🚴‍♂️ Make The World A Better Place.., Ride A Bike!! 🚴‍♀️#CongoNileTrail #AdventureAfrika on a #BikingTour!

Bright neon lights blind my eyes and I can hardly make out the silhouettes of an elderly white male with harsh, unforgiving features. In an unsympathetic tone he is demanding a syringe, another torture instrument, which he shoves into my mouth mercilessly. I am tense and anticipate the pain of hitting a nerve at any moment. Through my squinted eyes I see him take yet another tweezer and… Then I close my eyes and there appear green rolling hills which I am racing down, accelerated by the weight of my heavily packed bike, towards a place I do not yet know. As I am approaching the unknown, my eyes are tearing up and I hear kids giggling. To my right, the clear water of Lake Kivu sparkles in the sunlight. I have goosebumps all over my body. Considering the 30 C plus degrees they are not result from being cold. Rather, they are my body´s reaction to the feeling of exhilarating happiness.

If a distant memory of biking the Congo Nile Trail can be so powerful to overcome the dreadful visit to the dentist, can you picture what the actual experience would feel like?

Biking the Congo Nile Trail is certainly no picknick. It is undoubtedly challenging – both physically and mentally. Yet, it is the kind of trip that will take you back months, maybe years after you have settled back into your routine to moments of pure peace and complete contentment of the mind, heart or soul (or whatever else you believe a human body consists of in this context).

The Congo Nile Trail is an inspiring and stimulating name, yet it produces somewhat confused associations. The trail is neither in the Congo nor is it alongside the Nile. The origin of the trail´s name really comes from the Congo-Nile Divide, a continental divide that separates the drainage basins of the Nile and Congo rivers.

The recent foundation of the trail in 2011 coupled with the fact that the first association most people make with Rwanda is the country´s recent genocide (1994) means that the attention the trail receives is highly disproportional to its charm – a fortunate circumstance for intrepid travelers who enjoy ‘cycling off the beaten path’.

The Congo Nile Trail starts in Gisenyi, a small town at the Northern shores of Lake Kivu and ends 250km south in Kamembe, a town in the very southwest of Rwanda, just near the Congo. The whole route goes along Lake Kivu, a marvellously clear lake which serves as the natural border between Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Swimming in the cold lake along the route is a welcomed refreshment and perfect break when climbing approximately 6000 metres.

The one and only trail map of the Congo Nile Trail that I am aware off recommends dividing the trail into five unequally long (but similarly hilly) segments: Gisenyi to Kinunu to Kibuye to Mugonero to Kibogora to Kamembe.

The first two-thirds of the route are made up of a tangled network of unpaved, rocky trails and roads. You will cycle past countless little villages, rice, coffee and tea plantations and will always find a fruity snack thanks to the many banana and mango trees along the way. The last part of the route consists of newly tarmacked roads (2014) which allow you to really pick up speed. I would at this point like to discourage you from cycling here at night, a recommendation that has its root in an experience which I will gladly recount – from a comfortable distant in the day light (Snapshot 2).

But first, let me give you some background so that you can put my – at times critical decision-making into some more context. My trips generally tend to be characterized by two things: minimalistic planning and as a logical –  though not always voluntary – consequence maximum spontaneity. In the context of the Congo Nile Trail this meant that I had first learned about the existence of the trail one-week prior to embarking on the trip, that I received my Rwandan visa the same day we crossed the border, that my Ugandan travel buddy Nkusi (Ugandan adventurer, marvelous travel companion and creator of this website) and me met for the first time an hour before we embarked on the trip and that the remaining logistics were figured out “in a spur of the moment kind of way”, such as crossing the Rwandan border on mopeds with our bikes on the back. Luckily, we were well equipped with both no expectations and no idea of what to expect- the perfect prerequisites for a spontaneous, adventurous trip.

Below you will find two snapshots from our trip. The first one is about “why to not pretend to be religious when you are not”, a story which will also give you some insights about cheap accommodation options. The second one is a detailed story outlining “why to not cycle at night on a road with no lights in the middle of nowhere in Rwanda” or “a standard tale of the concept of time for those to whom the concept of time is foreign”.

I) Why to not pretend to be religious when you are not                                                                                        Since the “budget” suggestions of hotels were nowhere near our budget of 5$ per night, arriving at the end of the day in the destination village always signified the beginning of the search for a place to spend the night. Most nights we started our search for shelter by asking the locals for the church (which is always on top of the hill). Here, Nkusi made smart use of his eloquence and “bad conscience empathy talk.” With his sensitivity, deep understanding of human nature and his perfect knowledge of Kinyarwanda the pastors usually agreed to let us stay in one of their rooms within a matter of minutes. Nkusi then usually proceeded to top it off by asking to join for dinner “Whatever you eat we eat” This was also the case in Kibuye.

We arrived tired and starving at the end of another day of biking hills in the heat. Nkusi had once more managed to find ourselves a very affordable place to stay and got us invited for dinner in a pastor´s home. So we were sitting at the dinner table all excited, a delicious spread of rice and beans, fried potatoes and tomato sauce in front of us, and were ready to dig in. But before the meal there must be a prayer – something one could have anticipated in the home of a pastor. While I am officially catholic, I have never practiced my religion, and I have not been to a church since the last funeral (or was it a wedding?). So, when I was given the honour *insert sarcastic undertone* to give the prayer before our meal in front of our hosts –  a pastor, and three disciples  –  my heart began to beat fast.

In the next thirty seconds or so I had one of these hyper power moments where you think faster than you think is humanly possible. I was overcome by the realization that for these people being religious is not a joke, or a side hobby, or some statement, but the focus of their lives. So when they asked us (before they agreed to host us mind you) if we were catholic, that may well have been an entry requirement to be allowed to stay the night, and isn´t lying a sin (there are 7 sins right, what was the punishment again), if it now turns out that we have no clue about religion and that I don´t even know a SINGLE prayer, that could (1) turn into a very uncomfortable situation and (2) maybe lead to us needing a new place to stay, which would mean, going back out into the dark and most likely cycle in the dark to the next village to which we did not know the distance..  so what to do? Since I really did not know a single prayer I needed to think of something else, if I cannot think of a prayer I must –  bing sudden brainstorm.

After a moment of awkward and tense deadly silence I said (putting on a strong Swiss accent) “ I usu-ali präi in Swwwiss Görmen änd I was just sinking aboud chhhhh how do beschd transchlade our präjers chhhhh, bud I kand sink of se ride words chhhhhhh, wuld you mind ifff I präj in Schwizerdüüütsch instead?”. The pastor gave me a warm smile, Nkusi looked very relieved and all the tenseness was suddenly gone, “of course, a prayer in Swiss German will be just fine”. So I blabbered to myself for a –what I estimate to be the appropriate amount of time for a before dinner prayer – and closed with “Amen” (that one I know). Then, at last we ate, the best meal of the trip was worth every drop of sweat it cost us to get here.

II) Why to not “cycle at night on a road with no lights in the middle of nowhere in Rwanda” or “a standard tale of the concept of time for those to whom the concept of time is foreign”.                                 

On day 4 we planned to bike from Mugonero to Kibogora which was described as the shortest and (thanks to the tarmacked roads) –  easiest part of the route. How could we mismanage our time so badly and not even reach our destination when we had to cover the least distance and cycle a mere 30 kilometers? I think it must be for the opposite reason why you usually do make it when you are in a real hurry. When you are running to the border checkpoint minutes before they close for instance you are forced to focus.

But with excess time we found ourselves overindulging in it, having a break here, eating mango under a tree there. We were cycling at a comfortably slow pace breathing in the crisp air, stopping to chat with villagers and play with kids along the way, finally answering their “muzunguuu calls”.

When we looked (or rather glanced) at the map around noon, we figured that we must have already covered most of the distance for the day, which should leave us with plenty of time to rest at the lakeshore and nap during the hottest hours. We started making our way down to the lake, cycling on a small and steep path which would lead us down to the water, eventually. Before we should reach the lakeshore, we were faced with a few minor distractions. 

We passed through a small village and decided to try and add some mangos to our standard lunch – which was not by choice standard… a reality you will learn about soon enough when you yourself will go from shop to shop to shop only to find the same 10 items in each one.

Clearly, stopping and asking someone where to find mangoes without a proper introduction of ourselves, where we come from and where we are headed and why we would bike in the heat on the hills, would be out of question. The conversations we had mostly included the following lines: “Where are you coming from” “From Gisenyi”  “laughter” “No not on your bikes, have you seen the hills” “Yes, yes we really have” “And where are you going” “To Kamembe” “shaking heads in disbelief, fools.

After a few of said discourses and no mangos we met Malala, a teenage girl, who indicated for us to wait before she disappeared. While waiting for her, we had the pleasure to meet her whole family, who all gathered slowly around us, inspecting us and our bikes with great curiosity. We began to understand how bizarre our appearance and presence must be to them when they told us that they have been up to the main road, where we had just biked down from no more than a handful of times; when they pointed to the next hill, as a response to the question how far the furthest from home they have been is or when they told us that they think 20 years ago, some foreigner may have passed through their village. Eventually, Malala came back, with a big smile and a huge basket of mangoes, which she had, as it turned out, just picked for us. We selected some of the delicious sweet fruit and then, finally, headed down the last remaining bit to the lake.

It was steep and sandy and rocky and staying on the bike is perhaps possible but neither likely nor advised. Of course now we were followed by Malala and her 10 siblings which were giggling and running behind as, keeping their distance, hiding ever so obviously as we turned around.

If I am sure of one thing this hot afternoon it is that this human body of ours was made to be surrounded by cool water, to swim and embrace life in this marvellously refreshing substance. I dived and as I was under the water I felt at peace, taking in the absolute silence and washing off all the dirt. I came up and looked around in amazement, gazing out to the shores of Lake Kivu, the clear water around me and the rolling hills of Rwanda, how peaceful they looked in the distance. I swam and these strokes, this very stroke was worth all of it and all of what was to come.

We had put up a hammock in a shadowy spot overlooking the lake and hills. After some hours of reading and relaxing, the kids that had been hanging out in the distance and had started approaching us ever so slowly had now reached a distance of only a few metres and we invited them to test the hammock. The remaining kids who did not fit in the hammock began to sing and dance. Rwanda got talent!

Then, we had to pull ourselves together and get moving again. After all we still had a few kilometers ahead of us before reaching the next village. As we were biking up the hill to get back to the main road, the sun was hitting us with its full force. The uphill was so steep and our bikes so heavily packed that we almost fell off our bikes. Suddenly as if by God´s grace I started moving faster and felt light as a feather. I turned around only to see a bunch of kids smiling, giggling and pushing me up the hill in full force.

Eventually, the kids grew tired and we waved goodbye and cycled on, feeling energized and in good spirits. We kept moving and moving and moving yet the village did not seem to get any closer. It turned out, that somehow we had misjudged the distances and the next village was much further than we had anticipated, reaffirming once again my belief that the reality simply does not mirror the maps.

The sun had no mercy for two bikers who didn´t have lights; it took its usual course and steadily went down until the sky was pitch black. While the new Rwandan roads are marvellously tarmacked, they lack streetlights or reflector posts which made it challenging to stay on the windy road in the dark. The giant cargo trucks that were racing past us did not help our little situation. So when we approached a place where some people were gathering (not a village, or a house, or a hut mind you), we were happy to stop.

Nkusi got to talking with some guy, who seemed to know a place where we could spend the night. He indicated for us to follow him up some side path in the dark. Something felt off and if something feels off, it usually is. Nkusi and me glanced at each other, decided to follow our guts and abandoned the sketchy guy. We turned around and quickly cycled away, racing down the streets, and before he knew it, we had already vanished back into the dark.

This time around moving in the pitch black, pacing into the night, felt good. The feeling of relief and freedom only prevailed for a few moments, before we got overcome by the creeping realization that we were biking on a big road in the pitch black in the middle of nowhere. For every car or truck that passed us, we got as far out of the way as possible without falling of the road. We cycled fast, though tired, until finally we saw some lights. As we approached the lights we could see people chatting, sitting on the floor cooking; the chickens running around, minding their own business. The atmosphere felt light. We would be okay.

This was not our destination village, but there were some friendly looking huts here, even a small store, and welcoming curious people, the same that we had met all along the way. Jean Baptiste was one of them, an open-minded, helpful man in his mid-thirties. It turned out that getting a bed for the night would be a bit more complicated then we had anticipated and our request slowly but surely turned into an issue, an issue that needed to be resolved by the community, which, naturally, required a lengthy discussion, between changing members of the community, all of equal importance. Finally, after many people had been consulted, the conclusion was drawn that while there were people who would happily receive us in their homes for the night, including dear Jean-Baptiste, this would not be possible without previous agreement of the elders, who were, as it turned out, out of the area for some days.

The question how long it would take us to get to the next village was answered by several people with a vague and not very promising “over the next two hills, or is it three” and even less promising “a little far”. After a long day, and considering the absence of light situation we were facing (ironic right) this was not really an option.

We kept inquiring until we came across the information that, not far from where we were now “really just over the next hill and then basically right on top of the hill just following that hill” there was a church. And in that church they may “not certainly, but with some good chance” have a room for us to stay the night. Without further ado (and no alternatives) we got back on our bikes. Now we were accompanied by Jean Baptistes brother (or uncle or cousin) and his motorbike which shone a bright light on us. And we pedalled up and up and up the hill and down again and up and up and up once more. The asphalt road turned into an unpaved path, which became steeper and steeper, so steep that the motorbike could no longer keep up, and we took the relative´s word, that we really had almost reached. The backlight of his moto was the last light we saw for the next little yet long seeming while. We then realized that before it was not really dark, not compared to this, the path, completely covered by trees, did not leave through any light of the partly covered moon anymore and we could only guess where to place our feet next.

And then, out of the dark, a building resembling a church appeared. Nkusi went in and came out in a matter of minutes, wearing a big smile, yes we can stay here. Even this late at night, we were welcomed with warm hospitality. We were given water buckets to clean ourselves, even some hot water, a rich meal, and clean rooms with soft beds –  and the usual decoration of Jesus looking down at us.

The next morning, we woke up to a marvelous view over the lake and hills. The sun was just rising and shed its golden light on the surrounding hills. The morning fog seemed to have dampened all sounds, except for some birds which were wide awake chanting above our heads in the trees. As gravity gently lead us down the rocky paths, as we were breathing in the crisp morning air, as we were admiring the morning dew on the grass, as we were looking into distance dreaming of going far away and away we went, yesterday´s struggles were almost forgotten.

Well-rested with a good night sleep and fed with cereal, tea, bananas and honey we were ready. Ready for the longest uphill stretch of the trip. We didn´t even stop once; we just biked up and up and up, fueled by the false hope that behind the next corner it must go down. When seeing that the road just kept climbing up even steeper every time we just kept pedalling, determined to get to the highest point. By the time we reached the top we were out of breath, sweating - and smiling.

From here on the route was easy; the road went downhill for a while and the few small uphill’s, were nothing for us at this point. We already reached our goal Kamembe, 70 km, just after noon. Here, Nkusi and I part ways, Nkusi made his way back to his home town Kisoro and me, I went back to Nairobi.

The experience of cycling the Congo Nile Trail may certainly have led to “evolve” my previously purely romantic and idyllic perception of the “land of a thousand hills”. But surely we will be back. After all, “le pays de mille collines” has plenty more routes to bike, national parks to discover and above all plenty more hills to climb. There ain´t no rainbow without a little rain, and there ain´t no downhill without a little uphill.

Biking to the shores of Lake Kivu for a swim in the fresh water lake in the company of a group of smiling young children from the community.