The Tour d’Afrique is a four-month cycling journey from Cairo, Egypt, to Cape Town, South Africa. In its five-year history the trip has traditionally featured a healthy dose of rest days to allow riders physical and mental recovery from the constant and often-arduous movement of the tour.

Time for a haircut

Photo: Brian Vernor

In the past, an extended break lasting a week was considered but never included in the tour. This year, however, with the unplanned need to avoid the social unrest in Kenya, the TdA allowed riders a 14-day period of rest with the plan to resume the expedition in Arusha, Tanzania. The previously planned departure date from Arusha remained the same, as if we had ridden through Kenya instead of flying over. I used this time-off to review film footage with my partners, the Zenga brothers, get a much-needed haircut, and make a short pilgrimage to the Indian Ocean.

Most riders took the break as a chance to climb Mt. Kilimanjaro, tour the wildlife reserves of the Serengeti, or just lounge on the shores of Zanzibar. Almost everyone did anything available other than ride a bike. When the tour resumed riders were mostly well rested and anxious to be back on the bike chipping away at the final goal of reaching Cape Town.

Before coming on this expedition many people viewed Tanzania as the “real” Africa. The tribal culture, music, landscape, and wildlife have all been memorably documented within the glossy pages of National Geographic, and this portrayal is what people hold onto as Africa. The great opportunity of participating in the TdA was not only the epic bike ride down an enormous and varied continent, but also the unique chance to see more than the conventional view of a misunderstood continent.

Catching up on film editing

As I rode through this part of the continent I saw much of the Africa glorified in magazines. I saw the Massai people with huge hoops shaped into their earlobes, giraffe and wildebeest grazing, and expansive grassy plains with a scattering of Acacia trees. It seemed odd that it took two months of traveling the continent to see this version of Africa around me as I cycled. Without fitting into the glossy outsider’s view of Africa, the last two months of riding was part of the Real Africa to me. Inevitably, experience erodes previous ignorance and we take away a new and expanded view of Africa.

Tanzania brought to me another aspect of Africa that I knew to expect but possibly the Californian in me preferred to deny: Rain, rain and more rain. I’ve been told this was a “light” rain year for the TdA, but for the last couple weeks I’ve rarely packed up a dry tent, and attempts to hang-dry clothes after washing have been hopeless. There cannot be anything else like starting a hundred mile ride in a wet chamois and smelling musty and moldy. Of course, this was all part of the ride we should have come here expecting. It was gross to think about the fungal possibilities growing all over me but the rest of the TdA riders and I mostly looked past this discomfort and enjoyed the ride on the muddy roads that delivered us to Malawi.

By the time we reached Malawi, 1100 miles by bike from our re-starting point of Arusha, the strength and confidence gained over the last two months started to crack. People who sustained minor cuts were coming off the bike because of infections, and the fear and frustration of the minor becoming major began eroding the generally friendly mood within the tour. Sustained dampness was fine for a while but everyone was obviously over the experience after two weeks. Malawi delivered more of the same dampness and we just had to live with it. Regardless of our discomfort and accompanying frustration, Malawi was a welcomed new country with its own unique character.

After our first day in Malawi, camp was made outside a small village where an abandoned looking church stood near fields of maize and paddies of rice. A South African rider brought out his guitar while the film crew (the Zenga brothers and myself) tried recording him play inside the church. Instantly the small church was filled with a hundred excited local children and it was impossible to record the mellow blues song we planned. Taking the crowded chaos in stride the South African broke into an exuberant gospel-based two-chord rhythm, which ignited the children in song. A call and response structure formed with two older kids calling out the first lines of the song and the mass of small children finishing the verse. It was an amazingly un-self-conscious moment. Nobody seemed to notice the cameras clicking or the extended microphones capturing the sound of the singing. It was a moment that had nothing to do with riding bikes but which wouldn’t have happened unless we were traveling by bike. Throughout this tour we’ve stayed in small towns and camped in secluded areas, almost always outside the usual stopover points for tourists in Africa.

Visiting the local bike shop

Anywhere I’ve traveled I’ve always tried to visit bike shops. Bike shops in foreign countries often lack the high-end parts I’m used to seeing at home in Santa Cruz, but I usually find something in common with the local workers-in-bike. Throughout the five countries I’ve traveled in Africa I’ve found some well-stocked shops with knowledgeable people behind the counters. Almost all the bike shops exclusively carry Chinese bikes and spare parts. The coolest after-market accessory I’ve seen is the faux-springer suspension fork attachments. These attach to the front axle and the stem, and don’t do anything. That’s why they are cool. Tons of bikes I’ve seen on the roads in Africa have these springers and they’ve all been added just to make the bikes look cool. After mostly wasting the time of these shops I finally bought a set of springers for my bike. This trip may have beaten my bike to death, but I’m planning on rolling into Cape Town with some style.

Africa and the TdA can be understood through the contrast of experience. Less than a week of riding in Malawi brought us to Lilongwe, the capital city. There we saw sunny skies and stayed within the comfortable confines of a lodge with a crystal blue swimming pool and wireless Internet. Cold drinks, pancakes, other Western foods, and the general availability of everything shocked us on our rest day in the Capital. We all took the chance to guzzle the locally brewed Carlsberg beer, lick up as much ice cream as possible, and stock up on candy bars for the riding ahead. On this trip small comforts go a long way. And the looming Zambia is a long way to go before Botswana. After Lilongwe, our average stage distance jumps from 75 miles per day to almost 95 miles per day.

Thanks for reading,
Brian Vernor