Guy Deacon - upbeat in Angola

My phone rang late afternoon the other day as I was on a train at the beginning of a long, challenging journey from Ealing in West London to the fringes of Croydon for a football match. When I saw it was Guy Deacon, who’s on an even longer and more perilous journey across Africa to raise awareness of Parkinson’s. I braced myself for news of another setback. But not a bit of it. Guy was in chipper mood - and eager to give me an update of his progress.

When I called him the next morning, weary from my travels (it ended 1-1 by the way) the retired Colonel was still upbeat, installed in comfortable lodgings in the British embassy in Luanda. Given that last time we spoke the suspension on Guy’s battered VW van was damaged and both he and it appeared ready to give up the ghost, I was impressed that he had made it to the Angolan capital.

It turned out that a mechanic called Moses had done a brilliant job back in Libreville in Gabon “given that he had about two spanners and a hammer and that was about it.” So pretty soon he was back on the road, and had managed to cross several borders and negotiate two Congos - the Republic, and the Democratic Republic - before arriving in Angola.

Mind you, it had been far from plain sailing. Guy’s son Wilf had flown in from the UK intending to accompany his father for at least a couple of weeks. But a visa problem meant he could get no further than the South of Gabon and the border with the Republic of Congo before heading home.

So Guy was alone again, dealing with the bureaucratic nightmare of border crossings, wondering all the time whether he had the right kind of visa. But this time all went well - indeed, he was whisked across the final border from the DRC into Angola in just ten minutes. Then the accursed VW decided things were going a little too smoothly.

“At that point I heard this rattling noise. I knew this was not a good sound. And I didn't want to break down in the middle of Angola where I would know nobody and they speak Portuguese.” So he made a decision to call up a breakdown truck and hitch a ride to Luanda. Not something like an AA truck, he was keen to stress: “Not a bit of it, a 30 metre articulated truck, a huge thing turned up. And of course, getting on the back of that without ramps is quite a challenge.”

Somehow, with the aid of a few planks, they managed it and then set off on the journey from Matita to Luanda. Google Maps tells me this can be done in under 8 hours but it took 28. The ambassador was waiting to greet him at midnight, the repairs to the van should take only a few days, and Guy was looking in good shape.

I wondered why he was coping so well. Perhaps it was the fact that he was going to take a side trip to Zambia to see his daughter, or the realisation that the last section of his drive to Cape Town promises to be simpler with better roads. Or maybe it was just a good moment in the rollercoaster experience of living with an incurable condition. Guy said he had learned something during the trip about his Parkinson’s:

“It sounds very obvious, but I've kind of worked out when I'm going to be good, when I'm going to be bad. I have a good two hours in the morning, a good two hours in the afternoon, a good two hours in the evening.”

And what also struck a chord with me was what he said about stress making things worse for anyone with Parkinson’s. Standing for nearly two hours watching a tense Premier League football match nearly did for me, so I can barely imagine what it feels like to negotiate with gun toting soldiers as you try to cross a border in a sickly VW truck. “So being in a stressless environment now makes a heck of a difference because I can relax. Everything's easy.”

There are still a couple of borders and the small matter of 3,546 km to cross before Guy’s journey is over, and he will be meeting fellow “Parkies” and spreading the word about the condition along the way. But he says he can see the light at the end of the tunnel and whatever happens next, his sheer bloody-minded determination to carry on has been an inspiration to me and I’m sure plenty of others.

If you want to follow Guy’s progress you can track his journey to Cape Town here. I will have another update when the Colonel next calls.