why thru africa?

How many of us have dreamt and planned an amazing holiday? Planned to take several months off to travel and explore? But somehow we never get round to it!

We so often sit around the dinner table with friends or family and plan that inevitable trip thru Africa. Those glasses of Pinotage or Sauvignon Blanc always help make the trip all the more real … we decide on the countries, tents, time frames (always in a year or two), who to take with (everyone at the dinner table is always welcome – obviously) and how cheap it would be. We do get a little stuck on … Land Rover or Land Cruiser? Which one is better? And then there is the problem of couples or no couples, who likes whom and which person never pulls their weight…

And… inevitably… the next day, once the haze of good food and booze wears off, our partners have scolded us for being so far-off from reality and we trudge off to work, see our workloads and log-in to our banking website… we cannot believe we even considered such a foolish thing as a trip thru Africa.

I’m not too sure about everyone else… but I know I’m only going to live once. I may be a little selfish – but then this is my life. And more than likely I am a little crazy after all. I also don’t mind a little debt to make this awesome experience come to life. Furthermore, a friend/colleague of mine also helped me realise that something like this is possible – Billy and Christy are currently going by horseback through Africa, albeit quite a bit slower than I intend to take (see their website: www.africanhoofprints.com)

I heard about the Tour d'Afrique about two years ago when a fellow cyclist/runner – a member of both my cycling and running club – completed the same tour. I immediately started playing with the idea to do the same and haven’t looked back since.