Two years ago my mother was very sick and I needed a fun challenge to focus on, so I joined an expedition cycling from Nairobi, Kenya to Cape Town, South Africa. I met the team in Zambia and rode over 1,000 miles through Zambia, Botswana and Namibia. Much of the time I was alone on the road, biking for hours across the grasslands and looking for elephants. At night we camped in the bush, we ate under the stars, and showered from buckets. Each morning, we would start off again before dawn to avoid the incredible African heat.
At that time, I had never ridden more than 10 miles on a bike. In fact, I was actually scared of biking! But sports are a great way to heal and to connect--with nature, new friends and ourselves. I never knew I could ride 100 miles in a day. It was so hard, and many times I thought I couldn’t do it--but I did! And even better, we counted our days by how many elephants, warthogs, impala, kingfishers, hornbills, puku, kudu, duiker (all types of antelope) we saw. For example, a good day might be an “11 elephant, 7 warthog day.”
I never knew I could do anything this hard or have so much fun doing it. I can’t wait to share my story and photographs with you. I hope you learn something new, and that this experience inspires you to begin planning an expedition of your own. Let's go!
