It was a long ride and included a border crossing and a time change.

Left the hotel rooms and packed up everything into my locker. The first 12km were busy leaving on the main highway heading east and very gradual climb. However at 12km we left the main road heading to Dar and instead starting climbing. It took 17km to reach the summit as we left the valley behind.
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After this we had a wonderful 20km long descent with good grade. It became warmer, more humid and correspondingly more lush with bananas and other tropical fruits. The kids on the side were still well-mannered with a lot of “good morning sir” and an occasional “good morning teacher”

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After this we had occasional climbs with a few steeper ones. Lunch was welcome at 81km.

After lunch we had a sequence of rolling hills with the summit of each hill a little lower than the previous one. We could see Lake Malawi in the distance and came to the border at 115km. Here it was one stamp on the Tanzania side and one on the Malawi side.

I exchanged money without problem at the G8pub. However perhaps half a dozen riders ran into scams at the border. A common way this happened is someone would approach on the street offering a good rate. They would take your cash and dash off to get some in exchange. Come back and indicate that unfortunately wouldn’t be albe to make the trade and hand back what you thought was your money and quickly disappear. As you counted things, you’d notice that the $50 you handed was instead $20 or bills were replaced with counterfeit.

Malawi so far is very flat, hot and humid. There are marshy areas and areas to grow rice. Kids are a bit more unruly here and we’re back to asking for money. Looks poor and now need to learn the new coke stops.
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It was a long ride, but we had nice camp in Karonga. It will now get used to the time shift again.

Hair salon next to quiet internet cafe
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Carrying a load
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Sign for the section ahead
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Last night camp was noisy with club playing music, people driving motorcycles and lots of people noise. I think many were up early because of this, but also because of the “mando” challenging day ahead. On tap was 2000m of climb and 1500m of descent spread across 111km.

The first 15km from camp was some of the most obnoxious road I had cycled. Rocks had been added to clay soils, so very rocky. In addition, there was a lot more traffic including construction traffic squeezing through. I counted at least 10 large dump trucks, two flatbed trailers and several buses. As each vehicle passed, I’d get off the road and then back on again.

After 15km the road became better, we descended to a river and then started a long climb back up. The road kept winding and climbing. Each corner kept going up. Finally by 32km was close to top and then descent to cross a village. Stopped here for coke stop with few others. Not much longer came across the exotic pub
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After village the road became wider and more tracks to find. Also could see where a new road was being constructed. Parts of it were being smoothed out and parts the new bridge culverts were being put in place. In several years, this will become much easier. A few kms to lunch. It was about 12:30pm when I arrived and I was one of the last.

I knew the descent would be rocky and had already decided I’d take the truck down if I could. The morning climbs and tough road meant that I was happy to ride half day was well.
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Riding in the afternoon the road slowly started to wind and climb. By 65km started having some great top of the world views and over the next 27km it just kept winding through and along the hills. Looked like some spectacular rides. The area was still lush with an occasional village as well.
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The top was at 2500m and then some false descents around the mountains before a more substantial descent. One could see Mbeya below but it took a while before road eventually would its way down. Unlike ascent I was happy to hitch a ride down and later reports confirmed difficult (and slow cycling) for some on the descent. Now in Mbeya for a rest day.

No rain last night and also dry in the morning, hooray! The road started a bit sandy and my bike had a strange squeek. Eventually figured the squeek might be a disc rotor. but not after also oiling a hub.
The terrain was rolling all day with ~1000m of climb. Trees and bushes kept us from having much in the way of views, but also provided welcome shade as it would have been hot otherwise. Picture below shows that TDA truck sometimes had as much fun with remaining mud puddles as we did as we could often go around.

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There were a few villages and again in mornings we would see children out in their school uniforms. Throughout the day, it would be more common to hear “good morning, sir” – even in the afternoon. I figured this was because school was more often in the mornings and so this was learned better than “good afternoon”. Below was Henri stopped for coke at one of the multiple villages along the way.

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It was a slow and steady ride and by 69km reached the lunch stop. Learned here that two bicycles had been stolen the previous night. Rather frustrating and dissapointing. [Epilogue: we learned after this that local police had recovered those bicycles the following day and likely suspects, work underway to get them back to the riders].
After lunch a few more villages and warmer, though fortunately still not too hot. Photo below shows Irin cycling past in one of those villages. At 98km a coke stop and after this the last 22km became very rocky. It was slower cycling and also had some road construction. A short stretch of walking and also several spots to get off the bike and out of the way of construction vehicles.

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I was happy to see camp at end of a long but fun riding day.

I got my bike together and was one of the first on the road by 7am. I took it slow and cautious trying to pick my path on hard packed bits and avoid sliding sideways and keeping out of the puddles. On the ascents this wasn’t too bad, but on descents I was particularly careful. As a result most riders passed me.

The rain continued and at 19km I walked a short stretch of hill under rain while heard the truck come past. Decided to take it as an excuse to make a rain day today. There were three already on the dinner truck and by time we arrived in camp there would be eleven as others had similar idea. It did look like eventually after lunch the sun did come out and it dried up more. I know 125km of off-road would have been challenging without rain, so was happy to have taken an easier ride today. Below a few photos taken along the way
Bikes out at lunch, mud everywhere.
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Back in camp, enterprising teens set up to wash bicycles for 1000 shillings (60 cents); many riders took them up on the offer.
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Hats off to those who cycled all day. Here is James with big grin on his face as he arrives at camp.
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Taking photos of the kids would collect a big crowd when you showed them the resultant photos.
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At 12km we came across some thick mud. They had graded soft loose dirt on top of the road not long before the rains. This had developed a thick pasty mud that got up everywhere in the bikes. Those with fenders had it worst as those completely stopped up, but even other bikes had brakes and derailleurs all stuck. I and most people walked through this stretch – not quite certain how long it might be.

Adding to the challenge were stuck vehicles. Photos below show a truck that slid sideways before getting stuck and then a bus that had also gotten stuck. As cyclists we could walk/slide through the worst muck, but TDA trucks had to get past these stuck vehicles as well. Reports were this took a few hours for the big truck. All reports were also to skill of our truck drivers in carefully navigating this obstacle.
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Enterprising locals were selling cokes near the stuck bus as we came past. The price had nearly tripled from normal though. I was thinking, “at least the bus got this far – so perhaps the road will be better later”. My thoughts turned out to be correct and not too much after the bus, we had some fairly smooth road and much quicker cycling. Hooray!
After lunch we had varied terrain with some low hills to climb over. The track was generally narrow and as photo of Anne below shows fairly direct cycling over the hills.
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It was a longer ride and I was happy to see camp appear at 113km. Below shows some of the welcoming committee we found at camp. We have rain showers again tonight, will see what tomorrow brings.
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There is a fair amount of vegetation here and overall lush compared with further north. Also see crops including corn, sunflowers and others. There were a few villages we crossed and in Tanzania they put a set of four speed bumps very close together on the road entering and leaving the villages.
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At 61km the road changed to dirt. There were still puddles on the road but not too difficult to find a path to ride. At 85km was Itigi village as well as a coke stop. Below Naomi, Diederick and I stopped in the village.
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After this, the sun even came out for a while. This was good for drying off the tent when set up. All was dry not too long before we got afternoon rains. Below shows a local on their bike.
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Sheltering from the rain.
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Careful leaving camp as there were many thorns. Have “goat heads” in Tanzania too. Cycled through Katesh and mostly downhill for the first 10km. After this a big hill that was slow to climb but at the top some great views of overall countryside. We could see back to Katesh and the mountain behind it. Photos below show Francine, Omar and Chris as they came past.

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Fields of sunflowers and corn. Once on the ridge, we had mixture of descent and ascent with good views throughout. We came past half a dozen villages and locals were friendly but not too pushy. It was great ride to lunch at 69km.

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After lunch some more rolling hills and a roundabout at 77km. We gradually came to the larger town of Singida with a big descent at 86km and then some roads that kept us from going right through middle of the city. It got a bit warm and had one coke stop before leaving the city.
By 100km I was back to rolling hills and larger road heading south out of town. We came past some very interesting rock formations and then last few km before finding our way to camp. In the evening we had rain showers come through. Tomorrow we start off road, so will see how much rain we get there.
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Today we cycled 25km before starting the race. The road started climbing even before and was surprised at how much climbing compard with previous day. I came to time trial started after most had started and took it fairly slow both up and down the hills. Just put in low gear and climb. By 40km, we reached top of the climbs and had some descents before finishing time trial at 50km.
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This area had many fields of sunflowers. It became overcast in afternoon but stayed dry.
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Most of our climbing had been in morning, so afternoon had fewer climbs or descents. Made a stop in a village at 75km and then cycled to camp at 95km. We were camped near a hotel with drinks and chance to celebrate St Patricks day. Some local riders also came up with photo scavenger challenge to see who could get particular photos. Four teams participated.
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Evening rider meeting with Ciaran explaining the ride ahead.
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Packed my belongings and set off early today. It was humid and overcast to start and looked like chance of rain. However, stayed dry all day and got warm in the afternoon. The first 7km were through busy Arusha including local speed bumps and traffic to watch but once we passed the airport we were back in countryside. There were some rolling hills but not much climbing overall today.

At 40km we came to construction zone and were fortunate to ride on the not yet completed road while other traffic was on construction roads. This worked well except for short stretch with new soft dirt that hadn’t yet been compacted. However, construction only for 14km and then normal road. Many safari vehicles came past. We could see Masai living in area and some tending of goats and cattle.
Lunch was at 79km following rougher road. Just past was village with the market seen below and turnoff that much of the traffic left us to Ngorogogo. Nice to recognize the area.

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After this the we had some tailwinds and mostly flat roads, though warmer temperatures. At 102km passed Tarangire turnoff (been there too!) and coke stop. The last 43km weren’t too bad and made it to camp in mid-afternoon. There were many locals here to watch the bike shop and our other moves at camp.
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