A Cycling Adventure Through Africa - Daragh Cronin - and an update from Olly Hargreaves

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SPEAKER_00 0:00

Hello everyone, Bella Malloy here, host of Seek Travel Ride, and welcome to another midweek mini episode where I aim to fuel your stoke and fire and wonderlust for bike travel. This week I've actually got a couple of stories to share with you from listeners of the show. One of them, an Irishman, Dara Cronin, who is currently on an epic adventure down through West Africa. And Dara's gonna update us on what it's actually like riding on a day of his trip through Nigeria. And later in the show, I've got a few audio updates from our intrepid traveller, Olly Hargreaves. Ollie has Olly is about a month into his adventure now. He set off from Derbyshire up in the UK and he's headed for Thailand, and he agreed that he would update us along the way with how his journey has gone so far. I am looking forward to sharing with you what it's been like for Olly on the road, and he's sharing updates that will take us all the way up to the end of his time in Germany. But first, let's listen to what Darek Cronin has to tell us about cycling in Nigeria. Take it away, Dara.

SPEAKER_01 1:16

Hey, how's it going? My name is Darr Cronin, and I'm a 22-year-old Irishman from Cork in Ireland. And uh yeah, I just bought a bicycle on a whim. I had dreamt of doing a crazy trip like this. I've been lucky to travel the world for about two years now, but I wanted to do a trip that really changed my life, and I wanted to do in a way that would catch me like mentally and physically. And yeah, I had landed on this, and here I am now. Sorry, six months later since buying the bike with zero experience. Here I am now in Nigeria, over halfway into my journey down the length of Africa. Yeah, typical day in my life. Most days are pretty crazy, but so I'm currently in Nigeria trying to cycle all the way to South Africa. Nigeria is a country that I contemplated flying over, but mentally I just couldn't do that to myself. I wouldn't be able to sleep for the next 40 years if I took the easy option and flew out. So after a lot of thinking, I decided to keep going and yeah, cycle into Nigeria, and I've had no regrets so far. But Nigeria has definitely been an extremely top country mentally and physically. Yeah, with Nigeria it just brings a whole different level of challenges. One of which is like we can't wild camp, which is what I've been doing since I started my trip. So that was a big change. But a typical day in the life would start about 6 a.m. Yeah, I'd get a really good feed into me, really good breakfast. Once breakfast is done, I'm taking the married on as well to hopefully prevent malaria. That's the last thing I want to catch. So I get a good breakfast into me, do my malaria medication and pack up my gear. There's no packing up of the tent while I'm in Nigeria because yeah, it's just not safe to wild camp. So yeah, pack up the gear and check out of the hotel like every morning, load up the bike, pack up my whole life onto the thing, and yeah, get tires to terma just after the sunrise, just to try and maximize the amount of daylight we have because we don't want to be cycling late into the evening or anything. So yeah, we're on the road for sunrise. I'm currently cycling in a group through Nigeria and so safety and numbers, and yeah, just more people helps with safety and everything, and just makes the life a lot easier in Nigeria. So I'm cycling in the group. So we usually get on the road just after sunrise and get tires to teramak. We usually try to put up about 20 to 30 kilometers and then take a break, and so I repeat that throughout the day. But yeah, a typical day in the life, like tires to teramak after sunrise, smash out about 30 kilometers of cycle room, and then find a somewhat quiet spot for lunch, which is easier said than done in Nigeria. Every single person that sees us is interested in what we're doing. And Nigerian people they're extremely outgoing, so every single time we stop for a break, usually we're mentally drained, and the last thing we want to do is have these typical conversations that we have with most locals, just explaining what we're doing and stuff. So try to find a quiet place for lunch and get a bite to eat. And we do that every 30 kilometers or so, depending on how we're feeling, and depending on how the terrain is. But yeah, so 30 kilometers in, take a break, get a little bit of food into us, and then yeah, continue that throughout the day. It's crazy in Nigeria. We're passing through these crazy landscapes, and we're following the motorway, taking the southern route closest to the coast that you can take. It's meant to be the most dangerous route of the trip or in most dangerous route in Nigeria, except for like there's definitely safer routes you can be doing than the one we're doing, but for my whole time in Nigeria we've had zero issues. There's a massive police and military presence where we are, so we're cruising through these huge amounts of checkpoints daily with these big guys with even bigger guns, which is crazy to see. It's the same every day in early. We just cruise 30 kilometers, take a break, 30 kilometers, break. And then yeah, I'm trying to do about 120 kilometers between 100 and 120 kilometers a day, depending on how we're feeding and like what the weather's saying. Because coming into rainy season now, that has changed our daily life a huge amount because trying to avoid the rain and stuff is proving to be a big challenge. And yeah, rain just changes everything. And rain in Africa, especially, is r like rain nowhere else in the world. When it rains here, it rains real heavy, which is not punt cycling, and definitely not say yeah, we kick away all day, do about 120 kilometers. It's been a lot easier to cycling in Nigeria than I expected, but mentally it's very draining. It's tough on the mine in this country, but it's beautiful all the same. Like it's a beautiful, beautiful place to cycle to yeah. Once a day cycling is done, we usually go from big city to big city and avoid camping in like a rural area just for adding safety. Arrive into our city then that following evening and they find ourselves a cheap hotel and settle in for leaving. Make a plan for what's coming the following day, set out our route and how we're gonna go about today, and yeah, just get well fed, showered, and take it easy. It's a nice change of scenery, have to stay in the hotels after months of whale camping. Means we got power, electricity, and showers, which is just a game changer. Yeah. Take it easy for the day then and yeah, Shetlin. Beautiful.

SPEAKER_00 6:50

Thank you so much, Dara, and wow, what an epic adventure you are actually on. I know that the word epic can be overused, but I think in your case it's definitely well deserved. And I'm excited for what's coming up for you as you continue to make your way down the African continent. You also mentioned there, Dara, how you were teaming up with some other bike travelers for this section of your journey as well. And I hope, as has happened with many of my other guests, that that means that you've also made some fast friendships on the road, people to share experiences with and swap memories with in the years to come when you reflect back on the adventure that you're taking right now. Lastly, the other thing that I especially liked was just the mindset that you are all taking on the road of just breaking the day down into sections. Just do a few kilometers here, have a break, have some food, get on the bike, do a few more kilometers, break again, have some more food, repeat until you eventually set up camp or find your accommodation for the night as well. Breaking days down into those little doable segments mentally just takes a bit of a burden off your shoulders on the monumental journey that you are traveling on and the distances that you will be covering as you continue heading down through Africa. Now, listeners, keep your eyes peeled in the future for a full-length future episode to come with Dara. I absolutely cannot wait to share his full adventure with you. And Dara, I can't wait to ask you questions and hear some amazing and incredible stories, which I'm no doubt you will be sharing with us as well. Listeners, I have provided a link to Dara's Instagram account in the podcast description. So if you're heading to your podcast player app, click on the episode description page and you'll be able to find Dara there on the socials and follow his journey along as well. Dara, I wish you a safe onward journey as you continue on through Africa. Now, listeners, it's time to reconnect with Intrepid Adventurer Olly Hargreaves. I've had the absolute pleasure of featuring Olly's dad Phil and younger brother Jamie on the podcast before, and Ollie has just started his own amazing and incredible bike journey, and we are tracking his adventure from the UK to Thailand. These are the first audio updates that Olly has provided for us since he set off from the UK. So let's listen to what he's been up to and what life on the road has been like. Take it away, Olly.

SPEAKER_02 9:26

Hey Bella, it's Olly. It's exactly one week since I set off. Well to the day at least. Just got into France, so the trip has properly begun, I think, you might say. I'm currently shacked up in my tent just west of Dunkirk. I realised I probably should have got the ferry actually to Dunkirk instead of Dover to Calais because my route down has taken me all the way back up to Dunkirk anyway. So we live and learn. But yeah, uh, it's been a good week of riding. Had a rest day and sorted some bits out in Brighton. Seeing a lot of friends down through the UK, which has been really nice to catch up with a lot of people feeling good about the trip. Hey Bella, just wanted to send over a few more updates. Coming down through the UK was really, really nice. Um, didn't really feel like the trip had started, to be perfectly honest, seeing as I was stopping with all my friends on the way. You know, it was really nice to catch up a lot of people that I'd not seen in quite a long time, which was nice, it wasn't just you know my usual friends that I hang out with, those people that were kind of located all over the UK that I'd seen. So I only actually camped two nights, and one of them I actually sheltered in the same spot that my brother did in a bird box just kind of west of Dover, and then managed to get the ferry across to when I last sent you the message. The first week of Europe was really nice. It was really, really sunny, and you know, caught the sun quite a lot to be fair. I tried to kind of hide in the shade a little bit, but I did end up getting a little bit burnt. But yeah, travelling through kind of I only spent a day in France and then went kind of straight into Belgium and had a look along all the war memorials for World War II and World War I. So like the Khaki Chums monument, which was the football match that they played in 1914, I think it was, for the Christmas truce. And there were some you know quite harrowing events that happened, so it was really nice to see the structures that have been put in place to create a memory of those events. Another thing I'd say was in Belgium, because I couldn't really find much water around, I was kind of knocking on doors and you know, asking for a bit of water, and the hospitality of all the people that I met along the way was so nice. I knocked on one door and well, I I'd found a tap outside and started trying to fill my bottle up. And she came out and said, Oh no, no, it's it's rainwater, but come in and you can fill it up from the tap. And then she, you know, she was like, Oh, do you want anything else? Like, here, have a coke and stuff, and you know, it was really, really nice about it. And a couple of days later, I I did the same thing, knocked on someone's house, and you know, I was like, Oh, I'm really sorry. Like, do you have any water? And he didn't really speak much English, but you know, he was like, Oh, yeah, yeah, hold on one sec. He had a little dog with him, so he was trying to make sure it didn't run out. And yeah, went back inside and came out with all these two-litre bottles of like Vittel water, and rather than it just being from the tap, I was like, you know, tap water's fine, but he insisted. I mean, he was like, Oh, do you need anything else? And then came out with all this chocolate and goodies for me, and you know, was really happy to have been able to help me, which is really, really nice. I think I think in the UK, I'm I'm sure you do get it if you know if you try, but I I feel like over here it was it was a bit nicer, you know. And I feel like in the UK, if you tried that, people would be like, no, why like why are you knocking on our on my door? Uh but yeah, so coming through Belgium was really nice. And yeah, that's when I think the trip kind of felt like it had actually started, was when I hit Europe, where it meant no more familiar faces and proper going for it and kind of being on your own and on the adventure. Then I headed down from Belgium into Luxembourg, which was arguably a little bit out of my way, but I quite wanted to see Luxembourg. I'd heard some good things, and you know the riding was quite nice. The last day in Belgium was quite hilly, which was the most amount of hills that I'd had since the Peat District, literally the day that I set off. But then coming into Luxembourg, it was quite flat again. So, yeah, headed into Luxembourg, and then from there went to the city, had a bit of a look around, and then there wasn't a massive amount to see in the actual city, like the sites were really cool, but the actual city itself was just a lot of shopping, like you know, like Geneva, where you've got all these luxury brands and Rolex and or Mars Pigway and all these expensive watch shops and and things like that. Then coming out of Luxembourg, I actually I bumped into another person, and he was just like filling up his car with stuff, and he spotted the English flag, I think, on my bike and kind of waved me down and said, like, oh where are you gonna like spoke perfect English? He was like, Oh, like where are you heading to? and got talking to. And he'd done loads of travelling as well, and like and cycle toured and all this kind of stuff, and got talking to him, and he was really, really friendly, offered me a bit of help, and and then kind of talked to me about like couch surfing and whether I was interested in in doing that. And I said that I'd I'd definitely have a look at it. I thought maybe he'd offer me a place, but he didn't in the end. But it was really nice to talk to him. I think he was really busy, but then yeah, kind of headed up and spent so long looking for a campsite. I actually ended up in Germany, so I'd I travelled quite far that day. I think it was like 140k or something, it was quite long. Coming into Germany, the first couple of days were really, really nice. Say coming up from Luxembourg, I actually again went out of my way and headed up the river Moselle because I'd spoken to Dad and obviously he'd had the photo on the Rhine, and he said that the Rhine was really nice to cycle down. So I kind of made my way up the River Mosul, which I have to say was probably the nicest day that I've had so far. It was really nice to cycle along, it was really flat, it was very busy with other people cycling, but it's you know not necessarily a bad thing. But the views were incredible, it was really pretty, and there was loads and loads of history because it was the old Roman winestrasse, the wine tour where they used to make all the wine in the Roman times. So there was a lot of kind of stuff left over, which was made for a really interesting day, really. And then I kind of say headed over and had another really big hill that took me over from the river Mosul down to the Rhine, where I cycled back down. Oh, where did I go? Uh Mannheim. Sorry. I I cycled all the way down the Rhine to Mannheim. Along the way, got this photo where Dad had got his photo in 1984, and then I headed down and again had like a really long day, and it turned out it was a German national holiday, like a bank holiday, on the Thursday, which really took me off guard because I was like, you know, it's a Thursday, there's not going to be any issues with me going to the shops and stuff. So I'd actually run out of food, and this kind of led into a bit of a butterfly effect of because I couldn't get any food for dinner, I had to look for somewhere to eat. And because it was a national bank holiday, these German guys who had been off for the day had been off hiking and stuff and gone out for a meal later. And it just happened that we ended up at the same restaurant, and I sat next to them, and they kind of, you know, they saw my bike and overheard me talking to the the waiter, and we kind of got talking and and they'd done like a bit of bike packing as well. And anyway, like we kind of said our goodbyes, and about five minutes later, they popped back in and said, Oh, like we'd love to offer you a place to stay if you need it. To which I was obviously like, absolutely, because I think I'd only got to the restaurant at seven o'clock at night, so it had been quite a long day, and I didn't really fancy going too much further, anyway. So that was in Heidelberg, and it's one of the most beautiful cities in Germany, apparently, and it to be fair, it really was. But yeah, so it's just another kind of example of just really kind human beings along the way, really. It was really nice. I kind of spent a bit of a chill time in the morning at theirs before setting off, and then went up to the castle and headed up back over to making my way over to Munich. And then the rain hit literally the day after I'd left, and every single day has been soaking. The first day was alright because it kind of rained till about two o'clock, and then sunshine came out and everything dried off, and it was great. The day after it kind of rained, and then it kind of stopped about four o'clock, but you know, it was still quite cold, and and then it kind of started raining as I pitched up again. And because of the rain and it not you know not being very pleasant, I there wasn't really much to see because you know, if you start looking up, you're starting water in your eyes, and you can't really see you much, so I didn't really see too much on those days. Like the views were still incredible when I was going through because I was just cycling through obviously Bavaria with really pretty like countryside and stuff. Um, but yeah, made my way over to Munich, and the morning of Munich was really, really quite bad because it was like blanket rain, really fine rain that just got everything soaked and it was like zero degrees. So it was the first time on the trip that I've been like, oh, this is actually horrible. But then I decided that I was gonna stay in a hostel anyway in Munich, so I'd only had like 35k from where I camped into Munich, so it wasn't too bad of a day. Um, got to Munich, kind of got to the hostel and sorted stuff out, and then baffed about getting errands and doing some shops, getting some gas because I'd ran out the night before, and then met some fellow travellers and kind of had shared a beer with them. And then from there yesterday I cycled over towards Salzburg in Austria, to which I'm about 50 kilometres from now. And because the tent was still soaked, I was so adamant on trying to find a bivy spot. And fortunately, I managed to come across a barn and I had absolutely no problems, and it's been a really nice night. Hung up the tent to dry, so I'm actually about to set off now. Yeah, I will be in Austria tomorrow, or well, today actually, later on.

SPEAKER_00 20:27

There we go, listeners. Some updates from Olly, and it sounds like he's having himself quite a time, and that the adventure is really starting to unfold for him, as he says, since he started in Europe, it has felt a bit more foreign, it's not quite the UK, and there's lots of new things for him to take in and see. Olli, it also sounds like you've already had some awesome encounters and received some beautiful hospitality from the kindness of strangers already. And listeners, even though bike travel takes you to some amazing places to see some huge vistas, stunning landscapes and cityscapes as well, it's these beautiful encounters with the strangers on the road that I think really enrich the bike travel experience so much. And Ollie, it sounds like this has been very much the case for you so far. I'm so sorry about the grim wet weather. In fact, if my mind serves me correctly, I feel like Jamie had some pretty miserable stormy wet weather travelling through similar areas there as well. So I guess uh I don't know, is it the Hargraves Family Curse? Or you just levelling up on the adventure yourself there as well. I'm glad that you have found yourselves some shelter in that barn to dry out the tent. And I cannot wait for your next updates to hear how this adventure is continuing to unfold for you. Now, listeners, you can follow Ollie along obviously with these periodic updates that I'll be providing for you, and I have also provided links in the episode description to Ollie's social media accounts as well. So that you can have a look at some of the videos and pictures behind this journey too. I'm sure that you will join me as I wish Ollie all the best as he continues to pedal his way to Thailand. Now, listeners, it's time for one of my favourite parts of these episodes, and that is to say a big heartfelt monumental thank you to you, my super fans, who have reached out and shown your appreciation by buying me some coffees. It goes a long way to supporting me to continue to make these podcast episodes for you as well. This week I am saying a big heartfelt thank you to Susie Alexander who says, I love listening to the podcast on long, boring drives, or even when I'm working without too much distraction. I'm a 67-year-old grandma and I did my first month-long trip last fall. I am addicted and I cannot wait to go again. Well, Susie, awesome! Oh my gosh, I love so much about this message, and the podcaster and adventure cyclist in me wants to hear more about that month-long trip that you took as well. I'd love to know where you went, how it was, what it was like there, and yeah, so get in touch with me and fill in the gaps, please. But also, thank you so so much for supporting me and the podcast. You are an absolute legend, and I hope that these episodes continue to stoke your fire for bike adventures and that there are more to come in your very near future. Thanks for supporting me and the podcast. Next, I have A Route Less Travelled, and you've said, Hi Bella, I love your podcast. You're the first person I virtually poured a coffee for, but you won't be the last. I have an entry into this year's TCR and I am downloading past editions of Seek Travel Ride to motivate me and elevate my journey. Thanks for all the terrific content and bringing such interesting guests into my world. Well, a route less travelled, can I just say good on you for signing up. You have a monumental adventure ahead of you with Transcontinental. You've only really got a few months left to go, so the countdown must be on. And I'm glad that you've been downloading some of the back catalogue to keep you company on what must be some very long training rides as you get yourself ready for your own adventure. Your support means I can continue putting these episodes out each and every week, and I really appreciate it. Keep in touch with me, I want to see your TCR journey unfold. And uh let's see, maybe there's a podcast episode for you and where we can share all about it to our listeners as well. Thanks for supporting me and the show. Now, listeners, if you want to do as Susie Alexander and a route less travelled have done, you too can buy me a virtual coffee. Simply head to buymeacoffee.com forward slash seek travel ride. Buy me a coffee and most importantly, let me know what is it you're loving about Seek Travel Ride and where is your next bike adventure going to take you. And until the next episode, I'm Bella Malloy. Thanks for listening.