The Road to Bujumbura...

As I looked into the distance,  the new Chinese tarmac  road through Ethiopian no-mans land came to an abrupt stop and was replaced by, well, nothing, it just stopped! A dilapidated military bunkhouse with a few Kenyan soldiers signalled the end of Ethiopia. This point was the tri-border and the coming together of 3 nations, Kenya, Ethiopia and South Sudan, though there was nothing to tell you that you had arrived at any of them. A border which I was probably more happy to arrive at than  Ushuaia, the city at the bottom of the world, after cycling 27,000 kilometres from Alaska!

I reached out to shake the Kenyan soldier’s hand and impulsively said, “I’m very happy to be here!!”, with a huge smile on my face like Eddie Murphy in “Coming to America”. Considering there was absolutely FA there and the landscape which lay ahead  was an arid flat savannah of dead looking trees, a complete contrast to the dramatic green mountain scenery of Ethiopia I had just descended from,  unsurprisingly he looked at me like  I was completely bonkers! I could not hide my relief though, I’ve never cycled a country quite like Ethiopia...or had as many stones thrown at me in my whole life! A brilliant country, but to say it was stressful and scary to cycle would be the understatement of the century! The fact that this torment was all about to stop filled me with immense happiness.

I had bought a sticker for my bicycle from every country, ironically, the only one I could find in Ethiopia said, "I LOVE ETHIOPIA!" It wasn't until now that I was home and dry that I was prepared to stick it on my frame ! The Kenyan solider had a quick glance at my passport and promptly gave it back to me, no visa, not even a stamp!! Ahead was Kenya, the only sign of where to go being the odd 4x4 track weaving all over the landscape in different directions and the occasional stone road marker popping up on the horizon. Luckily I had something on my telephone know as maps me. I’ll explain.

I have long been a technological retard with neither the brain cells or desire to get to grips with the latest gadgets. Though I have come along way since first embarking out across India armed with a paper map, being swarmed by a 100 curious Indians every time I pulled it out at a confusing road junction. People I’ve met along the way have shown me google Maps and how I can download it on to my phone and introduced me to Maps me...  who should be paying me for this free advertising! Basically, you can download Maps of whole countries on your phone and use it offline. It tells you distances, hotels and campsites etc, and is so detailed it will pick up a footpath only evident by some bend over grass or odd footprint in the sand. On the downside,  It  takes some of the adventure out of cycling the world and stops you feeling like Indiana Jones.

Pedalling away through this hugely remote part of Kenya, apart from not being stoned, the first thing that hit me (excuse the pun) was the peace and quiet. Kenya’s  population sitting at 48 million with Ethiopia bursting at the seems and ever expanding with over 100 million! I encountered my first Kenyan a mile or two into the Savannah. A young lad walking aimlessly across the land dressed in Maasai Mara colours. In fact, for quite a while the ONLY people I met were of the Maasai Warrior tribe. They are Lean and muscular and look like absolute machines. Probably because they haven’t filled their bodies with processed shit like the rest of the world. Some of them had Kalashnikov Rifles and asked me for money, which could be somewhat intimidating when your in the Bush in the middle of nowhere! I would pretend I didn’t know what they were on about and handed them another piece of stale bread the more they persisted. When I offered them some water from my disgusting bottle caked in mud they normally gave up! They're  seen as the toughest tribe in Africa and apparently the British troops during the African war (WW1) were terrified of them. Becoming a Maasai Man was proven by  hunting down and killing a Lion with a knife, until stopped by the government as numbers dwindled. Today,  there’s  a bit of a war going on between the Maasai and the tribes in Ethiopia. An animal would be stolen by one tribe, which would be retaliated at by the killing of another tribe member, which of course would escalate. Luckily with my milky bar kid looks I wouldn't be mistaken for either tribe.

Masai Maria tribe, northern Kenya

Heading south the tracks in the sand merged together to form a more  obvious path. Tribes became less frequent and old trousers and football shirts became the dress code. The word for white man had changed from "Ferengi" in Ethiopia to "Mzungu!" The reaction to seeing me, Mr Mzungu,  was normally a high pitched scream from the kids as if they'd just see Santa accompanied with jumping up and down and clapping then running after me.....  The other, more rare extreme, was a terrified scream as if I was a ghost, whilst running for their lifes! Plodding along through the sand, on my right hand side were a row of mountains, perhaps a mile away. To my left was Lake Turkana. Like normal, I had planned nothing and had arrived in northern Kenyan just as the monsoon had started! Despite this being the driest part of Kenya, with the rains the road becomes impassable. Every few miles a huge wide river from the mountains would cut through the sand road on its way to the lake.  I got pretty lucky, the rain had threatened and come and gone, but not hit full swing. This meant my tyres were sinking into the sand, like I was on an exercise bike in top gear, and I was slipping off all over the place, but still moving! Some of the rivers were at knee height but I could still carry my bike across, with a heavy rainfall they swell and roar and your going nowhere!

The first real civilisation and town I came across was called Lowarengak. It was full of hotel’s. Well, it was full of metal shacks the size of a garden shed which were all called hotels! My favourite, one of the larger establishments, the size of a green house complete with a couple of plastic tables and chairs and cooking pots on the floor, The Grand Regency Hotel! “Good morning sir!” called out a man enthusiastically on the street! English (one of the official languages of Kenya) was spoken in an old school legendary way! The influence of the early British aristocratic settlers was clear to see. The other, and main official language of Kenya, had now of course changed from Amharic in Ethiopia to Swahili.

Lunch in a "Hotel"

My old waterproof bag on the front of my bike was my way of learning it, I write new words to learn in permanent  marker so I can see them when I cycle. It was time to rotate the bag and write down the basics.. saying a few words was a massive crowd pleasers among the locals. My favourite line being in Sudan....map suit in-e shuftak....its a pleasure spending time in your company. They went mental for it! Nothing would be as good value as learning Spanish (pretty much one language for the whole continent of South America) though I could at least use Swahili in Uganda too.

My first night in Kenya was spent in the very randomly located Spanish mission. It stood out like a saw thumb and seemed to have more money ploughed into it than all the villages along the lake put together. I went to find the father to ask if I could camp, in the hope of a free bed being offered. Unable to locate him, one of the Christians approached me and  told me they would “consult” the father. I was told I was unable to camp due to the rain!....but offered a room and asked to make a donation. I don’t think they were the most needy people in area but left the 10 quid note that had been in my wallet since leaving Heathrow  on the bed side table. On showing me the room I was repeatedly told “mass starts at 7!” On the 3rd time of telling me I figured it would be rude not to show my face at the chapel. When asking my religion, I boldly said, “Church of England”. I figured it was a smart move, enough kudos to rock up at a Catholic mission yet different enough to Catholicism to be able to turn down any crazy religious shenanigans if things started getting a bit metal in the mass! I arrived late at mass to limit potential damage, but timed it poorly. I had entered at the exact time the priest had asked all the worshipers to, “Reach out and hug the people around you!!”

I left the Spanish mission hungry. I wanted to fill my  face with food, the problem being that there wasn’t any! .....and even if there was, I hardly had a Penny...or Shilling! The nearest cash point was in the town of Lodwar a few hundred miles away. All that I’d managed to change was my remaining Ethiopian Birr before entering Kenya, giving me about 7 Quid’s worth of Shillings. The Kenyan’s weren’t interested

Mandazi and tea

In my US dollars from the post office in Hinckley town centre. The local people were waiting for the rain to come, without which they couldn’t grow anything. All I could get hold of was tasty milk tea and something made from flour called Mandazi. They looked like donuts but definitely didn’t taste like them. I had a bag of about 25 of the bland things, and that was pretty much all I eat for 3 days straight! When I finally reached the town of Kalokol (the first town of any size along Lake Turkana) and saw some old tomatoes for sale, I threw them down my neck like I’d never seen food before. They tasted better than rhubarb crumble (that’s saying something) The flavour amplified by 100 after all the Mandazi’s compared to how a tomato normally tastes!

I spend all but my last 100 shillings (one dollar) in Kalokol on food for the road and with zero funds kept pedalling into the evening. I’d been cycling for days on end without a break, but with no money left, needed to get to the ATM in Lodwar asap. I was told the road would be tarmac from that point. I stopped to spend my remaining shilling on a cup of tea at a stand alone hotel (shed). The lovely Christian man who lived there with his family cooked me a fresh roti and cup of tea, and said grace for me after placing it before me (possibly asking for forgiveness for my mass performance). I asked him how the road ahead was, to which he replied, “fine and nice just like this road!” It was terrible!

Fine & Nice Road! 

Lodwar was the capital of the province and a bustling town. A good chance to stock up, have a wash, and get some cash. 50km south of Lodwar saw a return to a paved road for the first time since leaving Ethiopia. Just as I thought I was retuning to some sort of normality a car pulled over next to me and shouted, “Be careful! Someone has been shot on the road ahead!” Indeed someone had been shot in the stomach by a madwoman on the loose with a gun, a gentle reminder I was not in the safe little England! I grabbed a cheap hotel and decided to splash out with my new Kenyan shillings and get my hair cut. I try to get my hair cut in every country, attempting to see if anywhere can out do the 7 potions and thumping my head ritual that was performed in India! This came close, the teenage hairdressers mate spent half of my time in the salon with his armpit in my face and arm wrapped around me trying to take selfies with me. After performing a wicked blend on the side of my head and covering the untouched top in hairspray to finish off I asked if he could give the top a snip too. “It will be of unequal lengths” came the typically genius reply. “No problem!” I said. As I sat in the barbers chair with a audience of 20 onlookers peering through the window, He attempted to cut the top with the blade of the clippers while his mate simultaneously had a go at another part of my head with a pair of kitchen scissors! He was dead right, it was definitely of unequal lengths! I admired the effort, and gave him 200 shillings instead of the 100 requested (1 US dollar!). He was delighted.

Uganda 🇺🇬 

Going Bananas... UGANDA 🇺🇬 

Nearing Uganda the flat road launched upwards into the mountains and immediately turned from incredibly dry to lush and green. There was just one little problem floating in my mind as I approached the border town of Malaba in the west of Kenya.... Explaining to immigration how I had travelled the whole of Kenya without a visa! “You don’t have a Kenyan visa!?” said the Ugandan border official with a smile on his face! “I thought I was supposed to get It here?” I said smiling back. He found the whole thing funny and was so blazzay about it I couldn’t help but start laughing! What a great continent! I’m going to struggle returning to the British ways of health and safety and law and order! I was made to pay 50 dollars (which no doubt went into his pocket) and cycled into the pearl of Africa!

Lake Burundi, Uganda 🇺🇬 

Uganda is a beautiful country of rolling green hills and is seen as one of the safest countries in Africa. Heading west along Lake Victoria I paid a visit to the town of Jinja, a nice moment as this is the source of the Nile that I have been following ever since leaving Cairo, before heading west to the capital, Kampala. My rest day in the capital was spent with my mate's uncle (the other idiot from my, "two idiots on a tandem"  adventure) , an absolute legend of a man in his 60's who had moved to Fiji and set up a nightclub before having to flee the country, he left marriage till nearly 50 and was now the big boss at Charity helping people with diseases. His beautiful house was simply styled with animals running around the place  and a wicked view over the lake.

Jinja - source of the Nile

Staying in style - Kampala 

Hilly Uganda turned into a mountainous and even more beautiful tiny Rwanda, a country just 26 thousand square kilometres with 11 million people. As I made my way uphill to the capital, Kigali (1567 meres) night fell...and it got wet, very wet! The rainy season had hit with a vengeance and the tarmac road turned into a big stream! The good thing about this was Rwandans were complete pussies when it came to rain, a hundred motorcycle taxis would cram under the petrol station forecourt and laugh and cheer as the idiotic drowned rat 🐀 Mzungu pedalled into the night.

Rwanda 🇷🇼 

Sun rose the following morning to reveal a beautiful green city spread out on rolling hills with more trees than buildings. With its shiny modern buildings on the hilltops it looked more like Beverly Hills than your average African city. It was hard to believe a genocide which wiped out over a million people occurred here as recently as 1994!

I decided I must go to the genocide museum, which is also a memorial and the burial site of a quarter of a million mascaraed  people. I wouldn’t necessarily say I enjoyed myself there!... but it was both incredibly interesting and disturbing. It was strange to think that in the year of the Lillehammer winter Olympics, as a 12 year old kid, I was completely oblivious to a million people being murdered a few thousand miles away.   According to the museum, the genocide was really initiated because of the treatment by the Belgian Conqueror’s. There were 2 main ethnic groups living in harmony before the colonisers came, the Tutsi and the Hutu. When the Belgians  arrived they did there best to divide the nation and changed these ethnic groups into socio economic groups. Anyone with more than 10 cattle was labelled a Tutsi and everyone else a Hutu.  I.D cards were given to every citizen to show which ethnic group they had been assigned to. There are of course a lot of influencing factors, but over a period of time hate was spread using media, encouraging the Hutu to not speak, trust or do any business with the Tutsi, depicting them as being evil. The radio was one of the main things used to orchestrate the month long massacre, which began on April 7th 1994.

Bicycle 🚲 Taxi Kigali

The bloodshed was more brutal and barbaric than you would ever believe. Women forced to kill there own children, families murdering there neighbours and members of their own family who were Tutsi, women humiliated and raped by HIV infected Hutu men before being murdered. People stabbed in the eyes, limbs cutt off and humiliated before being killed by being hacked to death by machetes and blunt tools. The colonisers introduced  ID cards checked at roadblocks, village searches etc to determine if a person was Tutsi and should be massacred. All of this while the UN and rest of the world turned a blind eye. Entering the country, it  had surprised me the complete lack of French spoken, all the kids shouting, “Mzungo how  are you?” and not Bonjour. The reason being that the French had supported the political party responsible for the massacre throughout. It was hardly surprising the whole country wanted nothing to do with the French language....and I was very happy to say, “Good Morning Sir!!” and not Bonjour!

Cutting west across Africa had been a huge detour, but it was worth it. The most direct and flatter route would have been to head directly south from Kenya to Tanzania. But cutting into Uganda and Rwanda was way greener, more mountainous and more beautiful, enabling me to tick off far more countries. I had wanted to cycle into the Congo, but with only a photo of an out of date yellow fever certificate, a difficult visa process, and being told that cycling through eastern Congo was more suicidal than dangerous, I’ll have to leave that for another trip! I did have one other country in my sites though, and the more people told me not to go and that it was dangerous, the more adamant I became to get there!.....BURUNDI!!! Its capital being the flamboyantly named BUJUMBURA.

After researching “travel Burundi” the advice from all government and other sites was...“the entire country is NOT safe to visit, if you are in Burundi consider leaving as soon as it is safe to do so”.  It was on the lonely planets list of dangerous countries not to visit along with the likes of The Central African Republic  and Somalia. A number of reasons I should check it out then! Apparently, since a failed military coup in 2015 the situation has escalated into violence. Like in many African countries, the president had remained in power for an illegal third term and the people weren’t happy.  I had made my visa application before arriving in Kigali. After writing to the embassy they told me to fax them an incredibly simplistic one page application form and a copy of my passport along with a photo. Despite forgetting to attach a photo I received an email saying my visa was ready for collection! ....I didn’t know whether this was more worrying than it was good news! Somalia is another country where a visa is very easy to obtain, I guess single entry is all that’s required there! :-/ !!

Rwanda 🇷🇼/Burundi 🇧🇮 border

Descending  downhill after a relentlessly mountainous day in the saddle, I stamped out of Rwanda and  crossed the river which  divides the two nations, questioning exactly what I was doing heading directly into the heart of a  known danger zone! At the same time I was enjoying the nerves and the excitement that comes with it. Immigration was surprisingly easy and quiet, the small border town that followed extremely neglected, poor and decrepit looking, hardly surprising for a country ranked among the 5 poorest in the world. However, it was bursting with energy as every single person on the street shouted out to me and called me over, full of mischief with huge infectious smiles on there faces!  The energetic craziness, chaos and huge curiosity reminded me of cycling Bangladesh and Venezuela...where the country receives zero tourism and the locals go mental being entertained by the sight of the  alien looking foreigner!

Heading into the mountains of Burundi, what I couldn’t help noticing was that the whole nation were bananas about bicycles and all completely mad!!! Everything conceivable was transported on the back of them, from bricks (stacked 5 feet high) to bananas to sofas to boat engines! These people were hard-core! As I cycled up the mountain road a bicycle taxi came screaming the other way, passenger on the back, foot out as he flew around the hairpin corner cranked over at 45 degrees in the wet, the passenger must have been shitting himself! But things were about to get even more bonkers, a lorry came the other way, tanking it downhill, at what must have been 60mph, and...... hanging off the back were 3 guys on bicycle’s!! Even for a nation where hanging off a lorry on your bicycle is the norm, this must have been pushing it!......there faces in full concentration and whole bike vibrating like crazy with the insane speed! To make things worse, it was raining, the bikes were pilled high with  goods and the riders were sitting on the crossbar sideways wearing flip-flops! I was impressed with the guys in Rwanda flying downhill with virtually no breaks and 50kg plus of bananas, but this was the next level!

The road maintained an altitude of 15OO metres constantly climbing before descending to cross a stream before abruptly climbing  again, until I could finally see the incredible Lake Tanganyika below in the distance, the road then plunging downhill for 25 miles. Normally I look forward to downhill’s, though on this occasion I wasn’t, the locals were not the only ones with no brakes! I was using mechanical disc brakes for the first time, and by now 4000 miles from Cairo, the pads were completely worn, metal on metal. The friction enough to take 20 percent off my top speed at most and sounding like a train about to derail! I should have changed the pads weeks ago, but kept procrastinating, and to tell the truth had no idea how! I figured it would be better to have metal on metal than attempt changing them and lose all braking capability with a big downhill ahead (poor choice, when I did final change them the following day it was incredibly simple). Though the crazy locals loved the fact the Kamikaze Mzungu wasn’t the boring stereotypical privileged westerner! On overcooking it on one of the downhill’s I came flying downhill with my foot on the ground trying to stop before performing a huge U turn in the middle of the road, right in front of a fleet of bicycle taxi drivers. On squeezing my brakes to show they were completely redundant as I rolled in, I was greeted with smiles and applause! My cycling proficiency teacher at St Margaret’s  primary school did not have the same attitude to me puling a huge endo for the emergency stop test!

Burundi 🇧🇮 

Flying downhill with one foot on the front tyre to slow me down, the city of Bujumbura was now clearly visible on the edge of the beautiful Lake Tanganyika down below. On the far side of the lake the mountains of the Congo could be seen. Nearing the city things  finally started to look dodgy as I passed through sketchy looking towns. Armed Police and army officers  littered the steep downhill road  as it carved its way through mountainside towns mixed with lush green tropical vegetation. Military and police checkpoints armed with serious looking guns became  more and more frequent, I tried to turn my head the other way for most of them, though one guy wasn’t entertaining that and pulled me over. Like always, I tried to immediately distract his attention, telling him I’m from Leicester City and asking who he supported, the reply, “Do you have money?” Definitely a worrying question in a country which every government advises against travelling to and that has no British representation!!...but I managed to get away with it, arriving in Bujumbura as night fell. The city didn’t have any working street lights so felt somewhat dodgy at night, so I decided to check in to one of the better hotel’s. I was knackered after my 100 mile day in the mountains, but it was Saturday night in Bujumbura! I asked the young lad at reception if there was a good bar near by, there was, and after telling me I could take a lady home no problems!... he locked the front door of the hotel and came with me! Welcome to Bujumbura, Burundi!!!

🇧🇮 Burundi 

The young lad at the hotel in Bujumbura asked if I wanted any fruit with my breakfast!....