“Jacob, what do you want to do in Kibuye(key(or tchee)-boo-yay)?” I asked him as we laid on the bed scrolling through insignificant posts on our phones.
“Hmmm…” Jacob looked away from his phone momentarily, thinking about the question at hand. Suddenly, his expression brightened as he exclaimed, “Biking!”
Uh-oh… Biking in Rwanda? Rwanda is known as the country of a thousand hills, so biking can only be done with endurance, mental stamina, and legs made of steel (For the sake of this story, it is important to know that I am not a biker. Yes, I know how to bike and I have ridden all over my home town, but I am not A biker).
For me the thought of riding up and down Rwanda’s steep hills let my stomach churning in knots (these hills can be over a mile above sea level). My legs were not made of steel and my mental stamina was somewhat faltering towards the end of this vacation. Despite my lack of “biking self-confidence” I strapped on my helmet as Jacob and I mounted our bikes we rented three days later.
I could tell right away that something was not right with my bicycle. One of the brakes was barely working and the bike kept rattling like an old car. To make matters worse, instead of riding down the smooth, well-maintained road that zig-zagged its way through Kibuye, our guide took us on a different path that consisted of fine sand, loose rocks, and an occasional meandering goat. Now, not only was my bike a quaker but now it was a mover and a shaker as it was uncontrollably flying down a dirt road with new and yet to be discovered hazards waiting in the dust.
Beginning to go up the first big hill, Jacob’s chain had popped off in the first two seconds of the climb. This is great for beginner bikers who want to practice hill starts on a bike. The issue was it happed a good seven more times on this one hill, and for the next 3 hills we went up. I guess it was one giant hill, with little plateaus as we had not gone down a single hill yet but that was to come.
After switching bikes with the guide, we encountered the first downhill. Here lies the almost death of me, the first real hazard, of which was when I slammed on the brakes and my bike finally tried to throw me, as my tires locked up and I went sliding sideways just managing to hop off over the handlebars before I too joined my skidding tires. Jacob looked back at the cloud of dust and wanting to help switched his bike with mine.
That did not make the trip any easier, but as we reached the paved road we both sighed in relief. To think that we were close to done, we were only 30 minutes into the 4-hour expedition. We biked down to a natural gas power station and then walked back up the way we came. We barely made it to the first natural hot spring ever found in the area, relying on sucking the sugar from sugar cane to get us back to town, where we were delighted to enjoy some cold Fantas and apples, before heading back to the hotel for lunch, and a 3-hour break before we were to be going out to see the night fisherman on the lake.
