Chapter 57 Expedition Team
January 12, 1867.
Namanga, a small place on the border of Kenya and Tanzania.
An expedition is heading north in the territory of Namanga. The leader of the expedition is Henriette, a self-taught explorer from the German region.
Henriette has been obsessed with listening to the adventure stories told by the old people in his hometown since he was a child, and he longed to explore around like the protagonist in the story, so when he grew up, he wanted to take adventures around the world, seeking that kind of excitement and novelty.
The first stop Henriette chose was Africa, because Africa is the most mysterious place in Europe at present. Unfortunately, Henriette didn’t have a penny in his pocket, so he couldn’t buy a boat ticket to Africa.
Fortunately, Ernst was recruiting people in the German region to explore the East African colonies, and Henriette signed up.
Henriette, like Captain Yarman, was a member of the first batch of East African colonial mercenary teams.
Henriette followed the mercenary team, starting from the Baltic Sea, across the Atlantic and Indian Oceans, and came to East Africa.
When they first arrived, the East African colonial mercenary team did not know much about the inland environment of East Africa, so they needed to investigate the inland environment, so they formed several expeditions to explore the inland areas of East Africa. Sign up and select from more than 2,000 Germans.
As the first person to sign up for the expedition, Henriette was appointed as the captain of a small team. He led an expedition team of more than a dozen people and explored all the way west to Lake Sauron (Lake Tanganyika) nearby.
And this time exploring Kenya, Henriette led the team to participate in the survey of the geography of East Africa, but this time it was from the East African colony to the north to explore the territory of Kenya.
At the same time as the Henriette team, there was another team sent by the capital of Mwanza in the Great Lakes (Lake Victoria) to explore north along the eastern edge of the Great Lakes.
…
A few days ago, Henriette and his party set off from Karatu, first went east to the Arusha stronghold, then turned north from Arusha, and arrived at Namanga today.
Namanga is a small town at the junction of Tanzania and Kenya in the previous life. To the east is Mount Kilimanjaro more than 70 kilometers away.
Since the Sultanate of Zanzibar controls a large area of eastern Kenya, in order to avoid trouble, the East African colony did not choose to start from the east of the colony to investigate the situation in Kenya
Instead, explore the central and western parts of Kenya from the relatively central northern plateau area of the East African colony.
Henriette's team only needs to go straight north from Namanga for about 150 kilometers, and they will be able to encounter the Nairobi area, the capital of Kenya in the previous life.
Kenya’s central and western regions are the essence of the former Kenyan country. This can be seen from the map of Kenya’s national administrative regions. The administrative regions in the southwest region are relatively small and numerous, while the three eastern provinces account for half of the area.
Kenya's population is concentrated in the western plateau and near the Great Lakes region, and only Mombasa and other places on the southeast coast have a relatively large population in other areas.
The Sultanate of Zanzibar has much stronger rule over Kenya than Tanzania. Basically, the eastern part of Kenya is under the rule of the Sultanate of Zanzibar.
Therefore, the colony started from the Midwest, and first prepared to take the Kenyan land between Uganda and the Sultanate of Zanzibar.
Henriette wore a bowler hat made of banana leaves on his head, leaned on a branch cut into a crutch, and walked with dozens of people against the scorching sun on the East African plateau. At the same time, he observed the changes in the nearby landforms. Record the scenery and things along the way.
"Captain, let's rest for a while? This bad road and the sun can't stand it!" A member suggested to Henriette.
Henriette raised his sleeves to wipe off the sweat oozing from his forehead, and took a deep breath.
He first took a look at the surrounding sky, took out the compass, and observed the direction.
He took out the simple map drawn along the way from his backpack, and crossed Ngong Mountain from the list.
Looking northward from the position of the expedition team, one can see that a hill has appeared in the eyes, which is the Ngong Mountain mentioned by the Arab businessmen.
Henriette pointed to Ngong Mountain and said to the team members, "Everyone hold on for a while, today we have to rush to the foot of the mountain. From this distance, Ngong Mountain is not far away. We can walk ten miles at most. Then we can Rest there."
The team members are no longer impatient when they hear that there are still ten miles to rest before they can rest. For the team members who have been on the road for a long time, ten miles is nothing but a warm-up when they are physically strong.
The team continued to set off. After about an hour and a half, the sky had begun to darken, and the sun was approaching the horizon.
The expedition team finally reached the foot of Ngong Mountain. The environment here is good, with dense greenery and many trees on the mountain.
The team started to build a camp to rest, and a few camping tents were set up after a while.
Henriette sat in the tent, took out the notes he had made along the way from his backpack, and began to check for omissions and draw a map.
The road from Arusha to Namanga is almost flat, with gentle undulations, but the climate gets drier as you go north, but there are still green plants along the way, and you can occasionally encounter some jungles.
This situation continued until near the Ngong Mountain in Namanga. The green space of the Ngong Mountain increased significantly, and there were large forests on the mountain, and there were more rivers, which is not inferior to the Arusha area.
Henriette read the notes carefully, and marked the sights he saw along the way on the map with a pencil.
It was not until it was completely dark that Henriette finished marking the map. A drawing was filled with dense text notes and icons.
…
"Captain Henriette, it's time to eat!" The voices of teammates came from outside the tent.
The temperature dropped rapidly at night in East Africa. The team members found some firewood and built a bonfire to keep warm and start heating food at the same time.
While Henriette was working, they had already hit the prey, the caracal.
After peeling and cramping, it weighs only a few kilograms with the bones. It is passed through the middle with a shaved wooden branch, sprinkled with spices and salt, and baked.
The expedition team brought dry food, which was rice from the colonial land. They learned the skill of steaming rice from the Chinese. In fact, the Germans in the expedition team wanted to eat bread more than rice.
Unfortunately, the conditions of the colony are currently not allowed, and the procedures such as kneading and baking are very complicated, which is not suitable for field operations.
That is, simple cooking methods such as barbecue and cooking can be learned casually.
Use an aluminum lunch box, pack rice and water, and throw it directly on the charcoal fire to suffocate the rice. The caracal meat is sizzling under the smoke of the charcoal fire, and the wild vegetables picked from the wild can make up a meal.
The rice in the colony is the long-grain type in South Asia, and the wild vegetables are learned and recognized from the local aborigines. The caracal meat tastes good, but it may not be very delicious because of eating habits.
After eating, the team members began to rest, and two people were in charge of the night watch, changing shifts in turn to prevent wild animals from invading the camp.
In the darkness, flames danced in the open space, insects sang everywhere, and there seemed to be a few pairs of shining eyes staring at the expedition team's position in the nearby forest.
The members of the night watch, while adding firewood to maintain the flames of the bonfire, while holding the guns in their hands, be vigilant around them.
…
The next day, the team members packed up their supplies and embarked on the journey to Kenya again, and they can enter Kenya after crossing Mount Ngong.
(end of this chapter)