Little Eden

After six whole days of sitting around we’re coming down with a serious case of cabin fever. When we’re cycling we don’t mind the diet alternating between rice with beans and chips mayai (an omelette with chips fried into it). It’s just fuel for the furnace. But while we’re stuck waiting for Ben to get better, having the same two meals day in day out seems like a huge burden. We remember ruefully how high and mighty we were about the food here after a few weeks in Kenya.

On day seven Ben is still not feeling 100% but hey, it’s just down to lake Rukwa and then 100km on a flat dirt road, we tell ourselves. At the end awaits the farm of two lovely Americans who we met at the guesthouse and who’ve invited us to stay with them. So eager not to miss out on some human connection we throw caution to the wind and get back in the saddle.

Oh, the foolishness. “Down to the lake” involves a lot more climbing that we had thought, based on the elevation profile. Then there is the dirt road along the lake. It’s one of the worst roads we’ve been on so far. Somehow it manages to be rocky, washboardy and sandy all at once and with no end in sight.

It takes us three hours to cycle 30km. We make it to a guesthouse but Ben knows he pushed it too hard on this first day. Sure enough he feels worse again the next day and we have to hitch a ride again. This time the only option is taking the bus. We are somewhat apprehensive as we’ve seen a few of these lying in ditches. We insist to take the bikes inside as there’s no roof rack.

The other passengers aren’t super thrilled about Jo and Olive clogging up the aisle. It makes us uncomfortable but the road is as bad as the day before and we are paying extra after all. We drive through a forest reserve that has very few trees, among them some baobab trees. The longer the ride the more passengers are being crammed onto the bus. Some raw fish is packed on top of Ben’s bag and Lina is handed a couple of three year olds who promptly fall asleep on her lap. All in all it takes us three hours to cover 60km.

We have a much more enjoyable cycle after the bus to finally reach Kwa Teddy – the farm (and pride and joy) of Ted and Kim. They have been living in the Rukwa valley for longer than we’ve been alive. Starting off as volunteers they contemplated how to do good and help people for a long time. They settled on creating jobs for people, which as we’ve thought before, is way more useful than what most NGOs are doing.

After a much needed shower and some delicious homemade limeade we‘re going on a tour. Ted shows us the lime, avocado, teak, mango and papaya trees, the vegetable garden, the geese, chickens and the bee hives. They also have pig pens, the slurry of which fertilizes their fish pond water. The wastewater from there fertilizes the papaya trees whose uneaten fruit in turn feeds the pigs. Talk about circular economy.

Ted, Kim and their team treat us to wine and cheese, homemade bread, crackers, butter, fresh vegetables, fruit, salad… anything two starving cyclists could ever want. We are staying in a safari tent with outdoor shower and a gorgeous view of a cliff face. At night the crickets chirp and fruit bats drool papaya over our panniers. We have to keep pinching ourselves to know that we’re not dreaming. It really feels like we’ve just stumbled off the dusty road and into little Eden.

We feel like we could stay here for a week, or a month (…or forever) but Ted and Kim are headed up to their other farm on the plateau. Being able to skip the horrendous climb while Ben is not fully fit is just too good a chance to pass up. So, only a day and a half after arriving, their Land Cruiser is loaded up with 300kg of limes headed for Dar es Salam, the bikes on the roof and a bag full of baked goodies and fresh vegetables for us.

Eliamu – one of the people Ted and Kim work with – sends us off with a prayer. We are so grateful for the amazing kindness, the openhearted welcome and the many conversations. It’s meeting people like them that really makes our time here. We always come away inspired and refreshed, body and mind.

Over the next days Ben is finally recovering. The antibiotics have left him even leaner than he already was. Fattening him up will be quite a challenge. Thankfully we’re headed to another town that supposedly has nice cafes (something we haven’t seen for almost a month). But to get there we have to brave one of the most notoriously dangerous roads in Eastern Africa. Let’s see if there will be another blog post after this one.