I arrived back from Africa on Wednesday [Feb. 13] after what turned out to be the most amazing cycle trip through Kenya and Tanzania.
Africa is such an amazing and beautiful country offset by poverty but complimented by very happy and beautiful people, well most of them anyway. The kids were just amazing. You could see them running to the road from way off in to the distance to come as see these green-cladded weirdos (we were all wearing Macmillan T-shirts) cycling through their villages. This happened day after day and I soon got accustomed to my reception upon arriving at each village. This has now been replaced with cabbies threatening to run me over and leering looks from pedestrians trying to cross the road in front of me. But it’s good to be home.
Cycling was tough but rewarding. I guess road-tax hasn’t reached Africa yet. The road quality can politely be described as varied as in sometimes there was tarmac but often there wasn’t. Speed bumps on motorways was an interesting concept. I hope that doesn’t take on over here. Temperatures often pushed 40-degrees on most days. Bugs in Africa are big. On a few occasions I was escorted out of my tent by a few resident creepy crawlies and a scorpion was found in a cycling shoe one morning, fortunately not mine.
Africa was a challenging and eye-opening experience that I won’t be forgetting for a while.
Based on the last update from Macmillan given on our last day, we’d collectively raised over £120,000 for the charity, which is already being put to use in caring for cancer suffers so a big thank you to all those that took part in the raffle and donated.
I still have some way to go in reaching my pledged goal so if you wanted to help there is still time. Just click on my Just-Giving
http://www.justgiving.com/David-Bowry-Africalink below and give what you can.
I’ve attached a picture of me donning my TriLondon cycle top next to some very shy Maasai locals, hence the awkward pose in this picture.
David Bowry