11900 km of Africa

2010-02-21T01:38:00.001-08:00

It has been a while!

Now that some time has passed and I've recovered from the trip, i'm back on it and I really want to thank everyone that supported me with donations and with encouragement. It was a fantastic journey and definitely the journey of a lifetime.

There seems to have been some problems with the donations not showing up on the online donation form on CanadaHelps. Could everyone that donated, and their donation did not show up, please email me and let me know how much you donated. I would like to give you credit!

Thank you so much and thanks again!

Carola

The last blog update... a little late

2009-06-07T21:21:00.000-07:00

All right. I may have written this blog update only a few days after finishing the tour, but it has taken me this long to post it. I really have no valid excuse aside from procrastination and being fascinated by everything shiny.

I wrote this on May 13th.
Right now I’m sitting on the plane from Johannesburg to Frankfurt cramped into the middle seat and eagerly awaiting the arrival in 9 hours. It’s all over now and it’s finally starting to sink in. For 4 months we packed up our stuff on a daily basis and moved on. We lived out of small lockers that required art, skill, force, swearing and patience to pack every morning, ate (or tried to avoid at all cost) excessive amounts of porridge and hoped that our bikes would make it to the finish line, and then it’s all over within the day of arrival.
I have to admit that I was ready to arrive. It was quite the journey and as much as I enjoyed it, it was time for it to end. Especially the last lag of 6 days in South Africa were a final sign that the voyage was about to be over. The 6 days were primarily booting along the highway to Capetown without fascinating scenery, lots of traffic, long distances, chilly weather, and more climbing than my tired legs hoped for.
Our last rest day in Felix Unite was quite relaxing and very much needed. Namibia was a killer and relaxing on the river right on the South African border was very much welcomed. Most of us switched back to road tires because we only had 1 day of off- roading in South Africa. I made the wise choice to switch back to my off road tires for only that day and it paid off. The road was terrible with heavy corrugation and loose rocks. The profanities that escaped my lips on that day are not to be repeated here, but essentially I arrived at camp barely able to hold on to my handle bars. I’d subluxed my shoulder on the corrugation and when I arrived I slammed my shoulder into the corner of a wall to pop it back in, grabbed advil, ice, proceeded to treat myself to a massive chocolate bar followed by delicious fresh fish and after that I felt much better. Thankfully my shoulder survived more or less the whole trip until 3 days before the finish line. It definitely flared up in places, but the tiredness, the atrophy of continuous biking and no upper body workouts (aside from stuffing my bags into my locker) simply were not enough to maintain my shoulder in a healthy state. Back to physio for me!
The last night before Capetown we stayed in Yzerfontein and it was a killer day getting into camp. We’d had terrible headwinds and it was definitely a team effort to get into camp of doing 3 km pulls along a busy highway. Not a fun day. I pulled into camp and everyone was looking at me intensely, while at the same time some dude was taking a photograph of me biking into camp. Something was weird. I got off my bike and the dude with the camera came over and it was no one less than my dad! He’d flown into Capetown to surprise me at the finish line! He met us a day early at Yzerfontein to share the excitement of the last day. I was pretty shocked considering it’s more than 20 hours of flying to get there from Vancouver. What a surprise! He is still there now and turned the surprise into a holiday for himself.
We were all surprised what a big deal our arrival was in general. We biked every day towards our final destination, but the fact that this was a publicity stunt never really occurred to us. We rolled into the water front with a marching band, the mayor, the various consulates and a ceremony at the water front stage. I think all we longed for was some booze, some hugs from family and just to jump into a shower. Media was swarming around and the medals were awarded in our spandex.
After the ceremony, which ended up being much less painful than we thought, we headed to the hotel, emptied our lockers for the last time, showered and headed to the final dinner with everyone. And then it was all over. The next day we boxed our bikes, donated all of the stuff we didn’t want to take home, ate, slept and drank.
The next few days were consumed by packing, organizing, eating fresh fish, and checking out Table mountain. And that was the Tour d’Afrique! Now that it’s over I figured it’s time to summarize a bit and sort of paint a picture of the trip, the organization and the experience as well as fill in some blanks. I also want to fill in some questions that I had before I started the tour for some people that want to do the tour in the future. I hope this helps!

The trip
Of the 11 900 km I biked around 11 400 km and I lost all of the 500 km in Ethiopia. 3 ¼ days to the stomach flu and one day to rescue an important package with bike parts from customs in the Addis Ababa airport. I did gain 20 km back after going 10 km in the wrong direction one day (oops!). So, I roughly lost 500 km. The ¼ day was a tough day a couple of days before crossing into northern Kenya and I was stopping every 200 meters thinking that I was going to throw up or fall over on really rough roads. At km 72 of 99 I finally called it quits with less than 30 km to go. Following that day I needed to take 2 more days off before I was back on my bike and ready for the rough roads of northern Kenya.
I self declared myself EFIBE. EFI is a title that not many people achieve on this tour. EFI stands for Every Fabulous Inch or otherwise more commonly known as Every Fucking Inch, which means that they cycled every inch of the tour. I cycled Every Fucking inch but in Ethiopia. When I committed to the trip, and especially after my accident I simply wanted to make it to the end, and I had to promise myself that I would not put my body under extra strain or under extra pressure. Therefore I was sad that I lost EFI, but I have no regrets in losing it. The state that some people bike in just for that “EFI” title is unbelievable. No one would consider going to work in such a state, never the less bike when at home, but on the trip the limits are pushed in every direction. I could not do that to myself. I’m proud of my accomplishments and I’m really proud of those that accomplished EFI even though I sometimes wanted to knock some of them against the head and tell them to smarten up and get on the bloody truck.

The rundown:
The trip has several things going for it. First, we start in the winter in Cairo avoiding the worst heat all the way to the Equator. After the Equator the further south we head, the more we head into winter down there. Throughout the trip we avoid the worst heat. The only sketchy section for weather is the rainy season in Tanzania and hitting the rains in South Africa, but we were extremely fortunate and had it pretty easy in both. The second thing the trip has going for it is that it moves from roughing it to increasing comforts the further south we head. In Egypt, Sudan and Ethiopia it’s all bush camps, the rare cold showers and minimal access to external food. The riding gets easier further south, and the cultural differences become less extreme. At one point a few of us were sitting around and tried imagining what it would be like if we’d hit Ethiopia after 3 months of biking instead of 3 weeks. I don’t think any of us could have handled it.
Would I recommend this tour to someone else? Hell yes! I have to give Tour d’Afrique credit that they do a phenomenal job organizing this tour because it’s no easy feat getting 50 cyclists of all levels across the African continent. The logistics of this trip are quite difficult and for the most part they are on top of it and it all runs smoothly. No doubt there are improvements that need to be made and they are easy fixes, but would take a bit of extra money.

Accomodation
One is the choice of places that we stay in. It is 95% of the time the lowest budget camping site that is available. It’s possible to camp every single night of the tour and some hard core individuals managed to do that, something I never aimed to achieve. Sometimes we camped on hotel grounds and it was first come first serve basis on the hotel rooms. The camp sites are almost without exception outside of the towns, which makes rest days or even after riding trips into town difficult, especially when there are no cabs and it’s unsafe to lock up your bikes in town. Then again, where would you house 60 people with tents within a city or town?

Food:
The second improvement that seriously needs to be made is with the food. The morning breakfast consists of either porridge or corn meal and once we were past Nairobi the occasional Muesli came along. About 5 times we even had eggs for breakfast. A serious appreciation for Peanut butter needs to exist to survive the trip. I personally dislike porridge, corn meal and can only enjoy peanut butter in small amounts so until we were able to eat breakfasts in lodges it was force feeding and simply not eating enough. Lunches consisted of factory white bread and we were only allowed one sandwich of what was served for the day, which was usually tuna, cucumber and tomato, or sometimes egg salad, and once you’d eaten that it was either jam or peanut butter. Not enough for the calories we were burning. No wonder we all lost weight and bonked almost every day. We were supplied PVM energy bars and they filled in the rest of the food in sections where we could not buy any other food, but how many of those can you eat? As shitty as breakfast and dinner were, the dinners were awesome. There was always a meat option and an excellent vegetarian option and lots of both. They were not to be missed. I would recommend bringing protein powder on the trip and making a shake after every ride. We found some in Nairobi and it literally saved us. The difference was immense once we started using it. The recovery was immensely faster. I would also recommend bringing electrolyte pills and/ or drops as well as some power drink, because there really isn't much supplied in that sense. The PVM energy drink goes off in the heat and I couldn't look at it anymore after Ethiopia.

In regards to doing the trip in one stretch it has its advantages and disadvantages. The ½ way mark is Nairobi/ Arusha and I definitely was not ready to leave at that point. I didn’t hit my “holy shit this is a long trip and I’m freakin tired mark” until Malawi. The most difficult sections at that point are over and then it’s a grind along paved roads to the west coast. I can’t say I enjoyed everything after Malawi as I did before it. I was getting to the point where I was getting sick of group travel, I was sick of camping, I was tired and I was ready for some chill out time and my bed at home. The low ended with Malawi, but the excitement definitely did not return that I’d had previously, which is unfortunate. Splitting the trip in ½ would prevent the burn out and a greater appreciation for the second half of the trip, but then leaving the first ½ and reintegrating into a new group for the second half would also be difficult. Personally I'm glad I did it in one stretch.

Traffic:
There isn’t much to say about traffic because about 90% of the time there is no traffic. The only places where we encountered traffic that made us uncomfortable was in Sudan south of Khartoum, in Tanzania approaching the Malawi border and the stretch in South Africa. Sudan, Ethiopia, northern Kenya and most of Tanzania had no traffic at all. In Ethiopia everyone walks or runs everywhere. In Sudan it was surprising and extremely scary that a lot of the buses and vans had hub caps that stuck out with sharp decorated metal bits that could easily amputate like the carts in the movie Gladiator during one of the battles in the arena. In Tanzania we lost Werner to a broken elbow when he got hit from the back by one of the trucks. The truck kept moving without realizing he’d taken out a biker.
What’s a better sign of some of the traffic is the excessive amount of road- kill. I’ve seen every size of animal and in every state of decay from a donkey hit mere minutes before we rode along still kicking with its front legs and the entire rear end and legs missing, to pancakes on the road. A smell that stalked us across the entire continent is the smell of rotting flesh in the African sun. Some of the worst were a dead elephant on the side of the road and a dead hayena. I still gag at the thought of that smell. I think I saw more dead wildlife than alive. Some that I rather saw dead were snakes and only once did I see a large snake on the road that was still alive. Others had closer encounters and even biked over some that were in the process of crossing the road and spanned the entire width of the road. Once in Ethiopia a large snake was spotted right by the tents and I don’t think anyone went out of their tent that night to pee.

Experiencing the cultures:
What is astonishing is watching the culture, the scenery and the temperatures change as we head south. I really enjoyed crossing country lines because there was always a drastic difference. The food also changes with the borders, as do the attitude of the people. The begging or the shouting would sometimes stop from before and after the border post within meters. Incredible!

A large part of the day is consumed by biking. For me, most rides were between 5-7 hours, and by the time I arrived it took time to get sorted and eat something and often I was simply too tired to do much of anything else. I thought that I would play with kids and hang out with locals more, but the tiredness overruled that most of the time. I was one of the faster riders and had more time to hang out in towns, coke stops and in camp and it’s hard to imagine for some of the slower riders that often took up to 10 hours to get into camp and had no time to do anything but bike. It would have been a very different trip. Many people did take the option of riding the truck for full days or ½ days when they were long or overly strenuous.

The bikes:
There really was a wide variety of bikes on the trip and I have to say that my frame, the Surly Karate Monkey was a great frame for the trip. No suspension steel frame that fit 29 inch tires. In hindsight I probably should have had suspension for the rough roads because of my shoulder, but it did survive and considering the large amount of tarmac riding it was nice not to have the extra weight of a suspension fork. One lesson that I did learn is that it’s worth it to spend the extra money on components for a trip like this. 11 900 km to go without any real bike stores until Windhoek (2 weeks before the finish line) is a long way to go depending on your components. I had to purchase a rear derailer and shifter from a sectional to replace mine. My front derailer made it across the finish line without shifting. In the end I replaced: my front derailer, front shifters, my headset, several sets of shifting cables, 1 casette, 2 chains, crank brother pedals x3, breakpads, seats, and went through aprox 14 tubes, 4 patch kits and 2 cycling computers.

Books:
Many people brought great books about Africa. Currently I’m reading “King Leopold’s Ghost” by Adam Hochschild, which is the story of Belgium’s colonization of the Congo. A terrific book and an easy read. Another book that I’ve started and have yet to finish is “The State of Africa,” which circulated wildly throughout the group. It focuses on the political state of Africa after independence and the atrocities that occurred through colonization and the disaster of independence. Also an incredibly easy read and really provides a great political overview of the continent. Two other books that were incredible to read is “What is the What” by I can’t remember who and “A long way gone” by Ishmael Beah. What is the What is the life story of a Sudanese boy that ended up as a refuge on his own at a very young age and grew up in camps along the Ethiopian and Kenyan border and then entered the USA as a refuge. An incredible tale of survival and tragedy. A long way gone is the story of Ishmael who grew up in a village in Sierra Leone and became a child soldier. It is his account of being a child soldier and how he survived. It’s incredible to consider that both Ishmael and the Sudanese boy are both around my age now. The fact that these incredible atrocities were committed so recently and are even still going on is mind boggling. It’s much easier to read accounts like these and consider it a thing of the past. This is now! Another book that I have at home, but got tucked away when my apartment flooded is 28 stories of AIDS in Africa. This is a book that I have heard many great things about, but that I still need to read. Just thought I’d throw some readings in too.

The HIV/ AIDS epidemic
Cycling through Botswana was a bit of a wakeup call. The population in Botswana is so low that we barely saw anyone, but it has the highest infection rate in the world. Aproximately 40% of the population is infected.
Considering this is a state of crisis, I figured that the government or social services would be all over the epidemic publicly and we’d see education and prevention propaganda everywhere. It was shocking that there was nothing. Condoms were free or to be purchased everywhere but that was about it. One billboard did exist, but it nearly made me fall of my bike. All it said was “Who is in your sexual network?” and it was in bright pink, yellow and green colors that made you think of a happy place. That’s seriously all it said on that billboard. Shocking!
I couldn’t help but walk through the grocery store and wonder who is HIV+. So many beautiful people and nothing is being done. Life expectancy has dropped to below 40 years.

Conclusion:
I feel like I’m writing an essay here. Overall, it’s been an incredible journey and I think it’s going to take a while for all of it to sink in. Right now I’m in the process of sorting through nearly a 1000 photos and I will create a slideshow of the trip and if you want to see it let me know. I was going to do a slideshow but those are always awkward. Thanks for all of your donations and please keep them coming! The support I’ve had from everyone has been amazing. The emails and notes with inspiration have really meant a lot. I’ve really enjoyed writing this blog, but this is where it ends.

Grad school starts in September and this summer I have some more biking to do!

Cape Town!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2009-05-10T05:54:00.000-07:00

This is where I would like to insert a whole lot of profanities before saying I'VE ARRIVED!!!!!!!! It definitely has not quite sunk in yet aside from the hangover, the bike box and the giant pile of stuff that's already gone into the garbage. I think my bike was more exited to arrive than I was. I was pretty close to taping my front derailer on with ductape just so that it would not fall off... I wasn't able to shift in the front for the last 2 days and thankfully there wasn't much climbing.

I'll give a full update a bit later, but just wanted to say I'M IN CAPE TOWN!!!! The city is beautiful and the mass amount of people are slightly overwhelming, as was our entry with a marching band, a ceremony and lots of champagne, but man it's good to be here!

More to come in the next few days...

This last section ain’t no piece of cake

2009-05-04T23:33:00.000-07:00

We are 6 days from the finish line and it was no easy feat getting to this point. What a trip! The flat and paved highways were left behind with Botswana and concluded with a 207 km ride into a head or cross wind to the Namibian border. Botswana on the previous tours was renowned for the strong tailwinds and ease of the long distances, but the wind did not favor us so much this year. The only day we did have the legendary tailwind was for the 310 km ride into Maun. The rest were cross or headwinds and by the time we reached Windhoek you could have marinated me and thrown me on a plate for dinner. No cooking necessary.

Windhoek was an incredible surprise. It’s a western city with fabulous restaurants, grocery shops, hotels and fast service. The Afrikaans and especially the German influence is apparent in the food, but also the clothing. Somehow the advances in fashion have not reached the male population that still seems to be stuck in the 80’s with short jean shorts (way above the knee), thick mustaches, socks with sandals and giant beer bellies. The only regret is not getting a photo of this incredible fashion statement. Fashion aside, let me talk about the food. German cakes, meats, cold cuts, breads, ice cream and whatever else you could think of. Essentially heaven! Last time I checked my email my dad had commented that all I talk about on my blog is food and whether I’d gained weight. I just started to laugh and considered the amount of time we obsess over food on this trip. Half the time you obsess over things you can’t buy here and that you crave, and the other half of the time you obsess over the food that you can get and how you can get more of it. Until about Zambia grocery stores were scarce and so were foods that we were used to. In Sudan and Ethiopia the accessible obsession were Bounty bars and warm Cokes (cold ones were nearly impossible to find). As we reached further south, the repertoire of treats slightly broadened, but only extended as far as packaged cookies and a broader selection of chocolate bars. To eat a healthy and sugar free diet on this tour is impossible unless you desire to arrive as a skeleton and bonk on every ride. Junk food is a staple and pretty much all you can buy in the grocery stores. I thought I would be eating lots of fresh fruit and such things, but it’s surprising how little of it is around. This tour is about snatching any calorie you can find, eating it and then finding more. Even the abundant flies you encounter on the road provide extra protein when they meet their death in the human esophagus. (At least this puts a positive twist on consuming African flies).

In Ethiopia everyone lost mass amounts of weight due to the extensive climbing, tough roads and stomach flu’s. Maybe I’ll make my millions with the introduction of the Ethiopian weight loss program. Combine stomach flu, biking up mountains and chasing kids with rocks into one and you’re guaranteed to drop pounds.

Now that we’re down south, and ice cream, apple cake, chocolate cake and good meat have entered our diets, our eyes tend to be bigger than our stomachs. A bunch of us have actually realized that we’ve gained a couple of pounds back due to our locusts approach to food. See it, devour it, move on and do the same all over again. Now that we’re in the land of good and abundant edible food we’ve actually had to re teach ourselves to ration food intake.

Another rather funny problem with our eating habits over the past four months is that none of us have any table manners left. We’ve been eating standing up, or with just a chair and the plate on our lap for four months and sitting at a table is a foreign idea at this point. What we are doing is “fressen,” which is the german word for eating like animals. I have a feeling that I’m going to need a good slap on the hands before I can be reentered into society.

Now that I’ve spent another good chunk of space talking about food it’s time to move on to the other aspects of the tour, the biking. Namibia has been absolutely stunning and I would have to say my favorite country so far. I have to admit that many factors have worked against us on this section including ridiculously long distances on dirt roads, unfavorable winds, general fatigue, a lack of coke stops, freezing cold mornings and hot days, and to top it off I ended up with a nasty cold that slowed me down massively. Even though the frustrations and exhaustion sometimes seemed overwhelming there was no denying the fact that Namibia is absolutely stunning in scenery. It’s absolutely breathtaking and the wide open spaces, vast views and lack of people make even the most exhausting rides some of the most memorable. Namibia is a huge country and the population is so small that it’s only 2 people per square kilometer. I have barely seen any people since Windhoek.

The roads are packed dirt and for the most part they are quite decent. We had a few sections that were corrugated or deep sand pits, but overall they are quite enjoyable. On some sections I’d be going 12 km/h while on others I was flying along at nearly 40 km/h. I’m also happy to announce that I only had 3 flats in the span of 7 days of off road riding! I can’t wait to see those Maxxis tires burn!

If you read the Lonely Planet guide book they do not recommend Namibia for biking trips and I can see why if you’re doing it unsupported. There are simply not enough stops to restock supplies or to get water. Supported, it’s heaven! I highly recommend it. We’ve been biking in Namibia for 8 days and we have barely encountered any people or towns. Occasionally we’d hit a random farm house and the next one we’d hit would be 50 km further. The funniest thing is that there would be nothing for ages and then I’d round the corner into a small town of 5 houses with a fully stocked store including magnums and Lindt chocolate and a small hotel serving fresh apple pie. Then nothing again for endless kilometers. The little Namibian Oasis’s.

From Windhoek we had 2 riding days to Sesriem where we had a rest day to check out the biggest dunes in the world at Sassusvlei. I was sick as a dog, climbed up the first dune and then retreated to stay in the van to let others take photos for me so that I could pretend that I was there to take them myself. In Sesriem I also had a chance to enjoy some of the local meats such as zebra, ostrich, springbock, oryx and a few others. They are phenomenal! Especially zebra, ostrich and oryx steaks are some of the best I’ve ever had. Here I go talking about food again.

The funny thing is that often when I’m biking I think about all the things I want to write about for my next blog update, and then when I actually sit down to write it I can barely remember ½ the stuff I thought of. It’s funny that so many people on this tour came on this trip thinking that they were going to solve big life problems and make decisions that need to be made for the future, but it’s incredible how little thinking goes on while doing these long bike trips. Before the ½ way mark, everyone is way to wrapped up in the everyday ocurances of the trip and particularly in Ethiopia I was consumed by constant plotting of what I’d really like to do to the damn kids with rocks and mentally staged elaborate wars or weapons to return to the road with. Don’t get me wrong I love kids, I work with kids, but Ethiopia was a bit much and I know I wasn’t the only one. Kenya was consumed by “holy f#$$*# when is this road going to end. I hurt!” but the further south I went, the more I started to think of what needed to be done when I get home and how much I miss my fridge, bathroom and bed. The lack of privacy and the ability to shut a door also starts to be exhausting.

With 5 riding days left, I'm pretty exited for Cape Town and the tour to end. It’s been an incredible trip and I would recommend it to anyone, but it’s time for it to finish. I’ll give a long update from Cape Town. There’s still lots of things to tell that didn’t have room in the updates as I went along.

I have not been pushing much for my fundraising for the Stephen Lewis Foundation, but if you get a chance, please help me reach my goal of 11, 900 dollars! If you already have contributed, thank you so much! I’ll keep the fundraising site open until the end of June and please pass it on to anyone that might be interested.

I’ll be home May 19th!

Botswana: First dodging insects, potholes and giant heaps of elephant poo and then biking 310 km in one day

2009-04-17T00:26:00.000-07:00

Now I actually have some time to properly update my blog. Last time I updated I had about 30 minutes before we had to jet to get to camp and get sorted before the boat ride. I promise that this time around I will minimize the use of exclamation marks!!!

Zambia was a fabulous country with some of the most friendly and welcoming people we’ve encountered yet. The further south- west we ride, the dryer the climate becomes. This change makes riding and camping much more pleasurable.

With a short ferry ride we entered Botswana. The four riding days we have had here so far have been a whole new experience for us. The flat endless roads paralleled with a complete lack of human occupancy has created a stark contrast to what we’ve seen so far. Botswana is roughly the size of France with only 1.8 million people. The country boasts of some of the largest Elephant herds in the world and an incredible amount of other wildlife. The road we take from the Zambian border to Namibia is known as the Elephant Highway for sectional riders, and it has its reasons. From the roads we see forests, sometimes quite thin, or vast grasslands. We were warned to watch for elephants, giraffe’s and other large animals on the road, which really got me exited to see those animals from my bike but also a bit worried because elephants can have a hot temper. With the amounts of poo on the road you figure that either they use the road as their toilet, or that there really are huge amounts of elephants in the area. I’m not sure about the first, but the second is definitely true. Yesterday we saw a giraffe and a kudu, and today we saw 5 elephants and a zebra. Others saw huge herds of elephants along the road and Paul, our race director even got charged for passing too close to a calf. Ironically he’d been the one lecturing us on not getting too close to the elephants. Today I got some wicked photos of me on my bike with a giant male elephant in the background. I’d tried with the giraffe yesterday, but the animals are not as docile here as they are in Tanzania. They are not as used to humans and generally bolt as soon as any form of human sign is smellable or visable.

Aside from dodging the heaps of elephant poo, we have also become pros at dodging insects of all sizes on the roads. The most comical are the chameleons, and it’s quite incredible how many there are of them. Those suckers move nowhere fast and when they cross the road, you can’t help but cheer them on and hope they get to the other side before getting squashed. Moving wheels do not phase them or make them move faster, so the amount of squashed chameleons we see is almost as frequent as unsquashed. Their ability to adopt the color of the surface they are on also does not work in their benefit when sitting on the road. I’ve had some last second dodges around a couple that were just chilling on the road in grey. Other insects are also innumerable. If I were an insectologist (and this is their official name) I’d be in heaven on these roads. Some of them are simply massive! Giant centepedes about the length of my forearm and about as thick as my middle finger slowly meander across the road and beatles almost the size of my palm do the same. Something that the Planet Earth series failed to cover in their filming is the mass migration of caterpillars across the road. I think the entire caterpillar population of Botswana is currently crossing that road and moving on to munch on the leaves on the other side. Try dodging all those suckers!

When the insects are flying it becomes a game of dodge and/ or close your mouth. We had a section in Zambia where the road was filled with mass amounts of dragon flies. Here in Botswana it’s mass amounts of butterflies. There are these giant flying beetles whose reaction time is that of a drunken bofoon and it becomes a test who can dodge first. If neither manages to dodge it feels like you just got hit by a bullet. They make this incredibly loud buzzing noise as they fly and as they are about to hit you the noise is super loud and within a second comes the giant smacking noise, which would make brilliant sound recordings. I always picture the beginning of the movie Men in Black where the dragon fly flies along the road and then splashes on the windshield of the car. That’s kind of what it’s like except no splatter. Thankfully! The art is to dodge elephant poo, insects and the humongous pot holes that line sections of the street. It could almost become a game. The roads are sometimes so straight, flat and long that it may add some entertainment.

As for the people and culture of Botswana I can’t really say much as of yet because we haven’t really seen any. The road is completely void of humans aside from the odd tourist bus or truck that passes us. I do know that Botswana has one of the highest AIDS rates in the world, if not the highest. Since 1990 the life expectancy has dropped from 61 to 42 and about 30% of those ages 24- 40 are infected. A scary thought.

5 of us reached Maun yesterday by packing 2 riding days into one. Yesterday's ride was 174 km into bush camp and today's ride was 135 into Maun. We had an incredible tailwind and averaged 35 km/h and the bush camp sucked, which made the decision to push on very easy. The bush camp was all thorns, no shade and insects on steroids. We managed 310 km in 9 hours and 15 minutes and were pleasantly surprised to find the nicest hotel for a rest day we've seen so far. What a reward! At dinner we just sat around and continuously found reasons not to get out of the chair while supporting our heads with both hands and shoving more and more food into our mouths. Now we have 2 full rest days here and the rest of the gang will probably roll in here around 1pm. For now we're savouring the quiet before the storm of everyone's arrival.

In 3 weeks we will be in Capetown! Time flies when you're having fun.

Flatter and paved roads, but long distances

2009-04-13T04:11:00.002-07:00

You know your perception is off when anything under 140 km in a day is considered a "short" day. Now that the terrain is flattening out and the roads are paved, the kilometers have gone up as well. This and next week, most days are around 150- 160 with one day at 207. I'm praying for strong tailwinds! We just crossed the border into Bostwana today and therefore checked off country number 8 of 10. Time flies when you're having fun!

Zambia was incredible and definitely ranks in my top 3. Riding was fun with lots of hills, often tailwinds, incredibly friendly people, no begging and great grocery stores! In Lusaka we had the incredible sightseeing experience of the all you can eat buffet at the intercontinental, the mall where we had western food, wine and went to the movies! We definitely spent our time there delving into local culture! The Lonely Planet guides somehow missed those sights when they wrote up on Lusaka and what's worthy to see.

Out of Lusaka we had 3 riding days to Livingstone where we had 2 rest days to check out Victoria falls. We were there over easter so it was packed, but there were ways to miss the masses. The falls are a spectacular sight! The water was so high that the riverbanks were totally flooded and the spray from the falls was so intense that if you walked down certain paths they provided you with 2 raincoats to layer, but you still got drenched. The paths were rivers and it was hard to see past the 2 meters infront of you. As soon as we cleared the spray, brilliant sunshine was back.

There is also a fantastic bunji jump sight into the Zambezi River just below the falls and man, if it wouldn't have been for my shoulder I would have done it! I did do the swing, which includes the free fall, but you don't bounce back up. It was spectacular and as soon as I get cleared for my shoulder to bunji jump I'm so in! Absolutely fantastic to be rushing towards the river rapids at such high speeds! The bridge is the connector to the Zimbabwe border. We could have crossed for the day but by the time we finished jumping, food was in order.

Now we're heading towards the elephant highway and this afternoon we're heading on a boat safari to check out the wildlife. It is supposed to be an incredible sight! Can't wait!

Malawi: Country #6

2009-03-31T01:00:00.000-07:00

Leaving Tanzania was definitely sad. It was a spectacular country and the last couple of days did not disappoint either. We had an incredible descent down to Lake Malawi and the Malawi border. This time we did not have to dish out excessive american dollars to cross, and only got a small stamp in our passports. I figure, if you have to pay for a visa to get into a country, you better get one hell of a colorfull visa stamped into your passport that at least fills a whole page. That was the only disappointment with crossing into Tanzania; the entry fee versus entry visa was not equivalent. We only got a disappointing one colored stamp. sigh. Entering new countries has also become extremely amusing because we also have to fill out forms for entry and each one asks for your profession. Considering they barely glance over the form, or know all the various professions that are considered legitimate in the english language, we have become a bit creative. On my form entering Malawi, my profession was "nerd," while others were much more creative and put such professions such as fluffer, pole vaulter, porn star, professional bunji jumper and many others. It always turns into a giggle fest after leaving the customs office, and especially for longer waits it keeps us entertained.

With the significant descent to lake Malawi, we also came into a more humid climate in Malawi. As with every border crossing, there was a visible difference. Malawi is one of the poorest countries in the world, and it was quite evident right after the border. We camped not far after crossing over, and our camp was pretty much filled with close to a hundred people running through camp or sitting right by you to simply watch. When you made eye contact the smile would quickly turn into begging for clothing, money, food or anything else that we brought. After Ethiopia and the lack of personal space and theft, all of us are still a bit weary and some lost their nerve with the kids and chasing them out of camp. Usually when dusk falls, many run home, but to our surprise some hung around and as we crawled into our tents to get away from mosquitos, shoes and other articles left outside the tents disappeared. Malcolm had his size 15 shoes stolen, and I really wonder what the locals are going to do with those. Maybe they'll use them to sleep in? Kids also tended to collect around those tents that had their headlamps on and where you could see in, which made for a slightly uncomfortable night. While border crossings can be kind of fun, camping near borders has generally been a bit of a drab. Nothing will compare to the camping we did in the border town between Sudan and Ethiopia, but this came pretty close.

The scenery in Malawi does not disappoint. It's incredibly beautiful and lake Malawi is definitely as nice to look at, as it is to swim in it. Our last rest day, we stayed on the beach and enjoyed a beach bum day of doing nothing but reading, eating and swimming. From there we were supposed to stay along the lake, but the heavy rains had washed out a bridge and we were forced to take the inland route to Lilongwe. This change of route also shortened our trip by 1 day and therefore we are now in Lilongwe for two days of eating, sleeping and reading. I think we all needed it!

Right now is the time of the trip where everyone has a bit of an overdose. We've been together 24/7 for almost 3 months, been biking every day and everyone is tired. More and more people are starting to take advantage of the hotels along the route and trying to spend some time away. Several take off for a few days to enjoy resorts, beaches or going on their own adventure and then rejoin on rest days. We have also now lost 3 riders in total. 2 with broken elbows (one from a crash into a pot hole, and another to a truck hitting the elbow while biking). We also lost Andrew to lake Malawi and the bars. He decided to stay on in Lake Malawi and work at one of the party places along there.

But the morale is still quite high. We have just over 6 weeks to go, and I think everyone is going to be pretty exited to get to the finish line. I still love the biking and the trip, but I think I've hit my max in my patience for camping. I think this max has definitely hit with the arrival of the rainy season and mass amounts of mosquitos. The sun sets around 6pm and then you're forced to retreat to the tent until you get up in the morning. Just a wheee bit claustrophobic, but thanfully we are in the south now where hotels are more bountiful and we are going to less and less bush camps. Man sometimes I miss the deserts because camping there was phenomenal!

We did have a great camp at a school a couple of nights ago. It was after a really tough day of climibing, and changing camp locations a few times, but the school left a huge impression on me. At first I thought it was an abandoned school, because of the broken windows and the lack of furniture or light in the rooms. The classroom doors were all unlocked and I started venturing from classroom to classroom to look at the class environments. As the grades went up, more paintings of lessons were on the wall and the blackboards were filled with writing. Surprisingly the date of the last lesson was the day before we arrived. The benches were all broken in the upper classrooms, while the younger classrooms had no furniture at all. Lessons on Geography, math, AIDS education etc. were permanently painted on the walls. It was incredibly shabby and I could hardly imagine that these classrooms held many, if any students.

During dinner the headmaster of the school came to talk to us, and told us about the school and its students. 800 students attend this school with 8 teachers to instruct them all. It's a primary school and every year only about 30 students go on to secondary school. The rest remain at that education level. Compared to other schools, 30 seems to be quite a high number. There are only a few secondary schools in the country and kids have to compete for spots in these schools. Therefore he was quite proud to produce that many students that could go, but whether they are able to go is a whole new question. It really was an eye opening experience that put so much into perspective.

While we set up our tents etc. many of the kids were around and watched with fascination, and followed us as soon as we started venturing. I had a lot of fun with a group of them and my digital camera. In all countries but Kenya, the kids have an endless fascination of seeing themselves on digital cameras. Quite fun for pictures!

Now we are in Lilongwe chilling for 2 days and then we head into Zambia within a couple of riding days. Although Malawi is one of the poorest countries, it has been the most expensive country we have hit since Egypt. We are constantly astounded at the prices of everything and how fast money is disappearing for simple things like snack food. A moment of glory did come when we found Mega's! This is the nestle icecream bar which in europe is called Magnum. Yummmm!!!!

Do we really have to leave Tanzania?

2009-03-20T04:18:00.000-07:00

Tanzania has been incredible and the favorite section of many of us. The scenery, the people, the offroad adventures, the fabulous stops along the way and the wildlife... the list goes on. When I last wrote on the blog, I was sitting on the edge of the Ngorongoro Crater about to go on Safari, which ended up being incredible. Driving into the crater reminded me of Jurassic Park minus the cheesy music to create more drama. You're in these SUV's and you cannot go off the road. At first there are only a few animals left and right from the car, but soon enough you are in the middle of herds of Zebra's, Wilderbeests, Gazelle's and other animals. We saw just about everything within 5 hours of being in the crater. Everything from elephants, lions, rhinos, hippos, hayena, cheetah, zebras etc. The only big one we missed was the leopard, but that'll be for the next time I'm in Tanzania, because I'm definitely coming back!

I also made the decision that I would like to come back in my next life as a lion in the Ngorongoro Crater. They are incredible animals and man, do they have an easy life there! You'd see a pride of lions kicking around, sleeping, chilling, maybe walking a few steps and plopping down again to sleep for the afternoon, and about 200 meters away there are huge herds of pray for them doing about thes same thing. So if a lion gets hungry, the effort to find lunch is a 200 meter dash, a few chomps and then more sleeping and resting is in order. Man, what a life!

After our 3 day break, everyone was rested and we were back on the bike for a 7 day biking stretch to Iringa. 7 days of biking is loooongggg especially when it's all off road, pretty much all bush camps, no showers, mud, rain and the trucks barely making it to camp. Don't get me wrong, it was probably one of my favorite weeks, but we were all relieved to land in Iringa yesterday. We were tired, and a bit shaken up after all the happenings of the week. The dinner truck was having major mechanical issues and a couple of times we nearly ended up without our tents overnight because the truck wasn't going to make it. They always ended up making it, but often hours late, and once not until well after dark. Some of us started packing changes of clothes just in case we got stuck, and once we bought sarongs and flip flops so that we wouldn't be stuck in our sweaty cycling clothes for hours on end. A couple of days ago we had a 90 km ride, which was pretty straight forward, but the trucks got stuck, and how you can extend a 4 hour day into 9 hours is sort of an art form.

This was 2 days ago and the day deserves sprecial mention because so much happened. It started off quite normal and we were all biking along. Taryn and I were cruising together when we came up on Paul and Tim on the side of the road. Paul had missed a pot hole and gone flying. Quickly a bunch of us made a team effort of creating a wall to block others from falling into the pot hole and patching up Paul, who was not in the best shape. After he was patched up, I was surprised that he got back on his bike, we kept biking to find another group of cyclists piled up where Bruce had crashed after losing grip of his handlebars. Crash #2. Both were quite serious, but both got back on their bikes. At the second accident site, I discovered a flat. My gazillionth flat at that... so that was fixed. Paul caught up to us at that site and he was not looking good. He was dragging his feet along the ground and complained that he could not brake at all after his crash, but he was keen to keep going.

A few kilometers before lunch my chain broke. It was only 2 weeks old and I had an entirely new drivetrain on there after having major shifting problems. Finally we rolled into lunch only to find out that the dinner truck had broken down for the 3rd time. We also reincountered Paul there, who had been picked up by the landrover. It turned out that he had broken his elbow and was bleeding profusely. The landrover packed him up and jetted towards the Iringa hospital at superspeeds. All of us were quite shocked and really hoped he was ok.

No dinner truck meant that we had to do the last 30 km as slow as possible to ensure we don't sit around a bush camp without any trucks or food. The lunch truck had to backtrack towards the dinner truck to pick up the dinner making equipment and then head to the camp and improvise our dinner because the other truck would not make it. No dinner truck also meant no camping gear, clothes etc. for us. For the last 30 km we stopped in about every village to find some food and drinks. The last stop before camp we stayed there for 2 hours eating chips mahai and their version of doughnuts until the lunch truck passed us.

We got into camp around 5, changed into the sarong and flip flops we'd bought in the last village and ran from the bees that were swarming around us at all times and quite agressively going for us. I got stung, but it wasn't too bad. Robin rolled into camp and had scalped himself by walking into a door. He got patched up. By then 1 nurse was in the Iringa hospital with Paul, as well as one of the riders who was also a nurse. The second nurse was busy patching up Bruce, Robin and Malcolm who had also fallen into a pot hole.

The truck finally arrived around 8pm with many cheers and an eager bunch of cyclists trying to crawl into their tents and away from the bugs.

Paul ended up having to fly to Nairobi for surgery. We are all sad to see him go, but by the sounds of it he hopes to finish the tour next year. Lone is back with us now. She broke her ankle about 4 weeks ago and is now ready to ride again with an air cast thingy (that is the official medical term :-). It's been a crazy week for many injuries and several hospital trips... hopefully that has ended now.

To continue with the story of the crazy day, and the next day...
The next day, day 7 was going into Iringa and our rest day. My day there started with a flat and I proceeded to get 2 more throughout the day. For anyone ever thinking of cycling across Africa... do not bring Maxis tires. They are not strong enough for the thorns and sharp rocks. Everyone that brought them has had massive problems and is swearing non stop. I have had between 20- 30 flats in the past month of offroading. The benefit is that i definitely know how to patch a tire, but the drawback is that I have not been able to enjoy the offroad sections as much as I wanted. Every time I hit a softer spot of ground I'd check to see if it was my tire. We have created a support group for those with Maxxis tires or endless flats :-) The meetings may involve alcohol and lots of food!

The ride has been incredible, flats or not! The kids are cute as hell and the adults and all have been incredibly friendly, open and easy going. The coke stops have been so fun and hassle free, that the stops have increased in length every time. On about the second day of our 7 day stretch, we hit a small village of about 10 houses at the bottom of a hill and about 5 of us crawled into a family's kitchen and ate 36 chapati between all of us. Robin was born and raised in Nairobi and therefore spoke Swahili and we had a great time with our translator chatting it up with the entire family. She introduced us to 2 of her 5 children and some of her neighbors. We ended up staying there much longer than planned and were still full by the time we reached lunch. All the villages we visted throughout the 7 day stretch were not used to having Muzungu's (white people) in their village, and especially wearing ridiculous cycling outfits and hoovering up any food and drinks they find.

Most villages we hit were incredibly poor and since it's not on the tourist route, we were quite the shock to many of the younger children that have spent their entire lives within a 5 km radius. We camped near one of these villages and the kids, as well as the adults were absolutely baffled by our tent city, and everything we brought. For the younger kids we were the first white's they'd ever seen. One of the boys spoke english and he explained how strange everything was for them. He could not grasp that the oldest person on our tour is 70 years old, because people don't get that old and secondly that they would have the kind of money to even buy a bicycle seemed unfathomable.

I have so many photos to compliment the stories, but they will have to wait...

I think I'm going to leave it with that for now. There is so much more to tell and so much to look forward to! In 4 days we cross into Malawi. I can't believe how fast time is flying! Before we know it we're going to be in Capetown!

South of the Equator it's all downhill

2009-03-11T07:53:00.000-07:00

We're past 1/2 way in days, but not quite in kilometers! Today is day 61 and I'm sitting with my laptop at the rim of the Ngorongoro Crater staring at the most incredible view. Today is day 2 of 3 days of rest before the grind starts again and man, am I enjoying every second of it! We crossed into Tanzania a couple of days ago and landed in Arusha, which is the starting point for Safaris and climbing Mt Kilimanjaro. A beautiful and peaceful spot and on our way biking into the town from the border, some already saw giraffe's, zebra's and springbocks. I can't say that I saw the giraffes but I definitely biked past them!

Just to rewind, our last rest day was in Nairobi, Kenya, which was awesome, but the entry into the city was painful to say the least. Our convoy entry was 35 km at 12.5 km/h, And our exit out of Nairobi was a convoy at 10.9 km/h over 11km, and to say the least we nearly fell off our bikes 1/2 the time due to biking too slow. Nairobi itself was great and relaxing. Everyone seems to have learned how to optimize their off days to get some rest in. The difficult part about rest days is that there are always a ton of errands to run, things to buy, internet to update and by the time you're done that 1/2 the day is gone. It's all about optimizing time, getting most stuff done before and then finding a nice hotel with a pool in the afternoon to chill at. It has become an art form!

The first 1/2 of the trip is over, and with that the rough life of desert camps, minimal populations and the lack of showers and hotel options. Now that we see fruit stands and coke stops every few kilometers we all question how we made it through the past 2 months without them. The climate is getting increasingly humid, and the sun more intense. We crossed the equator with big hurrah about a week ago in Kenya, and now it's all downhill, right? Maybe not quite but the riding does get easier, as long as the rainy season in Tanzania and Malawi holds off for a couple more weeks. If ti doesn't it could get real muddy and camping could get really interesting!

Although we've been biking nonstop for the past 2 months, the enthousiasm does not seem to wane. Everyone is tired, and I think everyone is really exited for the 3 day vacation but the spirits are still high and I'm definitely exited to see what southern Africa has to bring. The diversity in culture, landscape and terrain never ceases to amaze me.

Tomorrow it's Safari drive time and then back to Arusha. On the 13th we're back on the bike and biking towards Malawi, which we will reach in about a week or so.

You can only ride as hard as your poop

2009-03-04T01:11:00.000-08:00

I stole this quote from Randy, the tour director. It sort of sums up our experience of Ethiopia. The stomach flu made its rounds, and strangely enough, for me the stomach flu came with the Ethiopian border and left when we crossed the Kenyan border. Maybe Ethiopia and I simply did not agree... maybe it was too many triple decker juices, or the endura. who knows!

One thing that Ethiopia did teach us is how to bike through herds of animals. To bike through goats and sheep is probably the easiest. When approaching, make some random noises, stick to your path and they will usually scatter in all directions in a panic. A couple of dumbfounded ones sometimes need to be swirved around, but otherwise they are manageable. Cows are a different story. If you approach them from the back, the best thing is to find a space, make no noise and simply gun it through without them noticing you. If they do notice you while you are passing them it could get ugly. They tend to turn towards noise, so their heads with giant horns are suddenly right next to you, and if more of their body turns you could be slamming on your breaks hoping not to end up creating mince meat of yourself or the animal. If you approach them from the front, stick your course and they usually tend to move. And usually means sometimes.
With donkeys it is a hopeless case. You better get out of their way or you're screwed. Herds of camels are my favorite to pass through, mostly because one of them usually tends to freak out a bit and start prancing around swinging their dangly long legs and looking kind of like Jan when he gets hyper :-) They are funny animals and I have decided that I may bring one home as a pet. Jan, I do see the resemblance!!! haha

We are now in Nanyuki, Kenya and the roughest, toughest and most remote section of the tour is over!!! Crossing into Kenya meant getting onto the roughest, and toughest roads the TDA has to offer. 6 days of off road with extreme corrugation, sand, loose lava rock, extreme heat, no shade and barely any people. There was a lot of swearing involved and passing other riders included more sighing, moaning and swearing than the usual hello, what's up. Going over some of the corrugation or loose rock endlessly made you question whether you had to go to the bathroom, if you were hungry, had to vomit, and wonder whether you were actually in pain or had lost feeling to your hands or feet. On the roughest day, the average speed over 87 km was 12.7 km/h. It was tough, but man was it great to see the camp at the end of the day! Nick and I became Coke stop experts, which meant that whenever you hit a small town that sold pop, you'd plop your ass down, drink warm pop, watch riders struggle in, plop their asses down, swear at the roads and the heat and then when you've regained your senses you'd get your ass back up and struggle until the next coke stop or to camp. Our record stay at a coke stop has been 3 and a half hours! We actually managed to get to camp second last. We sat at the coke stop eating chipati and drinking endless bottles of pop and water, chilling with the locals, and saw several waves of riders through. Our shoes were off, and it was fabulous!

With the tough roads also came a severe bout of flat tires for several of us. I became an expert at changing tires, as well as patching them. My record in one day was 4 flats, all in different locations and some of them inexplainable. Quite incredible! Thorns are everywhere, and sometimes they are 5 inches long. Trees have thorns, bushes have them, and sometimes I swear the dirt consists of thorns too. I think my tires and my feet could compete for the amount of thorns that have been stuck in them. Incredulously, most of my punctures did not come from the thorns... some for sure, but not all.

Here in northern Kenya, it is the home of the Samburu, which are a cousin of the Masaii, which live further South. They are incredibly decorated with beads, colorful cloths, pearcings, scarings and head dresses. Unfortunately they do not like their photos taken, so the photos I have of them are scarce. I do have some because often when I had a flat, I had help from beautifully dressed sheep or camel herders, and at one point a beautiful group of Samburu women on their way to get water. Many of them speak excellent English and it's quite amazing chatting it up with them, and even when they don't know a lick of English they will talk non stop with you. I have no idea what they are saying, and usually I tell them all about how I'm patching my tire and what I'm doing to make the conversation 2 way.

The Race:
I have officially dropped my race status and it feels fabulous! I've been wanting to drop it for a while. At first because I was sick for so long and simply struggling to bike, and my reasoning then was that when I felt better I would enjoy racing again, but instead I realized that I felt more that I was missing out on having fun, going at my own pace, enjoying the scenery and stopping whenever I felt like it. I might join the race again later when the scenery becomes less interesting and we're chugging along paved roads. There are only 2 other girls left in the race, and one is out with a sprained ankle, so there isn't much of a race left for the girls.

Now that we have finished the tough half of the tour, everyone is pretty exited to enjoy a bit more luxury. And with luxury I mean a shower more than once a week, cold drinks, the occasional bed instead of a tent, more restaurants and maybe even an ice cream! With the departure from Egypt the power sources have been incredibly unreliable and so have water sources.

We would get to a town and they would have internet, but the server would be down, we would get to a shower, but there would be no water, we would see a toilet, but it would be clogged and twice we found swimming pools without water in them :-) welcome to Sudan, Ethiopia and northern Kenya! It's all part of the charm, but it's funny because we all take everything with a grain of salt at this time. For days the staff has been talking about the campsite we are at today, and boasting of the pool, the internet, the rooms and the bar at this campsite. We all joked that there would be no water in the pool etc. but they were right! Today we have a day of luxury! Speaking of that, it's time to hit the pool!

Nairobi in 2 days, and then we cross in Tanzania and hitting the official half way point of the tour in Arusha! We have 3 days off and the plan is to check out the Ngorogro Crater and the wilflife within it!

Sorry about the infrequent updates, but I have a lot of trouble acessing the blog from slow internet connections, which is pretty much always. It should get better from here on in! I once again apologize for the lack of editing in this blog, but there's a long lineup for internet and the pool is calling me!

You, you, you, you, you, give me money!

2009-02-15T07:48:00.000-08:00

I'm finally able to access my blog and spend some time on the internet without tearing out my hair! Internet in Ethiopia is as sketchy as some of the situations we've been in in this country! Sometimes the internet for an entire town shuts down and at some random time decides to start working again at a snails pace and selectively decides which sites you can access, or which emails you can open. Why or how, nobody knows! For example, earlier I was able to access facebook, but not my blog and now I can access my blog but not facebook. The mystery continues!

I don't even know where to start... we left Sudan and we were all sad to leave the country. The people were incredibly friendly and went out of their way to make us feel welcome and at home. The deserts were beautiful, although hot and after Khartoum we headed into more arrid farm lands with incredible flat lands and random rock structures. To cross the border was an experience. We headed into a town, put our bikes against a pole infront of a coke stop as we usually do, had a coke for too much money and then took our bikes to head to the customs office. Already we had all pouches on our bikes opened and some people had stuff missing. Something that we had not encountered in Sudan. We got our departure stamp from the Sudanese office, crossed the bridge into Ethiopia and were lead into a back yard with kids, chickens and a mud hut. We thought we were in the wrong place, but there was a desk inside the mud hut and he took our passports, so hey... it was the passport office! They had to check everything manually so all 50 of us were chilling outside the mud hut, and a bunch of local guys brought a few cases of beer and everyone proceeded to enjoy their first drinks after 2 weeks in a dry country. That's one way to get through customs. Once you got your passport back, you crossed the street to find our trucks, kick poop, dead animal parts and other unidentifiable objects out of the way to camp, and then proceed to shower at the Ethiopian brothel around the corner. Man, after spending a few weeks in the desert this was a bit of an overload for all of us. Kids were everywhere and some tents were targets for robbery that were near the periphery of our squashed campsite.

Luckily we booted out of sketchville the next morning on rough roads and into the Simian mountains. Everyone joked that with the border the mountains would just start going up, the kids would start throwing rocks, and we'd have to watch our belongings. We never figured that a simple border crossing and even a difference of crossing a bridge would actually bring such drastic differences, but it did! As soon as we crossed that bridge rocks started flying, every kid was practicing their english vocabulary which consisted of you, you, you, you, you! give me money! or money money money money!!! or you give me! or Farangi, you! money! I also hit a pedestrian!!! Shait!!! I think he was ok... I was a bit bruised but the key is to get away from the situation ASAP or you may get stuck in a situation that can't be resolved so easily and get ugly. I felt terrible... there's a longer story to that, but all turned out ok.

The kids....quite incredible! Most kids take it casually and simply yell, beg or stick out their hands but sometimes you'd get gangs of kids on hillsides when you are prone to go slow, and Ethiopia is pretty much all mountains so lots of of uphills and then then they get you and throw rocks, plan ambushes, try to pull you off your bike or yell english curse words after you.

I realize I'm not painting the most idyllic picture of Ethiopia here, and to be honest I don't think I can, but if someone were to ask me about Ethiopia and what I would remember the most, it is the stunning country side, the incredible climbs we did, the friendly adults, and how cute the kids are when they are not throwing rocks. It really is an incredible country, but I think we are all exited to leave it as well. It has been incredibly exhausting. We have done some crazy climbs on, and off road, long days in the heat and a large part of the camp has already or is still battling with a bitch of a stomach flu. I unfortunately was also a victim and had to miss a riding day. Ethiopia seems to be the hardest on the stomach and the most unfamiliar for all of us. Rumor has it that it will get better once we head further south.

The problem with the flying rocks and the harassment of the kids, is that lots of tour buses of foreign tourists go through and simply hand out stuff through the bus windows. Money, pens, chocolate bars etc. The problem with that is that the tourists feel like they have done something great, they feel better about themselves, but they have no idea what damage they are doing to the country, or to the Ethiopian's image of foreigners. Ethiopia is somehow still known for starvation and famine, but that was in 1985, and looking at the country now, it is incredibly hard to imagine that the place was ever known for famine. Farms, water resevoirs, animals sprawl over the countrysides. I wish I could upload my photos to give you an idea. Quite amazing. I'm not saying that Ethiopians are wealthy or that they don't have hard lives, they do! My god they do! The things they carry make our bike ride across the continent seem like a joke! Amazing!

What's incredible is that in Sudan and Egypt, everyone rode their donkeys. As soon as you crossed into Ethiopia nobody rides their donkeys anymore and they are only used for cargo. Ethiopians walk everywhere. There are always people along the road. You barely see any private cars, only trucks or buses, and otherwise just people walking or running. I definitely understand why Ethiopians dominate the Olympics in running. If they arn't walking they are running... especially after the Farengi. Man, little kids can keep up with us at pretty good speeds, still beg or hold a conversation. Amazing!!!!

The scenery of this country is truly stunning. The mountains, hills, the farms, the huts, the Blue Nile Gorge were absolutely breathtaking! A couple of days ago we reached the highest point of the tour at 3100 meters. A few days before we climbed 2300 meters in one day off road! That was a killer day and man was it great to see camp at the end of that one!

We also had a time trial up the Blue Nile Gorge which was an elevation gain of 2100 meters over 20 km on paved roads. Hurt like a bitch, but man was it beautiful! My favorite part was 1/2 way up, going through a small village I passed a guy and he said " Fareng, you look tired!" I was pretty exited to hear something aside "from money money money" and damn, he was right! I had to laugh out loud as tired as I was.

I feel like I'm missing so much of the picture... there is so much to tell, but once again I'm in a rush because of the shady internet connection. We ended up at the Sheraton here in Addis Ababa to enjoy the pool, lie on a lawn chair, eat copious amounts of food and mostly, reduce movement. And to enjoy their internet because it seems to be slightly more reliable. But only slightly.

Tomorrow I have to miss a riding day to clear a package out of customs for no reason. I asked why it was held, and the answer was that I simply got a bad customs dude. Got to love that reason. Some dude woke up on the wrong side of the bed and decided to make me pay extra for a couple of bike parts for no particular reason.

Hopefully I can update again in 4 days, but who knows!

Section one: Pharaoh's Delight

2009-01-30T00:48:00.000-08:00

Today a year ago I went into my first surgery to clear the staph infection in my arm... I would go for a drink or two except there is no freakin booze in this country! Oh the irony :-)

It's crazy how much can change in a year and section one of TDA is complete! We have done nearly 2000 km and in 4 days we enter Ethiopia. Yesterday we arrived in Khartoum and everyone was glad to have a day off and do nothing for an entire day. Sudan has been an adventure! Rough roads up until Dongola, and then paved roads, long kilometers and brutal heat into Khartoum. Considering this is winter for them and it hits into the mid forties during the day, I would not want to know what it's like in the summer. Since Dongola, several people went down with the stomach flu, a common cold or simply suffered from heat stroke. I think I fell into the heat stroke category about 3 days ago and have had a bit of a tough time recovering and riding since. The heat stroke started with a bit of a rough night after a 142 km day in headwind, racing and 40+ heat. The following day we raced 80 km till lunch. I hung in there until the end of the race and leaving lunch I knew I was pretty done. The last 50 km of the 157 km ride I had 3 other riders take my backpack and draft me in the rest of the way. I could not have done it without them! I think I would have ended up like one of the many dead camels that were lying on the side of the road...

The stretch from Dongola to Khartoum was all desert and the amount of dead animals on the side of the road and into the desert. Camels, donkeys, dogs, whatever you can imagine. At some point we thought there were 2 dogs playing, but when we came closer we'd realized that someone had propped two dead dog carcases up to make them look like they were playing. A Sudanese version of public art? :-) All of us kind of half laughed and half turned away in disgust and giggled about it when we got into camp. Our humour is already going off side :-)

It has been incredible riding through the deserts! Such beautiful scenery and such amazing open spaces! The sunsets and sunrises are unreal and the stars at night are just phenomenal.

The food is quite good too. The local food is Fool, which is beans with oil, cheese and sometimes some vegetables in a sort of paste which you pick up with bread. Sometimes they put falafel and some salad on the side. I quite enjoy it and it fills you up! Sudanese coffee is probably the best coffee I have ever had. They mix it with ginger and it is amazing! I have to figure out how they do it.

Today for our rest day we are staying at the National Campground Khartoum, which is probably more interesting than staying at the Zoo. I don't really know what the grounds are used for because there are a ton of Sudanese guys walking around in Soccer uniforms, someone talked about a huge group of guys being from the army and then someone said that it's also connected to the University here in Khartoum. Either way, there are about 40-50 Sudanese men on the grounds that are quite amazed by the show the white people are putting on for them. As soon as you are out of your tent, they are bound to be sitting or standing right by you, staring at everything you do. Sometimes they laugh, pull out their cell phones to take pictures, or simply continue staring. The toilets and showers are co-ed and a shower in my world right now is about the most heavenly thing you could imagine. Yesterday I got out of the shower after 4 days in the desert, opened the door and was welcomed by 3 sudanese soccer players wanting to take a picture. I couldn't help but laugh my ass off, and actually ended up taking a picture too, because of the irony of the bathroom photos with 4 sudanese men. (Thankfully I was not naked :-)

After our shower we found a western style mall and you should have seen the smiles on everyone's faces when we found a grocery store, chocolate, and ice cream! It was like kids in a candy shop! The mall even had a bowling alley and after everyone had stuffed themselves, everyone convened there and went bowling. I was 1/2 passed out in a booth and was pretty much just stoked to get some sleep. When we got back, sleep was not in order, because the Sudanese army men (or so we think they are) were playing a dancing game with singing, stomping and using crates for drums. We couldn't quite figure out the game, but essentially they would start stomping, singing and beating the crates and then at some point they would all stop and kind of explode in all directions with a lot of laughter. Some people from our tour gave it a chance too, which brought everyone into tears with laughter since we didn't know how it worked or when to stop, so everyone just kept going and the Sudanese guys just kept laughing and stomping.

Today is a day to do nothing, do laundry and recovery. The next 6 days are all riding days and in 4 days we enter Ethiopia. Apparently the place we're staying today is good training for Ethiopia, because once we enter there, we won't have any privacy at all.

Here are some photos from Sudan!
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=208099&l=76a76&id=523960696

Sudan, an entirely different world

2009-01-24T06:53:00.000-08:00

First of all I would like to compliment and thank Ed and the Mighty Riders staff for putting together a freaking fabulous bike! Especially the mechanic is eying my bike and many are wishing they had it. It looks pretty bad ass with the 29' tires and aerobars! The bike has gotten me across Egypt, which really was a dream in terms of tailwinds and paved roads, and now into Sudan which has some paved roads, because the road is being built, but large streches of it are still rough, unpaved and often you're biking through sand. So much fun but also super exhausting in 42 degree weather! I feel like I'm getting ahead of myself here though... let's rewind.

The ferry ride was totally pleasant, with cabins, food and lots of sleep. It's amazing what they packed on that thing! Everything from fridges, to satelite dishes, to mass amounts of food and endless people. It was an overnight ferry, and every inch of the deck and hallways was covered with sleeping people. Unloading took about 2 hours and then we spent another 2 hours in customs filling out what seemed like endless paperwork asking the same questions all over again, getting our bags searched for alcohol (its not allowed in Sudan) and getting questioned individually about where we're from etc. and everything being hand written. The reward was a falafel stand after we cleared customs. I think we made that guys day!

That night we stayed in the local soccer stadium which came with a donkey. quite cute! The next day we headed into the mountains and about 1/2 was paved. It was a non race day so we enjoyed the desert scenery and goofed around on the roads. Deserts really are beautiful! I took lots of pictures, but unfortunately i can't upload them today. The second day in Sudan was a race day from camp to camp and it was 115 km total with the morning being all sand and off road and the afternoon on tarmac. What a killer day! Everyone barely crawled into camp and fell into the Nile for a swim, only to be swarmed by endless bugs and retreating to their tents. Day 3 in Sudan was the toughest day we've had so far with 108 km of riding off road in 42 degree weather. The average speed was 17.2 km/h with riding time of 5:45. The only thing that got us across the last 10 km was a coke stop in a small village. We had raced to lunch, and Lone and I rode together and the champ she is she waited for me eventhough I ejected my waterbottles twice and dropped my chain too. Her and I make quite the team!

Today we had an open desert crossing in somewhat of a convoy where every rider was supposed to stop and make sure at every hump or corner that the next rider can see you, because it's so easy to get lost, and in 2004 they lost 9 riders in this desert and only found them the next day. A sandstorm that had kicked up overnight made the crossing that much more interesting. We could only see about 200 meters ahead, but it created a beautiful atmosphere! A blessing is that they are actually in the process of building a road along the entire stretch that we are biking along. Sometimes it messes us up because we're constantly weaving in and out of construction sights and losing the actual right road, but often we are happy to have some solid ground underneath us.

The rest of the way into Dongola today was much of the same, and a lot of paved roads with a killer tail wind! we hit speeds on flat grounds as high as 59.8 km/h without too much effort. The gusts carried much dust, and had we been going the other way, I don't think we would have made the 98 km.

Finding internet in Dongola was a surprise for all of us. Tomorrow is a rest day an we are all stoked! Everyone is exhausted and happy! We are camping in an old zoo, and partially we feel like we're on display as the locals stroll through to the other side. Our showers are old animal troughs (we guess) and the locals must think we are crazy.

The people here are beautiful! Absolutely stunning, and the skin color has gradually gotten darker and darker as we progress further south. We are now in the Nubian Desert and the hospitality of the people is amazing! They don't try to rip you off, throw stones or harass you endlessly. They more want to invite you into their home and drink tea with them, and it really does not matter that nobody has a clue what the other person is saying. Everyone is smiling, waving and welcoming. Even the dogs are friendlier! There is something about the people and the country that make you want to hug all of them! It's such a pleasant change after Egypt.

Hopefully I can post some photos soon :-)

Getting ready for Sudan

2009-01-18T04:43:00.000-08:00

We only have 17 km left in Egypt and then it's the ferry to Sudan! Everyone is exited and nervous about this turn of road conditions, people and food! So far we've heard that it's a drastic change once we get off the ferry and to be honest, many of us are pretty exited to leave Egypt behind. Egypt has been very good to us with amazing tail winds (some average speeds were as high as 38 km/h), great roads and fair weather. Other aspects we are not so sad to leave and as endearing as some of these qualities are at the start, they become quite overwhelming after a while. As a woman, it's an interesting country to travel in, especially wearing spandex on a bike. The country is very muslim and us women in spandex is probably a form of porn for them, so there is much yelling, kissing noises and last night a 12 year old boy grabbed my ass. It's not a country to walk around by yourself or as a group of women. The attention is relentless, as are the hagglers. Walking by shops, horse carriages, or anything else that could bring in money to locals is always entertaining and frustrating because as soon as they see a foreigner, you are surrounded from every angle and no matter what you do they follow you and try to sell you everything even if you have no intention of going on a sailing cruise or buying the half eaten sandwich they are eating.

This being the first time being in a fully muslim country, it is quite interesting how often the muslim pray and at the times that they pray. We get up quite early to ride. Usually 5:30, but as soon as 4:45 hits the mosques turn on their loud speakers and start blaring the prayers all over the city. It doesn't seem to matter how big the city is, there are at least 10- 20 loudspeakers blaring. The best is when they are live and you can hear the dude caughing into the loudspeaker. That was our favorite so far! The sound of all the prayers can be quite beautiful if located in one of the Egyptian temples or sitting on top of a hill, but when the loudspeaker is right next to where we are tenting, the sounds can be overwhelming. Sudan is also Muslim, but I don't think we will hit as many towns as we do in Egypt.

Other interesting qualities about Egypt is that they do have sidewalks, but nobody uses them and prefers to walk on the road, which simply adds to the mess of the street. The lack of use of sidewalks may be due to the planters that are strewn across the sidewalk, or because there is an extra step involved in getting up onto the sidewalk. We really don't know.

One last thing that is worth mentioning and that is our "security." We have had police escorting us the whole way, and guarding our camp at night. Wether it is really necessary is one thing, but I think they are happy to have something to do and to stare at women in spandex. We stayed at a police station in the mountains and I swear they must have been guarding the entire fortune of Egypt in the compound because there were armed guards all around. There was nothing for miles and miles, but this compound was protected against everything. We camped right infront and the guards were thoroughly enjoying having us around and took particular interests in our bathroom activities. There weren't many bushes and we definitely seeked them out when we could, but you'd think you were good to go, and then you turn around and there were several Egyptian guards watching you pee. Yantzy, one of the South African staff girls went at night a bit further and before she knew it she had 2 guns pointed at her head because she went past the perimeter of the camp. Another south africa girl was thanked for going pee, because she did not realize that they were behind her. A little creepy, but apparently they needed some entertainment up in the mountains.

This paints an interesting picture of Egypt, and it really has been quite entertaining. The staff that's been on the trip say that Egypt is their least favorite country to travel through. I quite enjoyed it, but I can maybe see how they logistically have problems with the country.

Biking across has been quite amazing because we've felt the temperature change, watched the skin colour of the locals get gradually darker and watched the vegetatino change as we approached the Nile. Everything was dust and dirt until we reached the Nile and the difference was that of night and day. Quite incredible! From one turn in the road to the next there were trees and farms and kids everywhere. The red sea did not support any vegetation along the coast, yet massive tourist hotels ligned the coast in certain parts, and oil rigs in others.

I had some issues uploading the photos. My patience ran out, but I was able to upload them onto facebook. Here is the link to check out some photos on the trip so far. They are a very select few and I will hopefully be able to upload some more once I get to Ethiopia.

Here is the link to the photos:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=202728&l=ec592&id=523960696

The next update on the blog won't happen until after Sudan, which is 2 1\2 weeks away- at least. I'm officially MIA until we hit Ethiopia and I'm not sure how the internet connection will be once I get there either.

I'm thinking of all of you! It's been an incredible adventure and my tan lines are getting more and more ridiculous! Sandra, my bridesmaid dress is going to have to have sleeves :-) maybe even puffy ones!

I'm sorry for not getting back to more personal emails... please keep them coming!!! I do read them and I love to hear from all of you, I just don't have too much time to reply to all of them.

One more note: Things I thought I'd never crave or think about 24/7: Toiletpaper, Snickersbars, Icecream, showers, Toiletpaper, Coca Cola, Snickersbars, Chocolate, Toiletpaper, Coca Cola... I hope I got them all :-)

Luxor, Egypt

2009-01-16T10:43:00.000-08:00

Internet is fleeting and we are finally in Luxor and time to update on the adventures so far! It's been incredible! We have already biked 763 km in the past 6 days and have crossed almost all of Egypt. In 3 days we are entering Sudan!

Leaving Cairo was an experience in itself. We took off from the hotel at sunrise and biked to the pyramids of Giza, which were not open to the public yet. We watched the sunrise as we biked past the pyramids and started the official Cairo to Capetown tour from there. It was quite an incredible way to start! From there we were in a convoy until we reached the city limits, which was about 40 kilometers later. The city is huge and unfortunately very dirty. 20 million people and a waste basket is hard to come bye.

What I did not realize was that the pyramids of Giza are in the middle of the city. The same goes with the ruins and tombs within Luxor. The city sprawls right up to the gates all around. The preservation of the pyramids, as with the museum is not the best, and unfortunately much of the ancient arts are being ruined by pollution and mass amounts of tourists.

The first day of riding was probably also the hardest. We had a killer headwind and were heading into the desert. After that first day we had an amazing tail wind and the racing started on the second day. The start of the race on the second day made everything more interesting. There are 47 riders in the group and about 17 of us are racers. There are 6 girls, and a Danish girl named Lone and I immediately hit it off and also quickly realized that we are about the same speed. In all the race days so far Lone and I finished with the same time, where I won the final sprint the first two days and she won it on the third race day. The way the race is organized is that not every day is a race day. If there is a lot of navigation, or if we hit big cities, they make it a casual ride for everyone's safety. I have to admit that I'm glad about that for several reasons: it's nice to get the break and the cities are CRAZY! You never know what you're going to encounter, whether it's donkeys, people, mass amounts of children blocking your way, rocks flying at your head or crazy drivers that really don't care that you may need some space on the road. Right now we have the Egyptian national cycling team biking with us and they generally bike with the race peleton and do much of the yelling for us. What we are going to do when they are gone is going to be very interesting!

As racers we quickly figured out who is good to ride with. We have a pretty solid group of about 8 riders that form the main group and the rest spreads out quite a bit. A lot of the tour riders take off at different times, so it's quite social as we pass them throughout the day and then chill with everyone at lunch. The funny thing is that our "lunch" is usually our second breakfast. We start riding just after 7 after we've packed up our tents and had breakfast, and then we have lunch once we have done at least 1/2 of the kilometers of the day, which is often at 9:30 or 10. This puts us in an interesting position, because then we may have done our 160 kilometers by noon, we grab some soup and then we wait for dinner, which starts around 5 or 6 and then we are famished!

The 3rd and 4th night we camped by the red sea, which made the afternoons and the cleaning a whole lot easier! Babywipes only do so much, so a swim was brilliant. Today was our off day in Luxor and everyone thoroughly enjoyed the day off, the showers, and giving their bums a break! The next few days are all just over a 100 kilometers and then we're on the ferry to Sudan overnight, which may take between 12 and 48 hours depending whether the ferry breaks down or not :-) There is never a dull moment in Africa!

Today we tramped around Luxor, checked out the valley of the kings, Queen Hatshetsup's memorial temple, temple of Karnak and Luxor. We decided that we definitely deserved an A+ in the tourist world today! I don't achieve that very often, but it was worth it today!

No time to proof read... time to upload some pics before I hit the sack... big hug

Cairo, Egypt

2009-01-09T08:10:00.000-08:00

After so much anticipation, it is hard to imagine the adventure is starting tomorrow! I arrived in Cairo on the 6th and spent a good chunk of the time up until now getting things sorted, finalizing things on my bike and doing a bit of sightseeing. The city is insane! The roads are something to reckon with and are occupied by insane drivers, donkeys with carts, bikes, motorcycles, people and all love the use of the horns. Cairo has incredibly interesting aspects to it because it is contrasted with much tradition and the modern world. I would love to upload some of my pictures and tell more about what's been going on, but unfortunately the hotel we are staying at charges 9 dollars for 1/2 an hour of internet! the city is quite cheap as a non tourist, but the tourists pay western prices or even higher. If i'd dress differently i'm sure i could get the local discounts. Everyone thinks I'm Egyptian and I've already had some inquiries as to how many camels it would take to buy me and to make nice Egyptian babies. Highest bid so far was 60 million camels, so i'm sure it was a very serious offer :-)

It's been super nice to meet everyone going on the trip. So many Canadians! It's such a great mix of people and ages. The youngest is 18 and the oldest is 70! Not too many people had signed up to race, but now many are switching over and to see how it goes. Everyone is pretty antsy to get going after hanging around Cairo for a while and so much talk of the trip.

We had a chance to see the pyramids of Giza, and we will be starting our race tomorrow under the Sphynx. We also checked out downtown a bit. I'll upload those photos later when I have more time! Speaking of that, I'm almost out of time, but I will update more as I get to Luxor in 6 days. Until then I dont' think I'll have internet access. So stoked to get moving and sharing the road with crazy drivers, camels, donkeys, and lots of people. The kids are super cute here and when you start walking down the local roads hoards of them follow you screaming "hi" or "welcome" or "hello" enlessly. When we're biking they line up looking for high fives as we bike past.

Tomorrow we start with a 128 km bikeride to desert camp. wheeeee!!!!

Champex, Switzerland

2009-01-04T04:31:00.000-08:00

What a crazy and fantastic couple of weeks in Switzerland before the African adventure begins! I left Vancouver in quite the scramble. I had to move out of my apartment before leaving because it had flooded a few weeks before, deal with the insurance and figure out how to fix everything while I was gone, pack for Africa, sort out an insurance claim for my car after I was hit a few days before leaving, attend various Christmas and goodbye dinners, and keep all my fingers crossed that my flight was still leaving with all of the snow that was hitting Vancouver.

I was not sure if I was going to get it all done, but somehow I did. I arrived in Switzerland on December 23rd to an almost full house. The house was built by my great great grandfather in 1904 and is located in a small town at an elevation of 1,400 meters. He had 10 children and all those that came after have access to the house. I guess it's kind of like a family time share!?!? The house sleeps 17 people, and we maxed it out with 18. My mom was the matriarch and the rest was my brothers, cousins, their boyfriends or girlfriends, and friends which resulted in mass consumption of alcohol, killer games of UNO, kings cup and semi professional towel fights in the kitchen. Endless laughs and shazam has taken on a whole new significance!

In the morning "Tize bootcamp" was in order and some people joined in once in a while but were soon scared off by Jan's endless pushups, my killer sit ups and complaints of sore musscles after the first couple of days of the bootcamp. I also have my bike set up on a trainer overlooking the Alps and a frozen lake. I don't think I could hit two more opposite places- Switzerland to Africa?!?!

The skiing itself was not very exiting for us spoiled Canadians. The weather on the other hand was spectacular. We have had brilliant sunshine and freezing cold, which also meant no snow. The only day of amazing skiing we had was new years day. It snowed all night and the next day we woke up to 40 centimeters of new snow and a clear blue ski. My brothers, Andreas, Jan and I and several others from the house decided to start 2009 by wailing down powder slopes at epic speeds. What a great way to start 2009! Champex has a very small ski hill of only 2 chairlifts, which is perfect for fresh snow because all the tourists are in the big ski resorts not too far away. It was brilliant!

What is amazing in a house full of so many people is that someone is always hungry, and the meals are extravagant, huge and always with a mass amount of cheese. It's definitely no joke that the Swiss make spectacular cheese, chocolate and meats. The amounts of each for each meal are also baffling. In the grocery store you can buy entire wheels of cheese! I think it's safe to say that we ate at least 2 full wheels of cheese in the time we were here. We ate cheese fondue, meat fondue, several chocolate fondues and new years was the epic night of raclette, which is pretty much eating raclette cheese melted infront of an open flame straight up, with some potatoes, pickles and onions on the side. Sounds wrong, but it's amazing! Jan had the crowning achievement of beating my uncles record of 14 servings with 15 servings (considering most make it to 5-8 servings this is pretty sick!).

All I can say is I'm glad I'm biking across Africa after this gorge fest! I think everyone's goal was to fatten me up before sending me over there :-)

The next two days consist of packing and getting myself organized before I fly to Cairo on the 6th! I am so stoked! The only people left in Champex after today are my mom and my brother Andreas with his girlfriend Kendra. What a drastic change to the hords of people that have been coming and going for the past 2 weeks! What an amazing time and so many epic pictures!

Shazam!

Snow Storm in Vancouver?!!?

2008-12-21T16:50:00.000-08:00

Total now is $4824 raised so far!

Currently there is a snow storm in Vancouver and flying out tomorrow might get SKETCHY!!!

The Fundraiser at Steve Nash

2008-12-14T19:07:00.001-08:00

The fundraiser was fun and well and it raised 650 dollars! This puts the total to 4434 dollars raised so far! Thanks everyone that attended!!!

Also thanks to Steve Nash Sports Club and particularly to Carla, Eddie, Dave and the awesome reception desk staff that helped with the event :-)

Wohooo!!!

Spin for Stephen Lewis at Steve Nash Sports Club

2008-11-27T22:18:00.001-08:00

Hey everyone,

Steve Nash Sports Club has been incredibly supportive of my ride and have generously offered their spin studio for a fundraiser. The best part is that everyone who attends will receive a 10 day free pass either effective immediately or whenever you feel like activating it. After the spin class you can also go lounge in their steam room or sauna to recover :-)

The fundraiser will be on December 14th at Steve Nash Sports Club located at:

610 Granville Street
Vancouver, BC V6C 3T3
Tel: 604.682.5213
it's on the corner of Granville and Dunsmuir in above the Shoreclub. You buzz in at the apartment tower entrance.

There will be 2 classes:
1st is from 12- 1 which will be more beginner oriented
2nd is from 1:30- 2:30 and is going to be more advanced

Minimum donation is 20 dollars and all proceeds will go directly towards the Stephen Lewis Foundation. I will have forms for tax receipts on hand.

Please confirm your attendance before arrival because seats are limited!!!
Please arrive 15- 20 minutes before the start of the class to check out the club and receive your 10 day pass!

I look forward to seeing all of you there!

Carola

My fundraising goal

2008-11-04T18:34:00.000-08:00

Only 2 months to go!!!! It's truly unbelievable how fast time is flying and how much I have to get done before I leave.

I just wanted to let everyone know that I've added another foundation to my fundraising goal, which is the Stephen Lewis Foundation. The race is all for a very worthy and needy cause and it would mean so much more to me if you would make a contribution to this cause. I hope and trust I can count on you for your support and here is why:

I am tremendously excited about the adventure for its own sake, but more importantly, my participation will raise funds for the Stephen Lewis Foundation http://www.stephenlewisfoundation.org/)

Stephen Lewis is a truly amazing and inspirational man whose foundation reflects his passion and his goal to help those that are suffering from the AIDS epidemic in Africa. My goal is to raise $11,900 dollars for the foundation, which is 1$ for every kilometer that I bike. Your support will keep me motivated as I crawl up the mountains in Ethiopia or bike through deserts in scorching heat!

Why the Stephen Lewis Foundation? Because they support grass roots organizations that help those affected by the AIDS epidemic. The foundation has already helped thousands of Africans, but much more work needs to be done. Stephen Lewis has raised awareness about this important issue here in Canada and around the world. Through his actions and dedication, he has had an enormous positive impact on the lives of people in Africa. With the help of fundraising events like mine, his foundation can reach even more people who so desperately need their help.

Visit www.stephenlewisfoundation.org to learn more.

Please click on the link below and donate to this worthy cause. Again, my goal is to raise $11,900 … Please think of the suffering you will help to end and the lives you will help to save with your donation!

Click here to donate: http://www.canadahelps.org/gp.aspx?id=2472

Whatever you can contribute... 10 dollars, 20 dollars, whatever!... Every contribution will make a difference!

This is where the money will go:
The Stephen Lewis Foundation (SLF) helps to ease the pain of HIV/AIDS in Africa by funding grassroots projects that help individuals, families and communities ravaged by the pandemic. We work in four areas:

• to provide care at the community level to women who are ill and struggling to survive, so that their lives can be free from pain, humiliation and indignity;
• to assist orphans and other AIDS-affected children, in every possible way, from the payment of school fees to the provision of food;
• to support the unsung heroes of Africa, the grandmothers, who bury their own children and care for their orphan grandchildren;
• to support associations of people living with HIV and AIDS - courageous men and women who have openly declared their status - so that they can educate themselves and share information with their broader communities on prevention, treatment, care and the elimination of stigma.

To find out more about the Tour d'Afrique or donate to their foundation, click on:
http://www.tourdafrique.com/foundation/
The tour d'Afrique foundation provides bikes to medical staff in Africa. This allows them to reach patients quicker and saves lives!!!!

This is where I need your help! Help me raise the funds to help those in need!

Instead of a Christmas present, please just donate instead! I could not ask for a better present!

Here are the links again:

To contribute to my fundraising goal for the Stephen Lewis foundation:
http://www.canadahelps.org/gp.aspx?id=2472

To Find out more about the Stephen Lewis Foundation:
www.stephenlewisfoundation.org

To donate to the Tour d'Afrique Foundation in my name:
http://www.tourdafrique.com/foundation/

Please forward this on to anyone else that might be interested!!!

Big hug and hopefully see you all soon!

Why this crazy adventure?

2008-10-02T16:42:00.000-07:00

2009 will have one thing in common with the start of 2008- I'll be biking! Except I hope that that's the only thing that the two will have in common. The reason I say that is because 2008 started with a crash in the velodrome, a staph infection in my right shoulder from an MRI anthrogram injection, 8 days in the hospital, 2 surgeries, 6 weeks IV antibiotics, and a 7 month recovery. I got my dose of movies and TV for the next few years, which means that I can go to Africa, start the year on a bike again and begin 2009 on a whole different note!!!

Somehow nobody seems surprised that I'm still going...
2009 will start in Cairo, instead of a Velodrome and instead of sprint laps, this race will go for 11, 900 km across the entire African continent to Capetown! One hell of a 4 month tour through Egypt, Sudan, Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania, Zambia, Malawi, Botswana, Namibia and South Africa!

To check out the route and all the other info on the race:
http://www.tourdafrique.com/tourdafrique/route.html

My entry fee is in, paperwork is mostly done and now it's time to train and get all the gear as well as finish 2 classes at UBC, write the GRE's, get grad school applications in and work. And somewhere in between sleep, eat and have a few drinks!