On this map, I’ve overlayed our planned Tour d’Afrique route (red) with my actual cycling data from Garmin/Strava (green), as well as photos and other interesting information. While cycling, readers were able to track our progress and follow my experience live.
Sudan Video—unembellished footage of what it’s really like
It’s a year since we crossed the Sahara and tried to stay cool in 40-50° Celsius. Finally, here’s a video to show you what it was like. This is the real thing, including my footage from both good and bad times. Enjoy 😉
Riders sharing their lessons learnt and inspirational stories
It’s almost four months since we cycled into Cape Town. Finally, here’s a video that I had promised months ago. Hope you like it. 🙂
Day 121: The journey is the reward
When I first heard about Tour d’Afrique (TDA) over a year ago, I was instantly hooked. It sounded like exactly the kind of challenge I’d been waiting for—to ride Every F***ing Inch (EFI) from Cairo to Cape Town. However, I was an unlikely candidate for that challenge: I had no particular cycling experience—even just pumping...
Paul’s humorous Pirate Speech about our staff
“Four months ago, I turned up at a rider’s briefing in a Cairo hotel. I looked at the staff line-up and thought… You have got to be fricken kidding! Has someone kidnapped the original crew and a bunch of pirates taken over? The head pirate, Jack Tellis Sparrow, when I looked at him, I...
Day 120: Don’t drink and ride
Today has been a mostly enjoyable ride, with heaps of opportunities to stop for a drink and/or snack. Everyone has been in a good mood, knowing that we’ve done it and nothing can stop us now. I joined Liz and her friends (who joined Liz yesterday to cheer her on and cycle into Cape Town...
Day 119: Accomplishing something extremely difficult is highly rewarding
Yesterday was a very difficult riding day, today was expected to be even harder—the make or break day for our EFI. “Don’t take long breaks”, Rupert had advised me. “Last year, even the best riders only reached camp at 4.30 p.m.” Tough climbing, dirt, and expectation of headwind in the afternoon would make today...
Day 118: We cannot control whether people like us, only our own thoughts and actions
We generally have quite a good group dynamic. Tallis had commented several times about our group being particularly positive and tolerant of each other. Apparently, in prior years, there had been instances of people openly fighting with each other. Well, we certainly have tribes and sub-groups, people who share more similar interests and thus tend...
117: Focus, focus, focus
This morning has been a difficult start: deep sand, heavy corrugation, and downhill right out of camp against freezing air. My fingers had become so frozen that it was painful to pull my breaks or shift my gears. Before TDA, there’s no way I’d have cycled under these conditions, and if, there’s no way I’d...
Day 116: Air resistance is an exponential function of speed
Last afternoon, Rupert announced that he had to watch his diet. Because he wasn’t cycling that fast anymore, he wasn’t burning the same amount of calories. That didn’t make any sense to me. Wouldn’t cycling from A to B always require the same amount of energy, no matter whether we’re going faster over shorter...
Day 115: Never mess with border officials
This morning, we’ve crossed the border from Namibia into South Africa—our 11th and final country. Both countries being relatively well developed (neither of them requiring a visa, at least not for most of us), this should have been a quick and easy procedure. By the way, if you’ve read my blog entry for day 3...
