It was time for me to experience – first-hand – the sights, the sounds, the smells, and the HILLS of Rwanda. I needed to see the coffee bikes in operation, meet some of the coffee growers, and discover the positive impact that Project Rwanda was having in that country. So this September I set out for a mountain bike tour of Rwanda with Tom Ritchey, and to help out with the second annual Wooden Bike Classic. This was an adventure of a lifetime for me.

Reading about Project Rwanda on a web site got my attention.  Talking to founder Tom Ritchey and his team got me more interested.  Catching the enthusiasm of last year’s 50 Mile Ride volunteer team got me excited.  But now it was time for me to experience – first-hand – the sights, the sounds, the smells, and the HILLS of Rwanda.  I needed to see the coffee bikes in operation, meet some of the coffee growers, and discover the positive impact that Project Rwanda was having in that country.  So this September I set out for a mountain bike tour of Rwanda with Tom Ritchey, and to help out with the second annual Wooden Bike Classic.  This was an adventure of a lifetime for me.  Here’s a recap of my memorable moments…

Day One – I love LA, but this is ridiculous
It’s Friday morning.  A mechanical issue on the plane (something about a faulty on-board generator) results in a TEN HOUR delay leaving Los Angeles.  I get a wee bit frustrated as I know I’m missing my Saturday flight into Rwanda.  United gets me to Washington DC that night, but can’t get me on a flight to Brussels until Sunday night.  The next direct flight from Brussels to Rwanda isn’t until Tuesday.  It took me all day, but I finally gave up MY plans and turned them over to God.  Patience, flexibility, and surrender are not easy for me.

Day Two – Shooting ducks in DC
I’m supposed to be on the Akagera Game Preserve in Rwanda today.  Instead, I’m strolling around a pea-green pond outside my hotel in Washington DC.  I shoot pictures of ducks, fantasizing that they’re really giraffe and elephants in Africa.  My revised flight plan leaves tonight for a two day unplanned tour of Brussels.  I buy a Belgium tour book at the airport and start planning an adventure of a different kind.

Day Three – Baguettes, beer, and a bidet in Belgium
Things are looking up.  The United baggage claim agrees to hold my oversize bike box for a couple days, which saves me from schlepping it to the hotel on the subway.  I tour downtown Brussels, gawking at all the beautiful gothic architecture just like the tourist I am.  (Complete with black socks and camera.  Just kidding about the camera.)  I enjoy my first Belgian beer, a scrumptious baguette sandwich for lunch, and a huge bucket-full-o-mussels for dinner.  I top it all off with my first bidet experience.  It was wonderful.

Day Four – Brugge – a lousy place to be a single
On the recommendation of my hotel, I take a one hour train to Brugge.  This has got to be the most romantic European city ever.  Wish Sandy were here!  Gorgeous canals, beautiful gothic buildings and towers, horse drawn carriages on cobblestone streets lined with pastry and chocolate shops.  I experience my first Belgian waffle and Belgian chocolates here.  Very fine indeed!

Day Five – A wild ride to Gisenyi
It’s Tuesday, my flight goes without a hitch and I arrive in Kigale (the capital of Rwanda) at 8:00pm.  My new best friend Eric Munyamana (Saddleback’s key contact in Rwanda) hires a driver, Jean Paul, to drive me to Gisenyi to meet up with Tom Ritchey’s bike tour group.  It’s supposed to be a 2 ½ hour drive.  I knew it would be a dark, windy, mountainous ride.  I didn’t plan on the rain and the pea-soup fog though.  It took us over 4 hours to get there.  A real white-knuckle ride for me.  Along the way, Jean Paul, in the little bit of English that he knows, tells me his favorite Americans are George Bush (strong military man!), and Billy Crystal (never said why).

Day Six – Land of a thousand hills?  More like TEN thousand!
Today I find out just how strong Tom Ritchey and his biking buddies are.  We set out for an epic mountain bike ride from Gisenyi to Kibuye.  “Epic” takes on a new dimension for me – I didn’t know we’d be riding over 75 miles that day.  8 hours in the saddle - my butt was sore for sure – but adrenaline and the thrill of mountain biking in Africa kept me going.  All along the way we enjoyed unbelievable scenery, gorgeous hillsides covered with terraced gardens and crops, endless dirt roads, beautiful blue skies.  I learned that “muraho” means “hello”, and I used it about a thousand times along the ride that day.  All the villagers we met would smile, wave, and respond with “yego” (means “yes” or a greeting response).  Kids would call out “muzungu” (white person) and run alongside us for blocks.  Very friendly, very warm, very welcoming people everywhere we went.

Day Seven – A blessing from God
We head out first thing in the morning to ride from Kibuye to Butare.  It’s supposed to be an even longer ride than yesterday.  I’m more than a little worried my legs may not hold out.  Sure enough, about halfway through the day I start cramping big time (no, I’m not crying – just maybe whimpering a little).  Our sag-wagon picks me up, and I’m grateful to humble myself and ride in the car a while.  As we approach a village, a young girl we pass calls out for my “agacupa” (empty water bottle).  We slow, I drop it out the window for her, and she takes off running for it.  She keeps running to us, even after she picks up the bottle.  We stop, and she comes up to us and tells me “murakoze” (thank you) and then goes on to say “imana umugisha” (may God bless you).  Wow.  In the smallest of ways – a water bottle - I wanted to bless her, yet with her kind heart and kind words she blessed me in the BIGGEST of ways that day.  Thank you God - I pray that you continue to shine big time in this precious girl’s life.

Day Eight – Riding the storm out
It’s Friday, the day before the Wooden Bike Classic events are to begin.  We head out in the afternoon for what was to be a short 9 mile “fun ride” to check out the proposed mountain bike race course.  A couple miles into the ride it starts to rain.  Africa-sized rain, complete with lightning bolts and thunderclaps – like I’ve never experienced in my life.  We’re riding through single-track rivers and flooded fire-roads, trying to find shelter somewhere.  We come upon a schoolyard, and take cover under an awning.  A couple hundred school kids crowd around us, so excited and so curious about the muzungus on bikes.  When we think it’s letting up, we take off again, only to have the rain and thunder come back even stronger.  I’m pedaling as fast as I can up these crazy muddy flooded roads, yet the ride group keeps getting further and further away.  I have visions of being all alone and stranded in the middle of Nowhere Rwanda.  A buddy gets chain-suck after passing through a flooded section, so he has to stop.  Thank you God, I’m saved!  We ride out together and find our way back to the hotel.

Day Nine – Road racing Rwanda style
Almost everyone else on our volunteer team is back up in Kigale for the start of the Wooden Bike Classic road race (80 mile race from Kigale to Butare).  I’m supposed to leave at 8am to bring water and bananas up to the race halfway point in Gitarama.  At 9:30am, I’m still in Butare waiting for my van driver to show up.  He’s a no-show (car troubles, surprise).  Eric Munyamana bails me out again!  He arranges a driver for us, and me and Joe and Josh (ace bike mechanics with the Scallywags ministry) speed to our aid station.  Thankfully the race is late getting started, and we get there just in time.  After an hour or two of passing out waters, we head back to Butare for the race finish.  Great crowds at the finish, lots of fun watching as people cheered on all the riders.  The highlight of the day was the reception for Project Rwanda at the Butare Museum later that night.  A native drum line and local dancers entertained us after dinner.  They pulled “volunteers” from the audience, and I showed them some sweet dance moves (learned them from my son Danny), earning myself the nickname “Dougie Fresh”.

Day Ten – Wooden Bike Classic
Today is the big day.  Our first event in the morning is the coffee bike race.  These are the Project Rwanda utility bikes, and it’s very cool to see so many of these bright green and yellow bikes in the race.  Especially cool because we know that these same bikes are making such a difference in the lives of the local coffee growers who use them every day.  Next is the single speed race.  These are the Rwandan “street bikes” – clunky, rusted, wobbly – that’s true.  But still ridden with pride by their owners, as evidenced by the many reflectors, colored tape, bells, and ribbon they use to decorate their rigs.  The mountain bike race is next.  Team Rwanda dominates in this event (as they did in the road race), taking the top 5 places.  The day’s final event is our “signature event” – the Wooden Bike race.  It was an amazing sight to see – over 60 hand-made wooden bikes, in all shapes and sizes – all lined up for the start.  Then, mass chaos prevails as they take off.  Pieces and parts were flying everywhere, racers tripping over each other as they hurled themselves down the dirt road toward the finish.  Our rules were pretty loose I guess – as long as you crossed the finish, it didn’t matter if you were riding your wooden bike or simply carrying pieces and parts over your shoulder.  It was a total blast.

Day Eleven – A sobering beginning, a fun ending
Our last day in Butare.  Some of us took a van to visit the Murambi genocide site in nearby Gikongoro.  Over 50,000 Rwandans were massacred in this area of Gikongoro during the genocide in 1994.  The Murambi site was a school where hundreds of victims attempted to take shelter.  Their mutilated bodies are preserved in lime powder in a kind of mummified state, still in the classrooms.  A tragic scene, very sobering.  On the way back, we stopped to tour the Maraba coffee cooperative.  I really enjoyed seeing the processing station, and learning about how coffee is de-pulped, washed, fermented, dried, and “cupped” for roast testing.  We were able to buy a couple pounds of green “Ucar” cooperative coffee, recent winner of the Rwandan gold cup award.  Can’t wait to roast it and give it a try.  Then we head back to Kigale for a dinner date with the President!  Yes, President Paul Kagame wants to meet me (oh, he also wants to meet the Rwandan National Cycling Team).  We need to dress up, but through an unfortunate sequence of events, I’m separated from my luggage and have to borrow a shirt from one guy and some pants from another.  Dinner is fabulous (finally, something other than goat brochettes to eat), good speeches, great publicity for the team, nice photo ops.

Day Twelve – Feels just like Starbucks
It’s our last morning in Rwanda.  I discover the Bourbon Coffee shop in Kigale.  This is the first true coffee shop in Rwanda, and Arthur (Rwanda’s coffee guru) really did it right.  Coffee is rarely roasted and served in many of the coffee-growing countries of the world, probably because most locals could not afford to buy a cup.  Bourbon Coffee opened this past February, and it’s been very successful.  They have plans to open 3 more in other capital cities in Africa.  This morning a Kenyan bike racer named Steven (who was training with the Rwandan team) tells me “It’s not just His angels – but GOD HIMSELF is with Rwanda and the Rwanda Cycling Team”.  Steven sees what many of us also see – how God is bringing just the right people and resources to bear, in order to nurture the spirit of hope and reconciliation that is embodied within the team.  This team:  Nathan, Adrie, Abraham, Nyandwi, Rafiki, and Obed are the bright new faces of Rwanda.

Day Thirteen – A marriage made in Heaven?
36 hours of travel time since I left Rwanda and arrived back in Los Angeles.  Gratefully, no major delays or mishaps.  While in a coffee shop in Brussels on a layover, I enjoyed a good conversation with Project Rwanda board members.  Representatives from World Vision were in Butare for the Wooden Bike Classic.  It appears very promising that World Vision will be the micro-financing arm of the project, freeing up Tom Ritchey and his team to focus strictly on the coffee bike design and manufacturing.  A great marriage!  Tom’s vision is to one day manufacture tens of thousands of the utility/coffee bikes right in Rwanda, providing employment and generating revenue for the local economy.  This will be a very happy ending.  Speaking of happy endings, this is the end of my blog.  And we all lived happily ever after.  The end.