Tour d'Afrique Ltd.

Kimsie Wimsie - TDA Chef

From sand strewn beaches to the city lights of Beijing, Kim finds herself at home in the furthest of places. There’s no denying that this here trip sits at the top of her list, which is not to say that there hasn’t been some fair competition.

Barreling up a steep mountain pass, riddled with potholes, chugging along at a snails pace only to arrive at the final destination in the cover of darkness, Kim found herself at the farm she would be staying at for the coming month. Initially heading out in search of rural indigenous artists, Kimsie found herself living on a farm at the top of a mountain living amongst the Sierra Madre people of rural Mexico. This life of farming became the spur to Kims love of fresh food from the ground, a dream that was first realized in a world far far away.

Living on the top floor of a 27 story apartment building in the heart of Beijing, listening to the never ending hum of the city below. Kim knew this wasn’t right. What was keeping her there was the Kung-Fu she was studying, and what was taking her away was a dream of a different life. Laying in bed one night, the city bustling below, and suddenly the image of herself in gum boots and a sweater on a farm and thought “That’s my life”

Back in Canada, it was clear what the mission was, and off to Everdale she went. Everdale is not only a productive CSA farm but also an education centre where school groups from the inner reaches of Toronto would come out to. Kim managed their CSA, farmed, and of course, cooked for the masses.

Preparing vast amount of tasty, healthy food has remained a passion of Kim’s to this day, a talent we appreciate daily here on TDA. Serving up 10’s of thousands of calories per day to our team of hungry cyclists, Kimsie continuously out does herself with a new masterpiece each and every day.

How are we ever supposed to go home and cook for ourselves now?

-- Adele Woodyard

Posted May 04, 2011 by Adele Woodyard
Namibia | News Briefs | Ramblings | Tour Updates

ZamBikes

Like a bus load of kids in a candy shop, 20 or so riders and crew piled into the back of a flatbed for what was to be the best TDA field trip yet. Outside of the city limits, past the smaller villages where many of workers live, we made our way to the ZAMbikes factory. On the way out Dustin had passed around one of their finished bamboo frames for all to drool over.

Holding this bamboo frame felt like sitting in a hand built cob home. Passing all the tests of performance and function, all the while adding a world of aesthetic beauty and sustainable design. It’s beautiful. ZAM’s bamboo bicycles are one-of-a-kind pieces of handcrafted art, with the strength/weight performance of carbon fibre, and style beyond any.

Beautiful bamboo frames are not all that the ZAM brothers are up to, they also build steel bikes and trailers for a variety of local uses. My personal favourite; the ZAMbulance. A bicycle powered ambulance. Whilst visiting the factory, a few of us were encouraged to take one out for high speed test rides round and around the factory. With the gear ratio’s set up as they were, it was actually quite alright to pedal, however even more alright was playing patient.

With invitations to show their bikes all over the world including the North American Hand Made Bicycle Show, the ZAM love is spreading. It doesn’t take a wizard to realize what you really get when purchasing a ZAM, a custom fit, high performance, piece of artwork that supports a non-profit bicycle movement in Zambia… hrmmm can someone please bring me order form.

http://www.new.zambikes.org/

-- Adele Woodyard

Posted April 14, 2011 by Adele Woodyard
News Briefs | Tour Updates | Zambia

Single Speed

In the event that any of our riders were not feeling worn down and half broken by this point in the tour, Mike, our new temporary bike mechanic may have just added salt to the wound.

He wasn’t the one who chose our rainy off road route, with pond sized puddles, sand pits and steep gravel climbs, no. He did however decide, against all sanity and rationality, to leave his mountain bike at home and rip the muddiest off road section of the tour on his steel single speed cruiser. Hard core. You might be picturing him now, bumping and bouncing off his saddle, walking up the climbs and staggering into camp amongst the last dozen or so riders, which indeed would be a fair assumption. The reality is that young Michael, not even riding with knobby or remotely fat tires, not only rides at the front of the race pack, but actually won the stage the other day. Worthy of much respect and recognition? Absolutely. Do I reckon that Michael should ride the full tour next year, setting a world record on a single speed? Yes I do.

Martin, our full tour bike mechanic, introduced Michael to the TDA as well as to the organization he helped set up, called Wheels of Africa. Both based out of Nairobi, Martin teaches road safety and mechanics to kids and adults and is working on bringing more mechanics like Michael into this kind of work.

With the dirt and mud of the off road, the TDA bike shop has seen its share of worn out brake pads and shifting problems, but none as tragic as the injury suffered by Black Mamba his week. Black Mamba is the name of Michael’s bike of course, which now rests in peace with a sizable crack in its frame. Will this stop him? Not in the slightest. Where there’s a welder, there’s a way. Borrowing another bike for the remainder of the week, Michael continues to push the pace right the way into Mbeya.

-- Adele Woodyard

Posted March 24, 2011 by Adele Woodyard
Tanzania | Tour Updates

I'm home!

We’ve all ridden bikes before, we’ve all camped before and perhaps even travelled once or twice before. So, what makes this so special?

“Honey! I’m home!” Yells Shuresh as he pulls into camp. Directed at no one in particular, yet everyone laughs at that all too familiar feeling of rolling into camp to a dozen familiar faces.

There are close to 100 of us, not any one of us knowing another before the start. Everything we had in common with our friends back home has nothing to do with our new life on tour. Everything you had defined yourself by at home is now gone. Your home, your job, your friends, your fancy cloths and your free time. You favourite foods, your bedroom, your Sunday mornings and your Saturday nights, they’re all gone. It’s just you, whatever is left that is you, your bare necessities stuffed into 2 dusty old sacks and 100 strangers.

A motly crew to start and now, a family. Like it or not, like a ship that never ports, the SS TDA trugs on leaving none behind. Like it or not, everyone is looking out for you ,and whether you’ll admit to liking it or not, you really care about all the other chickens in the coup more and more each day.

Resembling any large extended family, there are brothers and sisters, twins you could even say, there are cousins and aunts and uncles of sorts, all woven together in the TDA family tree. Everyone sits down to dinner together, tries to remain civil, yet inevitably, like any circling of kids around the table, the conversation winds up in the gutter. Sigh. As if packed into horizontal bunkbeds, the nattering and teasing carries on from tent to tent well past sunset. Pranks are pulled, stories are told and day by day these 100 strangers, although still strange, are now what we call home.

-- Adele Woodyard

Posted March 23, 2011 by Adele Woodyard
Tanzania | Tour Updates

And the music played on

Every day has a beginning, a middle and an end. You can be almost certain as to how each day on tour will begin, you can be nearly as sure as to how it will end, but what happens in the middle we are reminded time and again, is anything but predictable. Our day on the road yesterday being no exception to that rule.

And today? We roll on. All arrived safe into camp at the end of the day, dinner was served as everyone reflected on the day, each woven together by the intertwined events of the day. The tour was a unified entity. There were no distractions, or any events more pressing, than the well being of all. Chatter rolled on past sunset, none disappearing off to bed in any great hurry, and what could be more perfect than a campfire to let the evening roll on. Well, we didn’t have a fire, but we did have a treat even more perfect; Steve and his guitar. As some riders trickled off to their tents, the rest sat around, sang loudly, laughed in each others company, shaking the remains of the day away.

Today the tour rolled on. The race for today was cancelled, allowing all with the freedom to ride with who they choose, take their time and enjoy the ride. Acting class was back on at 4:00pm courtesy of Bastien, Yoga at 5:00 with Kendra, some choosing to head straight to the pool side, and others are in town enjoying cold beers and ice cream.

Tomorrow morning we say goodbye to winter here in the Northern Hemisphere and hello to summer in the south.   See you on the other side.

   -- Adele Woodyard

Posted March 12, 2011 by Adele Woodyard
Kenya | Tour Updates

And the staff are OK

Here we are, another blog posting from our little world to yours.   What if, for just this once, I stay in our little world. Our little world as staff that is.   Surely someone has wondered about how that world is going?   If that someone is you, then I shall say that according to my books, the staff are even more than just OK.

One from Switzerland, another Brazil, from Kenya, from Zimbabwe, the US and Ausie Land. A couple of Canadians, a Tanzanian, and few South Africans too, and for the next day or two, a handful of local Ethiopian staff. Each with their own tricks up their sleeves and skills they bring, this contraption of a machine we create ticks on. As each day comes and goes with all of it’s intricacies and to-be-expected surprises, there become less and less of what could be called a typical day on tour.

Each day a new flavour with a new mission at hand, the dozen or so staff become woven together, overlapping and interweaving in duties, until the sun has set and the day is done.

If there is one sure sign of health for this crew, is that there is laughter.   Full bellied, full throttle laughter all throughout the day and even most importantly, at day's end. As one rider said the other day, “the days are long, but the weeks fly by”, and in such truth, we must sit back and enjoy every trial and triumph of the day. Sit back smell the roses, and consider how lucky we are to be here. Even amongst all of the challenges, and not so celebrated moments of staff life, at the end of the day, if we can laugh, then what difference does it make?

Should this gift ever fail us, should we ever go astray, we at least have our dear Lucy. Lucy is a new member of our team. We found her just the other day. Lucy is our new kitchen plant. Lucy’s an Aloe. She was picked up the other day, cared for, potted in a reused coffee tin and is now our fortune telling sage. You can ask her anything.   “Lucy, do you think dinner is spiced enough?”, Listen…. “Lucy, how long until the last riders gets in?” wait and listen some more,”Lucy, where do you reckon we could fill up with water”… “Lucy, have all the staff gone mad?” … ?

-- Adele Woodyard

Posted March 02, 2011 by Adele Woodyard
Ethiopia | Ramblings | Tour Updates

The Little People

Let’s just pretend that we’re living in a story book. An old, worn, thick bound story book, drenched with intricately illustrated pen drawings and a smell of generations
passed. The story is full of mysterious characters and unknown lands, great journeys of hero’s and heroin’s and battles lost and won. This is where our story begins. Not with a story of hero’s, but rather with the entry of the protagonist; The Little People. A story some wish were not true.

The hero has said goodbye to the flat desert and greeted the mountains ahead with great anticipation. Up, up, up they went and down and down and up and up some more. Past farmers fields and villages, mountain passes and switchback turns, they found their way to the heart of the new world. Early mornings with mist hanging low in the valleys, the sun sparkling over the purple flower bushes hanging on to roadside and mountain side alike. The hills roll on ahead, each climb bringing a new vista, and the trees are full of delicious fresh fruit. This is heaven. Little by little, the villages wake up, the men and women go to work in the fields or down to the market, the youngsters tag along or head to school, but what is left of the Little People? What happens when every known adult is off, with nothing left for the littlest ones to do?

In being quite little, they know what is best for their kind, they know to stick together. When together, anything is possible. Today the Little People saw something strange come through their land. One very large truck with paintings on the side, unlike any of the tracks from here. Then another, and then yet another, only slightly smaller this time. The Little People got together.

In no time they were ready, without a moment to spare. Enter the first of the Bicycle People. No matter how little, they each had an important role. The littlest ones, hardly walking, cute as can be, they would be out front. A great disguise. The next in command could run, they could charge at the Bicycle People to see if they could throw them off their coarse,
and the biggest of the Little People had the most important job; throw of stone. Attack! The Bicycle People kept coming! Tens and tens and then of them, their work
was cut out. The Bicycle People came and went throughout the many hours of the afternoon but the Little People didn’t
feel they were done. They passed their plans along to their fellow Little People who lived were the Bicycle People were camped, with instructions for the final attack.The Plan. Assemble all of the biggest of the Little People, they’ll look most identical and will have the most dramatic effect. Collect matching cloaks for all, darker colours are best, and supply each with a matching staff. Wait until the Bicycle People are eating, occupied, and then, form a ring around camp, just as the sun in setting, nothing but cheek bones , noses and eye poking out and all with their staff in their right hand. This should throw them off.

Well, the plan worked in so far as startling the Bicycle People, as they had never seen such a sight. The Bicycle People stayed in their camp, and the Little People watched on. “Maybe they’ll drop a camera, a sandal, or a watch, and then it’s ours!”

The Bicycle People and the Little People never did figure out entirely what each other were up to and remain a great mystery in each others eyes still to this day. One might even say there has been a Little Person watching ME this whole time.

-- Adele Woodyard

Posted February 20, 2011 by Adele Woodyard
Ethiopia | Ramblings | Tour Updates

EFI - Every Fabulous Inch

If one does a little research on Tour d’Afrique on the internet, one thing to be found in almost every blog is the EFI (Every Fabulous Inch) status. The Tour d’Afrique is considered one of the toughest cycling events ever, and the longest bicycle race in the world. Being a 120 days long race with 96 riding stages, there are a lot of situations that can keep a cyclist from riding one or more times during the tour. A broken bicycle, a health problem, getting burnt out and many other issues make being able to ride every single inch of the Tour a matter of luck, hygiene, health, equipment, fitness and mental strength.

Only about 20% of the riders are actually able to make it all the way to Cape Town without ever having to ride in the trucks, but almost everyone leaves Cairo with that dream. Out of the 63 riders registered for the full 12,000 km tour, around 30 have been able to keep riding their bicycles despite heat, terrain, sickness, equipment failure and physical and mental tiredness on the first 3,000 km. Through the very long cycling days in Egypt, the heat of Sudan and the general diarrhea that usually goes on in camp throughout Ethiopia, these very determined human beings wake up day after day, put their tents down and jump on their saddles for another long day of riding, day after day, for every one of the 471,416,380 inches across Africa.

-- Adele Woodyard

Posted February 15, 2011 by Adele Woodyard
Ethiopia | Tour Updates

Ethiopia & The Gorge

An epic climb, at the end of an epic day, on the last day of our epic week. The TDA has successfully completed our longest stretch of consecutive riding days in a row. If the back roads of Sudan were not a true enough test of who is here to EFI then certainly the last two days of climbing were it.

Thinking back on all that has happened between our last rest day and now, I’m not sure if it feels like a month or more like one ‘epic’ly long day. Full days in the saddle with 100 stories to tell as the sun sets each night. Every rider with their own reason for coming and mantra to keep going, these inner worlds grow ever stronger with each passing day. Listening to the rustling and rumblings around camp at sun set, the sounds quickly diminish with the day. The heat of the day is done, calm has arrived, and as the debriefs of the day roll to an end, so do the riders. Whatever the day had brought, a road side attraction, a wanted distraction or unwanted detraction, the story ends the same. Muscles are spent, bellies full and it’s now time for bed. Well done all. More stories of epics and adventure to come, but for now ;rest.

-- Adele Woodyard

Posted February 14, 2011 by Adele Woodyard
Ethiopia | Tour Updates

Winter

Many hours spent in the same landscape now. Many rotations of the wheel, beats of the heart, breathing, water, peddling, and the view remains; desert.   In the hours passing, I figure out how I relate to this landscape, and how can I tell its story.   Unless it were fiction, I have no other perspective to take but my own. As a Canadian, I shall look at the desert through the eyes of the Great White North. How my experience here compares to my experience of winter, and time spent

First is the sound. Walk 300, 400 yards away from camp and listen. Away from the hustle and bustle of the tents and the kitchen, and listen. It’s windy in the desert.   There is no one around.   You hear not a sound, yet realize that you are deafened by the sound of the wind whirling past your ears. That whistling song of the wind; the soundtrack of rural solitude.    You start to walk, a new sound, the sound of your feet crunching through the top crisped layer of sand.   In the abyss of the surrounding wind, the volume of your footsteps sound is as if they’re coming from a speaker nestled just in front on your ear. Crunch, crunch, crunch, crunch, crunch, crunch, crunch. Whirl, the wind keeps whistling.

Like breaking the frozen layer of snow in blowing winter storm. Step out of winter for a moment, and look at the human geography.   Rural, sparse living where resources dictates residence. Much the same the whole world over. Without a map or road signs, one could pass through a dozen villages in a full days drive, or least a handful in a full days ride.   The desert is flat, you would think you could see the next one coming. Yet kilometre after kilometre, the official road-sign demarcations of towns come and go without a blink of change to the landscape.

Stay where you are for long enough, and a donkey cart or pick-up will come wheeling past and straight to the horizon. Spend a few hours on the highway to the arctic in Canada, and we’ll see who wins for the count on gravel tracks into the sunset. Why are these roads being paved? Same reason they take care of our Canadian north coast roadways. Oil.

You best be sure to take proper precautions driving here or there also. The only thing that will get your tires more stuck than 2 meters of snow, is most certainly 2 meters of soft sand. We’ve helped with more than one sand sunken vehicle and we’ve only been here a week. The one that makes me laugh the most.

The most unbelievable similarity between life at 30 degrees in the middle of the desert and winter in Canada; it that it is currently winter here too, so you can believe me, that all the kids are wearing insulated parkas home from school!

   -- Adele Woodyard

Posted February 03, 2011 by Adele Woodyard
Sudan | Tour Updates

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Kimsie Wimsie - TDA Chef

ZamBikes

Single Speed

I'm home!

And the music played on

And the staff are OK

The Little People

EFI - Every Fabulous Inch

Ethiopia & The Gorge

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