TheBigTrip: Getting Giddy About Gede

Sometimes I wish I was an archaeologist. If that were the case, so my reasoning goes, I could indulge my passion for ancient ruins by actually being paid to travel all over the world to examine them in detail and get into all kinds of cool adventures with mystical forces and thousand-year-old legends. Then I realise several things:

a) I'm not Indiana Jones.

b) Neither, for that matter, is anyone else.

c) Most archaeologists spend all their time in a library or academic institution.

d) The ones that are actually out "on-site" wish they weren't because they're getting paid absolute peanuts to spend interminable months running a tiny brush over four square feet of dirt that may or may not reveal the last resting place of a small clay pot.

So with these reassuring thoughts in my mind, I was more than happy for Jen and I to tackle the latest in our long list of ancient ruins as independent travellers. We were aware on our way up to Lamu of the ruins of Gede, nearby to Malindi, and so were determined to take a look at them on our way back to Nairobi. Our return to Malindi was far more successful than our first entry last week, by which I mean that this time we could actually find our guesthouse. The local wildlife clearly could too, because this very green snake was winding its way around our room balcony to welcome us...

It was nice to be back in Malindi for a couple of days, if for no other reason than the culinary standards. Malindi is a town with a huge Italian expat community and, homely sods that they are, they've brought their food with them. Knowing that the quality and variety of food is highly likely to decline as we get deeper into Africa, Jen and I therefore availed ourselves of woodfired pizza at every conceivable opportunity. As I see it, these Italians have brought the food of their homeland to the east African coast, and it would be downright rude of us not to show our appreciation by eating as much of it as possible. That's our story, anyway, and by God we're sticking to it.

As previously mentioned though dear friends, our main reason for making a second stop in Malindi was to use it as a staging point for exploring the nearby ruins of Gede. Not a site that I'd been previously familiar with, the ancient ruined city is very famous in these parts - and its story is made all the more intriguing by the fact that, as far as anyone can tell, no record exists of it in any historical text. Spooky.

And so, curiosity suitably aroused, we hired a tuk-tuk and made the journey out to the ruins themselves. Having been unfamiliar with the place and spoilt by the ruins we'd just encountered in Asia, I have to admit that my hopes weren't particularly high. However, Gede comfortably exceeded my expectations - it was impressive both in terms of its size and the buildings' quality of preservation.

So we passed a good couple of hours traversing the ruins, though were understandably still none the wiser as to the real history of the place by the end of it. It seems the archaeologists who've worked at Gede have been very good identifying what individual buildings and structures must have been used for, but no one can tell us exactly what Gede itself was all about. It remains a mystery. Maybe I will become an archaeologist after all, just to unravel that one.

Or maybe I'll just invent a story about the place, complete with associated myths, rituals and symbolism, and then write about it in a novel. I'd have to change my name though. Don Green perhaps, or maybe Dave Black...something like that anyway.

So now it's back to Nairobi for the start of a - shudder - organised tour for a while. I might have to let Jen talk about that, as it makes me feel all dirty.

And I apologise for a second consecutive blog entry with an alliterative title. I promise that it will be the last one. Until I do it again.

Things Jennie will remember:

1) That deciding to hire a tuk-tuk turned out to be the best decision ever! No more wondering around Malindi for us!

2) The bees! So many bees!