Mountain Biking the Congo Nile Trail in Rwanda (03 March 2015)

I had not considered cycling the Congo Nile Trail but when Gabrielle, a work colleague who was visiting DR Congo to help with training some of our new staff, suggested it I was keen. I was a little concerned as she is much fitter than me and I have only been on a bike once in the last two years but she assured me it wouldn’t be a problem.

She found a company called Rwandan Adventures in Gisenyi Rwanda, who hired mountain bikes and negotiated a deal for us to go without a guide. Our route was to take the upper trail of the Congo Nile Trail and then drop down at Kinunu Coffee Washing Station where we would stay the night before returning to Giseni by the main trail of the Congo Nile Trail.

We crossed the border from Goma in DR Congo into Giseni in Rwanda with no issues and drove 7 km along the edge of Lake Kivu to the cycle hire place. The bikes looked good but they had no front suspension. The hire company provided helmets, gloves, water bottle, repair kit and panniers. Gabrielle loaded one pannier and I suggested she should balance her bike and have two, one on each side. I volunteered my load onto her second pannier purely for her sake – and to handicap her extreme fitness advantage.

Ready to go on our solid steel beasts. Note the heavily laden panniers on Gabrielle's bike and my streamlined bike.

Ready to go we were off warming up on a km of flat before heading up the first hill which was steep only to realise that it was the wrong hill. There were some amused looking locals as we freewheeled back down the hill and joined the correct road. This road was not quite as nice a surface and the next hour was sustained uphill on rough rocky and slippery dirt road. I was thankful that I didn’t have the heavy load that Gabrielle did as we ended up doing a lot of pushing up the hill. The views were a great compensation, looking over Giseni and Goma, Lake Kivu and Mt Nyiragongo the active volcano.



We were a curiosity everywhere

Lake Kivu and where we started

Up, up and more up. Muddy and slippery roads

Glad Gabrielle has the heavy panniers!

Once at the top we undulated along a ridge and seemed to be going uphill a lot more than down. I had discovered by this time that my camelback bladder had absorbed the diesel fumes from when my gear was stored for 5 months in a shipping container with diesel jerry cans and the water was undrinkable. We stopped in one of the many villages and I purchased some water expecting to be ripped off and pleasantly surprised not to be. I find the places where they do not get tourists do not tend to rip off westerners. I guess they haven’t had the experience that they could charge triple and the tourists wouldn’t realise so they just treat us like their normal customers.



Still uphill but finally not as steep

Looking at Mount Nyiragongo which is in DR Congo

 Rwanda is a very populated place and it was seldom that we didn’t see any locals. We were a great source of entertainment for them and I imaging they did not see many cyclists as the upper trail of the Congo Nile Trail is not popular or well known. Also it was probably very unusual to see two females by ourselves. The children in particular were hugely amused and every single one was helpful enough to remind us that we were ‘Muzungu’ which is foreigner in Swahili. It was a constant background noise hearing “Muzungu, muzungu good morning”, regardless of what time of the day. There was some variety as this sentence was usually followed up with a request for something. In some villages it was pens, in some presents, others lollies and also for money. It was noticeable that some villages the children did not ask for anything which was a relief.

Children come running for miles when they see us.

This boy managed to keep up with us for over a km

While up on the ridge we were treated to views of coffee plantations and the occasional glimpse of Lake Kivu. There was one patch where we went through jungle and other places it was Eucalyptus plantations.


Not bad views - of course only stopping for a photo, not because I am stuffed.

More hills but hard to feel tired when you see how much weight is on these guys bikes



Coffee Plantations





Coffee

I had my own follower for a while, these boys have very good endurance - or we were going really slow.

 



Typical village

Proper paddocks which is a rare sight here. Looking down to Lake Kivu



Almost feel at home at milking time

 

I was starting to get tired after 3 hours and thankfully the down hill started. It was a long way down and now I realised the disadvantage of no suspension on rough roads. My arms and hands were starting to get very sore from the constant vibration. And the downhill just kept on going. For one part we went off the road and onto some narrower paths which lead to some fantastic mountain biking. Unfortunately I am so used to riding with SPD clip in pedals that I found my feet frequently coming off the pedals as I tried to lift my pedals up. Most of the time this was not too bad an issue but I had a few scary moments trying to lift my bike over rocks like I could when clipped in and ended up stopping very suddenly.



These ladies are incredibly strong

Lunch break now we are starting to head downhill.



Not far to go to get back down to the lake - yeah right!



This is more like it

Yeah!



Thought I was going fast but these kids kept up



And they are still with us



Last uphill for the day

I also discovered that not only is Gabrielle fitter than me she is far superior with more technical riding and seems to lack fear so I held her up a bit on the down hills. I was stronger on the uphills but that was probably due to the packed panniers she had to haul up the hills.

Finally the never ending downhill ended and we arrived at the Kinunu Coffee Washing Station. After checking into our rooms and having a cold shower (not by choice but at least there was water) we asked for a coffee only to be told that the Coffee Washing Station had no coffee.

Finally made it

We went for a walk to look at the Coffee Washing station and to ease the cycling muscles. We walked to the other option for accommodation in town and were happy to try the local coffee. We ordered a fruit salad and the manager apologised that they did not have their normal ingredients and only had orange, pineapple, passion fruit and banana to which we said was fine. After a huge bowel of fruit salad each and a lovely coffee we got the bill and discovered the manager had only charged us a third of the price of the fruit salad. We pointed this out and he explained that because he didn’t have the full range of ingredients he couldn’t possible charge us the full amount. This is a very unusual situation where we were being charged less than we thought we should have so we thanked him and paid a good tip. The huge bowel of fruit salad was fantastic and just what I wanted after a long day of riding.

Back at the lodge we relaxed until dinner. There were now two other people there and we sat together and bowl after bowl after bowl of food arrived. Definitely no shortage and it was good.

We then went to bed early as I was shattered.

The next morning breakfast was provided and it was good. I wasn’t feeling too bad except for my sore arms. We started with a 30 minute uphill grunt before starting the undulating trail back towards Giseni. By undulating I mean big long hills up and bumpy short downhills that were really hurting my arms.



Not a fun way to start the morning - straight up

Gabrielle playing around- need to put more weight in her panniers



Nice to be at lake level even for a short while

We ate lunch by the side of the road and made good time into Giseni where I was very glad to hand my bike back. I loved the trail but would only do it again on a bike with suspension.

These would be pretty waterfalls if it wasn't for the big power pylon



Flat smooth road - not a common sight



I got excited at seeing sheep - though not as most Kiwis would recognise. I call them Geep because they look like a cross between a sheep and a goat.



Coffee

We then went to a local restaurant for lunch before heading back across the border into DR Congo very satisfied with the adventure we had just had.

Mountain Gorilla Trek, Virunga National Park, DR Congo (19 April 2015)

While living in Goma, Democratic Republic of Congo is not everyone’s idea of the place to be there are some fantastic benefits like nice climate, being beside a lake (admittedly one we cannot swim in due to methane pockets having the unfortunate effect of rendering swimmers unconscious). All of this is set to a backdrop of a couple of volcanos, including Mount Nyiragongo which last erupted in 2002 causing devastation to Goma and multiple deaths. The volcano has one of the largest lava lakes in the world and the lava levels are increasing at a surprisingly rapid rate. Also it is right near the Virunga National Park which is one of the few places in the world where you can see Mountain Gorillas in the wild.
Several of my work colleagues were keen so we decided to go Gorilla Trekking. When booking we were quoted an amazing 180 US Dollar each for transport on a journey which would be between 45 minutes to 2 hours. While use to being ripped off on a regular occurrence we thought that was a little steep and luckily our work just happened to have some very good four wheel drive vehicles and a boss keen for us to explore out of Goma.

We left early in the morning and drove for nearly an hour covering a massive 30 km on the typical rough roads. At a village we picked up the armed National Park Guards and drove to the Ranger Station. I was very glad we had capable 4WD vehicles as it was a rough road and very muddy in bits. I was driving the front vehicle and needed to use all of my cross country driving skills to keep going. Unfortunately for the driver of the vehicle behind they didn’t have quite as much grip on their tyres and had to have a couple of attempts to get through some of the obstacles. In one mud patch there was no shortage of volunteers willing to help push the vehile out – for a price of course. Eventually we got to a very rough hill and I had to admit defeat so we parked up and walked up the hill the rest of the way to the Ranger Station. Along the way we passed fields full of different types of crops and had a great view of the two volcanoes that shadow Goma Mt Nyiragongo and Mt Nyamuragira.

Very strong ladies with huge loads. We provided entertainment for them by slipping in the mud in front of them

Different types of crops going all the way up the hill in the distance

Thankfully we did not have to climb this hill in front.

Smoke from the volcano Mt Nyiragongo

Slippery and steep

At the ranger station we all filled in our details on the visitor log and were briefed by our guide – in French. This was translated for the two of us that don’t speak much French and we were on our way.

Filling in the register at a Virunga National Park Ranger Station

We walked down a path and then through fields of crops for 30 minutes to get to the jungle edge where we waited while our guide got a location update from the Park Rangers who shadow the gorillas providing protection from the ever present threat of poachers.  

Heading towards the jungle through the crops

Thick mud claims a shoe

Then we were off following a faint path over a steam and then up into the hills. We were fortunate the Gorillas were near the edge so it was only another 30 minutes before we reached the Gorilla Troop. 

 

Loving the walk through the jungle

Security - whether from animals or the many armed groups, still nice to have some protection

There is a path - sort of, more just trampled bushes

 Here we dropped our bags and donned face masks to protect the Gorillas from catching any sickness or colds from us. I didn’t have to do this when I saw the Gorillas in Rwanda but was more than happy to do this and appreciated the measures they were going to prevent tourism effecting the gorillas too much.

We then walked forwards and enjoyed the next hour watching the family going about their business of eating, sleeping and playing. There was a wide range of ages from very young baby up to the 17 year old Silver Back who was huge. There were a couple of juveniles who were curious and had to keep getting shoed away by the Park Guide. They seemed to think this was a game and would play rough and tumble pretending not to notice us until they got really close and were shoed away again. A different juvenile made a couple of attempts to get closer and seemed frustrated he wasn’t allowed to touch us.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Park Ranger keeping the juvenile away from us



Silverback

 

The hour flew by and the Guide led us back to the jungle edge and through the crop fields but we took a different route to get back to the car. This led us through a village and before long we had a group of curious children following us.

Heading back to the car



One of many children curious about us

Back at the car is was a much easier downhill drive back to the road where we dropped off our National Park Guards and we were back home by lunch time.

The epilogue to this is only 2 days later that same road that we drove on had an anti tank mine deliberately laid on it and the team sent to investigate was kidnapped (and later released unharmed). It was a reminder that there is a reason we (the United Nations) are working there and while it is fun doing these excursions we have a way to go to get DR Congo to a state where tourism can be safely developed and bring much needed income to the people.