are camping, cooking our self and we like some comfort as well.
There are multiple things what you need to take care about when you are packing your motorcycle, of course the first thing is to find motorcycle panniers/bags that fit to your motorcycle. We have been traveling around the world on Honda CRF250L, they are not big motorcycles and carry capacity is not so much, therefore we think that the cases are heavy to Honda CRF 250L (Why Honda CRF for world trip) and we have chosen SW-Motech soft panniers.
The two most important things while packing your motorcycle is; You need to find everything quick and easy but also you need to make sure you have the right balance. Of course you still want to feel comfortable when you are riding with a balanced motorcycle. Especially in the beginning this is a big challenge to fix everything so you have your balance and all is quick and easy to find.
How to pack for a trip to motorcycle?
When we started to live in a tent it became our home. Therefore, we are looking for comfort and at the same to be light also thinks smart to our essential things to pack for traveling. We have two motorcycles and each Honda CRF250L has Sw-Motech tail bags, saddle bags and tank bags. She has extra drybags on the engine protection.
I will start with our 2 tail bags that we carry. One of them has all our clothes in the main part and toiletries in the side pockets. On the road you won’t need your clothes as you are riding. Your toiletries have easy access all the time also easy in the night when you are ready to jump in your tent and just want to brush your teeth. We call the bag “Clothes bag” The other tail bag is our “Kitchen bag” we carry our stove, daily food, plates and pans etc. in there. Nice to only use when you are cooking and not to heavy for the balance as it is high situated on your motorcycle.
I (fs) carry a small ‘tent’ bag just behind me in my back, there is not a lot in there. We have an extra footprint in there which we use to protect ourselves from the rain as well some times or carry extra water when we were leaving from the main road. Also it has in extra rope an hooks.
Her saddle bags (panniers) she is has one with all our camping equipment (tent, sleeping bags, pillows, mattresses, hammock etc.) We call the bag “Camping bag” Other her saddle bag ‘is “Food & chair bag” We always carry extra food with us if we go off road, mountain road… because we never sure we can find a place for food. And on the top of the bag we carry our chairs and table so if we break for a longer time we can relax or when we arrive to our destination I will set up the tent and she will start cooking so she needs the chairs first from everything else. After open the tent and get out our camping equipment from the saddle bag she can put her motorcycle gear inside it.
For my Sw-Motech saddlebags (panniers) I have one bag we call our “Computer bag” I’m carrying our computer on the road as we learned she drops her motorcycle more often so less change to damage our computer. 🙂 On the bottom of the bag I carry some small heavy things on top of that a bag with the computer, next to it for easy access our shoes, flip flops and pants when we arrive or take a longer break we have easy access to what we need right away. On the other side “All other thing bags” I’m carrying a bag with everything else we have with us, this bag is changing a lot and we are not opening it a lot like motorcycle winter jacket, gore-tex protection, thermal clothes…. I do same thing like her. When we change our shoes and put the computer bags inside to tent I use the saddle bag for motorcycle gears. Our motorcycle boots we have next to the tent and our helmets inside the tent.
Also she carries 2 dry bags on the engine protections from her motorcycle. This bags are for some “Extra tools” we carry and rarely things we use like glue, parts for our GoPro and other small things in here.
We also have small tank bags from Sw-Motech which are our daily “Electronic bags”. We carry cables, batteries, our phones, cameras, action camera…etc.
Apart of all the bags and panniers sometimes she carries our soft cooling bag behind her back including some water and ice so we have a cold drink when it is 45 degrees. Especially if you travel in remote and hot areas you always want to carry this with you with a very easy access. 🙂
She and I have been carrying small tubes under our tail bags which have chains and spare parts of our motorcycles inside. Behind one of my saddle bag I have a small shoe box. We have our tools in it.
I hope I explained it good enough, if you have questions you can always send us a message and we will answer your question.
FS
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Which tyre is best for a motorcycle trip
We have been on a long distance motorcycle trip since July 2016. Our plan is to travel around the world and we made so far 17.000 km in Europe and 50.000 km in Africa. So, we tested some different motorcycle tyres during this motorcycle road trip. Of course we did our research before we left and we got a lot of advice from different people, but most of this people did not go on a motorcycle trip to Africa neither did most of them ride long distance trips by motorcycle. So eventually we learned it all ourselves and now we would like to share our experiences with you, hopefully it helps you a bit on the way with your choice to find what tyres for a long distance trip will be the best.
First of all you need to take a look into what kind of roads you want to ride, this is where you can make a choice for your motorcycle tyres. For those who want to ride a lot in the desert with all the loose sand you need something very knobby. For those who want to pass the fastest way you will need more road tires and for the last group what we belong too those who want to ride everywhere except the real sand dunes you need a all road tire. This is because we will ride on the tar road, gravel road, muddy road, rocky road and some sandy road (no deep desert-sand). We are looking for some adventure 😉
Which Tyre is best for a motorcycle trip?
Our original motorcycles tyre size 90/90/21 (front) and 120/80/18 (rear), we are both riding a Honda CRF 250L and you can look for why we choose the Honda CRF250L.
She has started our motorcycle road trip from Turkey and we met on Germany after that we went to the North Cape and travel around Eastern Europe until we had a little experience how we can ride motorcycle because we had zero ride experience in the beginning.
Our first tyres where the original Honda CRF 250L tyres IRC Dual Purpose. After that we had Heidenau K60 just before start our Africa trip by motorcycle from Morocco. We changed two times more our tyres in Africa and used Michellin T63 and Mitas E07.
IRC Dual Purpose GP-21F / GP- 22 P
This is the standard tire Honda delivers the Honda CRF 250L with. We started our journey with it and made 17.000 km without change front and rear tyres, this was a bit of a surprise as the tires are knobby. It was our Europe journey and we didn’t ride motorcycle before, therefore we were riding mostly tar roads and ‘good’ gravel roads in Europe. The tires is IRC dual purpose and we could ride on the dust and mud with it.
Conclusion, we where very surprised they lasted so long (for a knobby tyre), they did their job and we felt safe riding with them on all different roads also during the rain. Just use them till they are finished.
Heidenau K60
We where very happy in the beginning with this choice Heidenau K60, before we only ride with the original Honda CRF 250L tires, so this was a huge step forwards. Especially as we started on the tarmac roads, we ride about 2000 km in Greece, Italy and Morocco before we started riding some off-road in Morocco.
We passed some amazing mountain roads in Morocco, they where all in pretty good condition and we where still very happy with our tires 🙂 Eventually we even try to ride a bit in the desert sands (or we can say soft sand) but this was not a great success but I think our motorcycles are just not strong enough for this either when they are fully packed. When we ride further down south the rear tire begin to loose more and more profile ( it was so fast to loose in 10.000 km after IRC experience), so we started to look for new tyres. Unfortunately this is not a easy thing in Africa, especially with our motorcycles as they are small for Western standards and big for African standards. With a lot of luck we found one new and one second hand rear tires in Nigeria with a lot of help from the locals.
Conclusion, the Heidenau K60 is a good tire but doesn’t last long enough for a long distance motorcycle trip also who we met on the road and used the K60 they were saying same thing like us. Anyway, we ride 16.000 kilometers with the rear tire, need to say the front lasted all the way to Cape Town (South Africa) 24.000 kilometers. So, we skipped some off-road ride because of that.
Michellin T63
We got our ‘new’ tires in Lagos (Nigeria) and we changed them in Gabon, just before we started a 280 km long mud road from Ndende (Gabon) to Dolisie (Republic Congo) (Movie). For this road you do need some profile on your tires as it can be very muddy all the way. They did a good job on this road but on the tar roads it’s not the best tire ever but that makes sense as it is a knobby tire. We ride in total about 8.000 kilometers with the Michellin T63 tires.
Conclusion, the Michellin T63 is a good off-road tire for mud, gravel, rocks or small sand roads. When you are using it on a tarmac road it won’t last so long as the profile is more knobby as a normal all-road tire.
Mitas E07
We arrived in Cape Town, South Africa during the winter time so it was a good place for us to take a rest and we decided to fly to the Netherlands from there to visit my family, my first niece was born and we really wanted to see her. Also this was a good moment for us to buy new tyres in Europe as they are much cheaper as in South Africa, by this time we learned a lot more from other riders on the road who we met or had contact with and also, we have learned how we can ride and which tyres is the best to motorcycle trip for us. 🙂
Most of them where using the Heidenau K60 (scout) or the Mitas E07, as for us the Heidenau didn’t last long enough we decided to try the Mitas E07. Also we found a good deal for the tires and we could take them with us with our flight, we packed them really well so we didn’t had a problem with the size of the package. Also we choose a bit bigger size for the rear tire, we now use 130/80/18 on our Honda CRF250L.
We started in Cape Town (South Africa) with the Mitas E07 and ride through all circumstances due weather and underground. In Africa we ride till Sudan, unfortunately our African adventure ended there (she couldn’t get Egypt visa because of some political issue between two countries) and we air freight our motorcycles from Sudan to Turkey. At the moment I’m writing this article we are still using the Mitas E07 since Cape Town we made 26.000 kilometers with front and rear and I’m not thinking about changing them yet.
Conclusion, the Mitas E07 is so far our best tyre to long distance motorcycle trip and we will continue with them as they are lasting very long and we feel comfortable riding with them.
What we have been learning on the road we always like to share. You can find playlist to watch from our maintenance here :
FS
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Motorcycle road trip | What spare parts to carry
We are on a motorcycle road trip to travel around the World. When we where preparing our motorcycle long distance trip we had a few questions in our mind one of them was what spare parts to carry with us during such a long road trip for our motorcycle.
When you decide to go on a road trip by motorcycle in Europe, USA or Australia you don’t need to think so much about what spare parts to carry on motorcycle to repair or for your routine control. But if you are in the nature and your motorcycle breaks down there is an option your phone is not working. At those moments small spare parts or tools can make your life very easy.
Also it can be more difficult to find spare parts of motorcycles in some countries. Believe us we have a lot of experience about it on our Africa trip, which was travel around Africa by motorcycle for two years, 50.000 km and 33 countries. Yes it was a long distance motorcycle road trip to Africa.
After all our experience on the road we can tell a lot about it so our advice will be to carry some parts with you on the road. We made a list what we carried or learned to carry (the hard way) with us.
What spare parts to carry with you on motorcycle for long distance trip?
- Inner tube
- Fork seals
- Wheel bearings
- Valve (extra for your inner tube)
- Oil filter
- Chain
- Set of sprockets
- Clutch cable
- Spark plug
- Fuses
- Break pads
- Clutch pedal
- Fuel pump
Motorcycle spare part oil filter change These are mostly small parts and easy to carry, of course it depends on how long your trip will be. For example you can only carry a front inner tube as they can fit (for a while) in your rear wheel as well.
If you are visiting our website first time you don’t know which kind of motorcycle we choose for word trip and why? Both of us have been riding Honda CRF 250 L. When we started our motorcycle world trip I had no experience to ride motorcycle. She had a little motorcycle experience from 10 years ago but only how to ride motorcycle on a tar road.
Not many people travel long distance trip with 250 cc motorcycle therefore it wasn’t easy to learn what spare parts to carry with us specific for our Honda CRF 250L. After write some blogs and friends who travel some part of Africa by motorcycle we learned and decided what to do.
Doing maintenance on our motorcycle in Tanzania What spare parts to carry for a Honda CRF 250L on a motorcycle road trip?
We wanted to travel around Africa. (West, South and East) So, we checked how many km we were going to ride in Africa. After a rough calculation we came to 40.000 km. We checked the technical book of Honda CRF 250L what is the routine maintenance. After that we took spare parts what is writing on the list.
- Two extra chains and a pair of chain sprockets for each motorcycles.
- Two rear break pads.
- Six oil filters.
- Two air filters.
- Two spark plugs (iridium).
- Extra two front lamp (not necessary to carry).
- Extra fuses
- One pair extra inner tube.
Motorcycle spare parts air filter change on the road Unfortunately, it wasn’t enough what spare parts we carried for our Honda CRF 250L. Because in Nigeria, we didn’t know that a truck pushed me from the road and I entered a deep pothole. After that I had a problem with one of the fork seals, we ended waiting for it two weeks in Lagos, Nigeria it needed to come from South Africa.
Also, we didn’t know that we could have fuel quality problem in Sudan and our motorcycles could stop after buy petrol because of a fuel pump problem. We didn’t have a new fuel pump, luckily we could just clean it but it didn’t work well we changed them as soon as we had one. Fuel pump was okay but we stuck a while in Khartoum, Sudan.
You might think you are able to find most parts somewhere and sure you can for some of them in bigger cities, but do you want to wait 2 days in the middle of nowhere for a inner tube while you can carry 1 with you as well? We don’t want to either, I broke my valve in the Democratic Republic Congo (DRC) in the middle of a village believe me I was very happy I could just put in a new one.
Flat tire in the Democratic Republic Congo (DRC) This crew surrounded us in just a few minutes of time, in 20 minutes we had a hundred people around us (all very friendly).
Broken valve Ultra heavy duty inner tube in the Democratic Republic Congo (DRC) Another story is about our clutch pad problem. When we arrived in South Africa our Honda CRF 250L motorcycles were already 48.000 km. So, we knew that it can be problem with our clutch pad soon because we already ride 50.000 km on our motorcycle road trip. They have a Honda motorcycle service in South Africa but spare parts were really expensive, much more than in Turkey, nearly 50% more. Now we got lucky as her father was going to visit us in South Africa therefore he carried 2 sets clutch pads for us. 🙂 Her Honda CRF 250L’ s clutch pad we changed in Tanzania at 58.000 km, mine we changed in Ethiopia when my motorcycle made 65.000 km. We really don’t like to change parts when it’s not necessary so we just carry them with us if that’s possible.
Changing clutch pads Honda CRF 250L in Ethiopia You can also check what spare part to change and which kind of maintenance we did in 70.000 km for our Honda CRF 250cc.
What we have been learning on the road we always like to share. You can find playlist to watch from our maintenance here :
FS
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Travel Around The World | Unexpected Breast Cancer
We have started to travel around the world by motorcycle on July 2016, we didn’t know that we could have a news middle of our journey which is unexpected Breast Cancer. When we were in Africa I had a smuggled passenger inside me, who was false-hearted getting bigger day by day.
We made it! CAPETOCAPE Life of journey: Travel around the world by motorcycle
We made almost 70.000 km in two years and visited 55 countries, 21 in Europe and 34 in Africa. We just met before the journey and we were so exciting to have a drivers license, buy motorcycle and start our journey of life, which is learn to ride motorcycle and fun, discover the world with your own eyes, try to understand life much more on the road. So we were running everywhere to get ready in a short period for travel around the world by motorcycle.
We were ready in 3 months and we hit the road, no real planning just go. First journey was Europe to have a little experience how to ride motorcycle but also how to live in a tent before turning around Africa. I was just coming 40 years old and totally a healthy person. After 4 months in Europe we jumped to the Africa continent. We were in Africa almost 20 months, our journey started in Morocco and end in Sudan. It was a dream to turn around Africa by motorcycle and we did it. Unfortunately, we couldn’t enter Egypt because of some politic issue between Turkey and Egypt. He is from Holland and I am from Turkey. So we had only one option to get out of Africa, which was to air fright our motorcycles from Sudan to Turkey.
The motorcycle are ready for custom service officer to check plate and number from it When we were saying goodbye to the African continent we were already making a plan how we will keep continue to our journey and what is next. We were agreed to travel a little in Turkey and visit my family after that ride to the Balkans and than ship the motorcycles to the USA. Of course, we didn’t know which kind of surprise was waiting for us and would have changed everything in a second.
Smuggled Passenger: A tumor – Breast Cancer
When I was leaving from my country I was just before 40 and totally healthy. I don’t go to hospital that much and don’t use medicines as well, just some normal controls. I have some basic genetic problems. Which could be pass from my family to me but nothing for cancer. Of course, I knew about breast cancer and the possibility that every 1 to 8 women can get it. Therefore I was doing monthly controls on the journey but nothing! The tumor was with me almost all our Africa journey but I couldn’t feel nothing or see anything different. So, we were totally healthy and having fun anytime.
All our breast cancer story video :
When we were going to Turkey I was thinking to check-up first even if I am not feeling sick, it was the same for him as well. Did I do? NO! We flight to Holland to visit his family. Did he go to any hospital? NO! Because we are healthy…
But I felt a little cyst in Holland. Definitely the first thing in Turkey to checked, no excuses. Yes, I went to hospital after arrived to Turkey in week. When I visited the doctor, who was thinking it is just cyst and looked like nothing a problem but I must go to mammography because every women needs to control after 40 years. No problem because I was fine.
Nightmare has started. They called us next day from mammography and took me ultrasound so fast. Unfortunately they were thinking about malign, means cancer tumor, I must see the doctor again and go to MRI. We were surprised because I didn’t have any signs from breast cancer. MRI came with the same results. I was just lucky because what I found on my breast was nothing. The tumor was another point and was so deep to find with hand control. Maybe, the cyst never show up I could wait to go mammography a couple of months.
Still, they were saying smaller than 2 cm and only one tumor, nothing divide yet so nothing on lymph nodes. This is really good news. We must learn more about the tumor therefore I went to biopsy. After a week they told us it is triple positive and half aggressive cancer tumor. We couldn’t say anything and we couldn’t talk about the word as well. “Cancer” word was too much for us. I wanted the operation as soon as possible because we wanted to continue soon to travel around the world by motorcycles, Balkans are waiting for us. It is just basic operation, right?
Before operation I went PET/CT to check all my body. I suppose my doctor was scare that we will run away with motorcycles after the operation. The result was clear as well. Happy time, of course.
It was operation day. When I opened my eyes I got the news; The tumor was more than 2 cm and my 2 lymph nodes has involved as well. Therefore the doctor took my lymph nodes under the shoulder. They were telling me to do some exercise later to open my arm again well also I must be so careful all my life with my arm to infection, any bite and lymph edema. I was just in shock and had nothing to say. But We were still smiling because cry never ever help…
We were waiting again second pathology results because this time we need 15 days. I was on the motorcycle again in 3 weeks after the operation. It was an amazing feeling to ride again and felt so much freedom. I know that I must be so careful with my arm but so much powerful thing to be on and show yourself. If you want you can do it.
After breast and lymph nodes operation first ride 🙂 Unfortunately, we didn’t want to accept but we knew that chemotherapy treatment is on the road for me because they found small parts in my lymph nodes. After two weeks the doctors were telling us to my breast cancer is stage 2B, means still early breast cancer, I need chemotherapy for my future especially if I want to be on the road, ride motorcycle and sometimes go to remote areas.
Chemotherapy, radiotherapy, Herceptin therapy, etc. all will take around a year. We just past 1,5 months (we had many problems in it that is not a subject for the article). The doctors and we are agree that if everything will go good in the next 4,5 months we can start to travel in Turkey by motorcycle also we can have short trips to Balkans and other surrounding countries as well because I need to have a injection for cancer (Herceptin) every 3 weeks and they need to be sure that I am ok.
October is the breast cancer awareness month every year.
We wanted to write the article because of it because breast cancer is look like so innocent if it is in a early stage. I was on the road therefore I couldn’t start to mammography when I came 40 but when I came back to my home country I didn’t go as soon as possible. I waited 7 weeks more until they find a small cyst on my breast from monthly hand control.
Breast cancer is not genetic to find you or if you have it can grow unaware maybe you cannot understand it with your hand or see it. We want to tell: Please, go to your control, have a mammography don’t be late. Fight early and keep continue to follow your dreams and enjoy your life.
We will be on the road soon and keep continue our journey of life: Travel around the world by motorcycle…
Breast cancer cannot be a problem travel around the world by motorcycle. 🙂
Are you curios how I fell in love with FS and all my life has changed? click to link : HOW DID I MEET MY LOVE?
GS
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Road trip Africa by motorcycle | Cost of travel
Our road trip Africa by motorcycle was 563 days and we made around 50.000 km; cost of travel was 25 USD everything include pppd. We started to ride motorcycle from Morocco, we passed 33 countries and had to finish in Sudan. 🙁
Road trip Africa by motorcycle | Cost of travel
When we started our world trip we decided our daily budget can be max 50 USD for both of us include everything (petrol, visas, food, accommodation, shipping / airfreight, fly, etc.) but it was except to climb Kilimanjaro, Gorillas trekking and safari to road trip Africa by motorcycle. They can change our cost of travel a lot because they are expensive things to do. This are options to do and we saved money for it before out of our budget. We could do all before leave Africa, some things are a once in a lifetime. 🙂
We divided Africa in three parts: West Africa, Southern Africa and East Africa trip by motorcycle. Southern Africa was a little hard part to keep our budget as it was wintertime so we needed some hotels sometimes and there is a lot to do and see.
Total road trip Africa cost was 11.975 USD per person for 19 months.
You can see on the basic photo of our calculate which part of Africa how much we spent in Africa trip.
The cost can change a lot depend on your journey what you want or how you want to travel. When we were traveling in Africa most of the time we stayed in the tent and cooked ourself.
We did a lot of wild / bush camping or set up the tent in front of a hotel or at the car parking. Also, a lot of people invited us to their home to stay, drink coffee or for dinner. We are so much thankful to them we made good friends and they helped us to keep continue our journey. So, we didn’t pay total 211 days for accommodation we slept in people houses or bush/wild camping.
Africa visas cost was total 1.850 USD for per person, include customer service, motorcycle traffic insurance and tax.
Visas price could be more if we entered more countries. We skipped some countries because they are so small and we have to pay 100 USD per person. You can find all details for African visas and border crossing .
Fuel is cheaper than Europe, US, Australia….etc. Our motorcycles goes around 30 km on 1 liter petrol.
Each motorcycle took 1.554 USD fuel in road trip Africa.
Other biggest parts were food and still hotel/camping even if we stayed 38% free of Africa trip. We can say that we spent approx. 8 USD each person when we stayed in a motel/hotel/hostel/campsite and spent 5 USD per person for food. (not include alcohol or cigarette)
5.500 USD was per person motel/hostel and market/food cost travel in Africa.
How much left from cost we spent for road, parking, transfer, shopping for motorcycle, sim cards, healthy…etc. Would you like to read all details country by country to cost of travel Africa? You can look at : West Africa trip cost and Southern Africa trip cost and Eastern Africa trip cost.
When you look to details you will see that airfreight motorcycle and our fly ticket, stay in Ethiopian tribes, visit Dallol in Ethiopia, do wildlife safari were include the total price of spent. 🙂
Begin of the article I wrote that our plan is spend daily 25 USD per person in world trip by motorcycle. So, we suppose to spend 14.075 USD total but we did less. It means we save money in the trip as well. 🙂
14.075 (we have decided) – 11.975 (we spent) = 2.100 USD We saved money more on the West coast motorcycle trip. Of course we didn’t keep money in a save account. We climbed Kilimanjaro. We knew that we were going to save money in Kenya as well. Therefore we visited gorillas and climbed Nyrigango in Virunga Park, Congo.
So, end of the Africa road trip we did everything what we wanted and daily cost of travel was 25 USD all-inclusive per person per day.
GS
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Overlanding Africa | Motorcycle trip : First county is Morocco
Overlanding Africa – motorcycle trip is starting! We have no experience to ride motorcycle but who cares we just want to live our dreams!
We have no idea why we choose to start one of the hardest roads in the world. Our plan is turn around Africa so will ride motorcycle west, southern and east Africa. We would like to share all our overlanding Africa journey on our website; African visas – safety- border crossing and bribes, our West Africa, Southern Africa, East Africa trip, all costs, about motorcycle and camping…
Overlanding Africa – Motorcycle trip : 1- Morocco
This is where we start our adventure in Africa! We arrived at Tangier Med port around 9 pm after a 28-hour boat trip from Barcelona, it’s already dark and we didn’t have a place to stay. When we booked the boat it was saying we would arrive at 3 am in the morning, we need to do customs when we arrive at the port so we thought we could go slowly through the process and start riding when the sun comes up. 🙁
Journey just started and we already have a friend
While waiting to board in Barcelona we meet another rider Christopher from Germany, he will be traveling in Morocco for 3 weeks with his motorcycle. We didn’t book accommodation on the boat as we found it was too expensive, but lucky as where Christopher did and invited us to his room for a few hours of sleep. We leaved the boat together and find out our passports need to be stamped on board, we missed this call and need to go back. I took her passport and go back on board with Christopher to stamp our passports and she stayed with 3 motorcycles. We went pretty smooth through customs but took two hours.
We decide to ride together to Asilah.
There we went to a campsite, Christopher to a hotel. But our first night ‘overlandig Africa- motorcycle trip’ wasn’t in the tent because they said that sleep in the tent 4 USD in a room 5 USD. Okay, take the room because it was November and cold outside. and we decided to meet the day after again to walk a bit around the city centre. The next day we get a bit of the taste of Morocco, we are enjoying together and making a plan what road to ride the day after to Fes on of the bigger cities in Morocco.
Asilah campsite, Morocco Next city is Fez
We found a nice road through the mountains towards Fez and all of us were really enjoying the landscape and mountain roads. Arrived Fez and we tried to find an affordable campsite what is much harder as we expect and eventually we end up in a hotel near the city centre. We walked a bit around the maze of Fez, it was really beautiful to see but all those sellers want something from you. After Fez we decided this is the last city we are visiting in Morocco. We wanted go to the Atlas Mountains to enjoy nature and the local life.
Fez, Morocco Time enjoy on Atlas Mountain…
From Fes we were heading south and passing some beautiful roads around the Atlas mountains, we were enjoying so much and looking for more challenging roads in the mountains. We found some mountain passes around Tinghir so that’s our destination. From here we crossed into the Atlas Mountains and ride with our motorcycles through the Gorges Toudra (gorges du todra), it’s all very impressive to see and with all the lovely curves it’s a true motorcycle paradise. We took a lot of breaks to enjoy all the amazing views we were seeing, I never expected this from Morocco.
Gorges Du Todra But it’s amazing we ride all the way to Agoudal where we find a cheap hotel to spend the night. We didn’t try to camping because it was already degrees was below zero. We don’t think so that clever idea camping with summer gears.
During the last hours of daylight we walked Agoudal village to have a better taste of the local life. We spent time with children and the local life. The owner of the hotel was very friendly and maked us the best tajine we ate in Morocco also he played music for us and his friends who were hanging out in the restaurant. We woke up early in the morning for breakfast. The owner warned us would have started snow when we ride. This means the village is not reachable anymore for the outside world. So we need to start riding soon as we have a long gravel road ahead of us.
We ride again through some amazing mountain passes on all the gravel roads, these were the first for me to ride and I was really enjoying. While riding we could see the weather changing and it will start to rain soon, we were not so high anymore so snow will not fall here. We arrived at one the highlights for motorcycles in Morocco the Gorges de Dades, it’s beautiful to see and even more nice to ride it. It was wet so we need to be careful but still we were enjoying a lot. After passing the Gorges de Dades we started to search for a hotel and soon we found one where we can put our motorcycles inside a garage so they could safe. There are some walking trails near the hotel to the mountains where we can visit some very old villages. December is not clever idea to ride motorcycle around Atlas mountain.
Gorges De Dades Do you think we can ride motorcycle on desert? 🙂 Going Sahara desert.
From here we decided that we want to go towards the desert, the biggest desert in the world the Sahara desert. We were riding through Ouarzazate to M’Hamid where the desert begins and we found a beautiful camp spot at the edge of the sandy desert and we were watching an amazing sunset, in the night we sat outside and watched an amazing sky full of stars.
M’Hamid, Sahara Desert We wanted to try and pass some part of the desert with our motorcycles; there was a short cut to a gravel/rocky road, which will bring us to the high sand dunes of the Sahara desert. Full of courage we start our adventure the lesson is you need to keep up the gas so you can fly over the sand, this was easier to say then actually do.
She fells of the bike a few times and I need to turn back to help her, all of this under the burning sun (around 42 degrees), after a few kilometers we decided this is not doable for us. So we returned and took a longer way around to find the gravel/rocky road to our destination. We followed the road but it leads to a dead end? I tried to ride a bit more to see if I could find another road but unfortunately I didn’t find anything. So we turned back again to follow a different road, which we could see on our map.We had about 200 kilometers in front of us, the road started pretty smooth we were enjoying but getting tired as we were riding already 7 hours. When we need to turn right at one point the road get worse and much more rocky so this slows down our speed a lot, also we need to pass some dry rivers with loose sand in it. Night started to fall and we were exhausted so we decided to stop and set up the tent somewhere. We didn’t see a single car for a long time and there were no houses around us so we didn’t need to hide ourselves. This has been one of the most amazing nights so far, between the mountains and the desert with literally nothing around us it was so silent and so pure. We had our own million stars our camping site :).
Bush camp, Sahara Next morning when we woke up and took a look on the map we saw we have more than 150 km in front of us to reach Sahara desert dunes, we tried a bit more but after 30 km later we decided to turn the road was not getting better, just worse and we were tired of our brain shaking.
We turned our road to Atlas ocean.
We will see a lot more of the Sahara desert in the Western Sahara and Mauritania. We ride through Foum Zguid to Tata where we found a campsite in Tata, as we were here in the mountains it gets pretty cold in the night so the owners offer us to opened our tent in the kitchen, which nobody was using so we had some shelter.
We decided to stay for a few days as we like the city and we wanted to explore a bit around with the motorcycles. We ask around to find some nice roads and quickly we are on the motorcycles and riding in the middle of nowhere was we could make some nice photos from us with the motorcycles.In Tata we celebrated my birthday as well, we pick a nice road to ride, which brings us through the mountains and some very nice oases. It was a perfect day for riding and we were enjoying a lot, what a beautiful country this is.
After 6 days, we leaved Tata and heading towards the coastline which we will follow all the way to Mauritania. But first we were again riding through the Anti-Atlas mountains (aka Lower Atlas mountains) again this was very beautiful. We did wild camping again at some nice places if we meet someone they didn’t bother us just gave a big smile and asked if everything is fine.
When we arrived at the coastline we tried to find a place to spend the night around Tarfaya, there is only one campsite but they asked too much money for nothing at all so we decided to find a place ourselves and wild camp again. We followed a narrow road along the sea where they actually have small fishermen houses everywhere but in the dunes we could hide our self a little bit we thought. We found a nice place, but it was still pretty close to one of the fishermen houses so we went there and ask permission to set up our tent for one night.
They said it’s ok and we opened the tent, we were watching a beautiful sunset and when it got dark some policemen’s arrived. They didn’t like the idea we were camping there and they wanted us to pack up and go to the campsite about 30 km back, we told them we cannot ride in the dark and we didn’t want to leave here. The policeman asked me to go with him to his post where he can call the chief and explained the situation. It seems the problem that all people living there are refugees and they cannot guarantee our safety in the night but they understand we cannot move anymore. The solution was to move next to the policemen house and spend the night there. There was a small house where nobody is right now, we opened the tent inside there and we need to cover the motorcycles. This was ok for us only this means we need to pack everything again but that’s the way it was. We had a quiet and good night. In the morning we went to the police officer his house and drunk tea with him before we leaved, another special adventure like this 🙂
From here we are riding into the Western Sahara. For us Morocco is a true motorcycle paradise, also the food is amazing and the country is very cheap to travel in.
FS
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Our last country in Africa is Sudan…
Sudan is totally different world after Ethiopia, in many ways. It is not a touristic country at all with only 10.000 people visiting in a year and most of them will probably have a background in Sudan. For us it was a country we needed to pass on our way to Egypt from where we would ship our motorcycles to Turkey.
We did hear a lot of good stories about the people in Sudan so of course we where very curious about it, especially after Ethiopia what was so intense and where you are never alone and everyone wants something from you when you stop with the motorcycle. Well I need to say all stories where completely true, we never seen so generous people.
We arrived in Sudan border afternoon and we left from the border at the end of the day; we already knew we would be able to wild camp again in Sudan after a long time.
For us this is still the best way to spend the night as it gives us the feeling of freedom. We ride till the sun nearly disappeared from the sky and we found a nice spot to open the tent and see the last bit of the sunset. We prepared a meal and after that we set up the tent. In Sudan it is very hot so we decided only our inside tent was enough so the wind could keep us from sweating. Also nice is that we can see everything outside without opening any zips. We slept like babies and woke up with daylight at 5 am, after a fast breakfast we hit the road again. In Sudan we need to ride early in the day and late afternoon, at the moment the temperature was getting up to 48 degrees and no clouds for any shadow on the road.
No petrol! And our motorcycles broke down in Al-Qadarif 🙁
We had 100 km to the first city is called Al-Qadarif; here we needed to look for petrol. The petrol in Sudan is very cheap 0,18 cents per liter. The only problem is that at the moment when we where there (May 2018) there was not enough petrol available. We passed several gas stations and asked for petrol, 1 of the wanted to sell us some for almost ten times more the price from what you pay at the pump. This was too much for us, after talking a bit more someone else came to look for petrol. They asked and drive away pretty fast, one guy (from the gas station) pointed me to the car to follow them.
I told her get ready we needed to rush, I straightaway started the motorcycle and ride behind them. Next gas station I was behind him, no gas again. He drive away again, when a traffic light came I went next to the car and explained him we are looking for petrol as well, he looked like a bit confused but then said, ok follow us. We passed several stations without success till we came to a gas station with a cue of hundreds of cars. Wow, this petrol problem is serious!
The car went straight to the front of the cue and talked a bit with the guy working and he filled up his car, unbelievable! He looked at us and said come, come you can get full now as well. They filled both our tanks but we needed 5 liters extra so we where able to make it to Khartoum (the capital of Sudan). He didn’t want to fill the bottle we had (we learned later this is illegal) but the entire crowd pushed him that we really needed it and he should fill our 5-liter bottle, luckily he did. Happy us, we started the engines and left the station.
We ride 500 meters with our new petrol and all of a sudden my motorcycle refuses to go, no way I did see we got petrol, not diesel! My motorcycle dropped down once, I started it again and we ride a bit more to see if it will work normally or not? Then she told me she had the same problem; this was not good! We looked on the map and found a hotel pretty close, this was the best place to go and we could check the motorcycles what was wrong? We tried to call our mechanic friend and her brother in Turkey to see if they had a explanation for what happened to our motorcycles. They told us the same as we said to each other, it cannot be that something broke down at the same moment for two motorcycles. It needs to be the fuel, but there is no other fuel available. We learned from the locals that the quality is not good and more vehicles have the same problem.
We decided we needed to drain the fuel, open and clean everything. The tank, spark plug, and tubes all we can find. First I tried to get both our spark plugs out, mine went normal but hers was a big fight (which I eventually lost). It was stuck and moving very hard, but it looked like it was moving so I pressed a little more and then boom my tool broke. Damn, my spark plug is out and I don’t have a tool anymore to get it back in. I took my broken tool and walked around the area, I found a local motorcycle and a few more people talking to each other. I showed my tool, and pointed to his spark plug (what was visible) and explained where mine was. They talked a bit and one guy took the broken tool and left. We couldn’t understand each other for a single word but I had the feeling I had no other option then to trust this guy could find a new one or repair the tool. I walked back to her and told her what happened, we sit down and waited. After one hour he came back with the repaired tool in his hand smiling, we both got a big smile as well and said thank you. First I did was place my spark plug back to where it belongs.
In the mean time it got late and dark so we decided to call it a day, have dinner and go to sleep. The next morning we can test the motorcycles again and see what happens. In the morning I started both motorcycles and started riding a little bit, no problem at all… What is going on? Is the whole problem to do with the temperatures, is everything getting to hot? We decided to still work on the motorcycle and clean the tank and some of the hoses that we can. It was too late to leave now anyway because it was hottest time of the day. After cleaning everything we started the motorcycles, they run so we decided to start packing them and leave around 5 pm when it’s getting a bit cooler. We ride 5 km and the same problem came back, we stopped and talked to each other and decided lets push the motorcycles a bit further till we find a place for bush camp, it is to hot to stay in a room.
In 20 km we find a good spot hidden from the road, we figured out the hot and the petrol must be the problem. We still had some petrol from Ethiopia as well with us what was a better quality, ok we can mix our petrol and leave with the sunrise to reach the next city and see how the motorcycles react to that.
We woke up at 4 am and after a quick breakfast we started riding at 5 am. Of course we where a little scared for what can happen now. They both went very smooth, no problems at all to ride. We pushed ourselves to not stop so much and made the 200 km in about 3 hours.
With all the mixing of petrol and emptying the tank we lost some fuel so we needed to buy another 5 liters to get to Khartoum, we stopped at a gas station what had a enormous cue again. I told her to go with the empty 5 liter bottle put on your best smile and hopefully he can help us. She walked to the pump but no one was getting petrol yet, she asked a military guy on a motorcycle how to get petrol and he pointed her to a men sitting in front of the station who was probably the owner of the station. She explained she needed just 5 liters to get to Khartoum and said her motorcycle is on the road, luckily he fell for the smile and give us 5 liters of petrol. Ok, that problem is fixed. 🙂
We had no option to ride, must stop Al Hasahisa…
We sit down somewhere to have a coffee and talked what we should do? Stay here or see if we can push ourselves another 200 km to Khartoum? We decided to go to Khartoum; there we could get rest. We just left the city and the problem started again 🙁 probably it’s to hot again for the motorcycles.
We stopped at the next village, which is called Al Hasahisa at a coffee place it was now 10 am. While drinking our coffee and eating our lunch we were talking what could we do next? We could not sit all day this small place because if we want to ride again we must wait around 6 pm to the weather and our motorcycles tank also engine really cool down. Suddenly, one man came to me and asked where we are from and do we have any problem on motorcycles? After explain what is going on he asked if we want to come to his house to rest a little bit and take a shower. I didn’t think twice and said yes straight away.
We followed Mamdouh to his house and met with his family, they brought us juice a bed and showed where the shower was. During the day we got relaxed and played a little bit with his 2 daughters, when he came back from work we ate dinner together. Then Mamdouh said to me we should stay the night with him and his family as well, we said ok and decided we can sleep here and leave early in the morning. Khartoum was 150 km away if we leave early we hopefully could make it without any problems.After a good night rest, we said bye to Mamdouh and his family. For us this is an unbelievable thing to just open your house for 2 complete strangers who stop in the city you live on 2 motorcycles. This is Sudan, the country with amazing hospitality from the people.
Finally we arrived Khartoum but with tear on her eyes 🙁
We started riding and everything went pretty smooth till we reached Khartoum, this is the capital and biggest city so that means a lot of traffic, which is not good for our motorcycles right now. Let’s just say we had a very big fight to make to our campsite in the middle of the city. She got very emotional when we arrived, these motorcycles are our babies while we are traveling, it is not feeling good if we need to treat them like this, we are breaking them.
After we calmed down we set up the tent and I bought a few cold drinks and we chilled out. We called Mohammed a local biker to meet in the night at the campsite to have a coffee or juice.
After one hour our friend Theresa showed up which we met before in Addis Ababa, she is Norwegian and traveling on a bicycle. It is so nice to meet other people on this kind of moments. We talked, laughed and shared a lot of stories. In the night Mohammed came to us as well and we shared more stories, he called one of his friends Fatih (a Turkish man living in Khartoum) also a rider and big fan of motorcycles.
Of course this was very special for him, it is not happening very often that a Turkish rider is coming to Khartoum by motorcycle and especially not a woman. We talked all night and Fatih invited us to stay at his house while we stayed in Khartoum. Unfortunately he was going on a holiday in a few days to Uganda but he allowed us to stay in his house while he was away. Of course this is a very nice opportunity for us to have some time to work on the motorcycles and solve our problems. Theresa came with us as well and we had a nice house all for ourselves. Fatih owns a car repair shop so we had a place to work and tools if we needed as well.
In these 10 days we relaxed a bit and worked on our motorcycles, they were riding fine again but most of the time. 🙂
Noway to get a visa for Egypt!
Now our next issue was a visa for Egypt to her. First time we went to the embassy they were sent us to the consult of Egypt, this is where they issue visas. We went there and they told us come back tomorrow at 10, this is the time to issue visas to foreigners. Again we went, we needed to get inside the consult to explain our situation. This seems more easy then it actually is, when we arrived and try to ask for any option to go in nobody wanted to speak English to us only Arabic, not friendly at all! After trying and trying we left and decided maybe someone can help us, a few local people told us that they can help. We made some phone calls in the night and hoped for the best to get an appointment with the consultant from Egypt. This didn’t work either, so we went back again to try it ourselves. Eventually we found with some help the right line to go for us to apply for the visa, we had all papers with us but after waiting 3 hours they simply told us for Turkish citizens there is a special procedure you need to go to the embassy itself or need to wait more than a month for visa result. We went back to the embassy again but they didn’t allow us to go inside, they were totally unfriendly and rude. They didn’t want to call anybody inside the embassy who we can talk and explain our satiation. They sent us back to the consult again and closed to the embassy door on our face.
It is so frustrating if officials work against you, we have been trying to solve our visa issue now for 5 days without any success at all. We shared our story with some people and they agreed we need to try it in a different way. Eventually some people even called the ambassador from Egypt in Sudan and in Turkey but nobody could help us to get the visa for her.
To be honest, we could not want to believe what was going on because we passed 33 countries in Africa and we never ever had any problem with visas before. Of course we were very disappointed as this means we cannot finish our journey in Egypt what we were planning. So, we need to ship our motorcycles out of Sudan and not going to see the pyramids in Sudan or Egypt, no diving in the red sea. 🙁 Maybe we could ride to Egypt borders and see nice pyramids in Sudan but she was so upset to run behind Egypt visa and nothing we had; also their behavior in the embassy made her so unhappy. She didn’t want to do something more because of that plus petrol issue plus motorcycles problem plus 48 degrees. 🙁
Until finish Sudan video, we would like to share our motorcycle shipping video which was fun and run 🙂
When we left our motorcycles at the airport we got a bit relaxed and enjoyed our time with Fatih till we fly out to Turkey. We are so happy to met him. I hope we can see you somewhere again Fatih.
We want to thank all the helpful people we met in Sudan.
FS
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Shipping/Airfreight motorcycles from Sudan to Europe or Turkey
How to get your motorcycle out of Sudan to Europe or Turkey, a lot of people riding the East coast of Africa and end in Sudan for multiple reasons.
In this article we will try to explain the options you have; shipping or airfreight from Sudan how easy or difficult, what are the costs, which country you can go or cannot go to ship or use airway for motorcycles, if you use airfreight to Ataturk Airport, Istanbul, Turkey what is the procedure in Turkish customer service and Turkish Cargo service. Also you can find phone numbers who you can contact for detail and help, the GPS coordinations for all places. 🙂
Let’s start with a little info about the countries around Sudan…
Egypt, for Egypt you need a Carnet de Passage (CdP). A lot of people travel without a CdP as it is to expensive or they bought the motorcycle in a different country as their nationality and could not find a country to support their CdP. If you don’t have a CdP you cannot cross through Egypt. Unfortunately for us it was another problem, she couldn’t get the Egypt visa as there is some political issue between Turkey and Egypt at the moment.
Saudi Arabia, it is nearly impossible to get a visa when you travel with a motorcycle also woman are still not allowed to ride a motorcycle in Saudi Arabia so this was not an option anyway. With a car you will be totally fine to go to Saudi Arabia as long as it is a Left hand drive (LHD), they do not except RHD vehicles. We learned from other overlanders you can get a Saudi Arabia visa in 2 or 3 days if you travel with a 4×4 car, truck or camper. For motorcycles they let you wait 30 days or more to response and then they still can refuse you for a 72 hours transit visa
Libya, this country is simple said not safe enough to travel through in our opinion.
Eritrea, this country is also not safe enough in our opinion to travel through.
Here our shipping adventure video. Before continue you read you can check if you like
What is the cheapest option to leave from Sudan by motorcycles?
Our trip ended in Sudan because we didn’t have any option to go another country. We didn’t want to ride all the way down again to Kenya and ship the motorcycles from Mombasa. The cost could be so much to apply visas, fuel, food…etc. So, We started to look for how we can ship our motorcycles from Port Sudan with RoRo / container or find a cargo to airfreight from Khartoum, Sudan.
We searched ship from Port Sudan to go Europe or Turkey but they didn’t have an option with RoRo, which is the cheapest way (around 400 USD) because you don’t need a container to rent or pack the motorcycle. We wrote some companies but couldn’t find any.
Some companies said that we can have a container and ship our motorcycle but the price was so high. Small container was around 1500 USD if you don’t have anybody to share container. Also you must pack your motorcycle and pay extra for it. On the other hand all ships go to Saudi Arabia first and than some stops. It means that we can have our motorcycles in Europe or Turkey more than a month later.
We had only one option more to fly with our motorcycles, means look for airfreight for it. Sudan doesn’t have a lot of option for direct fly or cargo to and from Europe.
For us the best and cheapest option was to fly the motorcycles to Istanbul (Turkey). From Istanbul it’s only 200 km to the Greece border or Bulgaria border. We contacted Turkish Cargo.
Going to talk Turkish Cargo in Sudan to airfreight Khartoum to Istanbul.
Most cargo companies don’t work directly with a customer, they work with companies. Turkish cargo works with Maks Aviation Services. We went to Khartoum airport and found the cargo service. We meet with Adil who help us for all procedures. (If you need help to airfreight your motorcycle you can contact Adil : +249 91 234 90 73 he speaks English very well)
Unfortunately, Turkish Cargo doesn’t fly directly to Istanbul, Turkey. They have big cargo flight every Monday. It leaves from Khartoum around 1:30 pm to Nairobi and leaves from Nairobi around 8:30 pm. It arrives Ataturk Airport at 2:30 am on Tuesday (so you have a full day to pick up your motorcycle at the airport).
Mister Adil from Maks Aviation Services The price for airfreight motorcycles? To be honest it was a surprise for us!
If you ask how much cost for a motorcycle to airfreight? It is depend on your pack size. We had two different prices for the same motorcycle because of the package size. I want to give an exam; my motorcycle pallet was 190*90*106 and it was 206 kilos after packed. Cargo weight came 302 kg.(DC) Rate was 28.5. So one motorcycle airfreight price was 302*28.5 = 8607 SDG (Sudanese pound)
And some extra cost for the fly, which was 1.350 SDG. Turkish Cargo air way price was 9957 SDG for 1 motorcycle.
You can quick check your cargo weight and calculate your cost easily: http://www.turkishcargo.com.tr/en/e-cargo/applications/volume-weight-convertor
Checking all documents together with Adil We need another agency as well to custom service in Sudan.
Mister Adil told us we need to worked with another agency who can do all custom service and dangerous goods paperwork. Actually, we didn’t go anywhere when we were inside the Maks Aviation Services office he came there. When you bring your motorcycles to customs you are not allowed to enter somebody official has to do all paperwork.
He got a price for custom service 1200 SDG and 1500 SDG for dangerous good to each motorcycles. But we paid extra 500 SDG extra to each motorcycles because custom service wanted to we paid something more. They started 2000 SDG but after negotiating the price came 500 SDG. We saw the note from the custom service who wrote on the paper we have to pay.
So we paid total 13.157 SDG to Maks Aviation Services, Turkish Cargo Agency to carry our motorcycle to Istanbul, Turkey.
If you ask how much USD it depends on the black market rate in Sudan. We exchange 1 USD=37.50 SDG. It means 350 USD.
Note : If you enter Sudan with your Carnet de Passage make sure that you have an exit stamp as well. When you give your CdP to the agency you should tell them to don’t forget exit stamp.
Time to make pallet for motorcycle with Asim We need to find a place to pack out motorcycle the cheapest way!
If you want to go to an agency and ask them to make a pallet and pack motorcycle for you the costs will be really so high. Already, mister Adil said that if we can do it with our self it could be so cheap. We knew a Turkish person (Asim) who has a little furniture company who help us a lot when we were in Khartoum. We called Asim and told him what we need it. If we gave the size to him he said that he could make a pallet for us in a half day because he wasn’t so busy when we were asking. 🙂
Asim is working hard to get ready pallets 🙂 He had some wooden in his place he made it from them so, we didn’t pay anything for it. But to make a pallet like this could cost around 2.500-4.000 SDG depend on the how much big and strong the pallet needs to be.
We paid 700 SDG for two clamping straps to stabile the motorcycle on the pallet. Also we paid 1.000 SDG for the truck to carry our motorcycles from Asim’s place to customs at Khartoum airport.
They are ready to go to the airport Asim couldn’t speak English but if you need to help you can contact with him with text message. You can write you took his number from ‘Gulcin and Ferry’. He has a worker who can speak French and when you meet him he can find a person who can speak English to help you. Asim phone number : +249 91 050 6295.
So, Airfreight cost, packing and transfer motorcycle to the airport price were for one motorcycle total 387 USD in Sudan.
It was a little scary to see our motorcycle was flying 🙂 Note: You should check your Airway bill (AWB) well. If anything wrong or missing on the AWB it can cost a lot to you in Ataturk Airport to wait and pay storage.
Check AWB number on it,
Shipping name is correct, which is your bill name
Consignee name must be writing because Cargo companies make documents with the name. They forgot to write on our bill and we spend a few extra hours for it.
Consignee phone number is correct because they will contact you in Turkey
By the way, we transferred our motorcycle our self. So the agency help us to enter the export cargo area with them. Therefore, we could check all our documents in there if anything was missing. Also, we told with Adil after finish custom service pack our motorcycle with plastic.
we said bye them in Khartoum airport, Sudan Get motorcycle from Turkish Cargo/Custom Service in Ataturk Airport, Turkey
If you use air way the procedure is same for any flight or cargo companies in Ataturk Airport. The custom service procedure is the same for Turkish people and other nationalities. I am from Turkey and he is from Holland but we had the same procedure. If your motorcycles register write your name everything is easier and you can take your motorcycle yourself. Otherwise, maybe it is nice to look for a fixer.
You should have three copies of your passport, motorcycle register, driver license and also the original documents with you. You must have a green card traffic insurance. I don’t know the insurance cover which countries when you have it in your own country. He is from Holland and his insurance covers Turkey as well. You should have a copy of that as well.
First of all, you must check your air waybill number (AWB Number) to tracking. The statue must be RCF – Shipment Received from flight. http://www.turkishcargo.com.tr/en/e-cargo/cargo-tracking. After that you can call customer management to learn your AWB – Ordino is ready or not http://www.turkishcargo.com.tr/en/about-us/contact-us
Second, you need to go Turkish Cargo office in Ataturk Airport and take your AWB – ordino. It will be cost 250 TL.
Third, you must go to Custom Service building (Turkish: Gümrük Binası) with your AWB – Ordino paper and with a letter. You need a Turkish letter, which can be hand write.
You need find director or assistant director (Turkish: Müdür Yardımcısı) room in the Custom Service building. (The room is second floor on the right) He will read your letter and check your original documents. He will signature your letter and writes a custom officer number on the letter.
Fourth, go to ground floor to the Paperwork office (Turkish : Evrak Kayıt Bürosu) because they must enter your letter in the system. They want to have a copy of your AWB – Ordino and letter. You can find the copy machine outside next door in a coffee place.
We are inside to the store. They brought our motorcycles Fifth, Turn back to Turkish Cargo office and go to Turkish Cargo store and find guard officer, I don’t know exactly English name. 🙁 Anyway on the door writes Turkish “ Muhafaza Memuru”. You need to give an id card (drivers license) to them and have a card to enter the storage. You don’t give your passport because you need it inside the store.
Then, you will enter from the store door where your motorcycle is. They will ask your AWB number. They look in the system where the motorcycle is. And then they will carry it to you. If your motorcycle is inside a box or closed you need to open it so the custom officer can see plate and VIN number (Vehicle Information Number, chassis number).
Sixth, After that you need to go custom office on the 1st floor. It is inside where you are. 🙂
He will come next to the motorcycle and will check plate and VIN number. After that you will with him to the office. He wants to see your original documents passport, motorcycle register and green card (Traffic insurance)
He will enter everything to the system and write on your passport custom service info. They want all documents copies there. Depend; they will open a file there or not.
The motorcycle are ready for custom service officer to check plate and number from it Seventh, You need to turn back to the custom service building and find director or assistant director again because he needs to see all documents again and they will signature again. They want to have you documents copies there or sent you back paper work office again to give copies to them.
Eighth, Turn back to Turkish Cargo store area and find a office where you can give your ordino paper, letter…etc. You will have door number there. (Turkish:Kapi numarası) The office is next to the guard office, which you went on the fifth step. 🙂 They will take your copies there for passport and motorcycle register.
Ninth, You will go back Turkish cargo main office, where you get a ordino and pay. Time to pay your store cost. The price changes every 24 hours. So, if you cannot finish all paperwork and take out your motorcycle in 24 hours you will pay again for another 24 hours. Note, they work until 5 pm.
Short explain; the motorcycle-tracking RCF (Shipment Received from flight code) time is 8 am in the morning. You will pay until next day 8 am for 24 hours. But if you can’t take your motorcycle the same day until 5 pm the work time starts next day at 8 am. So, you never finish paperwork in 24 hours and have to pay again. Therefore, Khartoum to Istanbul fly was good because it arrives 2:30 am and you can get Turkish Cargo Ordino AWB around 8-9 am. You have all day to finish the paper work and get your motorcycle out. 🙂
We paid 565 TL to Turkish Airlines Storage.
Tenth, after take your bill to payment you will turn back the store area and show you paper to somebody who standing in front of the door. They will carry your motorcycle to the door and they will ask you where they will put it.
We are working on the motorcycles to make them one piece again to ride in front of the turkish cargo store Finally, You should enjoy ride motorcycle in Istanbul, Turkey a while or ride around two hours to Ipsala border for Greece or Kapikule border to Bulgaria. 🙂
So we paid total 815 TRL to Turkish Cargo in Istanbul. 1 USD= 4.5 TRL therefore we paid 181 USD.
I will try to write all detail step by step if you want to do it with yourself. It took 3 hours for us all steps. Maybe speak Turkish was easy way. If you think so many things to do you should look a fixer. Maybe it can be nice to know all steps when you negotiate with them. 🙂
Khartoum, Sudan to Istanbul Turkey airfreight cost was total 567 USD for one motorcycle.
He is enjoying to ride in Istanbul If you have any question feel free to ask. You can send e-mail or write a comment under the article.
Note1: Turkish Custom Service does not take any money! You will pay only Turkish airlines for the AWB – Ordino paper and storage.
Note2: Some cargo companies don’t charge a storage price for first 12 hours. If you have plan to use airway for your motorcycle to send Turkey you should ask the company about it. We took our motorcycles in 12 hours but Turkish Cargo is charging. It doesn’t matter for them 5 minutes, 12 hours or 24 hours, all is the same price. But ask for a discount at the office.
GS – FS
