NOT ALL WHO WANDER ARE LOST

Off-Road in Rwanda with Nils Laengner & Raphael Albrecht

By GripGrab Field Notes

March 16^th, 2021

There are many places on Earth you as a cyclist dream of riding your bike. Ask any rider and most people will list Italy, France, Spain, USA - the usual suspects - but for photographer Nils Laengner and fellow rider Raphael Albrecht the global cycling field is far wider. If not in full wide-screen Cinemascope.

Field Notes asked Nils Laengner to put some words to his recent journey with Raphael Albrecht through Rwanda. A trip that would take them way off the beaten path along the border of Uganda and Congo.

I had met Raphael in Morocco during the Atlas Mountain Race in 2020. He was participating in this beautiful race and I was there as a photographer. We both got along very well and stayed in touch, but only met once again. After a while, we both heard about the 'Race Around Rwanda’, which should take place in 2021. A self-supported bike packing race in the small East African country.

We both signed in for it. You might have guessed it already, I went to the Land of The Thousand Hills as a photographer and he was there to race. My longing for cycling gave me the idea of cycling together after the event. Raphael and I talked about how we experience those ultra races and what we thought about the evolution of bike packing. We both really enjoy to get to our limits, and beyond, in our respective different ways. But, we also both think that it is bizarre to travel so far to reduce ourselves to only a “we want to experience people and landscapes “. We thought, there must be more than just racing through the night, stopping for food and only focus on the way ahead of us. That’s why we stayed a little longer. Besides, we wanted to scout new routes. So we talked to some locals and planned a gravel route. In the end, we did 1.100km, 17.000 meters of positive climbing and less than 10% of tarmac.

We had it all, from beautiful reddish, fast-rolling gravel roads to technical single trails, volcanic rocks, and mud in all its texture.

As we had no intention to ride very fast and no idea what to expect on our route, we had the privilege to get in touch with the people on the road. We stopped a lot, sat down, and (at least tried to) talk to all the kids who followed us.

It was a special experience. We never rode alone, at least not for long. They spotted us from far away and gathered everyone around by yelling „Muzungu“, which means white men. Normally it was all fun, as we felt like some sort of superstars. But at certain moments, where we were exhausted, and this gathering of a whole village was a little too much for us.

On one of those exhausting days, we tumbled on our planned route. We wanted to complete 180km and way over 3000m of climbing. But the trails were so much tougher than expected.

On our route, we didn’t only meet people. We also explored this varied and beautiful country. On the eastern part of Rwanda we rode through the Akagera-National park.

In the north we rode along side the Ugandan and Congolese Boarder. We saw volcanoes and huge lakes. We had some river crossings and were stuck in knee deep mud. We found a forgotten trail through the Nyungwe rainforest and talked to heavily armed soldiers who protected the border against rebels from Burundi while changing our mud covered tires.

Raphael is an experienced ultra-distance cyclist, but I am not and that is why I was very thankful for the joint ride. I learned a lot from him and I really enjoyed his company.

He taught me not to worry too much. There were moments in which I thought: “Oh no, what if we can’t make it on time? What if I am too weak for this trip?” And Rapha was like: “Don’t worry, Nils. As long as we ride, we get closer to the finish line".